(Via Dan Collins of POWIP) Senator Jim DeMint (R, SC) is back from Honduras - despite the best efforts of the Democrats to stop him from going - and he’s unkind about what has been pretty obviously an attempt by the American government to admit that we made a mistake and picked the wrong side of the Honduras issue:

[American policy re: the Zelaya ouster] was set in a snap decision the day Mr. Zelaya was removed from office, without a full assessment of either the facts or reliable legal analysis of the constitutional provisions at issue. Three months later, it remains in force, despite mounting evidence of its moral and legal incoherence.

[snip]

In a day packed with meetings, we met only one person in Honduras who opposed Mr. Zelaya’s ouster, who wishes his return, and who mystifyingly rejects the legitimacy of the November elections: U.S. Ambassador Hugo Llorens.

When I asked Ambassador Llorens why the U.S. government insists on labeling what appears to the entire country to be the constitutional removal of Mr. Zelaya a “coup,” he urged me to read the legal opinion drafted by the State Department’s top lawyer, Harold Koh. As it happens, I have asked to see Mr. Koh’s report before and since my trip, but all requests to publicly disclose it have been denied.

Read More →

Promoted from the diaries by Erick

From the lips of Obama at the United Freak Show last week:

No one nation can or should try to dominate another nation. No world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will succeed.
.
[snip]
.
There are basic principles that are universal; there are certain truths which are self-evident — and the United States of America will never waver in our efforts to stand up for the right of people everywhere to determine their own destiny.

OK then, big boy. How about let’s start with Honduras? How about you butt the heck out of Honduras, seeing as how the smart people conclude you are wrong about the recent so-called ‘coup’?

This week we find that the Congressional Research Service (CRS) states that Honduras acted within their laws in deposing Chavez-buddy, would-be dictator Manuel Zelaya.

Read More →

(H/T: AoSHQ) Not to mention Brazil’s public and increasingly outrageous assistance to Zelaya. So it’s going to have to stop:

Honduras is accusing Brazil’s government of instigating an insurrection within its borders, and gave the Brazilian Embassy 10 days to decide the status of ousted Honduran President Jose Manuel Zelaya, who has taken refuge there.

[snip]

The statement said Honduras would be forced to take measures against Brazil if Brazil did not define its position on Zelaya. It did not specify what those measures would be.

Well, according to Zelaya himself it’ll mean more hallucinogenic Jewish gas - no, really: that’s what he thinks - although it’d more likely that the Hondurans will just PNGing the entire Brazilian embassy and refusing to credential more until Zelaya is either in a Honduran jail, or is both de jure and de facto out of Honduran territory.  Given the general lack of a popular uprising to ‘rescue’ the ousted former president from his durance vile, that would be a reasonably face-saving way to end the confrontation.

Mind you, the way that this administration seems determined to play Ugly American, we might not be so lucky.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

(Via @jeffemanuel) One wonders whether something got lost in translation.

They’re torturing me, Honduras’ Zelaya claims

Honduras’ fallen leader told The Miami Herald he is being subjected to mind-altering gas and radiation — and that `Israeli mercenaries’ are planning to assassinate him.

TEGUCIGALPA — It’s been 89 days since Manuel Zelaya was booted from power. He’s sleeping on chairs, and he claims his throat is sore from toxic gases and “Israeli mercenaries” are torturing him with high-frequency radiation.

On the other hand, when it comes to this sort of thing eventually somebody decides to blame it all on the Jews.  Apparently, in this case Zeleya’s got “Israeli mercenaries” going after him with sonic weapons and radiation!  Spying on him with rays!  Can somebody explain why we’re backing this lunatic, again?  Oh, right: because the administration got caught unprepared by events, went off half-cocked, and guessed wrong: and God forbid that this administration ever admit that it’s capable of error.

I swear, it’s like the President is deliberately trying to be a caricature of all the Left-wing fantasies about President Bush.

Moe Lane

PS: Ed Morrissey has an extremely apt song in mind.

*Sarcasm. At least on my part.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

[UPDATE 6:30 EDT : the government has imposed a curfew from 4pm today till 6am tomorrow]

Multiple sources (Reuters) (AP) report that ousted and exiled former president Manuel Zelaya is back in Honduras, hidden for the moment in somebody’s embassy and therefore out of the reach of authorities, who have promised to arrest him and try him for treason if he re-appears on sovereign Honduran soil.

By the way, when you hear the name Manuel Zelaya, you should think pal and disciple of Venezuelan thug dictator Hugo Chavez.

Zelaya was ousted in what has widely been reported in the American press as a “coup” on June 28. The United Nations, the Obama administration, the OAS and other dubious characters like Hugo Chavez have roundly condemned the constitutional government in Honduras and have worked diligently to bring pressure to bear to reverse events in Honduras. The Reuters link above includes the assertion that “Soldiers toppled Zelaya”.

The truth is quite the opposite. Honduran officials acted perfectly according to their own constitution and within their authority in removing from office a president who was attempting to install himself as the permanent ruler similarly to how Hugo Chavez did in Venezuela. Take your time reading the sources. The facts of the matter are widely available, yet the Obama administration has led the way in applying pressure to Honduras, invoking economic sanctions and going so far as to revoke the visas of most high Honduran officials in order to block their attendance at this month’s United Nations General Assembly. You don’t want to know who all *did* make the cut and will attend. OK, yes you do: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Raul Castro, Hugo Chavez, and Muammar Gaddafi.

So far today:

Read More →

You may have missed this crisis if you get your news from the alphabet soup partisan media, who have mostly failed to cover it except to misrepresent it in favor of Obama.

You are probably not surprised to find that Poland and the Czech Republic are not the only loyal and faithful American allies getting screwed by the Obama Administration these days. The ongoing drama in Honduras is an outrage and a disgrace, but not because the Hondurans have done anything wrong. It’s because the Obama administration is actively intervening on behalf of a thug would-be dictator whom the Hondurans properly and legally drove from power.

Shame on you, Barack.

.
Follow closely, because this is an extremely important and telling example of the kind of foreign policy we are getting from Barack Obama. Let’s review what’s been going on in Honduras this year, and how the Obama administration has come down completely on the side of tyrants, cheaters, and marxists They’ve done it deliberately, and in keeping with their overall global policy of rejecting freedom and snuggling up to the thugs and bandits of the world [remember Iranian protesters after the fraud election? remember soldiers shooting them? remember Obama's reaction?].

Read More →

Call the members of the House and Senate foreign relations committees. Urge that they support Roberto Micheletti and the actions of the Honduran Supreme Court and Congress.

Go here to find the phone numbers.

Note: you’ll only see your Congressman or Senator IF they serve on the relevant committees.

Former Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, in defiance of the Honduran Supreme Court and Congress, attempted to hold an unconstitutional referendum to set himself up as President for life.

His move was backed by Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, and Barack Obama.

The democratic institutions of Honduras ordered the Honduran military to arrest Zelaya and named Robert Micheletti as President of Honduras.

Zelaya tried to make himself a dictator. Barack Obama has sided with American enemies against the lawfully elected government of Honduras.

Call the members of the House and Senate foreign relations committees. Urge that they support Roberto Micheletti and the actions of the Honduran Supreme Court and Congress.

(Background here.)

They had a court order.  Fausta updated:

1:50PM
Indeed, Honduras’ La Prensa states that (My translation: If you use this, please credit me and link to this post)

An official statement of the Supreme Court of Justice explained that the Armed Forces acted under lawful grounds when detaining the President of the Republic, and by decommissioning the materials to be used on the illegal poll which aimed to bring forth Executive Power against a judicial order.Other sources verified that the president of the Congress, Roberto Micheletti, will assume the presidency of the republic in a few hours.
…
Honduran president Manuel Zelaya was detained this morning by the military in compliance with an order of the courts of law.

Meanwhile, the foreign policy experts over at State and the White House* have gone into, bluntly, full Ugly American mode: they’re currently declining to recognize the right of the Hondurans to remove their own head of state on constitutional grounds. Apparently, when it’s a choice between a chief executive on the one hand and said chief executive’s country’s judiciary, legislature, military, and own political party on the other… well, it all apparently depends on what Hugo Chavez thinks.

Let’s just hope that they don’t ask Chavez what he thinks about the Jews.

Moe Lane

PS: Let me expand on that just a little.  I don’t think that this administration is slavishly following Chavez’s lead: I think that they care so little about South American affairs that accommodating their stance to that of a darling of the radical Left seems to them to be a no-brainer.  If the White House is worried about getting the answer to this wrong, it’s not immediately obvious.

*H/T: Gateway Pundit, Hot Air.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Via Fausta’s Blog:

Soldiers arrest Honduran president: AP+

MECIXO CITY, June 28 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Soldiers on Sunday arrested the Honduran president and took him to an air force base just before voting was to begin on a disputed constitutional election, according to the Associated Press.

President Manuel Zelaya’s private secretary told the AP that Zelaya was arrested and brought to a base on the outskirts of the capital, Tegucigalpa.

[snip]

Zelaya had pledged to go forward with a referendum on constitutional reform despite the opposition of the Supreme Court, the military, Congress and members of his own party.

Fausta has background here: if you don’t have time to read it, note that proto-dictator Hugo Chavez (and whoever’s channeling Fidel Castro this week) is spitting nails on this. Given that, as the Wall Street Journal notes, this entire thing got started over President Zelaya’s attempt to set up a referendum* in opposition to pretty much the opposition of the rest of the Honduran government, civilian and military… well.  A man is known by his friends, and I wish I knew what the equivalent Spanish idiom is.

Moe Lane

*One that would allow him to run for re-election.  The Honduras Constitution forbids that; given of what I know of South American history, this isn’t exactly surprising.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.