Dictator fetes ... dictator.

In a move that startled absolutely nobody, Venezuelan caudillo Hugo Chávez has bestowed Venezuela's highest honor, The Order of the Liberator, on dictator Aleksandr Lukashenko of Belarus.

The award, given for "meritorious service to Venezuela" was given to Europe's last dictator shortly after Chávez's own attempt to become president for life was narrowly thwarted at the polls. Undaunted by Lukashenko's rotten records on press and political freedoms, Chávez gushed that Lukashenko's Belarus is "a model social state, like the one we are trying to create [in Venezuela]". Venezuelans will doubtlessly be overjoyed to learn that Chávez views Belarus as a political and social role model, which removes those final doubts some Chávez opponents had about leaving the country forever before they're locked up as political prisoners.

Dictator week!

Voters in Venezuela say no to Hugo Chávez's bid to become president for life, fueling speculation if the one time military coupster will bypass the ballot box next time and simply go the more traditional route to seizing unlimited power.

On the other end of the spectrum, Pakistan's military strongman Pervez Musharraf has stepped down from his military position, hoping to hang on in what's sure to be an insanely rigged election in January. Trading on the political unpopularity of his opponents won't hurt, either.

And lest he think we've forgotten about him, Vladimir Putin has secured his efforts to keep running Russia behind the scenes after his term as president ends. Czarism, anyone?

And yes, I'm back! It's been a busy couple of weeks for me, but everything has settled down. 2008 promises to be every bit the golden age for dictators that 2007 has been, and DotW will be here to enjoy every second of it.

King Juan Carlos of Spain to Hugo Chávez: "Just shut up"

Someone forgot to tell Hugo that "fascist" is a real word with a real meaning in Spain, and who better to remind him than the king?

Chávez furious with Spanish pop star

Venezuelan caudillo Hugo Chávez has told Spanish pop star Alejandro Sanz, not in my house, motherfucker!

In 2004, Sanz told a reporter that he supported the recall referendum aimed at ousting Chávez, adding jokingly, "if that many people told me to quit singing, I would do so".

Fast forward to 2007, the Venezuelan government has canceled Sanz's appearance at a municipally owned and operated arena because of his three year old anti-Chávez comment. The Chavista Minister for Higher Education, Luis Acuna, blasted Sanz, saying:

If an artist comes to Venezuela to criticize Chávez and his movement, how do you think the people of this country would respond?

Judging by Sanz's immense popularity in Venezuela, the answer appears to be "just fine", but Luis Acuna went a step further by saying that from now on, the government will ban any event promoting "anti-educational" values from taking place in municipal venues. The sudden space freed up on the schedule can, and probably will be, filled by Chávez himself, who is fond of holding massive political rallies at the stadium.

Then again, Chávez's motivations may be somewhat more petty. While Sanz is a massively popular singer with a reputation as a ladies man, Chávez is short, squat, and has a face only Fidel Castro could love. And while Chávez has tried to branch out into a music career, for some reason, Sanz continues to outsell him, even in Venezuela. Perhaps Chávez would lighten up if someone would just buy his CD already?

Venezuelans reject glass Guevara gimmick

Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez is reportedly seeing red after ingrates demolished a pricey glass statue dedicated to the deader-than-a-doornail Ernesto "Che" Guevara.

A group describing itself as the "Patriotic Command of the Plateau" shot the glass statue six times, and thoughtfully left a note explaining their motive:

"We do not want a monument to Che, he is not an example for our children"

Considering for a moment that Che Guevara was an incompetent, bigoted terrorist, the protesters may be onto something with that sentiment. The real target, of course, is Chávez himself, and his endless love affair with all things relating to the Cuban revolution. Chávez has spent most of the month in Cuba, swooning over Che Guevara, and engaging in a romantic (if somewhat sickly) pas de deux with the zombielike remains of Fidel Castro. Chávez can't possibly be happy that one of his own ingrate peasants had the nerve to bring a token of his infatuation down to the ground in a sea of glass splinters, but that's the Venezuelan people getting all revolutionary on his ass, no?

Or perhaps it's simply a cry for attention? Hey, big spender, spend a little time with your electorate! With all the time Chávez has spent in Cuba during his rule, it's possible that the people just wanted to remind him which country he's actually president of! Either way, el caudillo hasn't seen fit to comment on the demolition of the Che memorial yet, but I'm sure there's a three hour televised rant on the subject coming soon.

Chávez y Fidel por siempre

Watching three plus hours of Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez's television call in show Aló, Presidente would bore men stronger and younger than ailing Cuban caudillo Fidel Castro to death. So you can imagine my surprise when the octogenarian recluse called in to Hugo's program to warble words of amor to the oil soaked political plutocrat who is almost single handedly financing the dying remnants of Castro's dictatorship.

Castro's call was prompted by an hour or so of Chávez singing hymns lionizing the deader-than-a-doornail Ernesto "Che" Guevara and the almost dead Fidel Castro. The Cuban dictator cooed words of loving encouragement to his pudgy protege, croaking "I am very touched when you sing about Che", prompting Chávez to excitedly squeal, "there is electricity in the air tonight!" Unfortunately, the standards of decorum were to slide even lower. Calling Fidel "the father of all revolutionaries", Hugo replaced God with Fidel Castro while riffing on the Lord's Prayer, a move that may ruffle some feathers in overwhelmingly Catholic Venezuela.

"Our father, who is in the water, earth and air ... you will never die. You remain forever on this continent and with these nations, and this revolution .... is more alive today than ever, and Fidel, you know it, we will take charge of continuing to fan the flame."

Even if Castro weren't already wearing a colostomy bag, it's uncertain that his mere mortal plumbing could remain unmoved by the avalanche of Chávez's affections. I think I may need to be excused for a moment myself.

Chávez set to jettison allies

When Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez described Cuban strongman Fidel Castro as his "mentor", he really wasn't kidding. Like Castro, and other communist dictators before him, Chávez has already begun to jettison the political allies that brought him to power and accused them being "counter-revolutionaries". The party in question is PODEMOS, a party which uncritically helped elevate Chávez to power in 1998. This is also the party that provided Chávez with crucial support for his efforts to pack the Venezuelan Supreme Court with Chávez's political cronies, issued threats against Chávez's political enemies, and in general, did anything the caudillo wanted them to do. Even better, they almost always anticipated his desires in advance. Well, that was then, and this is now, and as Janet Jackson once famously inquired, "what have you done for me lately?"

"If any of you has shame, this is the right time. You have time to join us sincerily and build the revolution. Stop talking nonsense, saying you are revolutionary"

- Hugo Chavez

So what terrible thing has PODEMOS done to transform them into dyed in the wool chavistas to treacherous counterrevolutionaries? PODEMOS leaders expressed reservations about Chávez's proposal to alter the Venezuelan constitution to allow himself to be re-elected in perpetuity. PODEMOS is not alone there, as the proposal is widely unpopular, even among voters who strongly support Chávez. So what gives?

Daniel astutely notes that this is part of the dictator dynamic. Now that Chávez has packed the legislature and the courts with his cronies, PODEMOS is no longer very important in maintaining his grip on power. What's more, one of the key personality traits of the authoritarian leader is the overweening desire to occupy the spotlight of attention. Not sometimes. Not most of the time. All the time. Any "ally" who attaches importance to themselves by virtue of boasting how close they are to Chávez is, by extension, taking some credit for his glorious tasks, and therefore, diminishes the volume of praise and attention that Chávez recognizes as his, and his alone.

Sorry, PODEMOS, you're 99.9% on board with the Chávez agenda, but for an autocrat, that's just not high enough. Enjoy your trip to counterrevolutionary limbo, PODEMOS, and count yourselves lucky that Chávez apparently hasn't gotten around to asking Castro how Cuba got rid of their "counterrevolutionaries".

Venezuela to women: "You gonna get RAPED!"

Just when you think Hugo Chávez's "Bolivarian Revolution" in Venezuela can't get any weirder, it does. Courtesy of The Devil's Excrement comes this public health billboard issued by the Chavista governor of Carabobo province. It breathlessly declares:

Inciting sex ... causes rape. Security is everyone's responsibility

Venezuela is not exactly famous for having a culture of sexual repression or modesty, so the sudden inference that wearing a bikini thong at the beach is an incitement to rape may come as a startling shock to Venezuelans. Then again, considering all the quality time Chávez has been spending with Iran's Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, one supposes it was only a matter of time before Venezuela starting exhorting their beach bunnies to start covering it all up.

UPDATE: The Chavistas continue to astound. The Caracas Chronicles shows the Venezuelan government of Carabobo's latest offering, which declares that political scandals cause terrorism. This is not so much a "public service advisory" as it is a veiled threat to journalists who might be inclined to print unfriendly news about corruption inside the Chávez regime.

So remember, if you notice ostentatious political corruption in Venezuela, do NOT make a big deal out of it. Or else.

Chávez to expel foreign critics from Venezuela

If you're visiting Venezuela any time soon, you'd best keep any observations about the autocratic rule of Hugo Chávez to yourself, or else expulsion from the country. On his television show Aló, Presidente, president Hugo Chávez vociferously promised to expel any visitor who might dare to publicly criticize either him or his cabinet. "No foreigner can come here to attack us!" the caudillo thundered, "anyone who does must be removed from the country!"

Chávez has long been sensitive to the "dictator" label (as we've seen before), and has not been shy about drying up criticisms of his regime at the source. Chávez's bluster appears related to comments made by a visiting Mexican politician attending a Venezuelan pro-democracy conference who made comments that Chávez's plans to eliminate presidential term limits were anti-democratic. A visibly fuming Chávez blasted back, saying:

"How long are we going to allow a person - from any country in the world - to come to our own house to say there's a dictatorship here, that the president is a tyrant, and nobody does anything about it? It CANNOT BE ALLOWED! It is a question of national dignity!"

- Hugo Chávez

Chávez apologists in Europe, the United States and Canada are finding it harder and harder to excuse Chávez's increasingly erratic, and autocratic behavior. Domestically, Chávez's political opponents are worrying that the expulsion order of foreign critics is a precursor to a fresh round of crackdowns on Venezuela's political opposition. The vow to expel foreign critics comes on the heels of Chávez's attempts to further concentrate political power in his own hands. The elimination of term limits is only set to apply to Chávez himself. Chávez is also set to attempt to further mold the rubber stamp National Assembly (who have already granted Chávez the power to rule by decree) in his own image, by gathering all of the currently pro-Chávez lawmakers into a single pro-Chávez party.

So there you have it. Chávez's rich Marxist friends from America are still welcome in Venezuela, but everyone else? Better keep your mouth shut. You have been put on notice.

UPDATE: I really wish he'd take that goddamned beret off that poor defenseless Amazon parrot.

Venezuela's brain drain

It's a safe bet that Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez hasn't given much thought to the concept of labor as capital. Oh sure, he's given some scant surface level attention to the Marxist concept of the labor theory of value, but it's hard to be certain he even understood what that meant. Well, unfortunately for Chávez, he's going to have to start giving the human capital idea some serious thought, because Venezuela is starting to feel the pinch of the nemesis of every developing economy, the dreaded brain drain.

For those unfamiliar with the term, brain drain describes the loss of skilled labor in a national economy; doctors, engineers, lawyers, and so on. Chávez, whose populist politics are built on pandering to Venezuela's lowest economic classes, has made a point to label Venezuela's formerly sizable middle and upper classes as "fascists" and "parasites". It's been no secret that the middle and upper classes in Venezuela have been hostile to Chávez's use of Cuban style class struggle rhetoric, and have turned against him at the polls and in the streets. Nearly 3.4 million people, many of them from the middle and upper classes, were signatories to a petition in 2004 for a referendum to recall Chávez.

While the recall referendum failed to oust Chávez, the petition remained. Never failing to seize on a way to screw his enemies, Chávez demanded that the Venezuelan government get their hands on the petition signatures. Chávista parliamentarian, deputy Luis Tascón, did just this, publishing 2.4 million names and ID card numbers on the internet. This list, now known as the "Tascón list" suddenly provided the Chávez government with the personal information of millions of political opponents, and predictably, Chávez moved to get even.

Once the list was online, Chávez appeared on television to provide the URL of the list, and exhorted his supporters to go online to examine it. Within days, thousands of the signatories found themselves losing their jobs, both in the public and private sectors. Some signatories from the Venezuelan armed forces found themselves suddenly demoted, while others found their contracts with the Venezuelan government mysteriously revoked without explanation. The message was crystal clear: oppose Chávez, and you just might find yourself out of a job.

Between the Tascón List and Chávez's infatuation with painting the middle classes as fascist parasites, Venezuela's educated professional classes found themselves doing something they'd never imagined doing before: leaving Venezuela. The numbers of people leaving, which had started as a trickle, is now turning into a torrent. A number estimated at more than 150,000 mostly middle class Venezuelans have fled to the United States alone, with many more applying for visas at the American embassy in Caracas, with hundreds of thousands of others reportedly heading to Europe, Canada and Brazil. The attitude of the Chávez government appears to be along the lines of "good riddance to bad rubbish", but there's certainly cause for concern. Not all of the same people who are fleeing Venezuela are idle plutocrats. Most of them are the trained professional specialists that a nation relies on to function, like the aforementioned doctors and engineers. So what is Venezuela doing to stop the brain drain?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. It seems that Chávez is content to let malcontents leave, reasoning that one less political opponent equates to one less vote against him the next time he runs for office. The thought that the loss of the people who run his hospitals, power plants, law firms and the like, not to mention the loss of an ever increasing chunk of his tax base, might be a disaster doesn't appear to have crossed his mind. The thought that so many of his skilled professionals are going to the United States, home of his sworn enemy George W. Bush doesn't appear to have occurred to him either. Apparently, he suffers from a classic delusion that when enough force is applied, a political enemy will be converted into an ally when he or she gets tired of fighting the system. The answer, incidentally, appears to be a resounding "no". They'll simply pack up and leave, taking as much of their money and all of their skills with them.

Some Venezuelans have voiced concerns about the possibility of Chávez restricting travel from Venezuela along the lines of Fidel Castro's Cuba, but for the time being, the Chávez government appears content to use emigration as a political steam release valve. Will Chávez crack down on professionals leaving once the effects of brain drain become too severe to ignore? We probably won't know for a few more years yet, but in the meantime, Miami welcomes the cream of the Venezuelan crop. Chávez's brain drain is proving to be America's gain.

Is Chávez cracking down on journalists?

Roger Santodomingo, the editor of the Venezuelan web site Noticiero Digital, resigned last week in the face of increasing threats from supporters of autocrat Hugo Chávez. Santodomingo received a letter that had been circulating at his son's school which called him a "traitor", and began receiving voicemails that suggest that his son would be run over while walking home from school. The cherry on the sundae occurred yesterday when his car was set ablaze while it was parked outside his home.

Chávez has been working hard to stifle media opposition to his "Bolivarian revolution", but the targeting of Santodomingo marks a new low in Venezuela's rapidly diminishing press freedoms. Just as when a Chavista mob attacked the offices of the (now closed) RCTV, Chávez could wash his hands of it and blame overzealous supporters. However, Chávez cannot wash his hands either of the incendiary anti-opposition press rhetoric that inspires his followers to use violence, much less forget that power in Venezuela is from the top down. If Chávez doesn't issue a statement calling on his party's regional leaders to stop, or even condemn, the violence, the attacks on journalists will continue. Granted, the Mercedes Marxists in America and Europe are embarrassed by Chávez's institution of Cuban style repression of journalists. A law passed in 2005 threatens journalists with legal action for "insulting" public officials, and while it had used mostly as a threat to journalists unfriendly to Chávez, the government has gone on the offensive with a spate of prosecutions.

Is anyone starting to realize why Hugo gets along so famously with Robert Mugabe and Alexsandr Lukashenko?

UPDATE: Welcome readers of The Beak Speaks!

Chávez and Lukashenko indignant over "dictator" label

Happy belated Canada Day! While our neighbors to the north were off doing the barbecues and beer thing, Venezuelan caudillo Hugo Chávez was putting the finishing touches on a trip to Minsk, Belarus to hobnob with Europe's last dictator, Aleksandr Lukashenko. After pledging "mutual cooperation" in trade, military affairs (?!) and scientific research, both caudillo and commissar sniffed indignantly about their rotten images abroad. Chávez in particular was indignant, huffing the following:

"We have many obstacles and opponents, above all this empire that calls us dictators."

This is a moment of irony so absolutely perfect, that I can't even bear to ruin it with a sarcastic comment.

The mouse that roars

Shortly after returning from a $3 billion dollar arms shopping spree in Russia, Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez told his armed forces to get ready to fight a guerrilla war against the United States. And what's his evidence that Washington is preparing to invade Venezuela? Why, the fact that students in Venezuela had the temerity to protest the shutdown of RCTV, of course. Who else but dirty dealing Yanqui imperialist capitalist swine could turn the revolutionary people against their caudillo?

Sure, Hugo Chávez may be out of his mind, but he's certainly putting his petrodollars where his paranoia is. In the past year, Chávez has gone on an arms acquisition binge the likes of which South America has never seen - not even when Argentina, Chile and Brazil were ruled by military dictators. The Russians are particularly eager to sell Chávez 9 hopelessly obsolete diesel powered submarines to stem the Yanqui tide of Ohio class nuclear submarines. While Chávez's attempts to build a modern navy from submarines that were outdated before Leonid Brezhnev even took office, such a purchase would, unbelievably, give Venezuela the largest submarine fleet in all of South America.

The real irony here, of course, is that the United States has no intention of invading Venezuela, and has no real need to. The United States is perfectly comfortable buying Venezuelan oil, which provides Chávez with the cash he needs to spend Venezuela into the poorhouse. The more oil the United States buys, the more hard currency Chávez throws down the drain, and the less valuable the Bolivar Fuerte becomes. The United States would, doubtlessly, not shed any tears if Hugo Chávez were to disappear, but unless Chávez is looking to build nuclear weapons, Washington considers him to be nothing more than a vulgar pipsqueak whose belligerent rhetoric can't keep up with his laughable ambitions and pitiful arsenal. The status quo is, ironically, exactly to Washington's tastes, especially since Chávez's self-inflicted out of control inflation can be just as hazardous to a dictator as any military invasion.

Chávez on dictatorship: "Who, me?"

This week has seen an overload of authoritarian irony. First, Russian President Vladimir Putin said, with a completely straight face, that he was the only "absolute and pure democrat" in the entire world, right before somewhat obscenely comparing himself to Mohandas Gandhi. Someone always has to try and one up the last guy in these sorts of contests, and Venezuelan caudillo Hugo Chávez has accepted the challenge. Breezily denying that he's become a dictator, Chávez hinted that it would be easy for people to make that mistake because, well, there's a yanqui imperialist plot to depose him. Apparently, Chávez "sounded hurt" by the allegation that his regime has taken steps to obliterate political free speech in Venezuela, and did not, apparently, acknowledge the massive street protests that took place after he replaced Venezuela's oldest television network with a government propaganda channel.

In another bizarre bit of news about Chávez, Hugo's naked cock worship of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro shows no signs of slowing down. Following Fidel's recent Cuban television appearance, Hugo applauded the return of his idol, but apparently he's tired of Fidel's newfound penchant for Adidas tracksuits. Instead, Hugo wants Fidel to resume wearing his military fatigues. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to create their own Freudian postulate on why Hugo's so desperate to see Fidel don his classic authority figure outfit again. Daddy issues, anyone?

Chávez defeats RCTV

Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez made good on his threat to shut down his nation's oldest television network on Sunday night, replacing RCTV with a government operated mouthpiece station. Thousands of Venezuelans took to the street, and predictably, they were dispersed with tear gas, plastic bullets and water cannons. Eroding civil liberties are, apparently, much more noticeable when Chávez's yammering mug replaces your favorite telenovela.

At any rate, it didn't take long for Chávez to announce his intentions to target the remaining television outlets he views as hostile to his "Bolivarian revolution", accusing the Globovision network of airing a veiled assassination threat. Globovision was, perhaps predictably, attacked by Chavista thugs as "retaliation" for assaulting the dignity of the President. The shutdown of RCTV sends a message to Venezuela's remaining independent press that unless they start toeing the Chavista line, they're next in line to be shut down.

Western leftists, predictably, ignore the fact that Chávez is systematically eliminating his potential political threats because (as Quico from the Caracas Chronicles put it), Chávez is stroking their ideological erogenous zones. They're creaming their jeans over the decision, calling RCTV a complicit partner in the anti-Chávez coup attempt in 2002. Perhaps they'd forgotten (or rather, ignored) that Chávez himself attempted a coup d'etat in 1992? They're squirming, but when push comes to shove, they can't ignore the fact that Chávez has become a dictator who rules by decree, squashes the free press, and is poised to turn Venezuela into nothing more than a squalid OPEC aligned Cuba. On the other hand, they've never had anything bad to say about any dictatorship that offers free health care, so I suppose they've got that going for them.

UPDATE: Publius Pundit has pictures galore of all hell breaking loose in Caracas.

UPDATE II: Now CNN has incurred the wrath of the caudillo!

Who's hot? Who's not?

HOT: Hugo Chávez (Venezuela)

Caracas caudillo Hugo Chávez is licking his lips at his impending victory over his hated enemy, Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) on May 27th. Yeah, the proles are protesting because they love their telenovelas, and they certainly aren't particularly fond of watching pro-Chávez propaganda on every television channel. So what? Are any of them ruling Venezuela? No? I thought not. Let them eat cadenas!

The tighter Hugo squeezes his subjects, the more the foreign left swoons in approval. He's on a winning streak with no end in sight.


Not Hot: Pervez Musharraf (Pakistan)

It's hard not to feel bad for the poor general, because I never seem to have any good news about him. Which is fair, because frankly, nothing has gone right for Pervez Musharraf for the past few years now. In fact, this entire Hot or Not? segment leads us all to experience some serious deja vu.

What's the latest in bad news for Pakistan's brasshat dictator? How about a wildly successful public speaking tour by his one of his most devoted political enemies, a Supreme Court judge he himself removed from the bench, and a Taliban presence in his own country that he cannot control, no matter how hard he tries? Why even today, even his allies in Britain are getting snarky with him.

How bad is it, really? Even Indian newspaper columnists are starting to feel sorry for him, and everyone agrees he's a goner. The biggest question remaining is: how long can he hold on? He's never been the type to rule with an iron fist, and when push comes to shove, he'll go careening into the dustbin of deposed Pakistani dictators.

¡Socialismo hasta muerte!

Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez held a press conference yesterday to announce that elderly Cuban dictator Fidel Castro is "in charge" once again after nearly 10 months out of power following botched intestinal surgery. Chávez went on to quote his sycophantic Bolivian counterpart Evo Morales by saying that Castro will be present in Havana for Cuba's unintentionally retro-kitsch Soviet style May Day parade.

There has been no apparent comment yet from Fidel's younger (but still elderly) brother Raúl, who assumed Fidel's title and duties when the caudillo went under the knife in July. If you think Raúl is disappointed, imagine how Cuban dissidents and journalists feel about the end of Raúl's modest experiments with liberalization.

Before his hospitalization, Fidel had moved past late North Korean tyrant Kim Il-Sung for the title of the 20th century's longest reigning leader with 47 years in power. While Fidel does not appear to be dying of cancer, he is 80 years old, which is fairly old even by communist dictator standards. Will there be a backlash by Castro? A backlash against Castro? Will Fidel attempt to pretend this interregnum never even occurred? It's all too soon to say, but if Fidel really is back, we can all look forward to rich western Marxists creaming their jeans in delight at Cuba's extended date with repression and poverty.

Chávez caption contest

For cheap laughs, don't miss this entertaining caption contest over at The Devil's Excrement, a great anti-Chávez blog inexplicably smack dab in the left-of-crazy Salon.com. Here's the three
photos in sequence along with my submission:





"No, fuck YOU, Lula."










"Go on, Hugo. Pull my finger."








"Jesus, I surrender."

Journalists' union endorses war on press

I'm not sure if I should chalk this up to Great Britain's vastly overinflated reputation for dry and ironic humor - I certainly hope so.

Great Britain and Ireland's leading journalists' trade union, the National Union of Journalists, passed a "near unanimous" vote to "build solidarity" with Hugo Chávez's "Bolivarian revolution" at their 2007 annual conference in Birmingham. The irony, of course, is that Chávez is one of the hemisphere's greatest opponents of press freedom - an issue that the NUJ pays token lip service to on their website.

Chávez has declared war on the Venezuelan press, and passed draconian laws restricting press freedom to aid him in his struggle with newspapers and television networks deemed unfriendly to his regime. Venezuelan journalists have been thrown in jail and even beaten, leading one to wonder what sort of press climate it would take for the NUJ to distance itself from the "revolution" that has made this treatment of reporters possible. A cynic might observe that this is another case of rich westerners sympathizing with an authoritarian regime that they wouldn't put up with at home. There's always been a tendency in the Western leftist lunatic fringe to sympathize with repression, as long as the ostensible goals of the tyrant in question are judged to be romantic enough to suit their tastes.

Which leads me to ask: was Malcolm Caldwell a member of the National Union of Journalists?

Castro and Chávez lash out at ethanol

Once upon a time, a certain autocrat of an oil rich country decided to team up with his geriatric Marxist paramour to create a partnership for the production of a trendy biofuel we in the United States like to call ethanol.

In 2005, Hugo Chávez directed the Venezuelan state oil company to strike a deal with the Brazilian state oil company Petrobras to import ethanol to Venezuela. At the same time, Chávez ordered that 700,000 acres of land be set aside to grow sugar cane for the production of ethanol. Finally, as a hand out to his doddering Communist amigo, Chávez planned to let Cuba build 11 sugar processing plants as the final step in Venezuela's newfound commitment to ethanol production industry. After all, enthused Chávez, ethanol is clean fuel! More money for the Bolivarian revolucion! And so on and so forth. Castro was delighted because Cuba is rich in sugar, and poor in fuel. Sugar to Venezuela means fuel coming back to Cuba. Everyone wins!

And then, it all went sour. And for a reason even a five year old would be embarrassed to admit. Jealousy.

You see, Chávez's hated archenemy, US president George W. Bush, visited Brazil, and struck up an ethanol partnership of his own with Brazilian president Luiz Inácio "Lula" da Silva. It makes sense, after all. The United States is the world's largest ethanol producer, while Brazil is the second largest. An ethanol partnership is not only logical, but frankly, inevitable.



One can logically presume that Hugo Chávez's face must have looked like he was choking on a rat sandwich when he saw this photo. What? Yanqui imperialists making their own ethanol side deals with Brazil? Unacceptable!

And so, Chávez did the only sensible thing a man in his position could do: throw a temper tantrum. Chávez performed an about face, and denounced ethanol as a "waste of space" that could be growing "food for the hungry" instead of "filling rich people's cars". A cynic would note that Venezuela's economy is completely dependent on producing oil to fill "rich people's cars", and that Chávez himself was going to clear 700,000 acres for growing sugar cane as a cash crop for ethanol, but I suppose there's no point trying nitpick with dimwitted Socialist autocrats, is there?

Never one to be outdone by his lapdog, Fidel Castro added further bombast by denouncing George Bush as "condemning three billion people" to "premature death" by starvation. All it took for Chávez's pie in the sky ethanol dreams to come crashing down was the participation of "the devil". In one fit of pique, Chávez has spited Venezuela out of countless millions of dollars worth of ethanol production, and Cuba has deprived itself not only of fuel, but of an actual market for its sugar crop. Producing ethanol from sugarcane not only provides a market for the existing sugar crop (now trading at near record lows on the world market), but increases demand for sugar cane, thereby raising the price. And that would actually provide Cuba with desperately needed hard currency to lift itself out of poverty, as well as providing cheaper fuel for itself.

But, no. It wouldn't do for the hemisphere's leading Marxist morons to engage in any enterprise, no matter how profitable or sensible it may be, that the United States may engage in as well. We can only hope for both Cuba and Venezuela's sakes that both Chávez and Castro ride off into the sunset, and leave the serious business of governance to new leaders who put the economic and social welfare of the people ahead of the petty personalities of their rulers.