A Nuclear Chavez Gets Obama's OK

After all the fuss about Iran development nuclear capabilities, Venezuela gets a pass. Obama's OK With Chavez  Having  Nuclear Reactors   Geopolitics: Venezuela's Hugo Chavez moves ahead with plans to go nuclear with Russian help, and the response from our president has been to give the lunatic dictator his full backing. This is trouble. Not since the days of Jimmy Carter have we seen as craven a U.S. response to a provocation as Chavez's plan for two 1,200-megawatt nuclear reactors 1,400 miles from our shores. "We have no incentive or interest in increasing friction between Venezuela and the U.S., but we do think Venezuela needs to act responsibly," President Obama told the Spanish-language press Tuesday. "Our attitude is that Venezuela has rights to peacefully develop nuclear power." Oh. So forget the Monroe Doctrine. Never mind President Kennedy's response to the nuclear ambitions of Cuba. Obama's new message to the hemisphere is that Chavez can go nuclear because he's a democracy and will therefore act responsibly. Obama's message was probably intended to deprive the dictator of his capacity to whip up nationalist sentiment in the wake of a U.S. rebuke. But, ultimately, it represents a U.S. failure to deal with the kind of threat Chavez actually poses. In itself, Chavez's plan to construct reactors is little immediate threat to the U.S., its ally Colombia or Brazil. But the treaty with Russia was signed in 2009 and is meant to take 10 years to complete. In that time, Chavez will have to develop nuclear experts and find a way to finance all these reactors. Given he already owes Russia $4.4 billion for weapons purchases, the sale of Venezuela's oil facilities in Europe to Russia won't be enough. The real problem is the relationships Chavez is forging. Chavez's visit to Russia and Iran to tout the nuclear deal was meant to show the U.S. that even after he lost a legislative election in September, he still mattered. And rogue states like Russia and Iran will still do dirty business with him — even if China won't. Chavez says he means to bring in Russian and Iranian experts for his nuclear project. That opens the door to influence from the mafiya-linked criminal underworld that includes the terrorists and arms dealers at the edges of Russia's and Iran's power structures. Chavez's closest Russian associate is Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, a raving anti-American with rumored ties to illegal arms dealer Viktor Bout. The latter was arrested in Thailand soon after the discovery in 2008 of a computer belonging to FARC terrorists. People like this are more than willing to get the materials for dirty bombs and provide support for terrorists — something Chavez has already been implicated in himself without consequences the past few years. He's been caught attempting to deliver $300 million to FARC terrorists, and FARC itself has been caught trying to secure nuclear materials for a dirty bomb in Ukraine and Romania. Meanwhile, the Russian mafiya and Iran's Hezbollah have been making inroads in Latin America as well, and will now find even more of a welcome mat in Venezuela with this nuclear project. For the Obama administration to dismiss the Chavez nuclear deal is shortsighted, given the interconnected nature of the threat from these rogue states and what Venezuela will become as a result. Obama should be muscling Russia to drop the plan and threatening to make Georgia a NATO member if he doesn't. Instead, right now, the approach is to make nice with a predator who has it in for us in more ways than one.It may buy us peace now, but it will buy only trouble in the long run. The Staff: Obama will do nothing to protect us from anything as I believe it is his intention to destroy America as we know it.Lets hope I am wrong