Chavez Discredits Mitt Romney’s Statements

The presidential candidate, a professed Mormon, also said that if elected, he will launch “a campaign to advance economic opportunity in Latin America, and contrast the benefits of democracy, free trade, and free enterprise against the material and moral bankruptcy of the Venezuelan and Cuban model,” branding the socialism of Chavez and the Castros as “malign.”

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Saturday called presidential candidate Mitt Romney “crazy,” referring to Romney’s statement that God created the United States to direct the world, and that if he gets to the White House, he will attack the “malign” socialism of Cuba and Venezuela.

“I was seeing there the statements of a Republican candidate for the United States presidency, attacking Venezuela and Cuba, talking about the malignant Hugo Chavez,” said the Venezuelan leader during a political function broadcast on national television channel VTV, AFP said.

“And he also has the nerve to say that God created the United States to dominate the world. He’s crazy. … Now imagine that this crazy man can be president of the United States,” Chavez said to members of his party.

On Friday, Romney, who aspires to have the vote of confidence of the Republican Party to fight against the Democrat Barack Obama in November of 2012, said that “America must lead the world, or someone else will.”

The presidential candidate, a professed Mormon, also said that if elected he will launch “a campaign to advance economic opportunity in Latin America, and contrast the benefits of democracy, free trade and free enterprise against the material and moral bankruptcy of the Venezuelan and Cuban model,” branding the socialism of Chavez and the Castros as “malign.”

Romney, ex-governor of Massachusetts, is slightly ahead of fellow conservative governor of Texas Rick Perry in the polls of the Republican base facing the party primaries that begin next January, from which will emerge the Republican candidate that will go up against Obama in 2012.

“Obama’s approval is falling, and now the extreme right is threatening to enter” in the race for the U.S. presidency, Chavez advised Saturday.

The United States and Venezuela maintain diplomatic relations full of ups and downs, and currently do not have ambassadors. What’s more, Chavez constantly accuses Washington of trying to destabilize his government.