VENEZUELAN PRESIDENT HUGO CHAVEZ DEAD @ 58.............

President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who has served for nearly a decade and a half as the oil rich South American Head of State died this afternoon of cancer at age 58.  Chavez only recently returned to Venezuela, after an extended stay in Cuna for surgery and convalescence related to the cancer.  Chavez socialized the Venezuelan national economy, destroying it in the view of his opponents.  His nationalization of the oil industry, cut prices and sold voluminous supplies of petroleum to other nations, including the United States at relatively cheap costs.  He was however, a fierce critic and outspoken opponent of the Amnerican Government, going as far as to call former President George W. Bush, "the devil", when he appeared at the United Nations the day after him in 2006; and expressed disappointment with President Obama's policies and leadership in 2010.  A close ally of the Communist Castro brothers Fidel and Raoul, in Cuba the former Army Colonel Chavez's rise to power came after two failed coup attempts against the sitting President, imprisonment for two years, and then a come from behind Presidential Election in 1998.  He won the Presidency of what he renamed the Bolivian Republic of Venezuela, after his political hero, Simon Bolivar.  He was re-elected last October to a new term as President with 63% of the vote.  His death was announced on Venezuelan Television by his Vice President Nicolas Maduro, who delivered a national address to inform the country and the world Chavez had died.  Vice President Maudro also launched a verbal condemnation of two American Diplomatsm expelling them from Venezuela, abd accusing the United States of poisoning Hugi Chavez with the cancer that killed him.     No details yet as to the celebration of his funeral as the unfolding coverage and commentary on Hugo Chavez's life and leadership on the world stage proceeds.............tdp