Today there was an act at the National Assembly which is more worth notice for what it says about the country than the actual act. In short, the Assembly used its fake chavista majority to play a video that supposedly exposed the violence of the police of Chacao. Unfortunately within minutes the video was decried as been old, and that all the investigations on police brutality had already been solicited by the Mayor of Chacao 2 years ago and that if no one was yet on trial it was due to the inefficient judicial system upon which the said mayor, Emilio Gratero, has no influence whatsoever. In short: Chacao administration had done its job fully to whichever point it could go.
Normally in a civilized country the injured parties (Chacao and the people named in the affair some who happened to not work for Chacao) threaten to sue and the National Assembly issues an apology and fires whoemever sent them such a useless video. But this being Venezuela and these being the times where thugs rule, things do not work that way.
First, it was nothing less than Cilia Flores who showed that video and commented on it. The viciousness of that woman has already been highlighted often in this blog, as the leader of the "cachifas de Chavez" and the main promoter of the 2010 legislative coup. This time around she reinforced that impression because she played an outdated video linking it to the present situation and naming names that had nothing to do with the story of the video, that is including Capriles Radosnki, Miranda Governor, who happen "casually" to launch his name for the primaries today. It even included a crass attempt at linking Capriles with the chavista lore, in this case long gone Posada Carriles who was active when Capriles was a baby.
Second, immediately the "news" was played extensively in the state media. The wished for effect was that any reply from the injured party will lag enough that the vicious attack will have gone for long enough unchecked. It was a move that adds a new meaning to "character attacks". Considering that the rebuttal might never be mentioned in the state media, well, you see what I mean. Never minded that the speed at which chavista media picked up proves to you that there was a certain degree of preparation: only tsunamis can get reported any faster.
And third, considering the way things work with the judicial system in Venezuela, even if the prosecution knows it has no case it will keep inquiring, if anything to distract the innocent parties of their daily lives and political affairs. You need to remember that there are people today in exile from Venezuela who had to leave because of false accusations, false accusations that have been exposed and yet the judicial system has not bothered revoking the actions and those people still cannot come to Venezuela. I have named Patricia Poleo as the poster girl of that kind of fascistic harassment. To confirm this methodology the National Assembly has voted investigation on the case, while refusing to extend the same type of investigation tot he documented case of the Barinas Police YESTERDAY.
So, what can we make of this? Certainly the excessively flawed Cilia Flores at this point of her career will show anything even if she knows that it is untrue. To lie has become a normal habit for the higher up in the regime, the more so with vicious sycophantic semi idiots like Flores. But we would be wrong at stopping at some sort of personal vendetta for people like Flores: this is a deliberate strategy. Dirty political war has been developed considerably by chavismo and this new stepping up is truly worrying as there is still 18 months of electoral campaign left ahead. If you look to a poll released this week end by Consultores 21 who puts Chavez losing next Sunday, you certainly can imagine the nervousness of the chavista camp, even though that poll was taken before the latest populist measures of Chavez which certainly should improve his numbers.
Again I must repeat what I often wrote: the chavista regime is too corrupt to surrender power peacefully because they know that too many of them will have to face criminal charges. These people do not operate like normal democrats, even if truly pissed off. These people are thugs at heart and now they are becoming open thugs in action as the beating of Lorent Saleh yesterday reminded us, and as today Cilia Flores character assassination tells us how awful the campaign will be.
When a country starts accepting behavior like the one of Chavez recently and of his sycophants as today, we may worry as to whether is anything worth rescuing. When people like Cilia Flores are respected in certain quarters you must wonder about the country she operates in..... At least we can be happy that Grateron was not intimidated whatsoever and that his reply showed what must be done all time. Too bad he is not inside the MUD....