Our need for understanding has not disappeared if our appetite for the press has. PJTV may be a new medium; its message: “Honduran President Micheletti on Hugo Chavez, Cocaine & American Media” may be new as well. Accessible, quickly put up, quickly listened to: this is the old way on steroids. But the argument Micheletti makes is simply an old way – to “respect the laws of my country” – that speaks of restraint and proportion. Laws are not uniformly good, of course, but we’ve seen the patterns before and we recognize the threats Micheletti describes. Leaders who want to abrogate laws limiting their own powers are seldom in the right.
Texas is at least well represented by Cornyn. Texans, for all the talk by others of our cowboy ignorance, are aware of our southern border. Note Cornyn’s conclusion, which is gratitude for a medium that even covers Micheletti, even tries to find out what happened. The interview with a representative from our State Department is not designed to make us feel grown ups are in charge, but rather the kind of boozy judgements in a frat on Saturday night – I don’t know much about the details, but I sure know about my position.
Perhaps if Texas could develop its own foreign policy, it might be more sensible – imagine our spot on the map at the end of this report.
It is a disgrace that the United States and many other countries, including Mexico, have chosen to punish the Honduran people for defending their right to live without dictators; Zelaya´s was trying to break the Honduras constitution that forbids presidents from running for a second term. Mexico has a similar constitution and it has protected us from dictatorships for the last 100 years. There´s something in our cultural formation and background in Latin America that has made us so prone to populism, corrupted dictatorships, military juntas and totalitarian regimes. I don´t know what kind of intelligence is Obama and Clinton getting about the whole situation in Honduras, but they got it wrong when they support a puppet of Chavez in Honduras who tried to break the law to remain in power, the Obama administration is dancing to the tunes of Chavez and Castro in the region, and it is just so sad that they have turned their backs on the Honduras institutions, including congress and the judicial power, the situation will turn violent and another young latin American democracy will have succumbed to populism and corrupted and demagogue dictatorship if they allow Zelaya to go back to power.
My impression is that Obama is well informed about Zelaya, Honduras and Honduran law, but prefers to side with the dictators.
I think the Honduras conflict is actually a caricature of a greater conflict, or part of a greater, much greater picture of what is happening and what is at stake in Latin America.
Many of you have read and learned about Colombia´s long and painful fight against the narco-terrorist group called FARC, this terrorist group has been one of the largest and oldest in the world and at one point controlled vast regions of Colombia.
What many people have failed to see is the long and lasting indifference of Colombia´s neighbors to their internal conflict that has caused thousands of lives: Venezuela, Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia, Argentina and other, who have not only NOT assisted or collaborated with Colombia against the terrorists, but have actually undermined Colombia´s efforts by establishing political ties with the narco-terrorist group many a time, they have sat down with them, negotiated with them.
The FARC guerrillas continually cross Colombia´s borders to safe areas in Ecuador and Venezuela, where the Colombian armed forces cannot attack them, they maintain friendly relations and many contacts and flowing communication with political leaders in Brazil, Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua and some European states, including France and Switzerland, whose foreign officials have actually tried to negotiate the release of hostages from the terrorist group instead of helping Colombia to win the conflict and free all hostages, these countries have also shown hostility against the Colombian government, openly criticizing the Colombian government for every operation they launch against the guerrillas while remaining silent when the terrorists kill or kidnap innocent people, needless to say, FARC always released a hostage or two to some of these leaders, just to keep them in their public relations game or to get money or weapons from them.
They released a couple of hostages for Chavez a couple of years ago, probably in exchange for weapons and money, as we are now learning, and France´s Sarkozy, envy when he saw Chavez heralding the two freed hostages like a hero himself and getting world wide tv attention, didn´t hide his intentions to get the terrorist group to release Ingrid Betancourt, a franco-Colombian politician who ran for president and was abducted by the terrorists, Sarkozy offered the narco-terrorist group all kinds of concesions, including political asylum and belligerence recognition by France and other European states if they released Ingrid Betancourt, fortunately for Colombia, the deal didn´t prosper and Sarkozy didn´t get the world tv attention get wanted.
But the tide has turned to Colombia´s favor, they have fought back, on March 1, 2008, they attacked a terrorist camp in Ecuador´s territory, with help from American intelligence who pin pointed the location of the terrorist camp after their leader made a cellular call, the attack occurred a few kilometers from the Colombian border, they killed FARC´s second-in-command, Raul Reyes, and got a hold of several laptops with much information about the group´s activities and connections with Colombia´s neighbors and others in Europe. Ecuador cut all relations with Colombia in protest for the attack on its soil.
Then in July same year, Colombia´s armed forces freed Ingrid Betancourt and other hostages in a successful and well-planned and executed operation called Jaque.
After that Colombia has managed to capture and kill many FARC terrorists, and FARC terrorists are on the run and their numbers have dwindled greatly.
But while Colombia has managed to greatly undermine the oldest and largest terrorist group in the
continent, Colombia has gained the hostility of Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and even Brazil. As information coming out of the laptops they took from the terrorists discloses nasty relations between the terrorists and the governments of Ecuador and Venezuela.
For a long time, Fidel Castro used his influence to stir troubles in latin America, they operated in Nicaragua, in El Salvador, in Bolivia and in many other nations in the region, but when the soviet union collapsed, the Cuban regime found it hard to promote uprisings and guerrillas in the region anymore, they didn´t have the money anymore. It was with Chavez in Venezuela who came to replace the soviet union´s as the island patron, and Chavez has now turned into an insolent interventionist in each and every country in the region, he openly supported Evo in Bolivia and helped him get in power, he did the same for Correa in Ecuador, Kichner in Argentina, supported leftists movements and politicians in Peru, Mexico and other countries in the region. Even in Brazil, he supported Lula´s reelection. Chavez and the Castro regime actively support leftists parties in just about every electoral process in the region, no country in the region can hold an election without their grotesque interventions.
These countries are now diplomatically isolating Colombia, the only US ally in the region. Venezuela´s Hugo Chavez is again using venezuela´s oil to leverage support from Brazil, Argentina, Brazil, Nicaragua and other countries in the region to achieve this goal. Their end-game: to get the United States out of Colombia, and help the guerrilla take power in Colombia.
Honduras ousted president, Zelaya, also became a friend and a member of Chavez and Castro´s group, and so he tried to remain in power, just like Chavez, Correa, Evo and the rest are doing and advance their so called “Bolivarian revolution”, some form of tropical socialism, much like Chavez in Venezuela and Castro in Cuba.
Honduras is only but a tiny little part of the whole picture, but the most important battle is being fought in Colombia now.
The south American nations created the UNASUR, a puppet regional defense organism from Chavez and Brazil to control the region.
When Chavez invited the Russians to come to Venezuela nobody in the organization said anything. When Brazil invites China to strengthen military ties with them and to jointly build jets and weaponry, nobody said anything, when Chavez invited the Russians to establish a military base in Venezuela, nobody said anything.
But now that Colombia has signed a deal with the United States to continue and have three military bases in Colombia, they are taking the issue to the puppet organism, and are calling on Colombia´s president Uribe to explain, as if Colombia had to ask for their permission to take a sovereign decision. Colombia´s president has refused to attend the organization´s meeting in Quito, Ecuador, but the pressure is there and they are threatening Colombia, in an effort to get the Americans out of the continent and leave Colombia to deal alone with a terrorist organization that enjoys logistical and military support from Colombia´s neighbors.
Now, Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Brazil are politically, economically and diplomatically asphyxiating Colombia. They have cut all ties, diplomatically and economically and have imposed tariffs to Colombian exports.
Colombia has a pending free-trade agreement with the United States, Colombia´s congress has already approved the agreement, President Bush tried to push the agreement in Congress in April 2007, but it has not been approved, and President Obama has said he has no “strict timetable” to get the agreement signed.
The Castro regime from Cuba and Chavez from Venezuela are pleased at Obama´s rejection of the free trade agreement with Colombia, they want to undermine, politically and economically the only US ally in South America, and eventually support a leftist puppet government there just as he has done with Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua.
Lula from Brazil is also pleased that the US-Colombia free trade agreement has not been signed; Brazil considers all of south America their own area of influence, to buy cheap oil, cheap gas and raw materials as they please, to set the prices of good themselves and don´t want competition.
They don´t care if they destroy a democracy in the process.
And today Honduras is yet another scenario in this long regional conflict, but we have seen it before and will see this happening again in other countries, El Salvador is probably next, Guatemala´s corrupted and populist president is also becoming a Chavez ally.
Great comment.