Haiti

Meet the new boss.  Same as the old boss.
Note that the UN came in and changed the method in which the votes were to be tallied in order to get the outcome they wanted.  I realize that they did it to avert a riot and possible violent rebellion, but color me nervous on how casually everyone agreed to do it.   Preval would have won a runoff election with ease, but the citizens there are to freaked out to realize it.  Someone was stirring them up to believe that an outright win was proof of corruption, probably Preval himself.

The end result might not be the worst thing imaginable.  Preval is one of three truly democratically elected presidents, and is still the only one to end his term (he was president from 1996 to2001) as a result of the natural expiration of his term.

Update:  Publius noted that the UN found hundreds of ballot boxes smashed in a garbage dump, filled with ballots marked for Preval.  So I guess the accusations of corruption are pretty well founded.  He continues:

My biggest problem is the trust put in the hands of the central election commission to tabulate the results without skewing them. These commissions are well-known to be biased and outright criminal — from Ukraine to Georgia to Venezuela. Yet, when Preval decided to challenge the vote counting process, it was ruled that the challenge would not go before the Supreme Court — obviously a much more honest venue — but instead before the very electoral commission that is being accused of fraud!

Let’s hope this works and that the people accept the result as the will of the electorate and settle down.