US POLITICS

Since 1998, when Hugo Chávez won the presidential elections of Venezuela, the relations between this country and United States have worsened. Hugo Chávez has been president of Venezuela for fourteen years and was reelected for another six years the past October. During this time, he has implemented many changes in order to establish the “Bolivarian Revolution” and has stressed his opposition to the United States and the imperialism of its regime. Therefore, the relations between this two countries has become more and more tense due to the comments and decisions that Chávez has made, for example, supporting Cuba and Iran, Known opponents of the United States. Consequently, Chávez has become a rival of the USA and some people have considered that Obama should intervene in Venezuela in order to remove him from power. Nevertheless, United States should not try to topple Hugo Chávez because it would disrespect a democratic decision, would violate Venezuela´s sovereignty and would affect the commercial and economic relations between the two countries.
According to Huntington, a country can be consider a democracy if “ its most powerful collective decision-makers are selected through fair, honest and periodic elections in which candidates clearly compete for votes and in which virtually all the adult population is eligible to vote”. Thus, Venezuela can be considered as a democratic country because it fulfills these requirements. To begin with, the country has periodic elections. The president is elected every six years; congressmen are elected every five years and governors, mayors and councilors every four years. Also, according to the National Electoral Council, the new electronic voting system is “100% fraud-proof”. Jimmy Carter, ex-president of the United States, described Venezuelan election system as “the best in the world,” and even “superior to that of the US”. Also, he declared that the system is “among the most heavily scrutinized” which “provides