Whatever the reason, it seems he is willing to do just that: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0508300139aug30,1,5132447.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

Chavez certainly gets some folks' knickers in a twist, so the comments here ought to be interesting. Please keep in mind though, he is no dictator. He is the popularly elected leader of a government appointed by the people of Venezuela.

This socialist tag that gets stuck on Chavez appears to be the result of two things he did to address the problem of huge numbers of impoverished, landless peasants flocking into the big cities and building ghettos of cardboard shacks with open sewers.

First, Chavez and his Congress passed a law that changed the split between the major oil companies and Venezuela from 84% (oil companies) - 16% (Venezuela) to 70% (oil companies) - 30% (Venezuela) in order to feed them. That made Chavez popular with the peasants, but earned him no friends here.

Then, he passed another law that gave these landless peasants farmlandland, but only those fields that have been abandoned and not used, land reform that had been proposed by our own Kennedy administration back in the '60s. When Chavez passed this law, only 3% of the population owned 77% of Venezuela's farmland, and that wealthy 3% made a mighty stink over it.

As for cutting "oil prices to help restore normalcy to the USA after the devastation to our Gulf Coast," that would be extremely generous of Chavez. After all, between 1980-2000, Latin America suffered it's worst 20-year growth performance in more than a century, even including the years of the Great Depression. They have their own problems.

I don't get the focus of critisism regarding of Chavez' manuevers to increase regional influence. Isn't that what all nations do? And do we really expect a nation with such massive poverty and economic polarization to provide significant cuts to the U.S.?
This kind of critique seems like so much chaff: we have other, more legitimate areas to address with El Presidente, such as his dismantling of democratic institutions (media, lower courts) within Venzuela.

"This socialist tag that gets stuck on Chavez appears to be the result of two things..."

Actually, I think the socialist tag gets stuck on Chavez because he says things like this:
"I am convinced that the path to a new, better and possible world is not capitalism, the path is socialism."

"He's building dangerous networks to take down Columbia, Bolivia, and any other country in his way." Is there any evidence of this whatsoever? It sounds prima facie like a darn silly claim to make about the man.

I also agree with misanthrope that it's very weird to ask of Chavez, in an accusatory tone, whether "he's really interested in giving generously of Venezuela's bounty or if he's just collecting political currency." If the former, then he's superrogatorily nice; if the latter, then he's just doing his job as the leader of his country. Either way, there's not even possible grist for an anti-Chavez mill here.

As for Colombia, despite a friendly tone, Chavez himself admitted in January that he wants "integration" with Colombia (as part of integration with all of South America). I wonder who the president of VeneCol would be? The leap here is to equate "integration" with empire-building, but it's not a huge one.

Chavez has numerous connections with Colombian terrorist groups FARC and ELN. He has attempted to supply terrorist party FARC with arms. It appears that his administration harbors members of FARC in towns near the Colombian border. FARC members have met with the Venezuelan military. FARC all-star Ricardo Granda was living under the protection of Chavez in Caracas until his December 2004 arrest and extradition. Chavez botched an arrest, release, and re-arrest of the Jose Maria Ballestas, leader of sister terrorist organization, ELN, making it clear that he didn't want Ballestas arrested.

That seems like prima facie evidence that he's looking for blood in Colombia, and that he has a plan for takeovers (under the guise of integration) well beyond his neighbor to the west.

Would the sudden urgent concern over Chavez be so prevalent if his country did not provide a significant portion of our oil supply? Adam's original post betrays this, as a reduction in oil prices seems to be the cure for whatever ills infect his administration. (This is not a condemnation of Adam's position, but of American policy since the end of WWII. Basically, as long as a nation's policiies benefit the U.S., we couldn't care less about internal strife, human rights violations, etc. See D. Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam several decades ago, when he was useful to us, as well as Saudi Arabia, whom we prop up while they produce anti-American terrorists and refuse to assist us with soaring oil prices.) Mr. Chavez has offered reduced oil and gasoline prices to impoverished Americans in addition to hurricane relief. Will the United States accept such offers, or will we proudly surrender to artificially inflated oil prices so that Bush administration friends can continue to gouge our citizenry while pocketing record profits?

If Mr. Chavez were aligned with the current administration's policies, there would be no crying about his ties with Cuba (the most pathetic red herring remaining in American politics) or his dedication to so-called socialist programs. Claims that Chavez has connections to Latin American terrorist groups ring about as hollow as the recent claims that Saddam Hussein had "harboured" terrorists in Iraq. This type of ex-post-facto wolf-crying provides nothing but an embarrassing excuse for imperialist, neo-conservative tactics with respect to global diplomacy. The hypocrisy bell rings loudly when anyone bemoans "empire-building" in South and Central America. Haven't they gotten the memo that we're the only nation allowed to interfere with other countries' politics and force our vision (read: economics) upon them?

In addition, it seems that Mr. Chavez has a greater "mandate" than our current president, as he won election (and a referendum) by greater margins than our Dear Leader. And anyone who is currently planning a "they're-South-American-so-their-elections-must-be-flawed" response should take a look at the biography of Rep. Harris of Florida and John Conyers' report on last year's election in Ohio. When we get it right, then we can call names.

It is lucky for many of those who currently make policy that they have already made their fortunes and will pass away before they will be held accountable for their actions. They will not have to face the people working for $5.15/hr who have to work an extra hour in order to pay for the gas to get home. Eventually and hopefully, American politics will be confronted with a population that is more concerned with feeding their children than with trumped up division issues like gay marriage and the estate tax (the second most pathetic red herring in American politics). When that happens, the "socialist" ideals of someone like Chavez likely will be more enticing than the false and borderline insulting promise of an "ownership society."

Mr. Bush may like his foreign policy to be based on faith rather than reality, but I like my bike wheels on the ground two at a time. I'm sure he can relate. And if not, maybe he can ask Lance Armstrong.

Chavez offering oil as humanitarian aid certainly does not "cure whatever ills infect his administration," but it casts him in a better light than United States media has done. I am not talking about the Bush administration, or even Pat Robertson, but USA Today and the New York Times, who have both denounced Chavez and used loaded epithets to describe him.

...and "so-called" socialist programs? He admits he's a Marxist. He admits he's a socialist. Why protect him from ideologies he embraces?

I don't get it. I scrawl out a post intended to spur critical thinking about the labels and preconceived notions we have about an important leader in an important area for foreign policy and I get a defense of Chavez that he probably wouldn't even mount and non sequiturs on Ohio elections, gay marriage, and the estate tax in response. Pardon my contempt.

At worst, that 'evidence' shows that Chavez is looking to increase the standing of his country in the competition with his local rivals, and he's willing to use some pretty unethical means to do it. Which puts him on a par with about 90% of world leaders. Really, there's nothing there that suggests megalomaniac would-be-world-conquerer type. ("Takeovers in the guise of integration...." Yeah, right.)