Some of the most sophisticated political analysts currently writing about Venezuela are defining Hugo Chavez's regime, either as a "procedural democracy" (Luis Vicente Leon, chief analyst at Datanalisis, a Venezuelan polling firm) or as a "hybrid regime" (Javier Corrales and Michael Penfold: "Dragon in the Tropics", Brookings Institution Press, 2011), but definitely not as a clear-cut dictatorship.
As a Venezuelan who has been closely living and watching our nightmare for the last 13 years and who has done his fair share of reading on what constitutes a democracy or a dictatorship, I find this tendency appalling.
Appalling? Yes. But hardly surprising. Thug rulers get a pass for their thuggery from progressives if the thug rulers share their hatred of America as we are.
As for the hybrid or procedural notions crap, it isn't a hybrid to have a thug ruler operating under the color of democracy by following the forms of voting and democracy. The "democracy" is just a facade to hide the true, ugly face of Hugo.
Hugo Chavez may be a buffoon and an inept dictator who is wrecking his economy, military, and society with his silly notions of how to run things, but he is a dictator with a growing list of real Venezuelan victims of both his malice and mistakes.
