Military Coup Against Democratically Elected President of Honduras

It comes down to two types of people. Those who inspire to get ahead or those who want to take from those who do get ahead.

 

It comes down to two types of people. Landed gentry who are millionaires and inherited their land from their great grand parents and their peons who want a raise from $6 to $ 7 dollars a day. You go with the landed gentry.

 

When I asked Colindres why his group supported Zelaya, he said that for the first time in decades, the government of President Zelaya increased the budget for public universities and increased scholarships for the students. “We have a lot of poor students who were helped by this government. We don’t want the elite to take back the government and use it, as they have in the past, to enrich themselves and impoverish the people.”

Our last visit of the day, which went on for hours, was a fascinating gathering with members of the indigenous community, Lencas and Garifanos. This group was lucky to have made it to the capital, where they are camping out in a school auditorium. Entire families, from babies to grandmas, participate in roving protests every day. They keep moving so the military doesn’t know where they will be from one day to the next.

One by one, these very humble and poor people told us about their situation, their beliefs, their fears and their dreams. Valentina Dominquez, a primary school teacher, said, “Our people are suffering from poverty, and President Zelaya tried to help. He raised the minimum wage and in the schools, he made sure that all the children were given snacks. He made school registration free and increased programs to help the 20% of Hondurans who don’t know how to read or write. That’s why we made our way to Tegucigalpa to defend his government and overturn the coup. But we are repressed by the military and have no one to defend us but God,” she cried. “That’s why we need help from the outside community.”

Teresa Reyes, with the organization of black Hondurans called OFRANEH, said this new regime was terrorizing the people. “On the day of the coup, they cut the electricity, blacked out the news, and told us not to leave our houses. We were scared, we are scared, and we’re exhausted—some of us have been walking for days to get here. But even so, we were determined to keep protesting.”

Salvador Zuniga, one of the heads of the Civil Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), talked about the extreme poverty and illiteracy in Honduras, and the desire of poor communities to participate in determining how the nation’s resources are used and distributed. Honduras is notorious for a small group of families controlling most of the resources, from the media to the mines. “With the vote that was supposed to take place on Sunday, President Zelaya simply wanted to ask the people if they liked the idea of rewriting the Constitution, of setting up a new legal framework for determining how decisions get made. The powerful elite in this country was terrified that this process would result in a new economic model at the service of the people, as we have been seeing in other countries of Latin America. That’s why they organized the coup, to maintain their stranglehold on the economy.”

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/07/02-0

 

My Grandfather wasn't a millionaire. He didn't inherit land and he built the house on his land with his bare hands. When the Sandinistas took over Nicaragua they took his land and his house for the "good of the people."

I'm a Democrat, not a communist. There's a difference between a 3 percent tax increase and taking somebody else's home and turning them into barracks for comrades.

 

Give us the whole story. I call bs if you are trying to say that the Sandinistas went around taking the houses of every little person who managed to build a home with their bare hands.

 

I really cant see how you can cast this as elites vs the people. The rules are the rules. If you want a constitutional amendment, you have to step down first. Not a bad idea for a country ravaged by power hungry dictators. You dont get to ignore the constitution just for the hell of it. I suspect the only genuine support is coming from Chavez. It mirrors how he became a democratically elected president for life.

 

Central America is not suburban Houston or a class on government at A & M.

 

You just posted an article showing how this gov't made major changes to benefit the middle class and poor in the country. Given that they were able to do all that legally, its hard to argue that the gov't was controlled by the wealthy elites and that the President simply had no choice but to violate the law.

 

Not really are you forgetting the recent military coup? You do have a minor point, though.

 

Honduras Crisis Forces Obama to Focus on Latin America

Posted by Tom Hayden, The Nation at 7:13 AM on July 1, 2009.



Will Obama side with a democratically elected government that happens to be a Venezuelan ally? Post Tools

The military coup against Honduran president Manuel Zelaya puts pressure on President Obama to break sharply with past American policies or risk massive defections in what remains of Latin America’s goodwill.



Yesterday President Obama declared the coup was “not legal” and affirmed the Zelaya government’s legitimacy, statements that were considered “very good” by Venezuelan diplomats interviewed by The Nation.



The Obama position is complicated by the history of US training of the Honduras armed forces, past involvement with shadowy death squads, and concern over Zelaya’s alliance with the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas. In the background are memories of US complicity in the attempted coup against Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez in 2002.



he issue will become paramount today as foreign ministers of the Organization of American States (OAS) meet in Washington, DC, to consider their response. The Venezuelans will be accompanied by the exiled Honduran foreign minister. Meanwhile, Zelaya is expected to be at the United Nations for meetings at the General Assembly. “This will be a turning point in the history of the OAS,” observed the Venezuelan official.



Some Democratic insiders were expressing mixed feelings over the coup. Michael Tomasky’s blog found it “complicated,” before concluding that “a military coup is a military coup, I guess.” Faith Smith, writing on the blog of Steve Clemons of the New American Foundation, found it “difficult to say which side is democratic.” She noted approvingly that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while criticizing the coup, offered “no specific support for Zelaya.”



The choice for Obama is whether to side with a democratically elected government that happens to be a Venezuelan ally, or be ostracized by the governments of Latin America. Obama’s policies have indicated a desire for modest and gradual rapprochement after the Bush years, without rapid or concrete changes. That gradualism will be tested today.

Honduras Crisis Forces Obama to Focus on Latin America

Posted by Tom Hayden, The Nation at 7:13 AM on July 1, 2009.



Will Obama side with a democratically elected government that happens to be a Venezuelan ally? Post Tools
The military coup against Honduran president Manuel Zelaya puts pressure on President Obama to break sharply with past American policies or risk massive defections in what remains of Latin America’s goodwill.



Yesterday President Obama declared the coup was “not legal” and affirmed the Zelaya government’s legitimacy, statements that were considered “very good” by Venezuelan diplomats interviewed by The Nation.



The Obama position is complicated by the history of US training of the Honduras armed forces, past involvement with shadowy death squads, and concern over Zelaya’s alliance with the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas. In the background are memories of US complicity in the attempted coup against Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez in 2002.



he issue will become paramount today as foreign ministers of the Organization of American States (OAS) meet in Washington, DC, to consider their response. The Venezuelans will be accompanied by the exiled Honduran foreign minister. Meanwhile, Zelaya is expected to be at the United Nations for meetings at the General Assembly. “This will be a turning point in the history of the OAS,” observed the Venezuelan official.



Some Democratic insiders were expressing mixed feelings over the coup. Michael Tomasky’s blog found it “complicated,” before concluding that “a military coup is a military coup, I guess.” Faith Smith, writing on the blog of Steve Clemons of the New American Foundation, found it “difficult to say which side is democratic.” She noted approvingly that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while criticizing the coup, offered “no specific support for Zelaya.”



The choice for Obama is whether to side with a democratically elected government that happens to be a Venezuelan ally, or be ostracized by the governments of Latin America. Obama’s policies have indicated a desire for modest and gradual rapprochement after the Bush years, without rapid or concrete changes. That gradualism will be tested today.
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video..._forces_obama_to_focus_on_latin_america/#more

 

The family of the deceased horse have asked me to instruct you to stop kicking.

 

What is there to tell, he wouldn't side with them, they took his property. You think when a violent revolution happens the losing side gets treated with respect? My grandfather was a retired military/police officer, had his own land, house, and livestock and he chose to come here and clean apartments instead of living under communist rule. If you like that lifestyle so much, why don't you move to Venezuela or Cuba?

 

The "military" coup (on instructions by parts of the civilian gov't) was in response to the President's attempted coup #1. Had he not gone off firing the military head for refusing to ignore Supreme Court orders, there would have been no coup #2.

But you guys are arguing that the President was justified in taking his illegal actions because he was fighting for the poor and that the gov't is otherwise controlled by elitists - that's not an unreasonable position if we accept that the installed gov't was essentially fascist and not representative of the people. But if he was able to make all these positive changes legally, with the consent of the Congress, why the need to go rogue? It seems to suggest the gov't structure was actually working as-is.

 

You just took Oski's real life story, lived by his family, and completely discounted it. Why? Because it doesn't fit your little ideological box. What a convenient world you must live in when you can crap all over somebody else's life experiences in the name of ideology.

 

Well we sure have some outrage on your part on behalf of your ideology. Just because it seems natural to you and perhaps all you were raised with , does not mean your conservative beliefs are not an ideology, though it is a good rhetorical point to claim otherwise.

I agree with Oski when you have people persecuted for generations brutally and the people try to change things peacefully and are gunned down and tortured forcing them to have a revolution there are winners and losers. We don't know to what extent Oski's grandfather helped the torturers of the Somoza regime, but . I feel for him if he lost his proerty as described and it may very well have been unjust. This does not negate IMHO the necessity for the Sandinistas to have rebelled against the torturers who blocked peaceful change for the vast majority.

 

Read my mind. At least I know Texx and TJ are trying to pull legs. Glynch is serious as a heartbeat.

 

Yeah it is serious business when you have people ground down for years by dictators like Somoza in Nicaragua, when their kids routinely die at child birth and they die at age 50 from old age,while Somoza and his cronies hobnob with American elites, when if they try to vote or have unions to negotiate higher wages, if they demonstrate against injustice Somoza's secret police imprisons them,tortures them and goes after family. I'm not too happy about the US even as recently as Reagan and the Bushs, abetting this. It is true I don't tend to be as light hearted about this as country club Republicans like TJ who enjoy their elite status with little contact or concern for others.

Let me also say I don't obviously know any details about Oski's grandfather. Most likely he went along to get along. That is what most people do in a dictatorship. Most of the ordinary Taliban, or Somoza police or Russian communist party officials were just trying to survive and are not the main evil doers. They are victims of the system, too.

 

I'm not sure what to believe regarding the whole story but I'd rather have an honest king over a corrupt democracy.

I don't think that's the case here though. Overall, I'd almost always ratehr have a democracy that's fair to all.

 

You are doing it again. It seems you are unable to process information contrary to your world view. Pity.

 

You are doing it as usual--unable to process info contrary to your ideoogy. Pity.