Bush critics unite: Chavez plug for Chomsky's book boosts sales

Who needs publicists and expensive advertising campaigns when you have Hugo Chavez plugging your books? When Venezuela's leader spoke at the UN this week and described George Bush as the Devil, he also gave a resounding boost to a book by another outspoken critic of the US President, Noam Chomsky.

After Mr Chavez recommended that anyone wishing to understand "what has been happening in the world through the 20th century" read Professor Chomsky's 2003 work, Hegemony and Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance, sales of the book soared. On Amazon.com's best-seller list, it leapt from 160,722nd position overnight to seventh.

Mr Chomsky, professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a veteran critic of much of the foreign policy of Western nations, said he had not yet had the opportunity to read Mr Chavez's speech. He knew nothing about the boost to his book's sales but said the policy was well-known.

Mr Chavez commended the book, a detailed examination of US foreign policy and the American efforts to achieve so-called "full spectrum dominance", both to delegates and others.

He added: "I think that the first people who should read this book are our brothers and sisters in the United States, because the threat is in their own house. The Devil is right at home. The Devil, the Devil, himself, is right in the house."