Or so says Chief Heathen Evangelism and Chilean Astronomy Correspondent R. N., in re: Pat Robertson’s call for democratically elected Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez to be assassinated. Of course, this is a guy who’s been praying for deaths on the SCOTUS for years, so I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised. His quote:

You know, I don’t know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don’t think any oil shipments will stop. But this man is a terrific danger and the United … This is in our sphere of influence, so we can’t let this happen. We have the Monroe Doctrine, we have other doctrines that we have announced. And without question, this is a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil, that could hurt us very badly. We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don’t need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator. It’s a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with. Eschaton

Atrios’ summary: “He’s got oil, and if he won’t give it to us we’ll just have to kill him.”