Chavez wannabe legally ousted, media calls it a coup.

[Trollbait]

If he was indeed a drug trafficker and the Honduran government kicked him out without the US having to roust him from a monastery Noriega style I don't see how anyone can complain much. In my opinion they should not be complaining now....but the latest accusations make that even more evident.

The egg will come from a world leader making statements of support for a drug trafficker and not knowing that his own agency has said drug trafficker under investigation. That is a very big egg.

[Lurker]

Yes Jecks, the DEA was investigating the President of Honduras for smuggling drugs and bringing thousands of pounds of cash into the country and nobody informed the State Department. That's plausible! You're being silly.

[Partha]

He's been silly since the days when he GUARANTEED that his friends in the military would find WMD in Iraq because they had to.

[Harlowe]

Not only does the State Dept NOT know this, but there are people on the interwebz that DO! If only members of the State Dept would sign up for access to Brell Rants. They would find an expert on everything!

[Ddrak]

Perhaps you missed the Honduran constitutional clause stating that the military is empowered to maintain good order along with the National Police. They are allowed to serve in a police role.

Last I looked, shutting down the free press while kidnapping citizens and transporting them to another country isn't "maintaining good order".

Come on, Jecks, claiming that this was following the rule of law is just absurd. You've stated pretty clearly a few times now that you're more concerned about the result than the actions that led to it and that's fine, just don't pretend that they did it "by the book". My position is either Honduras is a nation that follows the rule of law or they aren't. It seems to me that given their actions in this case they have shown themselves to be quite happy to ignore whatever rules they set for themselves and to use military force to achieve an outcome that could have easily been solved in another way and that doesn't bode well for the future of a democracy.

I think perhaps you are missing exactly what prompted his removal.

Nope - haven't missed any of it. I think you're missing what you laid out in black and white here:

In accordance with a direct order from both the Legislature and the Supreme court, with the legal backing of the Attorney General and the Human Rights Ombudsman the military removed Zelaya from the Presidential Residence

There is no constitutional or legal basis for this action. None of the entities you mention here have the authority to take the President and forcibly transport him to another nation. In fact, they don't even have the authority to do that to regular civilians or criminals. They took the law into their own hands and you keep admitting it.

Triolo is dancing around the issue. He knows damn well it was an illegal action that had the end result of upholding the law. Why people like him can't come out and say they think it's fine to break the law for the greater good is beyond me - maybe they really should just stay out of it if they don't have the courage to say what they really mean?

Full story is Zelaya got what he deserved, but the nation broke their own laws to do it. Life's not black and white - just because Zelaya is a bad guy doesn't make people who oppose him automatically good.

Dd

[Trollbait]

Not only does the State Dept NOT know this, but there are people on the interwebz that DO! If only members of the State Dept would sign up for access to Brell Rants. They would find an expert on everything!

Harlowe you are such a fucking retard. I bet you are the kind of person who interjects herself into a conversation just to hear her own voice.

Did you miss the part where I said "If this is true" or "If he was indeed a drug trafficker" ? or are you deliberately being an asshole? You have become Lurker's lapdog sidekick and it is a shame.

He's been silly since the days when he GUARANTEED that his friends in the military would find WMD in Iraq because they had to.

You and I discussed this before and it was clear I was given bad information by someone I trusted. You using it to take cheap shots at me 5 or more years later on a completely unrelated matter is very small of you.

Yes Jecks, the DEA was investigating the President of Honduras for smuggling drugs and bringing thousands of pounds of cash into the country and nobody informed the State Department. That's plausible! You're being silly.

Well I cannot say if it is true or not because I do not know and neither do you but saying I am silly for suggesting one department did not tell another department something you would assume they would and are obligated to do is not even remotely approaching silly. Given the history of such things I would say it is commonplace.

Also, I did not say the DEA did not tell State. Perhaps they did. But WHO was told at State and who did that person tell? It is all conjecture. All we have is the accusation at the moment and one other clue....

The other thing that tends to lend credibility to the accusation is that the DEA said they could neither confirm nor deny. If there was no investigation of Zelaya would they not have said so? They know that State and President Obama have voiced support for Zelaya so it would be best to quash the idea immediately if it was untrue.

Come on, Jecks, claiming that this was following the rule of law is just absurd.

I do not see anything in Honduran law that makes the actions illegal.

Kidnapping? That is an allegation not a matter of fact. Zelaya says kidnapped and the Honduran government says he left of his own accord. Zelaya says he did not resign and the government says he did. The government has since impeached him and he has outstanding arrest warrants.

Closing down a free press? Under a situation of national crisis that dog won't hunt, my friend.

just don't pretend that they did it "by the book"

I do not know yet if it was "by the book" or not. I know that Honduras has a right to self determination and self governance. It is not up to us to dictate to them how to run their affairs short of humanitarian issues or human rights abuses.

If the entire Honduran government sans the President does not have the right to kick the President out of office then who does? Should they go get the permission of Obama or the OAS or the UN?

The fact is that all that you can gripe about is the method by which he was arrested.

The Congress and the Supreme Court DO have the ability in Honduras to order someone arrested.

The Military of Honduras DOES have the authority to carry out an arrest order.

That is what happened.

So what law was broken other than an allegation of kidnapping?

[Lurker]

Harlowe you are such a fucking retard.
...
You have become Lurker's lapdog sidekick and it is a shame.

First of all, she's clearly not. Secondly, you've been using a variation of this line for years now. It's a lame tactic on your part.

====

State has been involved in multilateral negotiations with Honduras for weeks now trying to avoid what happened last week. That they wouldn't know about a DEA investigation that reached the level of the President of Honduras just isn't credible.

A DEA spokesperson refusing to confirm or deny adds no credibility to the accusation.

Let's flip this around. If the charges of Zelaya being involved in the drug trade and smuggling plane loads of cash and being under direct investigation by the DEA prove to be false, would that be a major blow against the people that took over Honduras? Seems like accusing your opponent of crimes like that is more in line with a dictatorship than a democracy, right?

I do not know yet if it was "by the book" or not.

Exactly.

[Trollbait]

First of all, she's clearly not. Secondly, you've been using a variation of this line for years now. It's a lame tactic on your part.

Exactly the defense of ones sidekick we would expect to see. Bravo. You are a loyal master.

=====

Let's flip this around. If the charges of Zelaya being involved in the drug trade and smuggling plane loads of cash and being under direct investigation by the DEA prove to be false, would that be a major blow against the people that took over Honduras? Seems like accusing your opponent of crimes like that is more in line with a dictatorship than a democracy, right?

It would mean that the government is willing to lie to further their position. And we know that only dictatorships do that, right? .....Right?

[Lurker]

Nice dodge. Accusing your opponent of a crime and threatening arrest is a bit more than just lying to further a position.

Would everyone supporting the people that took over Honduras have egg on their face?

[Trollbait]

Nice dodge. Accusing your opponent of a crime and threatening arrest is a bit more than just lying to further a position.

Not a dodge. I think that a lot of governments posture in this manner.

Would everyone supporting the people that took over Honduras have egg on their face?

Only if they turn out to be wrong and refuse to admit it.

[Harlowe]

You just like to dismiss me because I call you on your arrogant shit every time (as does Lurker). Lurker and I don't agree on quite a few things, you just choose to be ignorant about it because it doesn't suit your little petty agenda. If you need examples, you don't have to search any further than the recent chat on unions. Of course, you have your own circle jerk with at least one person here (Fall), so you are hardly one to speak on that.

With regard to liking to hear one's own voice, yeah that's yet another pot calling the kettle black moment. You never engage in honest discourse. You start out cluking your tongue and making snide attacks, demanding responses to your snide remarks, then launch into "you're a retard, you're a lap dog, you're a BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH" remarks.

At least I can say for most everyone else here, they are engaging in honest discourse, not trying to cluck their tongue at everyone in some hyper-sanctimonious ass mode.

[Trollbait]

You just like to dismiss me

This^


Back on topic, I think this article from the NY Times adds to the discussion. It gives us some insight to the lead up to the removal of Zelaya anyway.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/02/world ... 2coup.html

President’s Ouster Legal, New Honduran Leaders Contend

Article Tools Sponsored By
By MARC LACEY
Published: July 1, 2009

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras—Flipping through a stack of legal opinions and holding up a detention order signed by a Supreme Court judge, the chief lawyer of the Honduran armed forces insisted that what soldiers carried out over the weekend when they detained President Manuel Zelaya was no coup d’état.

“A coup is a political move,” Col. Herberth Bayardo Inestroza Membreño said in an interview Tuesday night. “It requires the armed forces to assume power of the country, which didn’t happen, and it has to break the rule of law, which didn’t happen, either.”

Governments around the world have decided differently, labeling Mr. Zelaya’s removal an illegal act and calling for his prompt return to power. “We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras, the democratically elected president there,” President Obama said Monday.

Colonel Bayardo, dressed in green camouflage and wearing a blue beret, described a behind-the-scenes struggle between the armed forces and Mr. Zelaya that played out over weeks before the fateful decision to grab the president from his home, shuttle him to a military base and fly him out of the country.

The army had resisted participating in a referendum on constitutional changes that Mr. Zelaya continued to push after both the Congress and the courts had labeled the president’s move unconstitutional. Army lawyers were convinced that Mr. Zelaya was moving to lift a provision limiting presidents to a single term in office, Colonel Bayardo said.

When the army refused an order to help organize the survey, the president fired the armed forces commander, Gen. Romeo Vásquez. He was later reinstated by the Supreme Court, which found his removal illegal.

The detention order, signed on June 26 by a Supreme Court judge, ordered the armed forces to detain the president, identified by his full name of José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, at his home in the Tres Caminos area of the capital. It cited him for treason and abuse of authority, among other charges.

“It was a clean operation,” Colonel Bayardo said, dismissing Mr. Zelaya’s remarks before the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday in which he described the arrest as a brutal coup. “It was a fast operation. It was over in minutes and there were no injuries, no deaths. We said, ‘Sir, we have a judicial order to detain you.’ We did it with respect.”

Two days before the removal of Mr. Zelaya, military leaders met with Roberto Micheletti, the leader of Congress at the time who has since taken over as president, to discuss what was viewed as a constitutional crisis, Colonel Bayardo said. But it was not until the day before the predawn raid that everything came into place with a flurry of secret meetings involving army and civilian lawyers as well as a small group of political leaders. At about 11 p.m. Saturday, the detention order reached the army’s top command, Colonel Bayardo said. It was carried out early the next morning.

Colonel Bayardo said a tight circle of people knew about the raid, and they did not include any American military or civilian leaders or other foreigners. “We had no obligation to inform the U.S.,” he said.

Ironically, Mr. Zelaya had nurtured close relations with the armed forces during his nearly three and a half years in office. “President Zelaya thought he had bought us,” Colonel Bayardo said. “He raised our salaries. He was our friend.”

But the president considered friendship to be loyalty at all costs, Colonel Bayardo contends.

“His view of friendship was different from ours,” the colonel said, vowing to carry out another arrest of Mr. Zelaya, who has vowed to return to Honduras on Thursday.

[Lurker]

Looks like someone doesn't like to be labeled the boards drama queen. The "talk to the hand" routine certainly isn't going to change that view.

[Trollbait]

Actually I am refusing to participate in the drama.

Anything to say about the article or topic at hand?

[Partha]

I find your continued 'ends justify the means' attitude to fall in line with the continued attempts to justify the Iraq war and downplay malfeasance that occurred prior to, during, and after it. It suggests a large streak of authoritarianism such as John Dean wrote about, which would be anathema to the vision of our Founding Fathers.

[Harlowe]

Watching someone who loves to create drama, dismiss responses to their drama is delicious.

Nerves, I hit them. (insert LOL-CAT meme)

[Trollbait]

Nerves, I hit them. (insert LOL-CAT meme)

I bow before the puppet master powers of the Sidekick.

I find your continued 'ends justify the means' attitude to fall in line with the continued attempts to justify the Iraq war and downplay malfeasance that occurred prior to, during, and after it. It suggests a large streak of authoritarianism such as John Dean wrote about, which would be anathema to the vision of our Founding Fathers.

Not at all. I simply do not find the means troubling and the end is justified. If it is shown that the means were illegal under Honduran law then I will be on board with the rest of you.

Similarly I sincerely regret supporting the initial invasion of Iraq now that it is shown that the reasons given for the invasion were false and probably deliberately so. I think I had made it quite clear that once we broke it we were committed, however. That is pragmatic as opposed to authoritarian and the jury is still out on the right or wrong of the post invasion. The authoritarianism that John Dean wrote about actually closely resembles the likes of Putin, Chavez, Zelaya, Castro, and their ilk.

[Lurker]

For some reason Jecks made me think of this old Kids in the Hall sketch.



The similarities between Jecks posting style and Head Crusher guy are amazing.

[Trollbait]

funny-pictures-bunny-is-sad.jpg

[Trollbait]

Ddrak~

I was searching around about the issue of the media and I found this article which begins as an article about the media being censored by the Honduran government but at the end makes a rather profound statement.

As a citizen of a country with allegedly independent media it never even crossed my mind that the government of Honduras would simply not believe in the independence of the Honduran media until I read the following:

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/america ... 22536.html

A 2008 report by the Open Society Institute said government payments to the press were widespread. A report by the InterAmerican Dialogue think tank in Washington said the Honduran media operate as arms of political parties.

''One of the largest threats to Honduran democracy is the lack of independence of the Honduran media,'' according to the paper written by Manuel Orozco and Rebecca Rouse. ``The media have failed to fulfill their social function as government watchdogs, are controlled by business and political interests and do not practice fair reporting practices.''

I was astounded.