Live Breathe and Die

Archive for September, 2006

I have not always been a big fan of Nancy Pelosi or Charlie Rangel, but I applaud them for quickly responding to Hugo Chavez’ remarks at the U.N. yesterday.  While, on the one hand, the remarks helped sell additional thousands of copies of Chomsky’s book to the fringe left, they also allowed the Democratic leaders to set the record straight.  

While neither Pelosi nor Rangel have any love for the President, they both stood on principle.  Dictators just don’t have a leg to stand on when they come to this country and call a sitting President the devil.   Chavez’ own record of repression is well known and his attempts to come to the U.S. to instill class and racial warfare are transparent.

Charlie Rangel responded to Chavez by saying,  “You don’t come into my country, you don’t come into my congressional district and criticize my president”  and  “it would be crazy to think that Americans do not feel offended.”   Thank you Mr. Rangel.

New York Governor George Pataki said  “This person has no right coming to our country to criticize our president.”  And while a year ago, Nancy Pelosi issued this statement; “President Bush must unequivocally denounce Pat Robertson’s outrageous call for the United States to assassinate the President of Venezuela,”  she today said “The manner in which he characterized the president demeaned himself and demeaned Venezuela. He fancies himself a modern day Simone Bolivar … But he is an everyday thug.”

Right on Mr. Rangel and Ms. Pelosi………..party politics aside, these were the right statements to make.

Speaking to reporters at the United Nations today, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said that the United Nations is a “deceased” organization.  He said it is broken and beyond repair.  Of the U.N. General assembly, he said that its system is “worthless.”
A majority of American conservatives would agree, thank you very much.   Beyond that, Hugo Chavez has much more in common with American liberals.

Mr. Chavez proved two things during his speech today; one is that he is aligned with extreme Islam and the other is that he represents the American extreme left.  As a matter of fact, he is aligned with the American left against America.  As he held up Noam Chomsky’s book, ‘Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance’, he further established his close ties with the American extreme left.  Chavez close ties with Al Quida and the American radical left are no coincidence.   Chavez said, “The United States empire is on its way down and it will be finished in the near future, inshallah.”  No coincidence either that Chavez sees the end of America and that he finishes his statement with an Islamic/Arabic term.

In America, the extreme left sees America as an evil, bullying giant, Hugo Chavez sees America the same way, as does Al Quida.  These three entities make up the true axis of evil.  

Just like the left in this country, Chavez exemplifies the hypocrisy of his holier than thou positions.  In the original presidential election that put Chavez in power in 1998, Chavez received illegal campaign funding from two large banks in Spain.  He later usurped many of the constitutional rights of the other branches of government to give himself unchallenged autocratic authority. 

In the 2000 election, Chavez won re-election by changing the timing of elections and causing his opponents to miss normal campaigning.  Even the Carter Center, which had been  Chavez ally, declared that the elections lacked any transparency, and were not fair to this opponents.  This is the man who points a lecturing finger at the U.S. and President Bush. 

In April of 2002, discontent with the Chavez administration caused large public scuffles and rioting.  Chavez commandeered all broadcasting outlets, and as only a dictator would, shut down any broadcasters who refused his demand to interrupt all programming day and night to turn the public against the opposition.  Chavez also installed all military leaders that were of sworn allegiance to him, while firing most of the upper echelon of the military.  Chavez also tried to blame the coup against him on the U.S., but numerous investigations found the charge as baseless.

Just as the American left makes any number of insinuations against the President and the U.S., so does their counter-part, Hugo Chavez.  Both the left and president Chavez are guilty of the ‘do as I say, not as I do’ approach.  Both find their guiding philosophy in communism and socialism.  Both are misdirected and dangerous to the future of democracy and freedom.