Mission to Caracas

On December 29 Hugo Chávez, President of Venezuela, recently re-elected with a whopping 61 percent of the vote, announced his intention not to renew the broadcast license of Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV), whose concession will expire in May. "They better go packing," he said, adding lest he be misunderstood, "Start turning your equipment off."

The announcement was not out of the blue, since a few days earlier Venezuela's Minister of Communication and Information, William Lara, had said that licenses of privately owned media would be subject to revision, and the fate of RCTV would be decided by popular survey. Chávez now put it more colorfully. His Venezuela, he said, would not tolerate media "at the service of coup-plotting, against the people, against the nation, against the national independence and against the dignity of the Republic." And when José Miguel Insulza, Secretary General of the OAS, denounced the move as censorship, Chávez called him a pendejo ("asshole"--translated by US media as "idiot") who had no business intervening in Venezuela's internal affairs.

In the weeks that followed, Chávez persuaded the legislature to give him the power to rule by decree for eighteen months, made known his plan to consolidate the parties of the left into one and announced his intention to nationalize various industries. Along the way he described Jesus Christ as "the greatest socialist in history," ended a speech to the National Assembly by shouting "Socialism or death!" and, after US officials expressed concern about recent developments, advised, "Go to hell, gringos! Go home!"

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