Well, well, well. What have we here? Democracy NOT “restored” in Honduras after all?“Te-goosey-goosey-galpa–Knock ‘er down and scalp ‘er!Up hers! H’ and your ass!Nobody will halp ‘er!”
–from The Sheep Look Up, by John Brunner. Sung to the tune of “Goosey Goosey Gander”.
Oh, cry me a river, Pepe. You and your Yankee bosses know full well that democracy was not restored when you were “elected”. You knew it at the time of your farcical “election”. Which you would not have won if REAL democracy had existed in Honduras. Well, you had democracy once, but you eated it. You might have had it, if you’d let Mel Zelaya finish out his mandate and hold the Fourth Ballot, the one that would have convoked a constituent assembly to rewrite the Honduran Constitution–this time on DEMOCRATIC lines. But noooo, you had to have your little banana putsch. You had to have the military bundle Mel onto a plane in the dead of night, in his pajamas. And since you’re stuck with the OLD constitution, the one written by the generals during the dictatorial 1980s, you’re fucked. Suck it up, cupcake–you’re not popular, and you’re not even really president.I wonder if that Facebook troll (undoubtedly from Washington, DC) who lamely tried to tell me What Hondurans Really Want is reading this. If you are, “Liberty Heights”, take a good goosey gander at this. There’s your “democracy”. Go live in it, and may a drug gang or some other assassin give your brainless antidemocratic existence the ending it deserves.A year after the coup that ousted Manuel Zelaya, the new Honduran president warns some want him to be next.Porfirio Lobo says he is the target of a new plot by some of the same wealthy businessmen who supported Zelaya’s removal.Himself a wealthy rancher who supported the coup, Lobo surprised his own political party when he denounced the conspiracy, warning: “I know who you all are.”The claim — made less than a month before Monday’s first anniversary of the coup — laid bare the lingering instability of a desperately poor country where a few prosperous families call the shots.[…]The violence — and Lobo’s allegations of a coup conspiracy — threaten to undermine the message the president has spent months selling to the world: that Honduras is a thriving democracy and should be welcomed back into the Organization of American States, which suspended the Central American country after the June 28, 2009 coup.
And it appears to be the prevailing view, among the savvy and sane, that Obama’s crew helped arrange the entire coup. Makes sense, when you think of it.
A certain “authentic journalist” sure seems to have moved on from this coup–he was the fellow chastising Eva Golinger for looking up (toward Obama and US imperialism) and not at the marvelous little people fighting the coup with marches.
Not to take away from these brave Hondurans (who have suffered on-going repression, assassination, surveillance, etc.), but it seems that the left-progressive pundits in the US would have us entirely forget this coup and its aftermath. Witness the scant attention all this shit gets.
I swear, Bina, the left-progressives hate on, and misinform with respect to Chavez in with the same vehemence that we see from the rightwing.
But Chavez is a handy caricature–a useful ball to have our eyes diverted toward as the US engages the same old patterns of imperialism in the whole region.
Kos has the sense of mind to totally ignore these issues *(Gaza, Honduras, Chavez, Bolivia, etc.) so as not to be seen as sympathetic toward genuine left movements (gotta keep the advertisers comfortable); Huffington Post does give some attention to some of these topical issues (and you can witness the frightening ignorance of the prog-libs in the comments sections at times)–the rest of the popular, mainstream prog-lib websites and blogs stay within the familiar terrain that makes up what we are ‘supposed’ to be discussing.
But it’s Mr. Authentic Journalist and his crappy blogs and website that are the most depressing. Their coverage is sporadic and stumbling. But Big Al’s game is to keep the dollars coming to the bank account. Too much critical coverage of Obama would ruin that nice gig. He caters to Democrat true believers in Obama, and he has lost credibility in the process.
See how Obama worship can be deleterious to critical thinking and ‘authenticity’?
When he was so eager to censor comments way back during the election–that was the primary indication.
End of rant. Sorry for that, but I donated money at during a span of time, and am totally ashamed that I can be such a chump at times.
Back to Honduras. My thoughts are with my friends down there, and the thousands of brave little people that risk their lives when they dare protest US imperialism and the disgusting, entrenched oligarchy.
At the very least, the State Dept. was tacitly complicit in the coup. They did NOT demand that Mel Zelaya be restored to power, as any responsible democratic body should have done. They also didn’t say boo about arresting the coup plotters, again as any responsible democratic body should have done. What they did do was cheerlead for the bogus election that put Lobo in power, and call that “democracy”. They were content to whitewash the crime, in other words.
Of course, Her Royal Clintoness’s pal, Lanny Davis, was a key architect in the campaign to legalize the illegal. So it’s no wonder no one said boo, or sent in the Marines in the interests of democratic nation building. So much for the vaunted good guys in Washington…they are crooks in cahoots with putschists.
And no, I don’t worship Obama. I’m disgusted with his inaction on this.
Anyone can always excuse Obama’s timidity–given the obvious constraints, the institutional configurations that have their own logics and inertia, etc.
Add to this, the fact of on-going racism and deeply entrenched hatred on the part of elites of anything to the left of Jimmy Carter.
The biggest mistake was allowing the movement that put him in office to totally collapse after the election. I saw it coming.
More, he hasn’t been aggressive enough with his policies.
Don’t get me started on the healthcare debacle. In a few years I will be forced to purchase health insurance from private corporations whose primary logic is to increase their profits. No fucking public option.
On the positive side, I see Obama’s failures as keeping the decline of the empire on track. I swear, though I might sound like a dreaded ‘extremist’, I give Bush a bit of credit for this too.
The military mires in Iraq and Afghanistan have taken a bit of the heat off of the left governments in South America.
Here in the US I guess the population needs to learn priorities: organize, inform, discuss, question authorities and institutions, become protagonists in stead of dumbed-down, bit players in a passive consumerist drama. Electing Obama simply is not enough; that is always the easy part. Venezuelans and Bolivians could teach folks here in the US a little about authentic democracy.
By the way, today’s Democracy Now! features a great interview with Michael Moore.