Hugo Chavez, the President of Venezuela, has recently been riding a wave of reform based on his support from lower-income voters. Using money attained from Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, Chavez has established a government that is very popular with lower income Venezuelans. He’s popular because many of his policies such as reclaiming farmland for natives and allowing the lower class more rights, which are empowering the poor in Venezuela. These types of reforms have many Americans questioning democracy’s safety in what appears to be a country that is rapidly becoming more and more socialist.

On Sunday, Venezuela held elections that would have allowed significant changes to Venezuela’s Constitution. As Venezuela’s Constitution stands now, Chavez will not be able to run again for President after his term expires in 2012.

Chavez and many of his supporters wanted to change the laws to allow him to run continually for life, but from the initial results of the election, it appears the changes have been defeated. By a narrow margin of only 51 percent to 49 percent, voters in Venezuela refused Chavez’s reforms.

Many Americans were saying that Venezuela would become the next Cuba with an extremely socialist government and trade embargo if these changes were implemented to the constitution. On Monday, the White House sent a message to the people of Venezuela congratulating them on their “desire to live in freedom and democracy” after they collectively denied Chavez’s reforms. The U.S. Government’s stance on this issue is if Chavez were allowed to run as many times as he would like, he could become too powerful and harm democracy in Venezuela.

Whether our government is really trying to protect the voting rights in Venezuela is debatable, however, as even with the new reforms Chavez would still have to be elected for each new term. It’s more likely that our government’s support for democracy in Venezuela came down to a decision not to support socialism because it clashes with our ideas of capitalism and need for oil.

In fact, Chavez displayed a great amount of dignity in accepting the results of the elections. Even though his referendums were rejected, Chavez claimed acceptance and said that the results were good for democracy in Venezuela. His response was very admirable, and the Venezuelan people should be proud to have him as President.

The most interesting part of this entire story, however, is a majority of the voters against Chavez’s reforms were actually university students. Students celebrated in the streets of Caracas after campaigning and rallying together to reject the reforms of a man that many of them normally support. Many of these students feel Chavez’s reforms were too much, and they banned together to vote against the reforms. This is a prime example of why students in America need to pay attention to politics and make sure they understand and vote in elections. Had the students in Venezuela not gotten together to help defeat Chavez’s reforms, with the narrow margins, the outcome of the referendum would have been different. So I encourage everyone to become involved and know exactly what you stand for when it comes time to vote next year.

What will you do to defend democracy? E-mail [email protected] and tell us.