Hugo: TMI. We don't need to know your pet name for your dingus.Venezuela's leftist President Hugo Chavez on Sunday promised hundreds of thousands of supporters he would win a resounding victory in his December 3 reelection bid he describes as a challenge to Washington.
Whatever works, I guess.
The former soldier and self-styled revolutionary is favored in the polls to beat rival Manuel Rosales after building a solid political base through a social development campaign financed by oil revenues.
I thought the US had some genius campaign in place so you would lose the "elections". You'd better be careful because it only took 50 years or so to get rid of Fidel.
Chavez supporters flooded Caracas thoroughfares waving flags and banners, congregating in different parts of the downtown a day after Rosales sympathizers held a similar march to close his campaign in the capital city.
Hey, even the Bhagwan developed a cult following.
"We are confronting the devil, and we will hit a home run off the devil next Sunday," said Chavez, who ruffled feathers in October by calling President Bush the devil in remarks at the United Nations.
I didn't know Bush was running in the Venezuelan elections.
"On December 3 we're going to defeat the most powerful empire on earth by knockout," Chavez said.
Whatever he says, just nod your head.
Donning red like most of his supporters, Chavez delivered a two-hour speech marked by his signature combination of fiery leftist rhetoric and crowd antics typical of pop music concerts.
Hey, Fidel was doing that even a few years ago.
He spent nearly ten minutes trying to see which of four groups of demonstrators could cheer louder -- then told them all to be quiet.
"As your dictator I command you all to be QUIET or I'll turn you into a donkey!"
"Whoever talks first will turn into a donkey," he thundered, only to break into his unmistakable giggle.
Well, someone had to laugh.
Following his speech, Chavez drove through the packed Avenida Bolivar standing atop a campaign vehicle, dancing to political jingles and occasionally reaching into the crowd to shake hands with supporters.
If only one of them would have held on . . .
The weekend, with massive government and opposition rallies choking the capital's streets, reflected the country's political polarization.
OK. Those with brains chant, those without wear red.
In the opposition stronghold of Altamira, Chavez supporters on their way to the march leaned out of windows waving posters of their "Comandante," and screamed "Viva Chavez."
"Y eres un pendejo!"
Residents in expensive sports-utility vehicles honked their horns in protest and shouted the opposition slogan "Dare."
"Y eres un pendejo!"
But a street cleaner and parking attendant held up their hands and spread their fingers, a symbol of Chavez's goal of sweeping 10 million of Venezuela's 16 million voters.
Any more than that and it would be too obvious.
The demonstrations themselves were also markedly different, with Chavez's joking spontaneity contrasting with Rosales' emotional but stern and unsmiling appearance in the opposition's Saturday march.
You'd be serious if Chavez's guys counted all the ballots, too.
Rosales in August united a fractured opposition movement that failed to oust Chavez through a botched coup and a grueling two-month oil strike in 2002 and a failed recall referendum in 2004.
If he gets to be more than token competition, Rosales gets something else fractured.
Most polls give Chavez a wide lead, with one AP-Ipsos poll showing Chavez sweeping 59 percent of likely voters compared to only 27 percent for Rosales, who points to opposition-linked polls that show the race much tighter.
Sounds familiar.
First elected in 1998, Chavez, a close ally of Cuba's Fidel Castro, has galvanized the nation's poor with promises of a revolution. But he has sparked outcries among middle class critics who call him an authoritarian.
Hey, poor people: Look over your shoulder at the equity in Cuba. Everyone's poor there. Nobody to buy anybody's wares. Bad. Figure it out.
The State Department describes him as a menace to regional democracy, though Venezuela remains the fourth-largest exporter of oil to the United States.
As usual the US goes for the expensive solution rather than just expanding its own oil production to beat down oil prices and reduce the petrodollars that get converted to extremodollars.