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Aid Program Through US Government's Millennium Challenge Corporation Won't Be Renewed

Memo Reveals “Rapid Response” Campaign Model To Back Lobo Government in Washington DC

More details have come to light relating to former Clinton White House official Lanny Davis' (pictured right) recent lobbying contract with the Honduras government. In a November letter (PDF) addressed to Honduras president Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo and the country's ambassador Jorge Ramón Hernández Alcerro, Davis writes that he'll focus on two objectives. One seeks to win more tax dollars from US coffers, and the other is a strategy to drown out accurate media reports that have been inconvenient for the government since a coup d'etat on June 28, 2009.

By Brenda Norrell

Wikileaks released new cables over the weekend, revealing more of the United States obsession with Bolivian President Evo Morales. The US spy calls it the "Axis of Evo."

In the new cables, the US also discusses the purported attempt to assassinate President Morales.

The cables previously released show the United States growing concern over President Morales' popularity.

By Brenda Norrell

The mainstream media continued to censor and twist the facts on Indigenous Peoples and human rights issues in 2010. Here are ten of the most censored issues:

1. The United States -- the last country in the world to support the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples -- fooled many people when President Obama announced the US would support the Declaration. However, the US did not "endorse," "adopt," or "sign on" to the Declaration. The US only announced "support," and attached a lengthy list of limitations from the US State Dept.

2.

By Brenda Norrell

The Wikileaks cables released about Indigenous Peoples so far have focused on Chile’s Mapuche and Bolivian President Evo Morales.

GOP Congressman Traveled With Campaign Contributors and Promoted Their Business Interests to Coup Regime

In addition to using taxpayer money to travel to Honduras to support a coup d'état, one US Congressman, Republican Dana Rohrabacher (pictured right), used the trip as an opportunity to back the business interests of his campaign contributors, according to a State Department cable recently released by WikiLeaks.

The US Embassy in Honduras assisted Rohrabacher's partners in their investment ventures, according the document, by arranging meetings between the businessmen and a US government-financed corporation that is tied to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and gave millions to the coup regime.

When Rep. Rohrabacher (Calif.) traveled to Honduras on Jan. 31-Feb. 2 he brought along some personal friends, which included “several American businessmen and investors” according to the State Department memo, written by US Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens.

The president of California-based company SG Biofuels, Kirk Haney, was a part of the delegation, along with John R. Saunders, a California real estate developer who deals in antique coins. Both Haney and Saunders are campaign donors and were given the chance to advertise their businesses during discussions with top Honduran officials.

In the State Department cable Llorens writes that while in Honduras Rohrabacher “endorsed US investment and particularly lauded the benefits of the development of biofuel industry in Honduras. He enthusiastically promoted a start-up biofuel company, SG Biofuels.”

Well, well, well… All you have to do is wait a couple of days and see what develops to find out the true intent of the whole false-flag operation, in this case wikileaks. Make no mistake, any time a big news item develops, you know it’s just a manufactured event, used to manipulate something or other.

By Brenda Norrell

Bolivia decried the agreement adopted at the UN Conference on Climate Change, COP 16, saying rich countries bullied smaller countries into a disastrous agreement that allows for an increase in global warming and more deaths from climate change.

"A so-called victory for multilateralism is really a victory for the rich nations who bullied and cajoled other nations into accepting a deal on their terms," Bolivia said in a statement following the adoption of the agreement after midnight Friday night.

"The richest nations offered us nothing new in te

By Brenda Norrell

Photo by Brenda Norrell

CANCUN -- It was a hero's welcome, with all flags flying for Bolivian President Evo Morales.

By Brenda Norrell

Photo: The Peoples Climate March in Cancun, Dec. 7. Photo copyright Robert Free.

CANCUN, Mexico -- The power of love and unity, and the promise of hope, is the message at La Via Campesina.

By Brenda Norrell

Photo: Huicholes at Cancun Climate Summit met with Robert Free of Seattle, Ofelia Rivas, O'odham, and Sarah James, Gwich'in.

Un resumen de nuestras redes en línea hasta el 7 de diciembre de 2010

7 de diciembre de 2010

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After Defending Media Censorship and Abuses During Crisis, Ex-Clinton Official Now Working For Lobo Government

Lanny Davis (pictured right), the former Clinton White House official who was behind a lobbying blitz to support the coup d’etat that happened in Honduras in 2009 is back in action. This time instead of being paid by business interests behind the coup he is now providing his services to the current Honduran government that came to power as a result of the crisis.

In a recent press release, Davis' firm Lanny J. Davis & Associates announced that it has been hired to cook up a public relations campaign for the Honduras government, headed by coup-supporter President Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo. Assisting in this effort will be Josh Block, another Clinton administration official who is an ex-spokesman for the US Agency for International Development.

"I hope to help the Government of Honduras and President Porfirio Lobo strengthen U.S.-Honduran relations by emphasizing that Honduras remains a loyal ally of the United States and a stable constitutional democracy governed by the rule of law," Davis is quoted saying in the release.

During the crisis Davis, a close associate of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was hired by the Business Council of Latin America to support the ousting of democratically-elected President Manuel Zelaya on Capitol Hill. Despite the fact that the coup was called “illegal” by the State Department, Davis served as the figurehead for the business interests backing the de facto government, all while it was shutting down media outlets, banning civil liberties, and committing human rights abuses.

When the State Department backed off from its anti-coup stance to support November 2009 presidential elections in Honduras, Davis disappeared from the media limelight and later started his own public relations firm. Lobo was declared the winner of the race, despite intimidation and fraud that was documented during the voting. After winning an election where more than half of the voters stayed home, Lobo gave amnesty to everyone involved in plotting the coup.

The reappearance of Davis and his new partnership with Lobo only provides more evidence that the Honduras government is merely an extension of the coup regime.

Mexican Officials Were Desperate to Produce a “Tangible Success” in Narcotics Fight and Save President Felipe Calderón's Political Legacy

Citing the “pervasive, debilitating fear” that has griped Mexico due to increasing violence with the drug war, high-ranking officials in the Felipe Calderón administration urged the United States in September 2009 to help them target drug trafficking groups in border cities like Ciudad Juarez and Tijuana in order to save the political legacy of President Felipe Calderón, according to a confidential memo sent from the US Embassy-Mexico City and obtained by WikiLeaks.

Nearly four years after Calderón declared war on Mexico's drug trafficking groups, Mexico's Undersecretary for Governance Gerónimo Gutiérrez told officials with the US Justice Department and the State Department in a Mexico City meeting that he feared losing the drug war if a “tangible success” could not be shown to the Mexican people in the next 18 months leading up to the country's presidential elections.

“We have 18 months," Gutiérrez is quoted as saying in the cable. "And if we do not produce a tangible success that is recognizable to the Mexican people, it will be difficult to sustain the confrontation into the next administration."