Private industry becomes an endangered species in Venezuela

Chavez aims to nationalize absolutely all of his country's energy sector, his own words:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said on Saturday the country's entire energy sector had to be nationalized, reinforcing his socialist revolution and possibly giving himself more targets for state take-over.

But he said he would permit foreign firms to hold minority stakes in energy deals.

The anti-U.S. leader, in power since 1999, this week announced he would nationalize power utilities and the country's biggest telecommunications firm, confirming his status as the catalyst of Latin America's swing to the left.

"We have decided to nationalize the whole Venezuelan energy and electricity sector, all of it, absolutely all," Chávez said in his annual state of the nation address to parliament, potentially opening up more projects for state acquisition in the No. 4 crude exporter to the United States.

The president was reinaugurated this week for a term that runs through 2013.

It's so obvious to me, and it should be obvious to anyone paying attention, that Chavez is trying to consolidate his power in order to become the Fidel Castro of the 21st century. Let's hope the Venezuelan people see through the smokescreen and see that they are being manipulated.