Cracks in the Honduran Coup Regime Grow Wider
By Al Giordano
We've previously noted that some key members of the coup regime power structure – notably business magnate Adolfo Facusse and Liberal Party presidential nominee Elvin Santos – had begun waxing aloud to find a scapegoat for the illegality of the June 28 coup d’etat. They had both settled on the Armed Forces, and the “original sin” of all that has gone awry since, according to them, was that the military shipped elected President Manuel Zelaya out of the country instead of arraigning him to face prosecution.
Coup regime “president” Roberto Micheletti has just added his voice to the cacophony, Bloomberg reports:
“There was an error by a certain sector,” Micheletti said today in an interview in Tegucigalpa. “It wasn’t correct. We have to punish whoever allowed that to happen. The rest was framed within what the constitution requires.”
…A mistake was made when Zelaya, still wearing pajamas, was put on a plane to Costa Rica instead of being held for trial, Micheletti said.
That is indeed rich coming from Micheletti who has fumbled two opportunities since the coup to walk his talk and arrest Zelaya as he keeps claiming he wants to do. The first came on July 5 when Zelaya attempted to fly into the Toncontin International Airport in Tegucigalpa but Micheletti ordered the same Armed Forces to litter the runway with trucks and soldiers to prevent the plane from landing. The second came on July 19 when Zelaya briefly stepped into Honduran territory from the Nicaraguan side of the border and again the military and police had orders not to arrest him.
Micheletti is in fact declaring the military a scapegoat for doing just once what Micheletti himself has ordered them to do a second and third time. He doesn’t really want Zelaya to stand trial because, first, the so-called evidence against the President is flimsy and falsified, and, second, because the regime fears that the very people of Honduras might assemble to break down any wall that might hold their elected president.
In that context, Micheletti’s words constitute an admission that the coup has been legally flawed from the start.
Meanwhile, Liberal Party candidate Santos – under criticism for the multi-million dollar highway construction contracts his company has from US taxpayers, thanks to the Millennium Challenge Corporation chaired by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – has determined that the best defense is to go on offense. Yesterday, he accused exiled Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, elected in 2005 on the Liberal Party line, of a “political alliance” with National Party presidential candidate Pepe Lobo to sabotage his chances in the planned November “election.”
And adding to the clown show was the coup regime’s make believe “foreign minister,” Simian Council member Martha Lorena Alvarado, who yesterday charged that the delegation currently in Honduras from the Inter American Human Rights Council, affiliated with the Organization of American States (OAS), is “infiltrated by Latin American leftist movements.” (The delegation is made up of human rights officials from elected governments throughout the hemisphere.) She insisted that “the first violation of human rights” in Honduras is that caused by striking schoolteachers whom, she accused, are violating the rights of the children to go to school in the summer months. As she spoke those words, out in the streets of the capital National Police were busy beating up a reporter for Channel 36 television who had the temerity to try and film what are now daily violent attacks against peaceful demonstrators.
This business of “working the refs” – the regime daily makes statements aimed at discrediting an OAS delegation of foreign ministers that will arrive next in Honduras to try and broker the return of the elected president - is clearly intended to deflect from the continued heavy-handed violation of the most basic democratic rights by an unelected regime.
And in Washington DC yesterday, a member of the coup regime’s own delegation to the US admitted to the Argentina news agency TELAM that the coup was illegal. Delegation member Arturo Corrales (speaking, in the photo above) of the Christian Democratic Party, is contradicting not just the Armed Forces but also the man who sent him to Washington: Micheletti himself:
“In Honduras, we are clearly convinced that the military participation in this process is zero. Its participation is limited to guard the electoral process,” said Corrales who added that President Zelaya’s rights “were violated… Every Honduran citizen has the right to live in Honduras and the State is obligated to do everything it can to guarantee that.”
“It’s true that Mr. Roberto Micheletti nominated us to represent the executive branch (in Washington) but we all represent a longing for a resolution in Honduras.”
The layers of the onion around the Honduran coup regime continue to peel and flake away from its core. The statements and actions of its own key players contradict the regime’s daily insistence that there is normality in the country.
“We (the members of the Micheletti appointed delegation) are convinced that the San José accord (to reinstate Zelaya to the presidency) is worthwhile and continues being the focus of an agreement to come before the (November 29) elections, “said Corrales. “This has come to the point of maturity. I believe that the visit by the (OAS) foreign ministers (to Honduras) is going to provoke the final stage of this dialogue and the implementation stage will begin.”
It remains to be seen whether the coup that can’t shoot straight will be able to come to agreement among its own conspirators, much less with the rest of Honduras and the hemisphere named América. But there is a sense that in this game of musical chairs the tune is drawing to a close and the coup plotters are nervously eyeing the seats in the hopes on not being left the last ones standing alone and abandoned.
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god dammit al
Submitted August 18, 2009 - 2:23 pm by please (not verified)we need you back here.
Micheletti's admission of guilt
Submitted August 18, 2009 - 3:01 pm by Ryan Vaquero (not verified)I was hoping that yesterday's article in Bloomberg would show up here! This is the best news I've heard in a while, actually. The reasons I think this is important:
1) Micheletti wouldn't have come out and said this unless he had to ... it publicly demonstrates that he's feeling pressure.
2) This demonstrates the lack of cohesion and truthfulness coming from the coup regime. It was waaay back on July 3 when the Miami Herald ran the interview with Honduran Army attorney Col. Herberth Bayardo Inestroza, who made some amazing assertions. The statement he made which is relevant to this comment was: ''We know there was a crime there. In the moment that we took him out of the country, in the way that he was taken out, there is a crime."
Although not exactly relevant to this comment, he also made the unbelievable statement that because the Honduran Army has historically been involved in suppressing leftist political tendencies, the military would never accept a leftist government, democratically-elected or not: ''We fought the subversive movements here and we were the only country that did not have a fratricidal war like the others. It would be difficult for us, with our training, to have a relationship with a leftist government. That's impossible."
Apparently, the concept that the Armed Forces serve whatever democratic government is elected by the people doesn't fly with Col. Inestroza and he's brazen enough to rant this to the Miami Herald.
3) Two weeks later, the president of the Honduran Supreme Court also made it clear that the removal of President Zelaya was illegal in an interview with La Tribuna: "The Supreme Court ordered Zelaya's capture and authorized the raid on his house so he could be captured," Rivera said. "The expulsion was not in the capture order, and in that sense, we have to analyze if (his expulsion) was the best thing given the necessities of the moment."
4) Unfortunately for Roberto Micheletti, it was almost 2 weeks after both the military -and- the Supreme Court admitted that Zelaya's removal from the country was illegal when Micheletti argued otherwise in his op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal:
"The military was ordered by an entirely civilian Supreme Court to arrest Mr. Zelaya. His removal was ordered by an entirely civilian and elected Congress. To suggest that Mr. Zelaya was ousted by means of a military coup is demonstrably false.
Regarding the decision to expel Mr. Zelaya from the country the evening of June 28 without a trial, reasonable people can believe the situation could have been handled differently. But it is also necessary to understand the decision in the context of genuine fear of Mr. Zelaya’s proven willingness to violate the law and to engage in mob-led violence."
So, who exactly is going to be "punished" for the "entirely civilian" removal, Micheletti? Maybe the person who was still defending it, long after the entire world and even members of the coup conspiracy itself were admitting that it was illegal?
5) Not really being a scholar on Honduran constitutional law, I have to believe that these admissions are significant. If Zelaya should have been arrested and gone on trial, then a whole bunch of people have been wrong about the "constitutionality" and pristine "law & order" of the coup. Now that the Army, the Supreme Court and the Executive of Honduras has publicly admitted that a crime (perhaps treason?) was committed during the kidnapping of democratically-elected President Zelaya, perhaps the only people in the entire world still defending the coup as perfectly legal is Connie Mack and Mary O'Grady.
6) Finally, Micheletti's threat that SOMEONE is going to be "punished" for committing this crime means that the coup regime gets to fight it out amongst themselves who exactly will be "punished". And, this should only be the beginning of who gets "punished" ... hopefully, other "crimes" that occurred during this coup period will be admitted to, and who will be punished for the order to fire live rounds into the peaceful crowd at the airport? Who will be punished for torturing and dumping the body of a young man at the Honduras-Nicaragua border? Who will be punished for the drive-by shooting at Via Campesina? And so on.
The coup plotters, who are supposed to be convincing the world that constitutional order is firmly in place in Honduras, will instead be engaged in a paranoia-driven blame game. Who wants to be the one to take the fall for this?
Mapping the fall of the coup
Submitted August 18, 2009 - 6:51 pm by Roy MartinAl,
You've done a great job explaining (and predicting) how all this would play out, though you were wrong about Obama's handling of the situation early on. Alternatively, you may have hit the nail on the head way back when you suggested it would be a mistake for Barack to appoint Hillary as SoS. It may be that she essentially tied his hands, though I must say I expected him to be able to pressure her to stay in line.
I really miss your political analysis on issues other than Honduras as the health care debate plays out. I'd love your take on whether Obama was floating a trial baloon on dropping the public option for fear he can't get it through the Senate. I'd also like to know your opinion as to whether we're best off getting whatever reform we can get and trying to improve it incrementally over time or simply saying no to change that doesn't include a real public option and letting the system continue to implode.
I'd sure like to see Obama do a much better job of selling health care reform, and would love your take on that too. I recall the way Reagan would go on the air and change the dynamic around political issues. Health care reform would seem ripe for that, with the insurance and pharmaceutical companies making great targets for popular outrage (rather than the Administration itself) if only the President could bring himself to move away from his instinct for moderation.
Would also like your take on the current climate, in which protestors are bringing guns to political events. Hard to imagine the Bush Administration permitting such things. I seem to recall protestors having been carted off to jail for far less than that. Tolerating such behavior would seem to welcome more of it and that's scary in a nation with a long history of political violence from the extreme right.
Wouldn't mind being called out for chicken littling if I'm off base. Would be well worth it to receive the education and understanding that was so helpful to all of us during the primaries and the election.
And another one gone!
Submitted August 18, 2009 - 7:17 pm by elchupacabras (not verified)TeleSur reports that El Payaso Golpeador (otherwise known as Michelleti) continues to create more animosity. He has now axed relations with Argentina. As he cuts ties with the outside, the noose on his bastard regime of military kooks inches closer to suffocating the precious "oxygen supply" that keeps it alive.
http://www.telesurtv.net/noticias/secciones/nota/56044-NN/gobierno-de-fa...
Some of the soldiers rebelled, what happened to them?
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 5:30 am by Tommy (not verified)Anyone knows what happened to the two battalions that rebelled against the golpistas?
If they throw their weight in(that is, the guns), with urban co-operation, wouldn't the golp just collapse automatically?
Health Care & Hondurus
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 10:45 am by Nancy Chester@Roy Martin
I really miss your political analysis on issues other than Honduras as the health care debate plays out. I'd love your take on whether Obama was floating a trial baloon on dropping the public option for fear he can't get it through the Senate.
Interesting idea, Roy that Obama might have been floating a trial balloon about taking the "public option" off the table. You could be right. I know I'm going to have difficulty articulating my thoughts but I think a positive pro democratic/left wing outcome for Hondurus is related to the current health care debate. In essence both struggles are fighting entrenched oligarachies and both struggles are trying to strengthen "democracy". For years poll after poll has shown most Americans want some form of "single payer" health insurance but American desires just don't make it through the corporate controlled system. I see a win against the coup in Hondurus is a win for American Health Care. We need to figure out someway to "peel the corporate onion" in the U.S.
I just sense that the battle in Hondurus is related to health care and other pro-democracy battles such as card check. Polls also show most Americans would join a union if they could but again that just doesn't translate into action in our system. In a nut shell it seems to me that so many of America's problems would be lessened if we didn't have such a broken democracy. And so I watch Hondurus and feel connected to their struggle.
Hurricane Bill may cause more disorder
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 11:15 am by El Cid (not verified)Authoritarian regimes don't have a great record of responding to natural disasters in Latin America; the possibility of a landing of Hurricane Bill might suggest the need for additional non-government civilian disaster preparation, including the possibility of post-disaster attempts by the regime to simply use the occasion for local repression.
Roy and AL
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 12:30 pm by Brian Curdy (not verified)Well, I think that Al is doing just fine. Al's preoccupations south of the border is a declaration (or a manifesto?) in itself that:
(1.) The United States does not exist as a separate planet-for Americans, too, are responsable for awareness of what is going on around them.....and...
(2.) Al is not irreplaceable-or "infallible" like His Reverand Excellence Señor Rodriguez (the now more discreet) Roman Catholic Archbishop and Cardinal of Tegucigalpa who has been mentioned (in the past) as a "possible candidate" for the next conclave in Rome.
What I appreciate the most about Al is not -or at least "not just" his reporting- but his dedication to training an encouraging people who might be able to "outdo" him some day (in what he is doing).
Who knows? ("Qien Sabe?") said Frank Glascow Tinker (1909-1939), the US Naval Academy Alumni who gave his life fighting Franco during the Spanish Civil War,--partly because the US Navy Department of the Roosevelt depression years had no use for the Arkansas crop-duster.....
So "Americans" miss Al's outstanding work regarding "American" issues?
Honduras is an American issue.
Let's look deeper at what he is asking us to do (organize, organize,) and get busy peeling our own onions in whatever kitchen we find ourselves doing "mess-duty" in (military term/idiom for those who've been in the service.)
The name of the game here is not how or where to recite one's personal catechism (or pledge of "allegiance,") but rather to form a common front and drum up solidarity for those who need our support-perhaps more than we need theirs..
A day may come the when Americans will appreciate support from abroad. At least Pershing remembered Lafayette, or so it seems.
I am old enough to remember German kindness to American soldiers and American auto-workers in the "economic crises and catastrophes" that marked the late "Cold War" period....
--Take it from one fed-up old Marine..
US Politics and Citizen's Needs
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 12:43 pm by Frank Balzer (not verified)In non-oligarchical political science, we measure how democratic a political system is by how much of the government's budget is spent on selected social issues that are considered important over time.
The major survey used to measure public political attitudes is the bi-annual General Social Survey. It measures the level of support for the following social issues: crime, environment, healthcare, improving race relations, education, solving urban problems, military spending, welfare, space programs, and foreign aid.
Between 1973 - 1984, the statistical averages demonstrated that US citizens wanted the lion's share of the Federal budget to go to:
Solving problems leading to crime, environment, healthcare and education.
When one compares the actual way the federal budget is allocated, as given in the Brief Reports of the President, it is the exact opposite of the political and social attitudes as measured in the General Social Survey.
In the areas designated as important to US citizens, federal spending either lagged behind other categories or it went down altogether.
Only in military spending, the space program, foreign aid (most of it being military support) did the Federal government increase spending.
Thus it appears that the US citizens' political attitudes and the actual direction of government spending are at odds. This is surely not democratic.
In Honduras, to change the subject, Zelaya's crime was to change government policy and spending priorities to better reflect the will of the impoverished citizens who constitute 70% of the population.
The oligarchy didn't like this sudden change in the direction of government spending priorities; thus the coup.
They hate Zelaya, himself, because they regard him as a "class traitor." He wasn't allowed to assume the Presidency in order enact policies and programs to benefit the poor.
The inter-oligarchy deal agreed upon by all those who participate in Honduran politics is to share the wealth created by selling the cheap labor of Honduras' poor and its resources to multinational corporations. (Of course, they also make informal agreements about the illegal enterprises they investment in.)
It is a form of oligarchical or gangster socialism (or welfare).
He reneged on that unwritten deal.
Thank you Frank,
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 2:00 pm by Brian Curdy (not verified)Well put (or at least I think so!)
Brian.
A Writer Must Follow His Passion
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 2:22 pm by Al GiordanoFrank is absolutely right: What we're reporting from Honduras can be applied to organizing around health care in the US or any other issue.
My own "take" on the health care debate in the US would likely underwhelm because it is formed by my total distrust of Western medicine. I don't want health insurance for myself (although I support the effort to make it available to everyone who wants it); I simply don't ever want to let doctors, hospitals, insurance (private or public) get their claws in me. I've seen too many cases in which once they hook a person they never let that person go. Thus, no matter what the US government does, it will have to do so without me signing up for it, whether it calls it "mandatory" or not.
Therefore, anything I write about the matter is going to be colored by my admittedly "out there" prejudices about the medical industry. I think most of what passes for medical care in the developed world - whether in Europe (where folks have national health insurance) or the US (where too many don't) makes millions of people a lot sicker and dependent on it.
There are hundreds of writers and bloggers who see it differently and are covering the matter around the clock. Consult them. Asking me to tell you about health care would be like asking a conscientious objector what it's like in the Army. It's just outside my sphere of interest.
Now, back to work on the matters that do arouse my passions...
Roy@3:51
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 3:05 pm by bonkers (not verified)Obama's done more to "sell" this "reform" than any President I've ever seen try to push for something. Not only does the BigMedia simply ignore much of what he says on a regular basis, but they actually purposely distort his words to fit into the various frames they've developed over the past few decades.
This is why polls are out where something like 50% of the general public believe certain things are going to happen even though those things are not even in any of the proposed bills. I've long felt Ronnie Raygun, Karl Rove and friends get way too much credit as great communicators and message people. They simply have a BigMedia that play along to whatever they want. I'm not sure Obama could be doing much more to control narrative given this dynamic.
And that's why providing alternatives to and/or busting up BigMedia conglomerates is one of the most pressing issues of our time. When people get just tiny glimpses of truth in reporting on just about any issue, they start "getting it." As Al's been reporting about, it's why one of the first things any coups do is take over the various message machines.
So, anyone out there got a million or two to set up/expand a School for Authentic Journalism in the U.S.?
Well...it's like I remarked to Lorie-or was it Ivan, Al?
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 6:32 pm by Brian Curdy (not verified)We (you and I) agree with Frank-and we are fired up over Honduras. Maybe not for the same reasons all the time-but what does that have to do with what's going on in Honduras?
From what I can make of you we probably are in the 75% mutual agreement range on everything in general.
From what you can (or want to) make of me-that may be considerably less.
So What, Big Deal?
Everyone that I know sees priorities differently.
What you said about bloggers I definitely agree with.
On national health plans (I am a Swiss living in Switzerland-not the United States,) I would have died in 2005 or 2008 were it not for mandatory health insurance coverage and access to traditional medicine.
I could never afford any of those "tri-care" or other private (US) DoD-sponsored veterans' scams to rip off disabled veterans and their dependents, either.
NB: My Massachusetts nephew (who is 25) served as a National Guardsman in Afghanistan, Iraq, Katrina, and USDHS "airport security low-cost scab duty" during the fake terrorist alerts.
He was wounded in Afghanistan but (says that he) was "marked for life by what he saw first-hand in Louisiana." To list the hassles that Gary and other veterans (me for example?) I know who have experienced-then one would conclude that the VA is a mop-up squad for "the Al Qaeda terrorists" and other fictional bogeymen for prime-time stake burnings and witch-hunts....
Getting back to the subject, though...
If you know of another way (other than emmergency surgery and antibiotics) to treat acute late-stage post-traumatic peritonitis, then I hope you will publish your findings because it might get you an honorus causis medical degree and a Nobel Prize in Medicine that could help fund the authentic school of journalism project, etc...
My wife Maryvonne has survived her (initial) 2004 bout with cancer. Without the grudging and expensive (but) mandatory (Swiss) medical insurance coverage, we would have lost our already heavily mortgaged home to pay for her treatment.
Then there are the serious cognitive development problems that have plagued and handicapped my 32 year-old step son for most of his life...he lives with us as a survival measure to squeak by the generousity of private sector demands on potential (low-salary scale) employees.
When I compare the ( much-welcomed) help I still get from a US Marine Corps disability pension (that I supposedly earned and is not to be confused with "charity"), and the barricades (to defend social justice) that unions, cooperatives, and the left must consolidate and reinforce here in a "reputedly" wealthy country (that traditionally hides the poor from view)....to resist the further erosion of essential and vital public services by fighting off ever more strenuous neo-liberal DOS attacks and "privatisations" of that public sector....well...
I'm off on a limb but you are a hero to put up with crackpots like me when we need solidarity, organization, and discipline
As far as Honduras is concerned-you are authentic journalism-and you are the English-language media....
That's democracy for you.
And that's how we must all try to defend it:
Organization-discipline-and coordinated non-violent action..
Viva la libertad
Respectfully,
Brian.
Police brutality rampant in Honduras, amnesty report says
Submitted August 19, 2009 - 6:39 pm by barbs (not verified)In the seven weeks since the military-backed bloodless coup in Honduras, several hundred people protesting against the de facto government have been arbitrarily arrested and beaten by government forces, a new Amnesty International report says.
The report, released Wednesday, said the beatings were meant to punish those who opposed the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya in June.
It includes testimony from, and photographs of, several people who were baton-whipped and detained by police officers who sometimes wore no visible identification and hid their faces behind bandanas as they broke up demonstrations.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/08/19/honduras.amnesty.report/ind...
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/Honduras-photos-and-pr...
Counterpunch on Health Care
Submitted August 20, 2009 - 1:16 am by Nancy ChesterAlexander Cockburn of Counterpunch seems to agree with Al's thoughts on health care and the current debate. Health Plans & Death Plans, from the Weekend Edition August 14-16, 2009.
The first illusion to chase off the stage is that the great debate here has much to do with health. So far, as public health is concerned, many of the biggest battles were fought and won a hundred years ago, at the end of the nineteenth century, with better nutrition, birth control, the change from wool to cotton clothing, the introduction of modern sanitation in the urban environment and – most important – clean water.
You can finish the article here.
http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn08142009.html
Sending up a flare
Submitted August 20, 2009 - 1:23 pm by Al GiordanoKind readers - I'm conscious that I've been unusually quiet here in recent days but it's not because we're on vacation.
I am on the road reporting the next round of stories, and will shortly uncloak. The wait will be worth it!
Need Clarification
Submitted August 21, 2009 - 12:03 am by Zena (not verified)How is the Honduras struggle with the powers-that-be linked to Obama's health reform?
While I understand that that the health care reform is centered around the struggle against the conglomerate companies, how does the toppling down of the Coup regime by the Honduras civilians a win in US health care reform for Obama?
I am not as knowldegable in either subjects as other users here, but I would like to understand the basics in this assumption repeated many times by users on Al's blog.
Thanks!
Zena, it's the onion idea
Submitted August 21, 2009 - 12:44 pm by Ann CantelowMy take: The link from the Honduras struggle to the health insurance reform is that community organizers must use the same techniques to get done what is needed. Al talked about peeling the onion in his Part II article in his ongoing series about Honduras, Toppling a Coup. If we want to fight for health insurance reform, we need to use skill and ingenuity to find our own onion to peel, i.e. find ways to discourage and eventually separate away all the groups involved, starting with those that may be only partially commited. All kinds of players are involved: insurance companies, lobbyists, congresspeople, different and varied right wing groups, on and on.
I think the onion meme is a great image.
Exactly
Submitted August 22, 2009 - 12:51 am by Al GiordanoZena - What Ann says. It's all about organizing, which means knocking on doors, making phone calls, and otherwise working, educating and mobilizing to stir up public opinion to the maximum level. People too often confuse organizing with mere activism. Complaining about injustice is all well and good, but without old fashioned organizing, it usually results in little to no change. Rolling up one's sleeves and taking part on the grassroots level to maximize public opinion and make it visible is the path whether in Honduras or the US.
Thanks Al and Ann
Submitted August 22, 2009 - 8:25 am by Zena (not verified)Ah--now I get it. Thanks guys!
Honduras vs. Healthcare
Submitted August 22, 2009 - 12:04 pm by boz (not verified)Al,
Just to throw in my two cents, while you can, you should stay on the Honduras story. There are hundreds of people reporting on healthcare, even from the alternative media side. There are very few journalists putting things together on the ground in Honduras. The added value of your reporting from Honduras is far more than the value would be from adding your voice to the healthcare debate. Even when I disagree with you, I appreciate your perspective and your reporting from the country. Looking forward to your next report. Keep it up.
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