Over at the Miami Herald, an opinion piece on what happened in Honduras that Obama, Hillary, the United Nations, and the Organization of American States should read before making pronouncements
The greatest tourist attraction in Central America has always been politics. Diplomats stop by every few years, take a couple of snapshots of what’s going on at the presidential palace, and then profoundly declare their opinions, devoid of context or history. This week’s favorite diplotourism destination is Honduras, where the army Sunday arrested President Manuel Zelaya and booted him across the border to Costa Rica. In the Polaroid analysis, it’s pretty clear what happened: ”A return to barbarism in our hemisphere,” as Argentina’s president Cristina Fernández put it.
She had plenty of company. ”The action taken against Honduran President Mel Zelaya violates the precepts of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, and thus should be condemned by all,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. “We call on all parties in Honduras to respect the constitutional order and the rule of law.”
The OAS Permanent Council voted ”to condemn vehemently the coup d’etat staged this morning against the constitutionally established government of Honduras.” U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon demanded “the reinstatement of the democratically elected representatives of the country and full respect for human rights.”
Here’s a question for all these new-found defenders of Honduran democracy: Where were you last week? Perhaps if some of these warnings about sticking to the constitution had been addressed to President Zelaya, the Honduran army would still be in the barracks where it belongs.
It boils down to: power hungry president doing something unconstitutional and being deposed, with his own party approving of him being thrown out of power. You see what Hillary and the OAS stated. They came out on the side of the un-Democratic and un-Constitutional.
- Obama called it an illegal coup: “We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras, the democratically elected president there,”
- The OAShas given Honduras an ultimatum to return Zelaya to power or Honduras’ membership will be suspended.
- The United Nationshas demanded that Zelaya be returned to power.
- Then you have nations like Spain recalling their ambassador, and their king condemning the “coup.” Go figure, a king is against democracy. Taiwan’s ambassador condemns the “coup.”
Funny how so many on the left want to see a president who violated the constitution returned to power. They say they are pro-democracy and pro-rule of law, but, when push comes to shove, they show their true colors. Just like with Iraq, where most of these same people were rooting for the mission to fail.
- Fausta wants to know what was on those referendum ballots, which were printed in Venezuela.
- Flopping Aces has a great editorial cartoon, and wonders why Obama will meddle in Honduras and Israel, but not Iran.
- Ed Morrissey highlights a break between the New Republic and the Obama cabal.
- The Hill points out that Obama is starting to catch flack for his handling of the Honduras affair.
- Over at The Jawa Report, Howie is wondering what Obama has against presidential term limits.
Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU
The President of Honduras was violating the Constitution of his country ? But wasn’t Bush CONSTANTLY found to be doing that by our own Supreme Court of which 7 of the 9 memebers were appointed by Republican presidents ?
I don’t seem to recall Bush trying to eliminate the term limit of the presidency so that he could rule indefinitely, or did I miss something.
Gee, John, all this time, and you folks have still not found anything but supposition and innuendo. And conspiracy theories, let’s not forget those!
But, can you actually defend Obama?
I find it interesting to hear Hiliary shout about, “The rule of law must prevail”, when that is exactly what has happened in Honduras. Their Constitution was being broken not ours Hiliary and they removed him from office. Funny how “rule of law” takes on many different meanings with Democrats.
I also find it interesting our President, the leader of the free world, is standing hand in hand with Chavez in this matter.
One socialist to another. Looks like a view for the future America.
Edisto Joe
http://edistojoe.com
The President was snot attacking constitutionally, he was introducing a bill on whether to have a vote on whether to have a constitutional referendum. That means that the population would have had two public votes on which to reject his constitutional change. Secondly why aren’t you suspicious that the coup has occurred now? Oh yes because he’s not a right wing american puppet.
Another thing that is amusing is how we couldn’t “meddle” with Iran, and didn’t even have an official statement regarding their demonstrations fro what, 3 or 4 days? But as soon as this happened, Big Bar had no problem “meddling” in Honduras’s affairs.
CHAVEZ STOPS HERE AND NOW
I’m Honduran. We need the world to understand that more than 90% of hondurans support the newly appointed government and DO NOT want Zelaya back.
Zelaya & Chavez = Pinky & The Brain for us.
Yes he won by tight margin in an election where very few voted because both candidates sucks. We didn’t know this guy very well OBVIOUSLY. But we did expect him to do his term and bye-bye.
But he betrayed us all by befriending the Castros, Chavez and the rest of Marxist Communist crew. We don’t like communism here, we never have, and most likely never will. What you when your President is suddenly bought by another countries’ leader, by different (completely different) ideology. We waited. We suckup every insult he threw at those who liked America or American. Him and Chavez called us PitiYanquis (a made up insult by Chavez). This as Chavez and Zelaya turned the Presidential Palace into a drinking and orgy Pub, publicly.
He tried to take over all powers of the country like Chavez did in Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicargua and Dominican Republic. The formula is:
1) Buy and run three or more TV channels and create your one News Paper
2) Change the Constitution
3) Submit the three Government powers under yourself (Legislative, Judicial & Executive)
4) Run all referendums, elections and ballots yourself
And guess what? you just became a dictator that no one will ever kick out with out bloodshed. Zelaya was stage two of Pinky and The Brains process.
We can’t have a trial here for him, because he and Chavez will bribe of threaten any one. Only some Union Leader and his government employees support him. But Union workers hate him, because they weren’t bought.
PLEASE HELP HONDURAS STOP CHAVEZ NOW. THIS IS THE TIME. IF HE RETURNS THERE WILL BE BLOOD HERE. PLEASE DONT LET IT HAPPEN.