Terrific: Jimmy Carter wants to go help in Venezuela

Please, desist from your trip: You have absolutely no credibility in Venezuela. Here is why. Your last actions in Venezuela have had disastrous results for the democracy here. When these became obvious you remained strangely silent for years, and only suddenly you wake up again. I will summarize just three of them that would require from you the most sincere apology and attempts to make amends if we are ever to consider you seriously again. You promoted in 2003-2004 a discussion table so that we would go to a recall election. We should have never had to negotiate on that since it is a constitutional right. But your "negotiation" gave in fact the ability to the regime to manipulate the conditions for that right as it pleased, resulting not only in electoral fraud but also into the Tascon List which it is still in application today. I have yet to read an unambiguous stern condemnation of the Tascon List from your part. In case your forgot, the Tascon List was the list with the names of the millions that signed for a recall election and who since have been actively discriminated against by the regime. Also, the members of that table that you were supposed to protect have done poorly since, without a word of protection from you. In short, your lenience toward Chavez then was a nice stepping stone for the abuses that came later.

You called very early, too early, the result of the recall election of 2004 as fair. You always refused to look at the statistical evidence presented by many people that questioned the quality of the result. By doing so you gave an argument to Chavez supporters around the world that this was the "best" electoral system even though with time even the Carter Center has come to acknowledge some problems. Following this laxity we got an outright stealing of election in April 2013 that we are waiting, by the way, for the Carter Center to at least make a strong "exhortation". In short, your blind eye to early electoral violations have not only allowed for Chavez autocracy to consolidate but has allowed Venezuela to lose free and fair elections altogether.

Jimmy Carter has a long and illustrious history of “mediation” in disputed Venezuelan elections, dating back to 1998. In every case his mediation served to legitimize the electoral fraud of Venezuela’s Castroites and socialists. In fact the international legitimacy of Maduro’s fraudulent presidency owes much to Carter himself. “The voting part” of it was “free and fair,” declared Jimmy Carter after Maduro “won” the elections of April, 2013 shortly after Hugo’ Chavez death. “Venezuela probably has the most excellent voting system that I have ever known,” he concluded. Maybe if Jimmy Carter spent less time watching Wayne’s World and more time listening to the Venezuelan opposition he’d know that election was blatantly stolen by Maduro. Jimmy Carter’s relationship with Venezuela’s current colonial overlords may explain his solicitude for the welfare of the Maduro regime. To wit: “We greeted each other as old friends,” gushed Jimmy Carter regarding his most recent meeting with Fidel Castro in April 2011. “In 2002, we received him warmly,” reciprocated Fidel. “Now, I reiterated to him our respect and esteem.”

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