Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez aids and assists Arab and Latin American terrorists. Chavez himself is supported, in turn, by the terrorist regime of Fidel Castro. Last year it became evident to patriotic Venezuelans that their country was being converted into a terrorist state. A mass protest and a general strike were organized.
I received many letters and articles from patriotic Venezuelans during the last six months. They hoped for the moral support of the American press and media. They hoped for a word of encouragement from the American president. But America did not care about the Venezuelan people. All eyes were fixated on Iraq. It did not matter that Venezuelan oil is more important to America than Iraqi oil. It did not matter that the issue was freedom versus communism. When answering questions about Venezuela the White House Press Secretary was like a deer caught in the headlights. Venezuela? Oh, we have nothing to do with Venezuela.
Chavez could count on his communist and terrorist allies abroad. The Venezuelan people, on the other hand, could count on nothing from America or the free world. Not even moral support. President George W. Bush said and did nothing while the communists strangled Venezuela. And they continue to strangle it.
One has to ask what it would have cost President Bush to make a strong statement in support of the Venezuelan opposition to Chavez. Oh yes, it would have been technically improper to encourage opposition to a sitting government. And yes, it would have caused a diplomatic uproar. The mere appearance of taking sides in Venezuelan domestic politics would have been blasted as "interference" or "imperialism."
But whatever happened to doing the right thing?
Must we now give up our sympathy for those who fight against an emerging communist tyranny because of international legalism and the complications of regional public opinion? Do the politically correct buffoons in Washington understand that a new communist bloc is forming in Latin America? Is stability in the Middle East more important than an emerging threat in the Western Hemisphere? Does it register in Washington that Brazil's Marxist government suddenly talks of developing long-range ballistic missiles?
A few months ago Chavez broke the opposition strike and restored much of the country's oil production. Day by day the hopes of the Venezuelan people are crushed. Chavez does not care about the welfare of Venezuela. He does not care about democracy or freedom. His idol is Fidel Castro, the dictator of Cuba. His enemy is the United States. He looks to Red China and Russia for foreign sources of supply. In the last 18 months Venezuela's economy has contracted by approximately one third. Only half the population is eating three meals a day. Unemployment is 20 percent. And despite all this, Chavez is actively strangling the private sector in order to consolidate his dictatorship.
And what does America do?
Last month the U.S. State Department declared that one of Chavez's leading opponents is a "terrorist." Gen. Enrique Medina Gomez's U.S. visa was revoked four weeks ago. That is to say, instead of remaining completely neutral in the struggle between the emerging communist dictatorship and the Venezuelan people, the State Department signaled its willingness to collaborate with the dictator. And this should surprise no one. It is a repeat of what the State Department did to Colombia's best generals as they attempted to fight the communist rebels of the FARC.
To be sure, many observers are bewildered. Why would the State Department oppose America's natural allies and encourage America's bitter enemies?
The answer is simple: The State Department is a bureaucracy run mostly by liberals. As James Burnham wrote many years ago, liberalism is the ideology of Western suicide. There is another cause at work: namely, the anti-American milieu of U.S. universities. To work in the government you need a degree or a credential. University training is unavoidable. Therefore, the liberal university is the incubator of the bureaucratic hatchling. In light of this fact, Marxism on college campuses is hardly a harmless phenomenon. Having failed in their attempts to ignite a revolution decades ago, the sixties radicals limped away to tenured professorships at leading universities. This was not a retreat inasmuch as it was a more effective angle of attack. And now we are faced with the result, though we pretend it is not happening.
Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Mary Anastasia O'Grady recently commented on the State Department's treatment of Gen. Medina: "A chimpanzee tossing darts to make policy could produce better results." But our bureaucratic apes are not tossing darts. Many of them prefer the politics of Chavez to the politics of Medina. That is to say, the United States government contains within its own ranks a significant leftist contingent. This group will sabotage President Bush's policies when it suits them. They will take aim at America's allies when they are free to do so. And the system itself is too weak to deal with them. The patriotic element in America is too compromising and "reasonable" to take firm action against this pathological element.
Since the time of Joseph McCarthy Americans have been troubled by the idea of anti-Americanism. For many people it is anti-American to call someone anti-American. Many people think that in America we should be free to burn the flag, subvert the system and denounce freedom as slavery. This has been mistaken for the American way. In today's topsy-turvy world the only sin is to believe in sin. The only anti-Americanism is to oppose anti-Americanism.
My friends in Venezuela and Brazil will have trouble understanding why the U.S. State Department revoked Gen. Medina's visa and declared him a terrorist. They might assume that President Bush prefers to work with Communists. But that is not the case. In truth, Bush presides over a divided government and a divided nation. The American people have been exposed to the Marxist influenza for decades, and the sickness began to affect policy long ago. Today the U.S. government forgets the victims of communism as it turns its back on Venezuela. But there is a conscience in the world, even if it's not to be found in Washington. And I will quote from one of its representatives, the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova:
"And if they gag my exhausted mouth
"Through which a hundred million scream,"
They will not silence conscience in the end. Today Venezuela is crying out and America refuses to listen. Meanwhile, the State Department pushes Venezuela into Castro's new bloc.
America's sin is not imperialism.
