A short note from Alek Boyd: Lopez as the king maker

I had a brief exchange with Alek Boyd about Leopoldo action, and asked him to put it as a guest post.  There it is.
-----------------------


Leopoldo Lopez: opposition king maker

It is encouraging to see fellow blogger Daniel keeping the new political actors of Venezuela honest. Our country suffers too much from caudillismo, and it is only independent and critical bloggers, whose lives don't depend on a paycheck from traditional media, the ones doing proper questioning these days. I like the fact that Daniel asked Leopoldo about internet and his new role within the opposition unity umbrella. As I wrote in the past, if he played his cards right, Leopoldo would become a king maker of sorts.

His decision of "anotarse a ganador" as we say, is the most elegant option for him, and, more importantly, for the opposition. The Capriles-Lopez duet should be a force to be reckoned with: on the one hand, the softly, let's-not-rub-any-chavista-feather approach of Capriles, coupled with Leopoldo's impressive ability to gather volunteers, from the grass roots up, would be, had Venezuela been a normal, functioning democracy, a winning ticket. The country not being a normal, functioning democracy, is a post for some other day though.

Nonetheless, while I send Kudos to Daniel on his interview, I would like to pat myself in the back by saying that Leopoldo played the only hand he could, under the circumstances, and indeed has become, as predicted, the king maker.

[OK, Alek went on heavy on the praise but it is so rare for Alek to praise anything..... Never mind that he predicted the endorsement of Leopoldo the first, in a way]