News item: "CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuela had a blunt message this week for Exxon Mobil, one of the world's most powerful oil companies: Get off my crude-rich turf."

All right, what do we have to do, wait for a pack of crazed Latinos to crash a hijacked airliner into Disneyland before we realize that Venezuela and its power-crazed presidente cum dictator Hugo Chavez have declared war on the United States?

And don't try to tell me that Venezuela's threatening an oil company and not the United States. Exxon Mobil is the United States. Just ask Dick Cheney. If you can find him.

Venezuela poses a clear and present danger to this country and has for some time. First, its people thumbed their collective noses at us when they restored Chavez to office after evicting him for a couple of days, thereby undoing all the good work our CIA had done.

Then Chavez, out for revenge, poked fun at our beloved president when they were down in Argentina and got several thousand other USA-hating Latin Americans to join in the fun. But it wasn't until last winter when Chavez demonstrated the depths to which he was willing to stoop in his Communist-inspired attempts to thwart our efforts to spread freedom and democracy throughout the world.

What did he do? For those who don't recall, he offered cut-rate heating fuel to needy people in the Northeast who were facing a cold winter and skyrocketing fuel oil prices at home.

Think about it: Here was a foreigner using his resources to undercut upstanding, patriotic American oil companies who were simply trying to make ends meet by exercising their Cheney-given, price-gouging rights.

The most embarrassing part of that sordid episode is that some states, Massachusetts, for one, actually took Chavez up on his offer. But then what can you expect from a state that would elect Ted Kennedy to the U.S. Senate time after time?

Exxon Mobil, to its credit, has vowed to stand firm against a country it has been exploiting for years and says it will not pull out, as those spineless bleeding heart liberals would have us do in Iraq.

I realize that our government, especially the departments of Defense and State, don't need any advice from me, especially considering the splendid job they've done in Iraq, but I think Chavez' belligerent attitude offers us a chance to solve two problems in one fell swoop.

With democracy in full bloom in Iraq and with the insurgents on their last legs and civil war a mere figment of the cut-and-run crowd's imagination, what better time to announce Mission Accomplished II and bring our troops home to prepare for another pre-emptive strike against a potentially deadly enemy much nearer our vulnerable shores.

As we know, Condoleezza Rice's Threat of the Month Club is prone to change. For a long time it was Iraq, until we went in there and got rid of all those weapons of mass destruction. Then it was North Korea and most recently, Iran. So why not move Venezuela up to Numero Uno?

Laugh if you will, but Chavez is rolling in oil money. How long do you think it would take him to assemble an invasion fleet of bum boats and invade Key West? Or he could invade Mexico and then send his hordes across our undefended border before Tom Tancredo and Jim Sensenbrenner can get their fence built.

I say fight him now on that crude-rich turf of his before we have to fight him here.

Besides, we have a pretty good win-lose record against fifth-rate Latin American opponents. Remember Grenada? And Panama?

On to Caracas!

David Rossie is associate editor; his column is published on Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Email to: drossie@pressconnects.com

© 2006 Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin

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