Free Republic

Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chávez is an ally of the Iranian mullahs, a supporter of North Korea, a close friend of Fidel Castro and a good customer for Vladimir Putin's weapon factories. Now he's also a business partner of Joseph P. Kennedy II. The former Democratic Congressman describes the deal he's cooked up with Mr. Chávez as charity for low-income consumers of heating oil. But it's worth asking what the price of this largesse is to Venezuelans and to U.S. security interests. The arrangement is this: Mr. Chávez's Citgo--a Houston-based oil company owned by the Venezuelan government--is supplying home heating oil...

Businesses and people around the country are digging into their pockets to help four Alaska villages whose tribal leaders rejected a heating-fuel gift from the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, a critic of President George Bush. Donations, including a huge one from several fishing companies, have been so numerous there might be enough to replace the gift -- and then some. "The response has been overwhelming," said Dimitri Philemonof, president of the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, a nonprofit representing villages in Southwest Alaska. --snip-- A conservative Web site, www. freerepublic.com, posted a story that had run in the Daily News...