What do Americans think of President Chavez of Venezuela?

There seems to be a lot of anti-Chavez sentiment. Obviously, the US coporations and politicians in power hate him because he constantly attacks them in the media and spoils their aggressive foreign policy in South America. But what do regular Americans think? Do they even know anything about him and his socialist policies, or do they just get brain-washed into mindlessly hating Chavez due to the biased media in the USA? (I'm not an American, by the way, so I was just wondering.)