Posted on 07/05/2009 7:25:43 PM PDT by Mount Athos
Last Sunday, Honduras removed its would-be dictator, Mel Zelaya, who flouted court rulings by using intimidation to try to get Hondurans to change their constitution to allow him to extend his tenure in office. The country's Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya, which the military enforced by seizing Zelaya and kicking him out of the country. The country's legislature then voted almost unanimously to replace him with its legislative speaker, in accord with the country's constitution.
Now, Obama, who knows nothing about Honduran law, is ignorantly claiming that Zelaya's removal was "illegal," and demanding that Zelaya be reinstated as president. His demand is joined in by the Organization of American States, many of whose leaders, like Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, have either violated their own countries' constitutions, or likewise seek to eliminate term limits contained in their own countries' constitutions. ("A senior Obama administration official said the United States would probably move to suspend economic development and military assistance" to Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere).
Obama is quite wrong to claim that the removal of Zelaya was "illegal." The Honduran president forfeited his right to rule under Article 239 of the Honduran Constitution, which bans presidents from holding office if they even propose to alter the constitutional term limits for presidents. And the Honduran military, which acted on orders of the Honduran supreme court, expressly had the right to remove the president for seeking to alter the constitutional term limit, under Article 272 of the Honduran Constitution, as even left-leaning commentators have now admitted. The Honduran military's role in enforcing the court order does not make it a "coup" anymore than federal troops' role in enforcing the court-ordered integration of the Little Rock public schools in 1957 constituted a military occupation or takeover.
(Zelaya was a corrupt ruler who so mismanaged his country's finances so badly that it recently failed to pay many of its bills. His violations of his country's constitution were criticized by human rights groups and the Catholic Church as well as the legislature and judiciary).
What happened in Honduras was not "illegal," much less a "coup,” agrees the Honduran lawyer and former Minister of Culture Octavio Sanchez in his July 2 column in the Christian Science Monitor. He notes that under Article 239 of the Honduran Constitution, the President automatically lost his right to remain in office by seeking to extend his term in office: “According to Article 239: ‘No citizen who has already served as head of the Executive Branch can be President or Vice-President. Whoever violates this law or proposes its reform [emphasis added], as well as those that support such violation directly or indirectly, will immediately cease in their functions and will be unable to hold any public office for a period of 10 years.’ Notice that the article speaks about intent and that it also says ‘immediately’ – as in ‘instant,’ as in ‘no trial required,’ as in ‘no impeachment needed.’ Continuismo – the tendency of heads of state to extend their rule indefinitely – has been the lifeblood of Latin America’s authoritarian tradition. The Constitution’s provision of instant sanction might sound draconian, but every Latin American democrat knows how much of a threat to our fragile democracies continuismo presents. In Latin America, chiefs of state have often been above the law. The instant sanction of the supreme law has successfully prevented the possibility of a new Honduran continuismo. The Supreme Court and the attorney general ordered Zelaya’s arrest for disobeying several court orders compelling him to obey the Constitution. He was detained and taken to Costa Rica. Why? Congress needed time to convene and remove him from office. With him inside the country that would have been impossible. This decision was taken by the 123 (of the 128) members of Congress present that day. Don’t believe the coup myth. The Honduran military acted entirely within the bounds of the Constitution. The military gained nothing but the respect of the nation by its actions.”
If Richard Nixon had been impeached and convicted for Watergate, and then refused to leave office, until being forced out by the military, would that have been a “military coup”? Of course not. But Obama and many in the press are taking essentially that position in demanding the reinstatement of Honduras’s would-be dictator.
The fact that the military carried out the Honduran Supreme Court’s orders in removing a would-be dictator, after he flouted the court’s rulings, does not make it a “military coup.” When court orders are defied by powerful government officials, troops are sometimes called out to enforce them, as happened in the U.S. in 1957 when federal troops forced Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus to stop blocking the court-ordered integration of Little Rock’s public schools. Indeed, Article 272 of the Honduran Constitution gives the military the power to remove a president even without a court order, if he seeks to violate the term limits prescribed in the Honduran Constitution. Even a legal commentator, Litho, at the leading liberal blog Daily Kos, which is run by a leftist Latin American immigrant, admits that the military’s action was “legal” in a “technical sense” under the Honduran Constitution.
Would-be bullying czars have been installed in the U.S., why not install a bullying totalitarian in another country?
IMHO
He's waiting for instrutions from Senor Hugo.
Don’t know. The “messiah” says he doesn’t like to “meddle”. However, he also said he was only going to raise taxes on “the rich” and we all know how that worked out.
Zero doesn’t give a d@mn about our Constitution - witness his expressed intent to conclude a SALT treaty with Russia without Senate approval (among numerous other violations) - so why should anyone expect him to care about Hondorus’s? All he sees is a fellow marxist wannabe dictator getting kicked out of office, and that’s where his sympathies lie...
Teleprompter will continue to write nasty letters.
He may be a communist druggie, but he is a spineless communist druggie.
Obozo is trying to rescue fellow Commie.
Doubt the sane people in Honduras will allow their Commie back.
Surely 0-Zero can see the same thing possibly happening to him in the future. He must see what has happened in Iran as another case of the same issue.
Citizens who know better want to live in Freedom not under Tyranny.
Makes one wonder what was really in that book Chavez handed to Barry personally? ... Advanced notice of the new offensive of fellow marxists in SA?
How?
It doesn’t look like Honduras is going to let itself be bullied by anyone on this matter.
To the extent that Honduras was doing things by the organization methodology that they set up for themselves, and in that there was nothing inherently evil about that methodology (although their system is different than ours) — we should have stayed out of it.
Obama’s mistake was opening his mouth in the first place. He should have kept his trap shut.
And by the same token, we should stay out of that situation and let them take care of it. And if they don’t take care of it the way that some think that they should (whether it be us that thinks that or “them” that thinks that) — we should still stay out of it — either way.
It’s their country and their laws and their people — not ours — so let’s take care of our own country. We’ve got our own Marxist to try and get out of here... LOL...
Why wouldn’t one Zero back another Zero?
I'd say yes. He and his Chicago handlers probably consider it a warm up. It'll be a nice way to test some strategies and techniques they may try here in '12.
I know other's have said it - maybe jokingly, maybe not - that they think there may not be a (valid) '12 election in the United States. With ACORN, the would-be terrorist designation for most Republican's, the knife grab to precede the gun grab (?), the flouting of laws and ethics on an epic scale... For the first time, I too am starting to have serious concerns about the '12 election...
If, as I suspect, the liberals and Democrats get their collective backsides handed to them in the '10 election (due to failed porkus, huge deficits, inflation, unemployment...) ... I expect that will seriously panic obama and his cohorts. Look for (more) unprecedented actions by him then. (unless his BC surfaces before then and he is behind bars by then)
In the mean time...
U.S. hopes Obama’s visit to Ghana will spur others
Sat Jul 4, 2009 1:58pm
NAIROBI (Reuters) - The United States hopes President Barack Obama’s decision to visit Ghana this month will spur other African governments to try and emulate the West African country’s democratic record
“(Obama) believes strongly in the rule of law, democratic constitutional rule and the principles that underpin it,” U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson told reporters during a visit to Kenya.
“We hope that his support for democracy in Ghana will be a catalyst for others to also adopt democratic norms that are equally as strong,
LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is bad news folks.
Bwahahahahahaha ... sad thing is, the fools voting for democraps actually believe that drivel because they are sheepel to be herded by the four estate turned fifth column enemedia.
“..the West African country’s democratic record..”
.
Does their Constitution have a 2nd Amendment similar to ours? If not, then it’s people are not free and Ghana is not a democracy.
I wonder if he will recognize our term limits.
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