Ominous rumblings from Chavez

Maria Anastasia O’Grady writes in the Wall Street Journal from Venezuela the most troubling reports;

Over the course of five days in Caracas last week, I couldn’t help but notice the ubiquitous image of President Hugo Chávez peering down from hundreds of his campaign banners that read “Vote against the devil; vote against the empire.” The nationalistic message denouncing President George W. Bush and the U.S. blanketed the capital.

On election night, as it became clear that more votes had been cast for Mr. Chávez than for candidate Manuel Rosales, the president appeared on the balcony of Miraflores, the presidential palace, to proclaim that “the devil who tries to dominate the world,” had suffered another defeat.

The red-clad Chávez dramatically recited from the Lord’s Prayer and then borrowed from it for his own prophesy. “Thy kingdom come,” he bellowed, and thereafter, “the kingdom of socialism.” The ailing Fidel Castro reportedly sent a short message from Havana congratulating Mr. Chávez and noting that “the victory was resounding, crushing and without parallel in the history of our America.”

Couple this with Socialist winning elections in Equador and Uraguay and Daniel Ortega winning his election in Nicaragua. And then back it all up with Chavez’ endless petro dollars after nationalizing his oilfields. So if we somehow defeated the Islamist facists today, tommorrow we’d be shifting our focus to the south.

It’s been my opinion for some time that Chavez has been taking advantage of the Middle East War to build himself up a power base and become the new Simon Bolivar. Most of the Central Americans I know think of him as a big joke, but with his non-stop flow of cash, his need to stay in power, and our current immigration problem, he’s becoming a bigger threat to us than the Arab terrorists.

Category: Foreign Policy, Hugo Chavez