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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (35220)	3/17/2004 10:06:23 PM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793955

Chavez could cause an oil crisis that would stop us in our tracks. Jonathan Gurwitz: Don't let Chavez choke Venezuela's democracy San Antonio Express-News President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has nearly completed what the Washington Post calls "a coup by technicality." Chavez, a former paratrooper who spent two years in prison for a 1992 military coup attempt in which 18 people were killed, became president in 1998. In his rewrite of the Venezuelan constitution, Chavez officially extended his term to 2006. Unofficially, the Fidel Castro protege has claimed he will remain in power until 2021. In addition to his ties with Cuba, Chavez has paid homage to Saddam Hussein and Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi and allied his nation with the Islamic extremists ruling Iran. Venezuelan expert Paul Crespo, noting the relationship Chavez has cultivated with Cuban intelligence and other state sponsors of international terrorism, has written that Chavez is turning Venezuela into a "new anti-American terrorism hub," a bastion of the axis of evil in the Western Hemisphere. Domestically, Chavez has in six years destroyed a jewel of Latin American democracy, a regional precedent for the rule of law and economic liberalism. He has provoked labor unions by sacking their leadership and installing handpicked loyalists, angered Catholics by denouncing church leaders, attacked the independent media as reactionary tools and waged a campaign of violence and intimidation against the opposition press. Chavez has jailed opposition political leaders, some of whom claim to have been tortured. He has purged Venezuela's military leadership, installing chavista commanders. Chavez's Venezuela now provides safe haven, training and direct support to Marxist FARC rebels waging a violent, terrorist campaign against the democratically elected government of neighboring Colombia. These factors — combined with rising poverty, increasing disregard for civil rights and Chavez's delusional mix of fascism and socialism — led 3,448,747 Venezuelans to sign petitions for a recall referendum at the end of 2003, 1 million more signatures than required by law. The Venezuelan constitution, drawn up by Chavez and his supporters, guarantees the right of Venezuelan citizens to petition for a recall election with the signatures of at least 20 percent of the electorate. International groups including the Organization of American States and the Carter Center closely monitored and audited this extraordinary civic demonstration. Yet an electoral commission handpicked by Chavez earlier this month threw out 1.6 million signatures. One chamber of Venezuela's Supreme Court ruled Monday that some 870,000 of those signatures must be restored. But the judiciary, like the other branches of Venezuela's government, are subject to manipulation and intimidation by Chavez. The chances of holding a presidential referendum — and peacefully resolving Venezuela's political crisis — appear increasingly remote. A country in which democratically elected governments have prevailed since 1959 is now on the brink of political chaos. Hundreds of Venezuelan writers, artists and academics recently signed a letter of protest that articulated the plight of Venezuelan democrats: "Step by step we are approaching what in the near future will be a brutal military dictatorship, disguised as a supposedly socialist government capable of awakening the utopian sentiments of Venezuelans ... but in reality it has been a self-centered, authoritarian and morally depredating government." Why should Americans care? There is an economic motive: Venezuela is the world's fifth largest oil exporter, providing the United States with 13 percent of its petroleum needs. There is a security motive: Just as Cuban missiles posed a threat to American national security in 1962, so does a Venezuelan base of terror in the post-9-11 era. More importantly, there is a moral imperative. Recent history seems to demonstrate an inexorable, worldwide march toward freedom. Venezuela has served as a model for democratic reform in Latin America. That progress must not stop, that model must not be broken on the backs of Venezuelans. It's time for the United States, the Organization of American States and all nations that value freedom to stop soft-peddling Chavez's subversion of democracy in Venezuela. If Chavez will not allow Venezuelans to exercise their constitutional right to hold a referendum, his regime should face the diplomatic isolation and economic sanctions accorded other dictators, terrorist supporters and rogue regimes.