Western Resistance

In Venezuela, he is consolidating power by arming his goons:

Mr Cabrices' 140-member-strong Popular Defence Unit trains weekends and weekday evenings in an empty parking lot in a middle-class Caracas neighbourhood called "The Paradise".

Rafael Cabrices believes the US is plotting to oust President Chavez
Cabrices heads a 140-member-strong Popular Defence Unit
The quiet street leading to the site is lined by homes, pre-schools and a hospital. On a warm evening, a group of about a dozen men and women in their 20s and 30s march stiffly to their corporal's commands of "Left, right, left".

Nearby, teenage boys and girls seated on the ground listen to their commander explain how 'imperialism' undermined Bolivar's revolution.

"The president is talking about" the threat of an invasion, "and the president doesn't talk foolishness," says Olimpia Hung, a cheery 44-year-old clothing merchant and impassioned Chavez supporter. "Fatherland or death."

A note to the innocent; the slogan "Fatherland or death" (Patria o muerte), is the same slogan with which Fidel Castro ends all his speeches to the Cuban people.

Chavez is also moving against private property:

The Venezuelan government has warned it will confiscate hundreds of private companies that are lying idle if they fail to re-open.

President Hugo Chavez said the firms' workers would be given help to set up co-operatives and re-start production for the benefit of the community.

He said the move was needed to fight poverty and end Venezuela's dependence on "the perverse model of capitalism".

He's using his undeserved oil wealth to buy influence: Venezuela signs Jamaica oil deal

Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez has signed a deal with Jamaica to supply it with oil at preferential rates.

Mr Chavez said his country, the world's fifth largest oil producer, was meeting the "call of conscience" by supplying cheap oil at a time of rising prices.

The agreement is part of a regional Petrocaribe initiative - proposed by Mr Chavez - to which most of the Caribbean countries have signed up.

Jamaica is the first to formalise its participation in the project.

Venezuela has been discussing similar deals with many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean in recent months.

(This is an incredibly short-sighted move by the Jamaican government. After the oil comes, the Communist agitators will follow.)

And finally, el loco Hugo is trying his hand at worldwide propaganda. (Notice the implicit delusion that CNN is somehow pro-America.) Venezuela sets up 'CNN rival'

In a popular shopping area of Caracas, with street musicians playing a bolero in the background, Jorge Botero is filming a promo for Latin America's most ambitious new satellite channel.

"Grabando," he shouts ("recording").

A young journalism student walks into shot and says: "The news on Telesur, the true face of Latin America."

Telesur is a new pan-Latin American TV channel based in Venezuela. It aims to rival CNN and the other Spanish-language news channels coming out of Miami and Atlanta.

Some have already dubbed it Al-Bolivar - a combination of the Arabic news channel, Al-Jazeera, and President Hugo Chavez's favourite independence hero.

The truth is there, for those who wish to see it. Hugo Chavez is a Communist dictator. He is working to foment Communist revolution in the rest of America. He is a vicious, unstable killer who will not be stopped by nice words. The United States needs to wake up from its paralisis, soon.