You might think that getting a biffing from his own people in his constitutional reform referendum - not to mention getting caught with his hands in the terrorist FARC organization’s cookie jar – might give Hugo Chavez useful time for a period of quiet introspection. You’d be wrong if you did, though.
President Hugo Chavez on Wednesday warned Colombia not to allow a U.S. military base on its border with Venezuela, saying he would consider such an act an “aggression.”
Chavez said he would not permit Colombia’s U.S.-backed government to establish an American military base in La Guajira, a region spanning northeastern Colombia and northwestern Venezuela.
The Venezuelan leader said if Colombia allows the base, his government will revive a decades-old territorial conflict and stake a claim to the entire region.
“We will not allow the Colombian government to give La Guajira to the empire,” Chavez said, referring to the U.S. during a speech to a packed auditorium of uniformed soldiers. “Colombia is launching a threat of war at us.”
What a putz.
Columbia’s opposite neighbor Ecuador intends to close US access to an air base used for counter-drug surveillance in 2009, so a new base of operations in Columbia – one of the dwindling number of US allies in the region – would be critical to countering the supply side of the drug problem.
Chavez on the other hand is desperately looking for a justification to support his belligerence against the US and other governments in the region preferring a liberal democratic tradition rather than his own brand of encroaching Bolivarian socialism. When Columbia struck a blow against a FARC encampment in Ecuador, it was Chavez who howled the loudest – and moved troops to his border.
US congressional leadership meanwhile, under pressure from organized labor, continues to use procedural means to block fast track consideration of a free trade agreement with Columbia, despite similar agreements with Mexico, Chile and Central American countries – an aggregation whose GDP dwarfs the potential US-Colombia market.
Because, you know: There are allies, and then there are allies.
When you ride the tiger of tyranny there’s no time for quiet introspection. That’ll get you eaten.
Congress recognizes no allies except money and votes and no higher interests than re-election. P.J. O’Rourke had it right with the title of his book on the Congress; Parliament of Whores.
Somewhere out there is a bullet with his name on it. It’s just a matter of time.
Byron – his people can only hope.