Calling a Spade a Spade

I've gotta give this guy credit.

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) -- Venezuela's highest Catholic prelate on Sunday condemned President Hugo Chavez's rule as a dictatorship and urged Venezuelans to reject it in an attack likely to strain already poor church-government ties.

"I am convinced that what we have here is a dictatorship," Cardinal Rosalio Castillo, who is retired, said in a interview published by El Universal newspaper.

He told Venezuelans to use their constitutional right to refuse to recognize the left-wing president on the grounds he was not ruling democratically. Castillo did not elaborate on what actions he thought Venezuelans should take.

But recent opinion polls show nationalist Chavez enjoys the support of a majority of Venezuelans because his self-styled "revolution" is using abundant oil export income to fund free health and education programs and cheap food for the poor.

Sounds like more of the same. Dictator gets popular support with promises of sticking it to the capitalist man, cardinal calls him out, nothing happens. You have to admit, though: this Cardinal Castillo character's got grapes.