Questions from a Reader About Honduras

Some other notes of interest:

Lanny Davis was recently given space in the Wall Street Journal to publish his own justifications for recognizing the November elections in Honduras, which you can read here:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870440240457452569325157370...

Of course, Lanny's conflict-of-interest is only technically disclosed in his byline, where it says that he "represents the Honduran Latin American Business Council," leaving it to the reader to figure out the connection between the coup plotters and Mr. Davis.

The WSJ has been on the attack regarding Honduras via Mary O'Grady, their "expert analyst" on the Americas, in which she simultaneously rewrites Chilean history in support of Augusto Pinochet (who merely "complied" with requests to stop Allende from "trampling the constitution", in her revision) and primes the region for further coup d'etats by writing that El Salvador is "now fighting for its life" against Mauricio Funes:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870479560457451985232467390...

(Incidentally, it would be a shame for the WSJ to get away with editorially supporting the Pinochet Regime ... I'd urge everybody to do something on this to let the WSJ know that this twisted historical revisionism isn't unnoticed.)

At the same time, it should be noted that strange developments in Paraguay should have us on coup-watch there. President Fernando Lugo, the last few days, has fired the top commanders and other high-ranking military officers amid rumors of a coup in that country. In addition, I've picked up on a leaked e-mail that has made the rounds in Brazilian media which seems to be an organizational e-mail for participants in the Comando Anticomunista Paraguaio (CAP). Here is a translation of part of the e-mail, which articulates their immediate goals:

"1. To gather money to liberate our friend, Fidel Zabala, 2. To gather money to organize ourselves, like them, but in opposition (like Chile, in the 1970s), 3. To gather money so that we have AR-15s, AK-47s, etc., 4. To follow, capture and physically liquidate all the communists that make attempts against our lives and possessions, 5. To publicly communicate to the government of Mr. Lugo that the party is over, that the days are numbered for his dream with Chavez, Morales, Correa, Castro and others."

The government of Paraguay has recently been talking about the formation of right-wing paramilitaries there which intend to harass the efforts of the left-wing there.

The statements made by the US Department of State over the past week are extremely disappointing. At this point, I am inclined to say that the United States -is- supporting the coup regime, which it had previously called illegitimate and it appears very clear that the US has reversed its position on the "immediate reinstatement of President Zelaya".

As noted in Al Giordano's article here, Tom Shannon explicitly told CNN Español that the US would support the November elections regardless of whether or not Zelaya is returned to power.

In addition, Friday's press conference by State Department spokesman Ian Kelly was filled with specific questions made to him about the US's position on Honduras, which he basically dodged over and over again but the key message he gave was when he explained the ORDER in which the recent Accord should be adopted: first, the Unity Government would be formed and AFTER that is when the US expects a vote on the return of Zelaya.

So, whether Obama and crew conspired this all along or whether they worked their way into it now is kind of irrelevant. The end result is that they have positively sided with the coup regime and they are doing everything they can to legitimize the November elections, regardless of what happens with Zelaya.

The OAS is meeting TODAY and, hopefully, they will make it clear that regional governments will not recognize the November elections (although, it has been indicated that the OAS is going to send election monitors, which is a way of legitimizing the elections). We'll see what happens today.

Like I've said before, the most important thing happening in Honduras is the resistance front ... however, if the coup is allowed to go ahead with the support of the United States under Obama, that will be a huge blow to the regional stability of Latin America and, as far as I'm concerned, an enormous blow to Obama's credibility in the region. If Obama allows the coup to go through, that's it for me -- he'll need to prove himself rather than getting the benefit of the doubt moving forward.

Is the resistance still going foward with organizing a referendum on a Constituent Assembly November 29th?  If so, is its power tied to whether the Presidential election is seen as legitimate?

Constance - The "people's referendum" concept as I reported it here was under discussion prior to the signing of the Tegucigalpa Accord. We've heard little to no talk about it since.

FYI, a follow-up on the OAS meeting today that I wrote about earlier.

The Latin American members of the OAS, including general secretary Insulza, are at least talking strong against the US's actions of the past week.

The OAS election monitors I alluded to will apparently NOT be going to Honduras given the current situation, as reported by the NY Times, per a statement made by Insulza today.

A handful of Latin American diplomats were very vocal today in asserting that they would not recognize the elections in Honduras given the current conditions. So, it could be that these elections will become a test between the increased regional power of Latin American countries versus the old hegemony of the US in the region. Will the coup supporters care if no one except the US recognizes their election? An interesting test, I think.

Also, in surveying Spanish newspapers today, I saw that Rigoberta Menchú was speaking in Mexico City today and she was egging on the OAS:

"Rigoberta Menchú affirmed today that the UN and OAS had been outflanked by the situation in Honduras, the country affected by the coup d'etat [...] During a visit to the Mexican city of Oaxaca, where she participated in an academic forum at Anáhuac University, Menchú indicated that the UN and OAS had been 'outflanked' by the problems in the Central American country. The human rights activist asserted that these two international organizations 'do not have the capacity to execute their resolutions which only offer romantic solutions.'"

She also called Micheletti the face of "the new Latin American dictator." (Menchú is an indigenous Guatemalan activist who won the 1992 Nobel Peace Prize.)

I strongly believe that the best strategy against Democrat administrations who want to play both sides of fence and who want to demonstrate that multilateralism is the best way to achieve the goals of US imperialism is to keep up the pressure on their hypocrisy. I also believe that, if you can't do anything else, every one reading here can help fight the infowar by calling and pressuring the White House, Congress, spreading the boycott Honduras elections idea and emphasizing the importance of allowing a coup to take place in this day and age in Latin America.

@ Ryan. Good approach, some of Obama's allies in Congress are already acting, and additional pressure from voters would not hurt. Just noticed that Anselem is still representing the US at the OAS, what a disaster.

While the announcement was celebrated by Republicans as a “reversal” of the administration’s policy, it ignited a storm of criticism from Mr. Obama’s allies at home and across Latin America.

Representative Howard L. Berman, Democrat of California, who is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, telephoned Deputy Secretary of State James B. Steinberg to express his concerns about the administration’s handling of Honduran crisis. An aide to the congressman said, “It was not a feel-good phone call.”

Frederick Jones, a spokesman for Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the senator believed that the State Department’s “abrupt change” of policy toward Honduras “caused the collapse of an accord it helped negotiate.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/world/americas/11honduras.html

I'm actually quite impressed by the ability of national leaders and news producers and pundits to treat as serious the suggestion that a government can be overthrown by military force and that the coup government can have its legitimacy recognized by running its own elections (under a coup) as long as it uses the same legislature that recognized the coup post-facto in the first place to simply re-title itself as the 'government of national unity and reconciliation'.

It's kind of brilliant if you think about it.

International negotiators:  'Hey, what you need to do is restore the legal government by way of a government of unity and national reconciliation, and then we'll recognize your elections.'

Coup regime:  'Okay, that's what we'll call ourselves now, and we'll have a vote upholding that title, and can you now please now recognize our elections so that we can get on with keeping the legitimate government out of power?  Thanks!'

I think it's pretty clear that this clever path was opened wide by Senator Jim DeMint's and Thomas Shannon's (and reportedly, via DeMint, Hillary Clinton's) statement that the U.S. would be likely to recognize the elections whether or not the legitimate recognized government of Honduras was ever restored.  Others disagree with that interpretation, but I think the evidence is fairly clear that that at least was the POV of the coup regime.

And Lanny Davis chimes in as the coup regime's hired help, blaming the ousted actual President for not being willing to help legitimize this game by the coup regime, so why don't we do what Davis has been wanting all along -- just ignore the question of who is the legitimate government of Honduras and let the nice coup leaders run their elections and stop all this fuss?

Given that the US now recognises as legitimate the farce of the recent Afghan elections I have every confidence that it will be no trouble for the US to recognise the outcome of the coming farce of the Honduran elections.

And yes Ryan, very troubling things are happening in Paraguay. Thank you for posting that.

The former U.S. ambassador to Paraguay and El Salvador, Robert White, revisits his analysis of the Honduran accords and how, in his view, the US government blew apart the agreements for which it had just been negotiating.

And, perhaps, where to go from here.

From the Center for International Policy and Commonweal Magazine, Americas Program updater (and I really think the brief commentary should be viewed in full):

It is now possible to reconstruct with a fair degree of accuracy how the Obama administration turned an imminent diplomatic triumph into a negotiated defeat...

(See link for full text.)

This is kinda easy to speculate on, forgive me. Shannon has a clear conflict of interest, no? He negotiated out of his hold in the Senate. That's a pretty basic connect-the-dots from the commentary:

DeMint holds Shannon's nom. DeMint speaks to Shannon. Shannon botches job, but DeMint is pleased. Hold is dropped... although another Republican (George LeMieux, R-FL) has placed a new hold. Something about being soft on communism. He also placed a new hold on Valanzuela, which DeMint had also dropped.

DeMint alone would have had no leverage after dropping the hold. Maybe this is why he can get away appearing so magnanimous.

Al,

I'd really like to hear your take on President Obama's decision to try Khalid Shiekh Mohammed in a civilian court.

As a non-American, I assume this is the right thing to do. After all, "a society should be judged not by how it treats its outstanding citizens, but by how it treats its criminals", right?

Hey, thought folks here would be interested in some actual goods news from Honduras today: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/18/business/18labor.html

Congrats to all involved for a rare, umambiguously positive development in the situation there.