Posted on 07/01/2009 4:48:18 AM PDT by Clive
The coup in Honduras -- the first in Latin America in 16 years -- is being condemned by practically everyone, especially leaders of neighbouring countries who don't want the same thing happening to them. That includes Venezuela's nasty Hugo Chavez.
Until relatively recently, coups d'etat were almost a traditional way of changing governments in some countries.
After all, President Manuel Zelaya was guilty of only wanting to stay in office longer than the Constitution allows, and sought to have a referendum to change the Constitution to permit him to seek another term. A true democrat.
When the Honduras Supreme Court, Congress and the army objected, Zelaya rejected the court's decision, fired the army commander and defied Congress.
Hence the coup.
Now, virtually every leader, including U.S. President Barack Obama, Chavez (who talks of military intervention on behalf of his pal Zelaya), Cuba's ailing Fidel Castro, and Canada wants Zelaya reinstated.
Canada, of course, urges restraint and a peaceful resolution -- predictably wishy-washy compared to Chavez's belligerent indignation.
The Honduran Congress appointed Roberto Micheletti, president of the National Congress, to take over from Zelaya who was removed unceremoniously, albeit somewhat comically -- taken at night in his pyjamas and dumped in neighbouring Costa Rica.
Obama's ingenuous view is: "We believe the coup was not legal." What, one wonders, is a "legal" coup? One that succeeds, I guess.
I don't know much about Honduras, but I do know that when coups occur, there's usually a reason. If the coup is vicious enough, the world quickly accepts it and hopes the malignancy is contained.
Think about it. The "government" (if you want to call it that) in Russia started after the 1917 revolution. In the first (and up to then only) democratic election, the Socialist Revolutionaries clearly won (370 seats), but the Bolsheviks (175 seats) staged a coup and seized power that lasted until the Soviet Union imploded in 1991.
The present Russian regime started out with elections but was more about the Russian Mafia taking over the economy, and the KGB managing the politics.
Obama scolding about the ouster of Zalaya is a bit precious. It's not his country. Perhaps he should let the people deal with it their way, so long as it wasn't subversion by another regime.
When the Portuguese were ousted from Angola in 1975, elections were held, and the party favoured by the CIA (FNLA) lost badly, but the election was stolen in a coup by the Soviet-backed MPLA. Jonas Savimbi's UNITA party objected, and after a long civil war, UNITA was on the verge of winning until America switched to support to the heirs of the "illegal" MPLA coup.
So much for sovereignty and integrity.
Periodically, Pakistan is subjected to coups. When "democratically" elected civilian governments get immersed in corruption, the military takes over via coups and restores something resembling honest government, then turns the country back to civilian rule -- which disintegrates back into corruption, and the circle begins again. In its 60-plus years of independence, Pakistan has alternated between civilian and military rule.
Manuel Zelaya has been neither a very good nor a very bad president. He's a bit too chummy with anti-American leaders, but he's not a zealot like Chavez.
Clearly his country doesn't want the Constitution changed, and he hasn't the power of Vladimir Putin who, when his two terms as president of Russia came to an end, simply switched to become prime minister and remained as boss behind the scenes.
So let Honduras figure out its own future. It staged a coup without help, and can manage quite well without outside interference ... if it is allowed to.
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It’s NOT a coup. The person who was trying to stage a coup was Zelaya, and he was prevented - legally and under the Honduran constitution.
There was too much cocaine, corruption and drug money involved. Certain people may be unable to resist wanting to “meddle.”
I have been discussing this with a friend who is from Honduras, now an American citizen. He is outraged at the world reaction, and especially Obama’s, and is seriously considering an extended vacation if things get hot down there so he can go and help defend true democracy.
I told him there’d probably be a lot of Americans down there with him.
Kind of a clueless article but the writer does arrive at the correct final destination.
Probably a lot of landscaping jobs available too.........LOL!
I have friends (Americans) who have lived in Honduras for 15 years. They, too, are outraged by the world’s condemnation of the removal of Zelaya. You won’t find many in Honduras who want him back.
Not me.
¡Viva la Libertad!
If we had adults in charge at Pennsylvania Avenue, we would have supported democracy. Instead, socialist obamma is supporting another dictator...
Let every American patriot closely watch the Honduran episode, particularly the constitutional issues involved and how the U.S. responds.
This could be our dress rehearsal.
He's missing the bigger point re:Obama. Even if the Honduran events represented a coup (which they didn't), the Big O is not one to lecture others about following the rule of law.
An interesting article but rather naïve as it does not consider the underlying political motives. However, perhaps it is more penetrating for precisely this reason, allowing people to ask this question on their own.
It does make one wonder. At one level, one might conclude support is rooted purely in ideological motives, but more cynical considerations would point in a more pragmatic direction (shudder).
"politics based on realities and material needs, rather than morals or ideas."
Geopolitics works best when nation states consider their own interests and those of their own citizens as paramount and abstain from officious inter-meddling motivated by what one of my professors called "my mother's theory of geopolitics".
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