Hard to Disagree with Him...

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez stole the show at the second day of the U.N. General Assembly's General Debate Wednesday, not for equating the United States with imperialism and hegemony, but for calling U.S. President George W. Bush the "devil."

Chavez received some positive applause for his Bush bashing, too.

Taking the podium he immediately held up a copy of Noam Chomsky's "Hegemony or Survival: The Imperialist Strategy of the United States," recommending it as an "excellent" book.

He said, "The hegemonistic pretensions of the American empire are placing at risk the very survival of the human species."

The threat "is like a sword hanging over our head," Chavez said.

"The first people who should read this book are our own brothers and sisters in the United States, because the threat is in their own house," the president said. "Yesterday the devil came here."

Chavez pointed to the podium and added, "It smells of sulfur, still, today," and made the sign of the cross.

"The devil came here as if he owned the world, truly as owner of the world. I think you should call a psychiatrist to analyze yesterday's statement," Chavez said. "As the spokesman of imperialism he came to share his nostrums to try to preserve the current pattern of exploitation, domination and pillage of peoples of the world."

He told delegates an examination of the U.S. president's 20-minute statement Tuesday revealed a recipe for ruling the world.

Chavez said you could make the scenario into an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

"I will even propose a title, 'The Devil's Recipe,'" he said.

Everyone seemed to agree it was not the usual polite diplomatic debate.