The usual suspects

If you have any doubt about how the far left operates (and would like to operate in this country), take a look at Venezuela, where Socialist President Hugo Chavez was sworn in to a new six-year term today. Comrade Chavez has already done such freedom-loving things as confiscate privately owned companies and land, nationalized the telecommunications, banking and power industries, and revoked the license of a private TV station that has been critical of him and his administration. So much for free speech and private property rights in Venezuela. Can the secret police be far behind? Why are you worried, comrade, if you have nothing to hide?

More chillingly, the article states that Comrade Chavez "now wants to scrap presidential term limits". Yep, straight from the communist manual. Get into power by any means possible, and then change the rules of the game so that one gets to be El Presidente for life, just like his hero, Uncle Fidel, whose "revolution" has been going on for close to fifty years now. Remember how Slick Willie wistfully wished at the end of his time in office that there were no term limits for him? These guys are true brothers in arms.

"Chavez insists he needs more power to save Venezuela from exploitation and even attack by capitalist countries".

There's always some excuse, isn't there? These power-hungry egomaniacs never have enough of it, until their central bureaucracy has its tentacles into every aspect of the peasants' lives.

This tendency towards centralization of power and control is on the rise in the U.S. as well, unfortunately. I've blogged multiple times about the self-important local-level commissars that feel the need to legislate everything, from banning smoking, trans fats, foie gras, biking without helmets, and thousands of other things that define the choices in life that a free person is capable of making on their own, without government interference. Governor Schwarzenegger in California is now talking about requiring health insurance for all state residents, including illegal immigrants, with no way to opt out. Now that Ms. Pelosi and Co. is in charge in Washington, look for even more of these "thousand cuts" of rules and regulations that will make life for the average peasant much more onerous and difficult.

Keep a close watch Venezuela's situation, as its economy crashes and burns in the near future, much like Cuba's has after the Soviet Union quit propping them up. Communism has never succeeded in any country that has tried it, and it won't succeed here.