Peter Krupa

Venezuela recently got smacked down pretty hard in its run for a two-year seat on the UN Security Council. Aside from one tie early on in the 41 rounds of voting, Venezuela stayed consistently behind Guatemala, and in the end could only muster an average of 80 votes.

This is sort of a big deal. Chavez spent a lot of political capital (and oil money) lobbying for this seat, and for the world to reject him so explicitly is quite a set-back. Add it to the other set-backs of this year and one can’t help but conclude that the Bolivarian Revolution is on the rocks as far as its international popularity.

Three more important events are left for this year. First, Nicaragua has presidential elections coming up on Nov. 5, in which it looks like Chavez buddy Daniel Ortega might finally pull out a win. (Some analyists, however, don’t think he’ll be able to screw things up as bad as he did last time.)

Second, Chavez is up for re-election in December, which he will win handily, because of a combination of shady dealings, genuine popularity, and incompetent opponents. Keep an eye out for violence after the elections - Rosales supporters will protest the loss, crying foul, and Chavez supporters, emboldened by the victory, will beat them about the head. It’s a typical Cuban tactic - sending a loyal, faceless mob to silence protestors - and given the preponderance of Cuban political advisors kicking around Venezuela these days, we shouldn’t be surprised at the emergence of such things once Chavez is comfortably in power for another six years.

Third, and speaking of Cuba, the deus ex machina this year could very well be the announcement of Castro’s death. I say “the announcement” because it’s a pretty good bet he’s already dead. No one’s seen him in months, and Raul is keeping a very tight lid on things. Chavez may want to make a move to cast himself as the savior of Cuba’s revolution, but Raul may not be too keen on that, which could be one of the reasons he’s holding back news of Castro’s death. But who knows? Revolutionary dick-swinging is just so hard to predict.

Anyway, that’s the run-down. Chavez will enter 2007 deep in the red (really, no pun intended). With the global - and even regional - stage slipping beyond his grasp, it will be interesting to see what he turns his ambition to next.