Venezuela

WARMTH and comfort are watchwords of the holiday season. Far from many minds are thoughts of nature's potential savagery. Nature has its way of reminding us, though. Last Wednesday was a momentous day in Venezuela's history. The people, sick of corrupt and vacillating politicians of the supposedly democratic parties, ratified a new constitution that makes President Hugo Chavez a dictator. And while they voted, the rains came, torrents following weeks of rain that had continued past the traditional wet season.

HUGO CHAVEZ, Venezuela's would-be dictator who failed at a coup in 1992 and had to win power by election in 1998, has been re-elected to a six-year term under a new constitution of his making. President Chavez won handily last week, but his coalition took only about 60 percent of the 165-member national assembly. His allies took less than one-half of the 23 governorships, so there was a recount Tuesday giving them more than one-half. This provoked riots. After Sunday, foreign observers pronounced it a fair election.

CARACAS, Venezuela - With his high-voltage smile and his trademark red beret cocked to one side, Hugo Chavez conjures the image of his nickname, "El Comandante," as he shakes his fists toward throngs of screaming fans at a political street party. But as Chavez faces voters again today as a result of the new constitution he helped fashion, his critics are multiplying, and, while they concede his likely victory, they foresee his political demise. Chavez's frequent speeches, once called inspired, are more often described as political tirades now by pundits who point to a 30-point slump in his approval rating.

NEW YORK -- Crude oil rose to a 23-month high as a strike that crippled petroleum exports from Venezuela entered its fourth week, forcing refiners to seek alternative supplies. Venezuelan crude production has dropped more than 90 percent since oil workers walked off the job Dec. 2, traders said. OPEC ministers have no immediate plans to boost output to cover the lost supply. Traders are also concerned the United States and Iraq may go to war and disrupt Persian Gulf crude shipments. Refiners "are scrambling to buy anything they can," said Bill Scott, a crude-oil trader at Burlington Resources Trading Inc. in Houston.

CARACAS, Venezuela -- The United States had better get used to its Latin American nemesis, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. If, as expected, he wins re-election to a new six-year term today, he says he will seek a change in the constitution that would enable him to serve indefinitely. As many as 14 million Venezuelans go to the polls today to choose between Chavez and Manuel Rosales, the scrappy governor of Zulia state. Rosales started his campaign late but has fared better than many expected in re-energizing a badly fragmented, dispirited opposition.

EL CALLAO, Venezuela -- In an effort to end disarray in the mining industry, Venezuela is planning to lift bans on gold and diamond mining in ecologically fragile areas and to grant amnesties to companies that have been mining without governmental permission.Government officials contend that large-scale mining is easier to regulate and tax than small-scale independent mining and that it will open the country's untamed south to development.But Venezuela, named by international executives as Latin America's most corrupt country in a survey this year, has also legalized mining with mercury and other damaging practices, despite warnings in government-commissioned studies.

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. -- Venezuelan right-hander Cesar Hidalgo zipped strike three past Michael Frost last night for his 10th strikeout. As that pitch settled into catcher Guillermo Quiroz's mitt, the Little League World Series was won by a Latin America country for the first time in 36 years.Venezuela defeated the U.S. national champions, from Northridge, Calif., 4-3, in a rain-interrupted game that finished under the lights at Howard J. Lamade Stadium.Hidalgo dropped to his back on the mound and his teammates came from every direction to pile on. The celebration was on. Soon they would be carrying the Venezuelan flag on a trot through the outfield.

CARACAS, Venezuela - With final results in Sunday's election tabulated, President Hugo Chavez has won an overwhelming personal victory, but his coattails were apparently not quite long enough to pull into Congress the followers needed to guarantee him absolute powers. Chavez won 59 percent of the vote. But in the races for the National Assembly, pro-Chavez parties won 99 of 165 seats, which fell just short of the two-thirds majority that would have turned the new single-chamber legislature into a rubber stamp.

CARACAS, Venezuela - In politically charged Venezuela, when President Hugo Chavez takes over the airwaves to deliver one of his rambling speeches, Gloria Villamizar leaves her apartment in a huff. "I just don't want to watch him. I just don't," said Villamizar, 40, a newspaper editorial assistant. By contrast, her husband, Leopoldo Otero, 53, rarely misses a minute of the pugnacious leader. He turns up the volume on the television set, lights a cigarette and settles in for the hours-long sermons.

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. -- Blowing plastic horns and waving blue-white-and-red Dominican Republic flags, the parade of 10 strutted down the steps behind the Venezuelan dugout at Disney's Wide World of Sports yesterday. An hour before the first pitch of this game in the inaugural World Baseball Classic - a game eventually won by the Dominican Republic, 11-5 - this group of Dominican revelers was purposely in enemy territory. They were there to make noise. The Venezuelan fans heard the interruption and immediately responded by chanting "Hey, Venezuela, Hoo," to drown out the bleating horns.