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Caribbean-Latin America
Sean Penn Attends Vigil for Hugo Chavez in Bolivia
2012-12-12
The vulture is doing double duty, for Hugo and for Sean's career...
BUENOS AIRES -- Actor Sean Penn made a surprise appearance yesterday in Bolivia as he attended a candlelight vigil for the health of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who is currently in Cuba undergoing his fourth cancer surgery.
Bolivia? Isn't Hugo in Havana right now?
The event attracted Chavez supporters as well as Bolivian officials, and took place in a diplomatic location in La Paz. Penn joined Venezuelan ambassador Crisbeylee Gonzalez and took the stage wearing a Venezuelan flag jacket, according to a report by EFE.

"Thank you, Sean," said Gonzalez, "for joining us and for wanting to be here. We know President Chavez is a good friend of yours, and you didn't hesitate one second about coming here with us to this vigil."

"He's one of the most important forces we've had on this planet," said Penn. "And I'll wish him nothing but that great strength he has shown over and over again. I do it in love, and I do it in gratitude.

"I just want to say, from my very American point of view, of my friend President Chavez: It is only possible to be so inspiring as he is, as a two-way street. And he would say that his inspiration is the people."

Penn has openly expressed his admiration and support for the left-wing government of Venezuela in the past, and declared U.S. audiences have been "hypnotized" by big media corporations regarding Chavez's democratic credentials. "Who do you know here who's gone through 14 of the most transparent elections on the globe and has been elected democratically, as Hugo Chavez?" he stated in 2010. Since then, Chavez has won yet another presidential election this year against opposition candidate Henrique Capriles.

Penn was in Bolivia this week to attend a hearing for the release of businessman Jacob Ostreicher, who has spent 18 months in a maximum security local prison with no trial or sentence, under charges of money laundering.
Posted by:Steve White

#7  #4,672 in the line to bang Madonna
Posted by: Frank G   2012-12-12 21:37  

#6  Sean who?
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia   2012-12-12 21:07  

#5  Awwww

Prog and Toad are friends.
Posted by: swksvolFF   2012-12-12 20:35  

#4  ???????????????????????????
That's all I've got to say :-)
Posted by: Raider   2012-12-12 12:47  

#3  watch out Danny Glover! Somebody else really wants that useful idiot of the year award...
Posted by: Broadhead6   2012-12-12 11:21  

#2  Fun fact:

Sean Penn is the guy who wished his critics would "die screaming of rectal cancer."

That was in 2010, a year before Chavez was diagnosed.

Karma!
Posted by: Elmerert Hupens2660   2012-12-12 07:55  

#1  Spicoli's old teacher Mr. Hand weighs in...
Posted by: tu3031   2012-12-12 01:11  

00:00