Maybe this will be something that we can get the Democrats and the Republicans to come together on- President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela recently announced that Iran is helping them find uranium. And that Russia is helping them to figure out how to develop nuclear energy.

(This is where I am at home, staring at the computer, thinking: what can I possibly say that will illuminate this issue more- what can be more stunning than this announcement in and of itself?)

Three key things that come to mind:

1.    Iran is driving the West crazy with their semi-secretive nuclear programs that they say are only for energy purposes. Obama and the rest of the world are not so sure and have put a lot of UN inspectors and diplomatic resources toward going into the country to see whether it’s true or not- so far, Iran is right- all energy, no weapons.

2.    The Venezuelan government owns and operates CITGO gas- more specifically, from the CITGO website: “The company is owned by PDV America, Inc., an indirect, wholly owned subsidiary of Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A., the national oil company of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.” Why is this important? Because any kind of nuclear issues always get to international trade politics and sanctions, which could have an impact on the amount of oil coming into the U.S., which would have an effect on our economic recovery. Point being- if we slap sanctions on North Korea or Iran, not a huge deal- we don’t get much from them anyway. If we slap sanctions on Venezuela, well, they have a bargaining chip that we can’t afford to lose right now.
 
3.    "What we propose is for nuclear bombs to be eliminated. Venezuela will never build a nuclear bomb," said Chavez.

And my first thought was: wow: if that’s true, then we are the ones who are over the line, right? As in, maybe Venezuela, Iran and Russia- well, ok, Venezuela and Iran- are doing the right thing, pursuing nuclear energy and because the U.S. has this paranoid, paternalistic condescending worldview we think that anyone messing with uranium is going to build a bomb to drop on us- or at least, would like to be able to build a bomb to drop on us. That’s pretty self-centered.

Yep, pretty self-centered and totally necessary. On the nuclear issue, anybody who is out there talking about how evil the U.S. is shouldn’t be messing with nuclear anything- I’m into it. I expect the U.S. to be very (diplomatically) unhappy with this announcement and respond accordingly. Iran needs to be cut off big time from the rest of the world- and in no way, shape or form should they be helping Venezuela do anything that involves uranium. They shouldn’t be talking about trading baseball cards, let alone knowledge about how to find or manipulate nuclear materials.

We’ll see where this one goes, but I would expect it to be immediate, forceful, and no holds barred on the side of the West. If not, well, it’ll get lost amidst the COP15 build-up- which may be Chavez’s plan.