Micheletti on TV
What do you do if you're a president who took power as the result of a coup and you want to sway public opinion in the U.S., but your visa has been revoked? Put on a flowery shirt, go on Fox News and say this is a "happy country."
He is interviewed by Greta Van Susteren, who admits she does not know Honduran law or the constitution, but that as she understands it, the June 28 vote was supposed to give Mel Zelaya a second term. For that and other falsehoods, just watch the big guy in the loud shirt.
33 comments:
If that's the case, Greta understands Honduras better than Zelaya supporters do. Of course the June 28 referendum was going to lead to Zelaya running a second term.
You have to be incredibly naive to believe that Zelaya did all he did, broke laws, was going to have his people run the poll, and not the legitimate authorities, if he wasn't 'sure' of the outcome ahead of time. The day after he would have proclaimed a win and then immediately pushed to have a new ballot to allow a reform before the elections.
Then again Zelaya supporters also seem to think that Cuba is an economic success, and have nothing to say about Ortega stealing elections, so I suspect it's not that they are naive. It's something else.
I agree with Gabriel. I think we need a new principle in international law that says coups are acceptable as long as we're sure we know what would have happened in the absence of the coup. It avoids the need for annoying trials or presentation of evidence, which is a waste of time and resources.
I agree they should have tried him, not kicked him out. But it makes no sense to pretend we had no idea what Zelaya was up to, to claim that he wasn't looking to force the issue of his reelection.
Zelaya's actions were very, very clear. If people choose not see what's in front of their eyes though...
BTW, I'm still waiting for at least one Zelaya supporter to acknowledge that every political institution (other than the presidency) in Honduras is legitimate and none think there was a coup.
Anyone?
(Please, no bringing up what outsiders think.)
Or maybe, since we are talking about new legal principles, we can establish a new one that says that we can safely ignore any country's legitimate institutions if their actions don't sit well with our own world view.
Maybe RAJ can help with this one. He showed such creativity when he claimed that Zelaya could safely ignore judicial rulings if he decided to interpret the law in another way (why have courts at all then? RAJ didn't elaborate on that). The good news for RAJ is that such rationales don't require any type of actual knowledge of how things are carried out in the real world, a limitation that led to some troubles when he claimed that pollsters in Latin America have to use telephones, which, sadly for his argument, was completely false.
If you are trying to engage in an ad-hominen attack me Gabriel (anon), I never said Cuba was an economic success. I said they have had econmic success the last few years (averaging more than 7% GDP growth for 3 years). Certainly they have had their share of ecopnomic problems, because of internal and external factors... I would, however, call them a social success (as many UN agencies have) and an environmental success (WWF calls Cuba the ONLY sustainable country in the world).
If you have some proof that the Sandinistas stole the municipal election, please share. Lods knows the whole liberal world has been scrounding for such evidence. All the supposed allegations were investigated by the Electoral authorities, who are represented by the different political parties. I trust you are as deeply concerned about the elections in Afghanistan, where the EU recently estimated that a full 27% of the ballots appear "fraudulant."
But it makes no sense to pretend we had no idea what Zelaya was up to, to claim that he wasn't looking to force the issue of his reelection.
How many times do we have to spell this out for you, Gabriel? The dates don't line up. In the unlikely event that the proposed constitutional referendum had been held, it would have been simultaneous with the November presidential election, meaning that it was sequentially impossible for Zelaya to seek a second consecutive term.
And by the way, RAJ is not a "he."
leftside,
Are you actually saying you think there's no proof they stole the election? What is it with leftists and their unwillingness to face reality? Then again, you didn't know how bad the situation is in Cuba so who knows?
Justin, the dates line up fine. On June 29th Zelaya would have announced he won massively and forced a new election for the reform of the constitution ASAP. You sure you study politics? Your naivete is astounding.
Still waiting for someone to respond to my 12:06 post.
Actually, it occurs to me that it is a shame Lula was not overthrown very quickly, because when he was elected everyone knew he would be a crazy leftist.
On June 29th Zelaya would have announced he won massively and forced a new election for the reform of the constitution ASAP.
That's quite a crystal ball you got there, Gabriel. Never mind that you can't show us one piece of evidence to support such wild conjecture.
hmmm Greg, did Lula openly ignore judicial rulings and dare the Attorney General to arrest him? Not that I recall.
Justin,
If you don't want to see reality, so be it. I'm still waiting for your explanation of why Zelaya decided to use his own people to run the elections, and not the competent authorities. I'm sure you can come up with something as creative as RAJ. Give it a try!
Your argument has been that we should overthrow presidents based on what we knew they would do before they did it. So that means Lula should've been exiled in his pajamas.
With this logic, more Latin American presidents need to sleep in their clothes.
Actually that's not my argument Greg. I've said repeatedly that Zelaya should not have been kicked out. He should have been arrested and tried.
But I find it incredible that people who study politics professionally can claim with a straight face that it was not clear what Zelaya was up to.
Also, I keep waiting for any Zelaya supporter to answer my 12:06. It's not a coincidence I have asked that many times yet no one ever responds to it.
If anyone believes that Zelaya was removed unconstitutionally when an investigation and trial was the only legal avenue, then they should also support his return.
No matter what they thought he was going to do in the future.
I support his return so long as Zelaya accepts that the other institutions are legitimate, which he doesn't.
I've heard that sometimes happen to people who are kidnapped by the military, and then hear Congress talk about a letter of resignation they didn't write. Then have the Supreme Court invoke a constitutional article not discussed in the court's own documents.
Yes, so you then agree that Zelaya doesn't view the other institutions as legitimate?
And you want him to return as president?
Which means that you think Zelaya is the only one with legitimacy in this whole debacle and he is safe to ignore what anyone else in Honduras says?
I'm still waiting for your explanation of why Zelaya decided to use his own people to run the elections, and not the competent authorities.
There could be no use of State funds (per the Courts) and the official electoral authorities can only be used for an offical binding election (per the Constitution). This was something else. Zelaya was trying to abide by the actual laws on the books, which is what all the hyper-ventilation on this case seems to want to forget. He just did not accept the fact that there could be NO PUBLIC POLLING of the population, because of the clear allowance under the Citizen Participation Law.
So according to you he was willing to break some laws and ignore some rulings but not others?
Pretty ridiculous but not much more so than RAJ's analytics, who is supposed to be an academic.
Er, no. The correct answer is that he showed he was willing to ignore anyone who stood in his way, be it the courts, Congress, the Attorney General, or the Electoral Tribunal. The courts told him he couldn't use the military but he ignored that, because he needed them. He sidestepped the electoral authorities not because it was illegal, something he showed he didn't care about, but for other reasons.
BTW, I'm still waiting for at least one Zelaya supporter to acknowledge that every political institution (other than the presidency) in Honduras is legitimate and none think there was a coup.
You want us to call Honduran institutions "legitimate" when it is clear they conspired illegally against the very basis of democracy. Everyone has had to admit the military acted illegally. Everyone agrees that Congresses vote to transfer power to Micheletti was based on a fabricated "resignation" letter. And everyone can see that the Supreme Court manufactured a post-facto rationale for the coup wholly outside of their actual legal opinions. In other words, an illegal consipiracy took place. But you keep pressing us to respect these institutions as "legitimate"!!? You are out of your mind.
I'll take a shot at your 12:06 post. Yes, the Honduran Congress and Judiciary approve post-hoc of the president's removal. It doesn't change the fact it was a coup.
Just because 2 out of 3 government branches approve of the takeover of the third, does not automatically mean it's perfectly democratic. If the president (in let's say Venezuela or Colombia or Argentina, for three hypothetical examples) has the backing of the legislature and decides to remove the Supreme Court and pack the Courts with supporters, it's not really considered democratic (and that's happened plenty of times in history across the hemisphere). If the president, with the backing of the public, rolls out the tanks and takes over the Congress as Fujimori did in 1992, that's not necessarily democratic either even if public opinion backs the move.
Now, there is a problem in the hemisphere that regional institutions, analysts and governments are biased towards presidents. I wish people would get equally angry when legislatures are smothered or courts are undemocratically changed as when a president gets overthrown. But that doesn't make the presidential overthrow by the military any less of a coup, even if the other two branches of government support it.
There is a difference between a coup and the institutional removal of a president through impeachment or judicial action. If Honduras has played out the democratic institutions further, if the Honduran legislature had tried to vote to remove the president institutionally (and I realize there were some constitutional problems with that, but they didn't even try) or if the judicial branch had ordered an arrest and trial, we'd be having very different arguments right now. But at the point the military showed up one morning and kicked the president out, no amount of post-hoc institutional backing justifies it.
You've "said repeatedly that Zelaya should not have been kicked out," but you don't seem to understand that kicking him out with the military rather than even attempting to deal with the problem through the institutions is what makes this a coup.
Boz,
If Honduran institutions are legitimate, then right now there are legitimate arrest orders for Zelaya. This is something that Zelaya supporters never address. Let's all agree that Zelaya should return to Honduras. The question is, return as what? Zelaya supporters want him to return as president, but if you agree that the other institutions in the country have legitimacy, that's not possible. There's an arrest warrant for him!!
That's why, I suspect, Greg and leftside focus on what the courts and Congress did to Zelaya to kick him out (the 'resignation letter' and such) but don't focus on all the things Zelaya did prior to that (storm a base, openly ignore judicial rulings, etc..)
I'll accept this was a coup and Zelaya should return. But he can't return as president with no strings attached for the simple reason that he has arrest warrants against him.
The only solution to this mess is for all parties to agree for Zelaya to return to be arrested and tried, and for Zelaya to publicly accept that and make sure none of his supporters storm his prison. But Zelaya supporters can't accept that (neither can Zelaya by the way).
This is the key problem. Zelaya's supporters act as if nothing anyone else in Honduras says matters. Unfortunately the rest of Honduran society disagrees.
BTW boz, if the president and congress 'pack the courts' you can disagree with the outcome but it is perfectly legitimate, as long as they follow the rule of the law. That's pretty different from using tanks to get your way, which is not legitimate.
Meanwhile, the two institutions duke it out over a court case asserting the illegality of Zelaya's removal.
Time-killing theatrical exercise or possible path to restoration of the elected president? You make the call...
During El Progreso's Independence Day event, city council member Bartolo Fuentes denounced the restrictions on free speech and the repression under the coup government ... so the mayor cut his microphone and had him arrested. Freedom's really on the march in that "happy country"!
See the video (Spanish only), or watch an only slightly condensed version with subtitles as part of the latest video report on post-coup Honduras from The Real News.
That's a fascinating link Nell. So over at RAJ's blog they think that if the SC in Honduras rules the actions illegal, that means they should be obeyed and Zelaya would return. Yet when the courts in Honduras ruled against Zelaya and he openly ignored them, that was not a problem for them. RAJ even came up with an incredibly creative (and utterly nonsensical) rationale for Zelaya storming a military base.
It's fascinating watching leftists and Zelaya supporters pick and choose which institutions and which rulings they think are legitimate and which not. It changes all the time!
By the way, who is that rns that wrote the blog piece? Another academic?
He (or she) says that there is politics involved in the selection of the SC in Honduras. Wow! That's just like...almost every single other country in the world! Talk about a useless statement.
I support his return so long as Zelaya accepts that the other institutions are legitimate, which he doesn't.
Gabriel, you've made it abundantly clear that you don't support Zelaya's return under any conditions, so please spare us the prevarications.
I come back to something I periodically wonder about when I read comments, namely why anyone keeps reading a blog they very much seem to dislike. Not just disagree with, but dislike.
can't talk for others but I like this blog. A lot, actually. And I agree with a lot you write. But on the specific point of Honduras I struggle to understand how so many people seem so willing to ignore what all the other legitimate institutions of Honduras have to say about all of this.
It's one thing to say that Zelaya should not have been kicked out. I fully agree with that. But it's quite another to ignore all Zelaya did prior to the coup (including openly ignoring valid judicial rulings and trying to use the armed forces in illegal fashion). Or to ignore that there is an arrest order for Zelaya today, from legitimate institutions. None of that ever gets mentioned by people who comment on Honduras. Why?
I come back to something I periodically wonder about when I read comments, namely why anyone keeps reading a blog they very much seem to dislike.
I like some of the things you write, Greg. I also dislike some of the other things you write.
No doubt the fact that you tend to ride the fence keeps people from different sides of the spectrum coming back.
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