With enemies like these, who needs friends?

[Barnabas]

He asked the president of Argentina for a Nuclear Reactor

http://feeds.venezuelanews.net/?rid=658d451d1dcc8a47&cat=262fd6adf564928c&f=1

[Barnabas]

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/nation/12872937.htm

"I cannot imagine anything that Argentina could do that could get the United States more upset than this," said Peter Hakim, president of Inter-American Dialogue, a think tank in Washington. "Venezuela is seen as a major adversary of the United States. The U.S. has no confidence in Venezuela, and they don't have a lot of confidence in Argentina either."

The timing is tricky. Venezuela's proposal to purchase the reactor was made formally in August, but it was not disclosed until Clarin broke it on Sunday. The news comes less than a month before Argentina is to play host to Bush, Chavez and the hemisphere's other presidents at the Summit of the Americas on Nov. 4-5.

Argentina is also in the heat of a campaign for parliamentary elections Oct. 23. Among the high-profile candidates Kirchner is backing is Rafael Bielsa, Argentina's foreign minister.

Bielsa said Sunday that Argentine would pursue any potential nuclear sale to Venezuela "with great responsibility" and follow its agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency. He said the United States had not objected when Argentina sold nuclear technology to Egypt, Australia, Algeria and Peru.

But others questioned the wisdom of such close dealings with Chavez, particularly on such a controversial issue.

Ricardo Lopez Murphy, a center-right candidate running for parliament in greater Buenos Aires, criticized Chavez's government as "tending toward totalitarianism." Interviewed on Radio Palermo, he warned against making any deal that would cause "a serious problem with the international community."

Even within Kirchner's government are critics who either do not trust Chavez or think such a deal is not worth the ire it would bring from the United States, Clarin said.

Bush administration officials and critics across the Americas say Chavez's efforts to spread his so-called Bolivarian Revolution are sowing insecurity across the region. They accuse him of crippling democracy at home and using his plentiful oil revenues to meddle dangerously in the affairs of Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia and other nations.

But Chavez is popular with many Latin Americans. His anti-Bush rhetoric wins fans, and so does his largesse.

[RGBVideo]

WTF does he think he needs a two-bit gangster like Mugabe?

The same reason Republic of China needs to be friends with tiny poor countries around the world and Israel was friends with Iran in the 80s; it's UN-centered realpolitik, the best way for internationally loathed countries to get allies in important votings is to be friends with other internationally loathed countries.