Did He or Didn't He?

The bad thing about the study of history is that an accurate picture of events often never emerges for a long time, well after it's too late for actual people whose lives may be destroyed or made substantially worse. It'll be a long time before we know exactly what happened with the 2004 recall referendum in Venezuela that kept Hugo Chavez in power, but this is certainly interesting and it lends some scientific rigor to the numerous anecdotal claims of an essentially stolen election. Of course this ought to be carefully weighed against counter evidence, but the nature of the Chavez regime and the world's historical experience with violently aggressive socialist movements ought to encourage us to pursue these claims and review this evidence very seriously.

Alas, by time we ever figure out what happened, Venezuelans will be vastly poorer and many may have their lives ruined or ended to extend and preserve Chavez's messianic socialist crusade. If indeed the 2004 referendum, and/or the recent election, was rigged, I will amend my view that Venezuelans deserve what they have unleashed, but that will hardly matter to Venezuelans whose nation has been stolen and who will have had to suffer.