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May 24, 2013
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 OAS Delegation to HondurasPosted on Aug 7, 2009
Little has been done to undo the coup d’etat that rocked Honduras over a month ago. Now, the Organization of American States, hoping for new elections and the return of President Manuel Zelaya, is sending a delegation to the country to try to negotiate an end to the crisis.
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By ardee, August 10, 2009 at 2:54 pm Link to this comment
You apparently have married much of the non-White population. I have always suspected that other people lead far more interesting lives than I do.
I am laughing almost too hard to type…..Darn you FT.......
Despite my aforementioned difficulties I refuse to embrace your far too encompassing critique of my fellow Americans. Certainly we are an arrogant people, and some among us are cruel as well, though they wrap that cruelty in the flag and call it patriotism.
But, and its a big one so you better sit down for it…...when one compares the behaviors found around the world, bombing and shooting and ousting whole populations for reasons of tribal memberships, ethnic differences,religious persuasions and even more trivialities we seem to be doing fine by comparison.
We certainly have a long damn way to go, and we both share that knowledge, but we are making progress, albeit it far too slowly.
If you want to see progress come on over for one of our family gatherings sometime…..We got various tones, shades and colors and I personally cant wait until the whole world is plaid!
Report thisBy Richard Grabman, August 10, 2009 at 11:45 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
The CIA probably has less to do with this than ATT and Verizon, which have been trying to get their hands on Hondurtel (the state telephone company) for the last several years. Two names that show up again and again in Honduran coup backers are Otto Reich and Robert Carmona. Reich, the former U.S. Ambassador to Honduras (Reagan Adm) is a lobbyist for the phone industry; Professor Carmona has business ties to them. Most Latin American journalists who have written about the coup are aware of these connections, as well as that of Lanny Davis (of the Clinton Administration) who is a lobbyist for coup backers in the Honduran business community.
Honduras is not “run by Spaniards” but by a small clique of eight Honduran families with close business ties to the United States. The single largest factor in the coup was attempts to ram through the legislature a new minimum wage bill, with the refusal to denationalize the telephone company being a rationale to discredit the elected President.
The OAS is not considered a particularly useful international body, but they do have their uses. The Honduran golpistas NOW claim they will accept OAS mediation, but only if the elected chair of the OAS (Insulza, the former Chilean foreign minister) is excluded… his “crime” according to the golpistas being that he’s a member of a socialist party. It’s pretty obvious, the coup is more about preserving an economic system than any particular need to save democracy from itself.
Report thisBy Folktruther, August 10, 2009 at 10:22 am Link to this comment
Ardee, while American people, like all people, tend to be PERSONALLY campassanate, the conception of justice and humnaity instilled in personal relations has not been generallzed historically to all earthpeople. In the US it is incompatible with a central value of the American people instilled historically by the ruling class.
That value is homicidal racism. The American people, to a great extent, cosider it acceptable to kill, torture and rape non-White peoples. When this is done in foreign affaris, it is justified as Defense. When it is done in the US, it is justified as Law and Order. It is mostly an uncoscious value, but widely prevelant, inclduding distribution in the non-White people themselves.
It was your difficulty in getting a simple racist incident accepted by TD Progressives that led me to realize the importance of racism in the Amerian soul.
Since most of the people of the world are non-White, this has influeced the American worldview, especiallythe unsconscious part.
You apparently have married much of the non-White population. I have always suspected that other people lead far more interesting lives than I do.
Report thisBy David Brookbank, August 10, 2009 at 7:07 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Sorry Old Geezer Pilot. Not sure where you are getting your story line. Nicaragua is already a member of the OAS. You may be referring to Cuba but since Cuba is not asking to return to the OAS, their return is not a certainty. http://www.escambray.cu/Eng/Special/ALBA/Arauoass080417204m.htm
And to Virgina, regarding your question about the lack of reporting by the U.S. media on Honduras (and may I ad, so many other topics of importance), you might want to google—media ownership in US. One hit will be http://www.corporations.org/media/
Report thisWhile it may be nice to speak about a “free press” in the U.S., it is a lie. The press is owned and those owners exercise control over content and political line. Not only is the U.S. geographically isolated, it has corporate-owned razor wire around it when you talk about the media most people access on a routine basis. When you go to an airport, for example, you witness a captive audience of hundreds, sometimes thousands of people, subject to right leaning corporate media feeding people a very limited perspective on the world.
By ardee, August 9, 2009 at 4:55 pm Link to this comment
Folktruther, August 9 at 11:59 am #
Virgina, most Americans wrongly, very wrongly, don’t care or know anything about foreign affairs, and don’t understand how they personally affect the American people.
....................................
Dont know, for certain, dont care, unproven and perhaps needlessly harsh.
The likelihood that America had its dirty hands on this coup is , in my opinion ( and yours apparently), rather great . The way our news is managed and sanitized it is pretty likely that most are just unaware of the coup at all.
I think that failing to give the public credit for being a compassionate and caring people leads to a cynicism that makes activism less possible.
Report thisBy Virginia777, August 9, 2009 at 1:07 pm Link to this comment
You got that right, Folktruther!!
Report thisBy Old Geezer Pilot, August 9, 2009 at 9:41 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Since his term expires in January 2010, there will be little traction to restore him to power. According to Wikipedia, the straw poll he tried to take was perfectly legal, yet he was barred from appearing in court to defend himself.
Who knows if the CIA is behind this? But it looks like it will stand. There will be an election and a new president next year, Nicaragua will be allowed back into the OAS.
We’ll be right back after these commercials.
Report thisBy Folktruther, August 9, 2009 at 8:59 am Link to this comment
Virgina, most Americans wrongly, very wrongly, don’t care or know anything about foreign affairs, and don’t understand how they personally affect the American people. The Dem and Gop party have a bipartisan foreign policy so US oppressive policies are not debated in the public truth consensus. or rather, the debate is between militarists and more right wing militarists.
Obama and the US media know this, so simply blank out US violence and illegality in other countries. The simple truth about US violence and racism is unpatriotic and un-American in the US mainstream truth consensuss. So both Conservatives and Progressives agree to consider blatant Big Truths as being true.
The Iran Stolen Election is a good illustration of this, joining the Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction and the Darfur Genicide in the power delusions of the American worldview. Iran has a tradition of counting the votes honestly in an election, an anti-imperialist candidate wins a landslide election, and the US mass media declare, on no evidence at all, that it is fraudulent, should be canceled and another election held.
Everyone knows that the American power structure lies to the American people, but it is not generally realize the intensity, and breadth of the US Big Truths. With the rise of TV and modern advertising techniques, the US population has been systematically deluded about the nature of political and social reality. Especially in foreign affairs.
Report thisBy Virginia777, August 9, 2009 at 8:25 am Link to this comment
Can I rant a little here?
Why IS this issue, a Democratic elected leader is ousted in a Military Coup, getting so little attention from our Press?
In stark comparison to the still-ongoing onslaught and furor (meticulously recorded and relayed, with every single nuance written down) over the Iranian elections??
(where are the “green balloons” for the Hondurans?)
Report thisBy ardee, August 9, 2009 at 6:30 am Link to this comment
Folktruther, August 8 at 11:47 pm
Or something…...
When Hugo Chavez Frias rose to power in Venezuela there appeared a similar coterie of such posters, all swearing to have lived, or worked, or had relatives who lived or worked, in that nation and thus knew more than we the people did. Exactly the same style and story too….
Coincidence? I think not.
Report thisBy Virginia777, August 9, 2009 at 6:25 am Link to this comment
According to Reuters, Zelaya has given up on returning to Honduras:
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5746J720090805
One of Zelaya’s main backers in Latin America, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, also appeared to pull back from pushing for his ally’s return to power.
“The most important thing for Zelays [Chavez has said], is not that he returns. The most important thing is that he stays on a path toward what the people want, which is political and social change in Honduras,” Chavez told reporters in Caracas.”
Obama continues to do nothing against putschists, claiming policy of “noninterference” (which sounds like the US blockade on arms to the Spanish
Republicans fighting the fascists).
The Press continue to have very little coverage at all of the Honduras military coup, in stark contract to the Iranian elections.
Report thisBy Folktruther, August 8, 2009 at 8:47 pm Link to this comment
It is remarkable, isn’t it Ardee, the number of truthers living in Honduras who swear on trudig that the coup is not a coup. Especially as most Americans probably think Honduras is in the San Fernado Valley somewhere. It just shows you what a lot of public spirited citizens there are in the world. Or something.
Report thisBy coloradokarl, August 8, 2009 at 4:21 pm Link to this comment
The Spaniards that run Honduras are in with our CIA and 80-90% of the street level Drugs in this country are now sold by Honduran gang members. Gangs that were started by our actions in this country for the last 30-40 years. I hope the natives(are there any left?) rise up and kick some ass and we keep our broke selves at home where we belong.
Report thisBy David Brookbank, August 8, 2009 at 8:38 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
What is great about the interaction between Lanny Davis and Greg Grandin on Democracy Now is the fact that Davis was dragged out into the open and revealed for the propagandist that he is.
One important thing to understand is how intimately connected Davis is to Hillary Clinton and former president Bill Clinton. The September 3, 1998 New York Times article, “PUBLIC LIVES; Public Defender of a High-Profile Private Life” indicate Hillary and Davis have known each other since their days at Yale Law School in the late 1960s where apparently Davis was an intimate confidant of Hillary Clinton. Now that Hillary Clinton is Secretary of State, the presence of Davis managing her crisis in Honduras as a “private citizen” and propagandist for the Honduran ruling class business elites is not in the least surprising. Davis has managed sensitive crises for the Clinton’s in the past — Davis was Bill Clinton’s White House Counsel and defender during the days of the Clinton’s scandal and personal crisis involving Monica Lewinski.
It is also important to look more closely at the background of someone like Davis who, in the “debate” with Grandlin, nearly foams at the mouth calling Grandin a liar and Amy Goodman a propagandist. As to liars, Davis ran for Congress in 1976 as a Democrat from Maryland’s 8th congressional district. He won the Democratic nomination, but after a major scandal over his lying about his academic record at Yale Law School, he lost to the Republican candidate. According to National Review Online from August 13, 2004, referring to Lanny Davis, (quote) [The Washington Post, December 21, 1996] He won the 1976 Democratic primary and was neck and neck with Republican Newton Steers until a controversy erupted over the portrayal of Davis’s academic record in a campaign brochure. Davis claimed he had graduated from Yale Law School cum laude — a designation the school didn’t award in 1970, the year he finished. (end quote).
As to Davis as a propagandist, the National Review Online article continues (quote) And if you think Lanny often sounds like a door-to-door Amway salesman, there’s a reason for it. The same Post article teaches us: After he narrowly lost a 1976 House race, Davis, 51, began evangelizing for the motivational door-to-door distribution company, which markets everything from toothpaste to telephone service. A prominent Maryland lawyer-lobbyist, who refused to speak for attribution, recalled that Davis once invited him to lunch to discuss a “business opportunity.” “We didn’t order yet when he started talking, and it was like a switch went on,” the lobbyist recounted. “He asked, ‘Are you interested in making more money?’ Well, what lawyer isn’t? ‘Do you want to be in control of your destiny?’ And I go, ‘Wait a minute, Lanny — is this an Amway pitch?’ (end quote)
To all the world, Davis sounded in the Democracy Now “debate” as if he was out of control, perhaps similar to what Davis said about himself and his mental health in the above mentioned New York Times article: (quote) “Nonetheless Mr. Davis said he is concerned about his well-being because ”I have pushed myself mentally and physically to a point where I think it was beyond healthy.” (end quote)
President Obama could give Davis a long-needed vacation from the evidently overwhelming stress of his job as a highly-paid propagandist and waterboy for Secretary of State Clinton by coming out in a crystal clear fashion (no more meely mouthed statements, please, Mr. Obama) in declaring, as he did in the beginning, the coup a coup, the Micheletti government as illegitimate, and taking actions which would drive the military backed Honduran government out of office and allow the return of Zelaya. That way Davis could get back to selling Amway or what ever kind of hype he is selling when he is not selling military coups and human rights abuses in Honduras.
Report thisBy ardee, August 7, 2009 at 4:56 pm Link to this comment
I cannot help but wonder about US involvement in this coup. Zelaya was cozying up to Chavez, Honduras has a huge US police presence due to its being the fulcrum of our “war on drugs” down there, and we do so hate ‘the commies’!
Like any other story about this coup I expect to see the propagandists back in force swearing on their sainted mothers that;
They live in Honduras and know the real story, or they worked there for a jillion years, or their mother, father , brother, pet goat live there still.
Zelaya was ousted legally
They do not, honest they dont, post from a desk at Langely.
Report thisBy Russian Paul, August 7, 2009 at 3:56 pm Link to this comment
Democracy Now held a debate this morning between paid off lobbyist Lanny Davis and NYU professor Greg Grandin. He accused Amy of bias and ideological ranting and at Grandin he piled on the ad hominem attacks and spinned his lies. It was a remarkable performance by an experience showman, but it was apparent there was little truth to anything he was saying. http://www.democracynow.org/
As far as these talks go, they are a counterproductive distraction. Zelaya will not be allowed back in a position of power unless he takes it by force, which he should. This coup cannot be reversed without a violent overthrow of the coup government, that is the unfortunate truth.
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