a death far too late

Chilean ex-dictator and former torturer-in-chief Augusto Pinochet finally kicked off, and there was much rejoicing. The old General was 91, further proof that "only the good die young." Pinochet apologists inside Chile and elsewhere try to credit Pinochet for Chile's current prosperity and political stability. They ignore the fact that before Pinochet's coup -- inspired, if not ordered, by Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon -- Chile was already South America's most prosperous and politically stable country.

And Pinochet apologists also need to answer a few questions about the thousands of people executed and tortured to death by Pinochet's regime, not to mention the hundreds of millions of dollars found in bank accounts and gold deposits overseas in the General's name. Hardly the stuff of a patriot just looking to help his country.

It's too bad Pinochet didn't die 35 years earlier. Good riddance, and if I believed in Hell, I'd be glad to contemplate his eternity there.