Watching Hugo Chavez in his weekly TV program can be surreal. I usually can’t stand it so that I simply watch the recap later on TV of the most “significant” things he said. Sometimes as I watch, I am not sure whether I am seeing the real thing or a parody of our President. It is not easy to transmit the style to those that have never seen Hugo Chavez in action. A week ago it really seemed like a parody as Chavez spoke and sang Christmas songs laughing at the opposition. I thought hard about trying to convey what I had seen, but did not think it would get through. This Sunday I had the same feeling, this is impossible to explain, convey or communicate. But I will simply reproduce what Chavez said on October 12th., what US citizens call “Columbus Day” and we had called “Day of Races” until Hugo Chavez changed the name to “Day of indigenous resistance”. Here is my recap:
He said Columbus reaching the Americas, unleashed a genocide which lasted 150 years in the hands of conquistadors who were worse than Hitler. He called what happened the worst genocide in the history of mankind. He said the conquistadors, be it Spanish, Portuguese or British, killed one native every ten minutes for 150 years, exterminating 97 million people. He saluted Sitting Bull explaining the story of Custer and the screamed Long live Sitting Bull! (Toro Sentado in Spanish)
Now, this was all carefully prepared and staged (the numbers had to be given to him prior to the program) and there were massacres and abuses that nobody can question in the conquest of the Americas. But Chavez sounded like he was talking about the present. Venezuela was probably one of the countries with the smallest population and the most backward natives of the region, but he made it sound like ity all happened right here and he actually personally suffered from it and without it our native population would have developed a better country. But when he said Long live Sitting Bull!, it became so theatrical and infantile that is was simply absurd. Like so much in this country……..
The Devil's Excrement 
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