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Latin America, long considered off-limits for Russian military outposts because of its proximity to Washington, is rapidly becoming the latest region targeted for Moscow’s expanding reach. As the Kremlin was secretly planning its invasion of Ukraine in late February, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced Moscow’s plan to establish a permanent military presence in Latin America, including naval visits to ports in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. Russia is also asking those countries to allow long-range bombers to refuel at their air bases.

It is rare that this site has to offer assistance to the Associated Press, but this is one such occasion. In November, 2012 the AP posted a story exposing the miserable failure that passes for a healthcare delivery system in Venezuela. The truth seeped into the AP’s website and archives but has since disappeared. This is where we can be of help. Thanks to the ever vigilant Wayback Machine the truth as originally posted by the AP lives on. The news organization’s story starts by following the misery of a 37 year old woman who has a huge cancerous tumor...

Sean Penn is an idiot. But you knew that. There are more idiots in Hollywood. But you knew that too. Here is a who's who of Hollywood idiots who were supporters of Hugo Chavez. Oliver Stone, Danny Glover, Kevin Spacey, Harry Belafonte and Don King. Belafonte has claimed that millions of Americans support Chavez. Of Chavez government King once said "To see what is happening here makes me feel good all over." If only someone would shove a microphone up his in his face and in the faces of all these idiots and see what they have to say about...

(BELOW IS THE MOST VOMIT-INDUCING PART OF THE STORY) Sean also paid tribute to South-African-born Charlize in a speech he made before auctioning off a Jeff Koons sculpture made out of 67 guns he previously owned. 'I'm a self-proclaimed Alpha male who owns 67 firearms,' he told the star-studded audience. 'But I've had my mind changed about guns by a strong woman, a beautiful South African woman. 'I don't need these cowardly instruments of violence and destruction, none of us do.'

Like father, like son. Hopper Penn, the 19-year-old son of Oscar winner Sean Penn, attacked a photographer yesterday. The assault brought back memories of his father's famous battles with the paparazzi. The young Penn upped his daddy's violent outbursts by hurling a homophobic and racial slur against the photographer in question, who is black, according to TMZ.

Maria Conchita Alonso, the Cuban-Venezuelan actress who counts as one of her best-known films “Moscow on the Hudson” with Robin Williams, is drawing controversy over a political ad in which she appears with a California Tea Party lawmaker who is running for governor. Several Latino organizations criticized the actress for endorsing Tim Donnelly, an assemblyman who founded a state chapter of the Minutemen, an armed vigilante border patrol group, and who has pushed for a hard line on immigration.

Sean Penn and Charlize Theron seem to be getting awfully serious. On Saturday evening during the Help Haiti Home Gala in Beverly Hills the 53-year-old actor hinted his 38-year-old lady love of several months changed his mind about his the astonishing number of gund he owns - 65 in total - per E! In his speech the Mystic River actor said 'a strong woman who happens to be from South Africa' convinced him to destroy the fire arms. -snip- 'Sean stated during his speech, 'Being provoked by this aforementioned strong woman and considering how liberating of bulls--t and ugliness it...

Sean Penn, who has a long and violent relationship with photographers, was caught giving a verbal beat-down to a fan who tried to snap a photo of the actor while he relaxed at the Lobby Bar in San Francisco’s St. Regis Hotel Tuesday night. TMZ, which posted the video, said bar patrons told the website that the fan used his flash from afar, which caught Penn’s attention. The website said bar-goers saw Penn chase the man, slam his phone to the ground and scream, “Do we look like f—ing zoo animals?” “Get the f— out of here,” Penn says on...

If it weren’t for the tea party, Congress would work well, Hollywood actor Sean Penn said during a recent appearance on CNN with host Piers Morgan. And he also said tea partyers should be forcibly committed for mental health treatment. Really, the tea party is to blame for nearly all of the issues facing Congress, he said, as Politico reported. “I think they have — there’s a mental health problem in Congress,” Mr. Penn said. “This would be solved by committing them by executive order, I think. Because these are our American brothers and sisters, we shouldn’t be criticizing them,...

SEAN PENN: It is funny. Because what you were talking about before we went to the break, you know, I, I was in Port-au-Prince when the shutdown happened. And, and I said to people -- they need, I had stuff that it was demanding on me in Port-au-Prince but I, I had to come home, listen I, I have to leave Haiti now because I have to travel to the third world county that I come from. You have been, you know, this I think, you know, on the forefront of this gun thing. All of these things and this...

"There's a mental health problem in Congress," says actor and liberal activist Sean Penn. The president could solve the problem "by committing them by executive order," Penn told CNN's Piers Morgan Monday night.Asked if Penn would have "people like Ted Cruz" committed, Penn said, "He is my American brother. I won't -- I think we should take care of him, he is in, he's the trouble.""Well, actually have him committed," Morgan followed up."Yeah, I think it's a good idea," Penn said.

Our government is yet again marching us towards a war of choice in the Middle East and our non-partisan, peace-loving celebrities have gone missing since late 2008. We fear the worst. 1. Sheryl Crow LAST KNOWN PRE-2009 COMMUNICATION: “I think war is based in greed and there are huge karmic retributions that will follow. I think war is never the answer to solving any problems. The best way to solve problems is to not have enemies.” — Sheryl Crow 2. Bruce Springsteen LAST KNOWN PRE-2009 COMMUNICATION: “War. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing.” — Bruce Springsteen

In 2003, ahead of a U.S. attack on Iraq, a robust anti-war movement in Hollywood included [2] a TV commercial starring Martin Sheen and Sean Penn visiting Baghdad. There were online petitions signed by Ed Asner; letters to President George W. Bush pleading for peace were signed by Matt Damon, Tim Robbins, Barbra Streisand and Alec Baldwin; former M*A*S*H star Mike Farrell fronted multiple press conferences where celebrities denounced war. In interviews, Janeane Garofalo stopped identifying herself as an actor -- she preferred to be called a member of the U.S. anti-war movement. The good news for President Barack Obama...

KANYE WEST GOES POSTAL ON ANOTHER PHOTOG Paramedics On Scene THIS VIDEO IS CRAZY ... Kanye West viciously attacked another photog at LAX Friday afternoon -- and it was so bad ... paramedics rushed to the scene. Kanye was on his way out of the airport when he was swarmed with paparazzi, snapping pictures. One photog was especially aggressive -- not a TMZ photog -- and probed Kanye with a bunch of questions.

With U.S. policymakers distracted by the situation in Honduras, Nicaragua continues to move toward authoritarianism. On October 19, a Nicaraguan Supreme Court panel overturned a constitutional provision limiting presidents to two non-consecutive terms in office. The ruling will allow incumbent Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega--the Sandinista party leader, former Soviet client, vociferous critic of the United States, and current Hugo Chávez acolyte--to run for another term in 2011. If there were any doubts that Nicaraguan democracy is slowly being extinguished, this latest development should remove them. The Nicaraguan Supreme Court is composed of 16 members. Thanks to a political deal made...

Kristen Stewart: Um, sweetie? You don’t need to screw the director once you’ve already gotten the part. Also, the perma-stoned look is so 2004.

Scenes of mass grief and hysteria have accompanied the deaths of many dictators, from the Soviet Union’s Josef Stalin in 1953 to North Korea’s Kim Jong-Il in 2011. The public mourning in Venezuela following the death this week of the country’s Socialist President Hugo Chavez from cancer at the age of 58 will be played out for weeks. The Venezuelan people have been whipped into hysteria by the propaganda of the sinister — and aggressively anti-American — political machine Chavez left behind as his legacy. The complete collapse in law and order in his country meant crime spiralled out of...

AFP - US filmmaker and long-time Hugo Chavez supporter Oliver Stone hailed the late Venezuelan leader as a "great hero" on Tuesday, saying he will "live forever in history." Actor and activist Sean Penn, another Hollywood friend to Chavez, also paid tribute saying the world's poor had lost a "champion" and America had also lost "a friend it never knew it had."

Sean Penn on the Death of Hugo Chavez: "I Lost a Friend" Despite his criticisms of the United States, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez did have supporters in Hollywood, including Sean Penn, who mourned Chavez's death Tuesday. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez dead at 58 "Today the people of the United States lost a friend it never knew it had," Penn said in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter. "And poor people around the world lost a champion. I lost a friend I was blessed to have. My thoughts are with the family of President Chavez and the people of Venezuela." Chavez,...

Hollywood leftist Sean Penn’s support of the belligerent socialist leader of Venezuela is well-known. Around this time last December a Venezuelan-raised actress called him out as a “communist a**hole” at an airport for his stance, but Penn has steadfastly supported the man who called President Bush “the devil” at the United Nations headquarters in 2006 and accused the United States of giving him cancer. Saying journalists who refer to Chavez as a “dictator” should be jailed (which should tell you a little something about how he understands freedom), Penn claimed in 2010: “Who do you know here who’s gone through...

Kid Rock: "You are a Communist" Sean Penn: "You are a red-neck" It gets better.......

Kid Rock and Sean Penn teamed up this week to make a short movie tackling the rhetoric and stereotypes that can accompany political differences. Rock, who is a Mitt Romney supporter and recently spoke at a Paul Ryan rally, joined Penn, a supporter of President Obama and vocal political activist, in what Rock called in a tweet "a public service film." The mini-movie, titled "Americans," is co-written by Penn and Rock. It shows the two men meeting in a bar and clashing over their politically opposite opinions. "The goal of the film is to tear down the one-dimensional political stereotypes...

Sean Penn campaigns in Venezuela — for Hugo Chavez Human Events- Coupled with Chavez's own 14-year record of intimidating political enemies, denouncing U.S. opponents, and forging alliances

Sean Penn loves dictators, especially if they are anti-American leftists. Recently, the Hollywood star visited Venezuela to campaign for strongman Hugo Chavez. Mr. Penn joined Mr. Chavez at a major rally in the city of Valencia. The actor has been a longtime friend of the despot. With Venezuelans going to the polls on Oct. 7, Mr. Penn came to bolster Mr. Chavez’s re-election efforts. He should be ashamed; Mr. Penn’s actions border on treason. “Thank you very much for visiting us again, dear friend,” Mr. Chavez said, while introducing Mr. Penn in front of a large crowd. “We're all Americans,...

U.S. actor Sean Penn joined President Hugo Chávez at an election rally in Venezuela on Sunday, bringing a dash of Hollywood to the campaign as he rode with him atop a truck past cheering supporters. Penn is a friend of Chávez, who hopes to win a new six-year term on October 7. The campaign has turned into the toughest fight of the president's political career. …

Sean Penn was Hugo Chavez' guest of honor (again) last week, serving as keynote speaker at graduation ceremonies for Venezuela's Salvador Allende Medical School. "Allow me to impart a little anecdote," beamed the two-time Oscar winner to the enchanted crowd. "I had the privilege (italics mine) to introduce my children to comandante Fidel Castro and as he posed for a photo between them I told him: "President, (italics mine) I'll now be denounced in the U.S. for educating my children as socialist revolutionaries. So Castro responded: "That's among the best things that could happen to them.” Besides his fame...

The Falkland Islands put on a show of strength against Argentine aggression and outspoken left-wing Hollywood actor Sean Penn - with a mile-long convoy of 4x4s. Dozens of Union Flag-waving Falklanders snaked their way out of the capital Stanley yesterday afternoon in a patriotic blur of red, white and blue. The procession, which looked at times like a summer carnival parade, is unlikely to scare Argentina into not launching an attack on the dispute archipelago. It is also doubtful it will force Penn, who has consistently backed Argentina in recent days, to keep his mouth shut. But it does act...

<p>CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Actor Sean Penn criticized Republican presidential candidates during a visit to Venezuela on Thursday, saying that right-wing policies in the United States aim to benefit the wealthy. Penn made the remarks after meeting with socialist President Hugo Chavez at Venezuela's presidential palace, when he was asked by a reporter about criticisms of Chavez by some Republican candidates.</p>

Sean Penn Appointed Haitian Ambassador LOS ANGELES, USA (defend.ht) - Sean Penn has accepted the job of Ambassador for Haiti, where he has spent the last two years managing a tent camp for displaced Haitians after the earthquake. Sean Penn will now be the "ambassador at large" for the Caribbean nation. Penn was offered the position by Haitian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Laurent Lamothe, while at the Cinema for Peace benefit in Los Angeles on Saturday night. Picking up a humanitarian award for his work in Haiti, he told the crowd: "I do accept [the job]," before adding it would...

Via the New York Post, which has an account of their angry exchange at LAX, 15 solid minutes of hippie-punching goodness. Skip ahead to 5:30 for the meaty bits. She wrote an open letter to Penn last year unloading on him for his cretinous Chavista apologetics and I guess he must have remembered because allegedly the word “pig” ended up being thrown around during their chat — and not by Alonso. Quoth the NYP: Penn, traveling from Haiti, told us: “I only knew that a hostile woman was nonsensically berating me. I didn’t realize it was that actress. I think...

An actress and former international beauty pageant queen had a heated run-in with actor Sean Penn at Los Angeles International Airport recently, in which she says he called her a pig and she responded by calling him a communist. Maria Conchita Alonso, who is known for her role in the movies "The Running Man" and "Predator 2," was picking up her wheelchair-bound mother at LAX when she noticed fellow actor Sean Penn standing by the same luggage carousel. Alonso had not interacted with Penn since she wrote an open letter to him in March 2010 criticizing him for supporting socialist...

Penn sees red in LAX tirade Sean Penn and Cuban actress Maria Conchita Alonso were once Hollywood co-stars — but they had an angry bust-up at LAX, with Alonso branding Penn a “communist [bleep]hole” after he called her a “pig” in front of a stunned crowd. It started when Alonso picked up her mother from a Miami flight and spotted Penn in an American Airlines lost luggage area Sunday. Alonso, born in Cuba and raised in Venezuela, says her “heart stopped” when she saw the actor, to whom she’d written an open letter last year to say she was “appalled”...

Cuban-born, Venezuelan-raised actress Maria Conchita Alonso and actor Sean Penn had a contentious exchange at Los Angeles International airport recently, in which Alonso called Penn a “communist a**hole“ and Penn called Alonso a ”pig.” Over a year and a half after Alonso penned an open letter to Penn asking him why he supports socialist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the two met up serendipitously (or not so) at LAX while both were waiting to claim lost luggage. Alonso, who starred alongside Penn in the 1988 film “Colors,” described the exchange to Steve Malzberg on WMAL. “I go ‘Hello,’ and he smiles...

Interview over a confrontation at the Airport where she has words with Sean Penn. Audio at link.

Apparently British talk show host Piers Morgan is still hacked off about the Boston Tea Party and looks at the Fourth of July as a day of mourning instead of a national holiday, as yet another guest on his show "Piers Morgan Tonight" has used it as a sound board against Conservatives and the TEA Party. Sean Penn (aka Hugo and Fidel's Pal) echoed previous guests actors Morgan Freeman and Alan Cumming (the night before the Penn interview, Cumming said that the TEA Party was driven by 'homophobia and racism.) in his their hatred of the TEA Party by remarking...

Actor Sean Penn says the Tea Party wants to “lynch” President Obama, launching the latest celebrity attack on the conservative grassroots movement that has grown into a political force. During an interview with CNN’s Piers Morgan on Friday in which Penn rambled about the need for more infrastructure spending, affordable health care, bolder actions from President Obama and an end to the Afghanistan war – all in the same answer -- he segued into what’s wrong with the Tea Party. “And yet there’s another problem. You have what I call ‘the get the N-word out of the White House party,’...

US Hikers Freed from Iran Speak: Thank Penn And Chomsky, Blame Mutual US-Iran Hostility for Detention --------“The only explanation for our prolonged detention is the 32 years of mutual hostility between America and Iran,” said Bauer. “The irony is Sarah Josh and I oppose U.S. policies towards Iran which perpetuate this hostility. We were convicted of espionage, because we are American.”

U.S. actor Sean Penn engaged in attempts to secure the release of two Americans freed by Iran this week, flying to Venezuela to ask President Hugo Chavez to intervene with Iran's leader, a source close to the release process said on Friday. Since Tehran freed Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer on Wednesday details have emerged about the efforts to win their freedom, which involved the United Nations, Iraq and Oman - as well as Chavez, who is a fiery critic of the United States. Venezuela's deputy foreign minister said on Thursday that Chavez brought up the case with his Iranian...

Sgt. Dustin L. Williams will have to find another date to the Nov. 10 Marine Corps Ball. His first choice, A-lister Scarlett Johansson, won't be able to make it. In an exclusive statement to Zap2it, Johansson writes: "I feel incredibly honored to have been invited to the Marine Corps Ball by Sgt. Dustin L. Williams. Not only does Sgt. Williams deserve recognition for his bravery, selflessness and dedication to the United States and its people, but he also displays a cheeky talent for film making.Sgt. Williams, unfortunately due to prior commitments I will not be able to attend the Ball...

To make their first bonafide Hollywood debut as a couple, Scarlett Johansson and Sean Penn picked the most romantic event possible: a wedding!

I recently watched a video of actress Susan Sarandon being interviewed at the protest in Wisconsin. Susan bravely cheered for solidarity, decried plutocracy in America and she spoke out about those horrible, greedy people known as ‘The Wealthy.’ Of course, I naturally thought she was talking about HERSELF. After all, Susan Sarandon has been a famous movie star for many decades, and I was pretty sure she had accumulated quite a bit of money. But no, apparently “The Wealthy” Sarandon spoke of was Wisconsin’s Governor Scott Walker (or as she called him, “idiot Walker”). “It takes a lot of courage...

After getting into an argument with a female airport employee and balking at going through the security line, Sean Penn was taken aside at TSA officials today before jetting out of LAX. While being patted down, the Oscar-winning actor was on his best behavior, and after he made his way through the line just like everyone else, we're hoping he continued to mind his manners.

EXCERPTS "I didn't have commitments, except for way in the future; I had nothing pressing," he told the publication. "I got practical issues … I had just got taken for one half of everything I had in the divorce, so it's not like I don't have to work." (snip) "Let's face it," he declared, "I'm a person that feels pretty alienated from the rest of the world and never felt understood by anyone."

WikiLeaks cables reveal the crew of an American Airlines jet was detained in Venezuela in 2008 after making a minor joke over the plane's PA about President Hugo Chavez, forcing American to fly the plane empty to get them home.

Minutes after Naomi Watts, movie star, arrived at the CIA’s secret Virginia training center called The Farm, she was thrown to the ground in a way that left bruises. When she cried out in pain, her instructor glared and informed her, “Don’t say 'ow’ again unless you need to go to the hospital.” During the days that followed, she was “stripped of everything that cloaked her in specialness,” said director Doug Liman. The actress chose the rough treatment, Liman said. He chose Watts to play Valerie Plame Wilson, the spy who was outed in one of the most controversial episodes...

Nearly a year after Haiti’s devastating earthquake, Sean Penn’s JP Haitian Relief Organization is managing a massive tent city. And now, as several of his relief partners announce they are pulling out, Penn is standing his ground.

Rats and diseases infested Cuban prison cells so badly that some inmates tried to kill themselves and other did themselves harm, according to freed political prisoners who spoke Thursday in Spain. Those who spoke were among 11 political prisoners released this week and flown to Spain to start new lives. At a press conference in Madrid, they painted a squalid picture of the prison conditions they had endured. "The hygiene and health situations in prisons throughout the island of Cuba are not terrible, they are worse than terrible," freed dissident Julio Cesar Galvez said. "We had to live with rats...

Yesterday, the Supreme Court upheld a federal law barring material support for foreign terrorist organizations. And right on time, America’s favorite useful idiot has come out swinging against it. Jimmy Carter is upset because, with this federal law upheld, he won’t be able to pal around with his buddies in Hamas and Hezbollah anymore. Cue the tiny little violin playing: Former President Jimmy Carter has voiced concern that Monday’s Supreme Court ruling on “material support” to terrorist groups may criminalize his “work to promote peace and freedom.” Carter, whose advocacy has entailed contact with groups designated by the U.S. government...

LOS ANGELES – A prosecution spokesman says Sean Penn has reached a plea deal in a case in which he was videotaped kicking a photographer. Penn entered a no contest plea to vandalism through his attorney Wednesday morning. City attorney's spokesman Frank Mateljan (Mah-tell-JIN') says Penn was sentenced to three years of informal probation and ordered to perform 300 hours of community service. Mateljan says those hours can be completed through Penn's earthquake-relief efforts in Haiti.