Johann Hari in Venezuela. posted by Richard Seymour

It is hard to believe, but Johann Hari has been blowing the horn for revolutionary socialism down in Venezuela, where Hugo Chavez has been transferring wealth and power to the workers, arming the peasants, thumbing his nose at the US and selling cheap oil to their geopolitical enemies.

Here he defends what he chooses to describe as a "Salsa revolution", and even goes so far as to fight for Hugo Chavez's honour. Chavez? The Venezuelan George Galloway (use your imagination)? The friend and ally of Fidel Castro? Why, yes, the very same...

Here he talks some more about the mountainous inequalities in Venezuela, contextualising them in relation to US imperialism, and also satirises the pretensions of a couple of upper class pillocks he meets while there.

Of course, it is all framed within the purview of European social democracy: the Venezuelans are only fighting for what we Europeans take for granted. Still, as Lenin said "one must always try to be as radical as reality itself.” Reality itself, it would seem, has been biting Johann hard in the ass while he has been visiting downtown Caracas.