Venezuelans protest Chavez's new socialist push

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Riot police used tear gas Wednesday to block
hundreds of Venezuelans protesting the latest moves by President Hugo
Chavez to concentrate his power. The demonstrators said a blacklist of
opposition candidates and a series of socialist decrees are destroying
what's left of their democracy.

Though the protest of about 1,000 people chanting "freedom!" was small
compared to past marches, there is a growing public outcry over the
sidelining of key government opponents ahead of state and local
elections in November.

Chavez opponents also are outraged by 26 laws the president just
decreed, some of them mirroring the socialist measures voters rejected
in a December referendum.

"We said in the referendum that we didn't want that, and now he's put
it in the decrees," said protester Josefina Bravo, a 59-year-old who
wore a sticker reading "No means no" on her baseball cap. "That's the
problem we have: All the powers are concentrated in the president."

Chavez issued the decrees just before the expiration of special
legislative powers that allowed him to make laws without National
Assembly approval for the past 18 months.

For a time after the defeat of his constitutional referendum in
December that would have imposed radical economic changes and let him
run for re-election indefinitely, Chavez seemed to be taking a more
pragmatic, less confrontational approach to his socialist project.

Now the leftist leader is pushing hard again to remake Venezuelan
society.

One decree establishes a civilian militia that critics warn could
emulate the citizen groups that control many aspects of community life
in Cuba. Another gives Chavez the ability to designate regional
authorities who critics say could undermine the power of locally
elected officials.

Other decrees empower Chavez to expropriate goods from private
businesses and increase state control over food, punishing business
owners who fail to comply with price controls with fines, closure and
even 10-year prison terms.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080807/D92D4QGO0.html