"Cool, now the US navy can practice shooting doww MiGs & Sukhois without having to go halfway around the world."
Actually, I think they are a waste of money for Venezuela, unless they plan to use them against Colombia. What do they think, that that few aircraft won't be the first items consigned to the scrap heap by cruise missiles if they challenged Uncle Sam? And how are they going to maintain the aircraft much less train the crews?
Besides lot's of training in Russia, Russians will have to come stay in Venezuela to continue training and maintaining them. I'm sure that Chavez thinks this will gain him some influence in the security council (after all, it's working for the Iranians with whome he has been hobknobbing). He probably thinks, too, that we will be more hesitant to attack him if we might kill Russians in the process (don't bomb my airbase lest you kill Russian technicians and make Putin mad).
As for wasting money, he doesn't care. He has a severe case of "short guy" syndrome (as well as others). He needs to buy lots of toys to make up for his "shortcomings".