Todavía soy un hombre joven.

Wow. Translation software has certainly improved. I put in the sentence, "I am still a young man.", in babelfish, and had it translate into Chinese. I then copied the Chinese translation, and entered it to be translated to Spanish. Then just to check I had it translated back to English.

Expecting a result similar to the instructions for a made in China BB pistol--like the ones I supplied at Christmas one year---I was shocked to see the result: "I'm still a young man." It picked up the contraction along the way and that is it.

"Why that phrase?", one may wonder. Well I was daydreaming about the situation in Venezuela, thinking how Hugo Chavez is going to combat the upstart Henrique Capriles who is running against him in the October election. Young and healthy guy against an unhealthy sociopath (if you ask me).

Hugo is busy giving out apartments and pensions, spending money like there is not tomorrow. Very possibly, for him, there isn't. Besides, it isn't his money.

Then I thought about Obama. It seems a great way to hedge his bets. Hugo could tell people, "Don't worry about my health, about which I lie all the time. If I kick the bucket, and Obama, for some reason doesn't get reelected, he can replace me. You won't notice a thing."

Hugo before he fell apart completely. He looks religious, but that is actually a drug delivery device, and a lollipop. He tries, but not the stuff of T-shirts, like his idol, the late comrade Che.

So, Obama is talking to his advisors, like the guy with the motorized Mr Potato head eyebrows, and he says, hey if we blow it, I can get my chops back by being El Presidente in Venezuela, and since I am still a young man, I can come back in four years, and serve at least 2 more terms. Maybe we can get term limits suspended, or even elections when the only ones running against us are the bad guys. Once I'm in, who needs interference by voters or their representatives. It is the bane of the presidency--people don't always get that you need absolute power, dammit.

So, that is how the whole babelfish experiment came about. I thought it made sense that the big O would be trying to say things in Spanish. I was thinking he might just go down there and run in that election, too. Except it is before ours. His big talking point against Hugo would be that he's still a young man. Everyone thinks Chavez is likely to die at any minute, so it could sway the votes. Policy-wise, no real difference, most likely.

If he wins there, and wins here, then I'm not sure what happens. He could just let Mr Potatohead motorized eyebrows run Venezuela. Or run everything. But O would have to hang here so he can keep Air Force One. If he used it for official Venezuela business, people would be displeased. It's OK for vacations and for campaigning though.

Who knows, Venezuela could become the 58th or 59th state--however many we have plus one.

I'm not too sure where this story goes. It is full of holes as is the way of daydreams, but I think I explained my visit to the world of free translations.