Chavez gift to Obama makes bestseller list

A book that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez presented to the US President Barack Obama has become a bestseller in just two days. Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent, was ranked 54,295 on the sales charts of Amazon.com before Chavez gave Obama the book. It has now jumped to number two. The book, written by Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano, looks at the impact of foreign intervention in Latin America over the past five centuries. It was first published in Spanish in 1971, and offers a critique of the consequences of 500 years of European and US colonization of Latin America. President Chavez handed his American counterpart the book on the sidelines of the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad on Saturday. It was a Spanish-language paperback copy inscribed with the message: "For Obama, with affection." The Venezuelan President described Barack Obama as a 'poor ignoramus' in March 2009, adding that he "should read a little bit so that he learns about the reality," referring to Latin America.