More Delicious Venezuelan Oil

Time for a moment of news zen: Venezuela's President, Hugo Chavez, yesterday pledged to continue his country's program of providing discounted home heating oil to the poor in Massachusetts. Chavez, you may recall, is the Bush administration's public enemy number one in Latin America because he's, um, leftist. Not a dictator, not in power by undemocratic means, not giving support to terrorists; just leftist.

Naturally, Republicans in this country are up in arms that U.S. Congressmen (Quincy's Bill Delahunt and Queens, NY's Greg Meeks) are canoodling with Chavez for the nefarious purpose of helping poor Americans (!). The Globe, therefore, dutifully reports in some detail on what it is that makes Chavez so bad in some people's eyes. Three of these things struck Bostonist as just too ironic to escape comment:

Chavez, although democratically elected, has been accused by human rights groups of "thwarting press freedom." In other news, our President had "fruitful" talks with the President of China, which has no press freedom at all.

Chavez has also been accused, according to the Globe, of "loading the judicial branch with judges sympathetic to him." Do we even need to say it?

Lastly, the Globe tells us that Chavez has "used his nation's surging oil revenues to help the Venezuelan poor, a move that has contributed to his popularity at home. But critics warn that Chavez is playing a risky financial and political game by relying on high oil prices that may one day fall, potentially leaving him with a discontented populace and a national budget problem." Hmmm . . . cash giveaways used to buy popularity at the expense of long-term financial stability? That's totally bad enough to justify higher heating costs for poor people.

Photo: Don't believe that Hugo Chavez is trouble? Well look at this: He even bats lefty!