As a rock-ribbed conservative, I seldom agree with the socialist president of Venezuela. But it happened last week.

“Hey, Obama has just nationalized nothing more and nothing less than General Motors. Comrade Obama!” Hugo Chavez declared during one of his customary rants on state TV. He added that if he and Cuba’s Fidel Castro weren’t “careful,” they might “end up to [Obama’s] right.”

Chavez has nationalized most of his country’s economy. That’s helped turn the country into a “Repressed” economy in Heritage’s annual Index of Economic Freedom. Crime, corruption, inflation and food scarcities prevail in Venezuela, even though the country has taken in hundreds of billions in oil revenues in recent years.

That’s because nationalization discourages private investment and innovation. So Chavez’s oil production is likely to plummet, just as Mexico’s has under a nationalist protection scheme.

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Americans have reason to be concerned as they watch our government go down a similar road with one of our critical industries: automobile manufacturing. On June 1, the federal government announced GM would enter bankruptcy protection. But not traditional bankruptcy.

Under a plan crafted by the Obama administration, Washington will own some 70 percent of the new GM, while the United Auto Workers union will own almost 20 percent. The federal government will pour another $30 billion into GM on top of the $20 billion taxpayers have already shelled out.

Still, “What I have no interest in doing is running GM,” President Obama announced on June 1. “GM will be run by a private board of directors and management team with a track record in American manufacturing that reflects a commitment to innovation and quality.”

Sounds good. But it’s difficult to believe, especially when Obama recently fired GM’s CEO and hand-picked his successor.

Obama has also put 31-year old Brian Deese, a “a not-quite graduate of Yale Law School,” as The New York Times puts it, in charge of restructuring GM. Deese, “had never set foot in an automotive assembly plant until he took on his nearly unseen role in remaking the American automotive industry,” the newspaper says. Continued...