(CNN) -- Venezuela's authoritarian president Hugo Chavez is a villain out of a Batman movie: buffoonish and sinister in equal measure. Sunday's vote result powerfully exposes both sides of his clown-prince system of rule. Read more: Survivor and Venezuela's long-serving president For weeks before the vote, Chavez signaled a willingness to surrender power, should the result go against him. On Election Day itself, he gave the Venezuelan newspaper El Universal a quote indicating he foresaw the possibility of defeat. "Let's get ready to recognize the results, whatever they are," he said.. And yet just a few hours later, Venezuela's Election Agency showed Chavez winning massively, by nearly 10 percentage points. Is the result legitimate? That's hard to say. Venezuela has not invited any international election observers since 2006 and anomalies have been observed in past votes, especially the 2004 referendum to recall Chavez from the presidency
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David Frum: Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has won; his system of rule suspect, sinister
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He says Venezuela election fraud system evident in rigged media, vote-buying, police threat
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He says robberies and eavesdropping routine, economy in awful shape under Chavez
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Frum: Did Venezuelans really vote for this? Hard to say in a society like it
Election Day
Yet it should also be said: In Venezuela, the most important forms of vote fraud happen well before @placeholder.
Hugo Chavez
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Hugo Chavez
Chavez
Apart from campaign ads, however, the president himself can commandeer as much TV time as he wishes, although in the case of the long-winded @placeholder, such appearances may not be vote-winners.
Hugo Chavez
Chavez
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Hugo Chavez
Chavez
@placeholder does have a militant populist constituency, and it's not impossible that the final result does reflect what the voters actually did.
Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuelan
Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuelans
It is not elections alone that make a free society -- and a free society is what @placeholder long ago ceased to be.