He's still alive because some clueless bishop saw Chavez crying after he was captured and believed Chavez's lying promises that he would reform and be nicer to those outside the thug-class that supposedly elected him. The bishop then convinced Chavez's captors to let him go. The rest is a fine lesson on why you don't have mercy on a poisonous snake and why it's a good thing to separate church and state.
That's interesting, I'd never heard that before. There are still a lot of leftist clergy in Latin America. But I don't think it has anything to do with church and state - the bishop didn't have any authority, after all, but was basically just a bleeding heart liberal who whined at the right people. One of the problems was that there was no leader set up to take over right then and there, as soon as Chavez was gone, and that we withdrew our support for the attempt almost immediately, thanks to the leftist-favoring idiots at State.
Personally, I think one of the things that has led to Bush's desire to shake up State is its massive misunderstanding/mismanagement of the Latin American situation, particularly VZ. It's also one of the reasons the Dems hate Bolton so, because he tried to clean it up, even though the leftist favoring analysts were the darlings of various left-leaning Dem legislators.
That said, the sooner Chavez is not alive, the better. But he's had a number of years to get deeply entrenched now and to extend his power throughout Latin America, through the channels set up by Cuba over the decades, and I think this problem is not going to be easy to solve.