The second to worst worst thing that can happen to a civil society is civil war. The only thing worse than that is what Venezuela is living with right now, a dictatorship in which there is no hope of democratic change or equal justice. In Nicolas Maduro’s Venezuela his voice is the only one that matters. It has been that way since he took over as the hand-picked successor to communist blowhard Hugo Chavez in 2013.

Since then, opposition figures have tried everything to get a fair chance at defeating Maduro at the ballot box and at every turn they have been thwarted. Some were arrested and wound up in jail on trumped up charges. Others were simply told they weren’t allowed to run. The latest effort in this long series involves Maria Corina Machado, a candidate who supports free-markets instead of the black market socialist economy which has resulted in extreme inflation and more than 7 million Venezuelans fleeing the country to survive.

Machado is well liked and last October she was the overwhelming winner of a 10-candidate race to become the main opposition candidate in the next presidential election. There was just one problem. Nicolas Maduro’s government had announced prior to the opposition election that Machado was forbidden from holding office for 15 years. Why? That’s a question you ask in a country that isn’t a banana republic. In Venezuela the only answer is because President Maduro considers her a threat.

Today, Venezuela’s Supreme Court upheld the government order that Machado not be allowed to hold office for 15 years, meaning the opposition’s top candidate can’t run.

The court’s decision bars the opposition figure, María Corina Machado, from taking part in an election for 15 years, upholding the Venezuelan government’s decision to exclude Ms. Machado over what it claimed were financial irregularities that occurred when she was a national legislator…

In a post on the social media platform X, Ms. Machado said on Friday that Mr. Maduro and “his criminal system chose the worst path for them: fraudulent elections.” She added, “What is NOT ending is our fight to conquer democracy through free and fair elections.”

Maduro’s government agreed to new elections this year in exchange for sanctions relief but even when the agreements were signed the government made clear that putting Machado on the ballot was non-negotiable.

the agreements signed on Tuesday, during a ceremony on the Caribbean island of Barbados, were vague. While they included commitments to allow international election observers and access to the news media in 2024, there were few other concrete promises. Experts say it is unlikely that the United States will fully lift sanctions if Ms. Machado is not allowed to run.

“We are going toward the supreme objective of lifting the sanctions,” said Jorge Rodríguez, the president of Venezuela’s legislature, at the ceremony. But “if you received an administrative disqualification,” he added, “then you cannot be a candidate.”

In addition to ruling her off limits, Maduro’s goon squad has also been targeting her operations.

Ms. Machado said that her campaign headquarters had been vandalized and that three of her campaign officials had been arrested.

The United States on Tuesday said it was “deeply concerned” by arrest orders and detentions against at least 33 Venezuelans, including opposition members, journalists and former members of the military, according to a statement from the U.S. Embassy in Bogotá, Colombia.

“We call for the end of politically motivated harassment, including attacks upon opposition campaign offices and all efforts to stifle the democratic aspirations of the Venezuelan people through fear and intimidation,” the statement said.

And that brings me back to the point I opened with. One side of this fight is trying to play by the rules of a real democracy while the other side is playing Calvinball and making up the rules as it goes. At a certain point the opposition has to accept that there is no free and fair election in Venezuela so long as Maduro is in power. If the freedom loving people of Venezuela want their country to be a democracy again, they may have to put a violent end to the dictator who keeps democracy forever at arms length. Its a scary prospect though because I’m sure Maduro wouldn’t hesitate to turn the army against his own people if he thought his power were really in danger.