After months of purposely mystical and calculated comments, the US State department is now speaking with diaphanous clarity on the situation in Honduras. This sudden openness came after it became clear that Zelaya would not uphold the Tegucigalpa/San Jose agreement if not reinstated immediately. In today’s press conference, Ian Kelly showed with detail, the position of the US on Honduras’s November 29 election, and although raising a hostile eyebrow of the clearly pro-Zelaya questioner, survived.

This is a large excerpt from yesterday’s daily press briefing:

QUESTION: Ian, on Honduras, the parliament seems to have put off until after the election a decision on whether Zelaya will be restored. What does that do for the possible credibility of these elections?
MR. KELLY: Yeah. Well, let me give you kind of an update of where we are. Craig Kelly, of course, has been in Tegucigalpa. He’s been down there to help support the implementation of the accord. He held a series of meetings down there to support the OAS efforts to have it fully implemented. He’s met with President Zelaya and he met with the de facto leader Mr. Micheletti. He told us that these were very frank and open talks.
Regarding the reports on the Honduran lawmakers will not decide on whether or not to restore Zelaya until after the elections, according to the accord, the – it called for the national congress to issue a pronouncement on the restoration of a democratically elected authority, Mr. Zelaya. As you know, it never stipulated a timetable for the congressional action. All along, we’ve called on the congress to act expeditiously in the spirit of the accord. We believe that steady steps towards the implementation of the accord will enhance the prospects for transparent, free, and open elections that will ultimately resolve this crisis and allow Honduras to rejoin the international community of nations.
Another one of these important steps towards the implementation of the accord and resolving this crisis is the formation of the – of a government of national unity. So that’s also an important component to this.
But since the accord never actually gave any kind of deadline by – to have this vote by the national congress, scheduling the vote on December 2^nd doesn’t necessarily – isn’t necessarily inconsistent with the accord.
QUESTION: What – I’m sorry. That’s – you’ve just opened your – this is – they’re going to have a field day with this. So it’s okay with you if five years from now, they go and come back and say, all right, yeah, Zelaya can go – he’s restored, when you can’t – you can’t be restored after you’re voted out of office if you’re not – he’s not even running.
MR. KELLY: That’s right. I mean, he – his term ends the end of January.
QUESTION: Yeah. And so it’s okay – so it’s okay with you, and you’ll – it will be all right and you’ll accept the results of the election, if they – even if they don’t put him back in when you –
MR. KELLY: Well, he’s not running. He’s not running for the election.
QUESTION: Yeah, but he’s going to be out – he’s effectively out of office. I mean, talk about – that’s the lamest of lame ducks. He’s not – he is – I’m confused. You no longer think that he has to be restored before he is voted out of office?
MR. KELLY: Well, it has been a very strong principle of ours that in order for the country to be reconciled, there has to be a restoration of the democratically elected president. That implies that he has to be restored before the end of his term, okay?
QUESTION: So basically –
QUESTION: All right. So 10 minutes – 10 minutes before the end of his term?
QUESTION: December – until the end of January it can be.
MR. KELLY: Look, I mean, clearly, he has to be restored in a timely way. And I don’t think we’ve ever said anything but that.
QUESTION: Well –
MR. KELLY: But what we’re focused on is the implementation of the accord. I mean, that’s – and – I think that’s what everybody has to be focused on is. And that’s what Craig Kelly was down there for to make sure that it’s done step by step. And there are a number of steps that have to take place. Now, the national congress has set a date to pronounce on this, to pronounce on this issue of the – what – I mean, the accord calls it a pronouncement on the reversion of the executive branch, a pronouncement on the – whether or not Mr. Zelaya should return.
This is a – this is basically – it’s a – we have a lot of interests, obviously. This is – the Organization of American States have a – has a lot of interest in having a government down there that reflects the will of the people and having reconciliation between the Zelaya camp and the Micheletti camp.
QUESTION: Am I correct in thinking that there’s –
MR. KELLY: And the accord is the best to do this.
QUESTION: Am I correct in thinking that there is no way to guarantee that this pronouncement will even restore him to office?
MR. KELLY: It’s up to the congress.
QUESTION: They could come –
MR. KELLY: The both sides –
QUESTION: — back and say no, he can’t come back and –
MR. KELLY: They could come back. I mean, that is –
QUESTION: Well, what happens then?
MR. KELLY: Well, we’ll – let’s see then.
QUESTION: Then you walk into –
MR. KELLY: It’s now. It’s not then.
QUESTION: Ian, will the election –
MR. KELLY: It’s a Honduran crisis. And we want to make sure that –
QUESTION: Well –
MR. KELLY: — the Hondurans are able to sit down –
QUESTION: — you inserted yourself into it –
MR. KELLY: We have.
QUESTION: — quite – so it’s no longer just a Honduran crisis. You’re involved.
MR. KELLY: Of course, we’re involved. We are involved because we want to be involved, because it’s important for us to be involved. We’re involved because they want us to be involved.
QUESTION: Ian, the election will enjoy international support, including that of the United States, even if at the time they vote the Congress hasn’t decided?
MR. KELLY: It all depends on how the vote is conducted. It depends on how the campaign is conducted. We will decide how to pronounce on the election when we see how it is conducted.
QUESTION: Thank you.
QUESTION: Sorry, another topic.

Beware of Boars

A foreign student from a communist country unexpectedly interrupted a college sociology lesson to ask the teacher:

“Do you know how to capture wild boars?”

The teacher suspected the student was heckling him, but decided to hear the punchline anyway.

“How would you do it?”, he replied.

“You capture wild boars finding good place in forest, and throwing corn on ground every day. Boars come daily to feed on free corn. When boars accustomed to come every day, you build fence on one side of place. They get used to fence and continue to come every day to eat. Then you build fence on other side of place. Boars get used to this and continue to come. You then build third side of fence around place with same result. The last side more difficult. You build only little bit every day, and soon boars will come through narrow opening to eat. When boars inside, you close opening with door and you have whole group.”

“Is very simple, in seconds, boars lose freedom. They run in circles, but once inside fence, they are subdued. Then they eat free corn and forget what freedom was like. Wild boars dangerous, but once captured they forget how to hunt and fight and accept slavery.”

Image by Nathan Duckworth, used with a Creative Commons license

I saw the commercial above the other day on Babalú blog, a blog written by several, sometimes radical, Cuban exiles. Named “I Pledge”, it has a eerie section where actors pledge to “serve Obama”. I’m mostly ignorant of the situation, and know only what I read in the blog post, where I first heard of Obama wanting to speak to all the nation’s students. Many parents were concerned that their children would be subjected to indoctrination and partisan messages from the President.

This is actually happening in Venezuela, where the new education law passed a few weeks ago gives the government the power to forbid any teacher to speak against Chavismo, and to teach, even in private schools, government propaganda as fact. Even in Honduras, leftist teachers have been grading students on how well they have assimilated pro-Zelaya propaganda.

Although it does seem to me as an overreaction by the US parents, CNN has spun a glistening web of ridicule to discredit those who were afraid of Obama’s speech.

Why should there be “left” and “right” news sources? This politization and polarization of truth only serves to breed ignorance and senseless hate in both sides of the political equator.

The Colombian House of Representatives has approved a referendum to ask for a constitutional amendment allowing a third presidential candidacy for Colombia’s president Alvaro Uribe. This is a very bad thing, as I’ve written before, but at least they voted, and no one had to be exiled.

Image by the Center for American Progress, used with a Creative Commons license

This one analyzes Obama’s stance on Honduras, not Hillary’s.

In this video, recorded on July 29, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen speaks in the House of Representatives to defend the decision of the Honduran Congress and Supreme Court of removing Manuel Zelaya from the presidency of Honduras.

The Colombian Senate has passed a resolution to approve a referendum to see whether their constitution should be modified. Their goal: to allow popular president Alvaro Uribe to be reelected. At this, the opposition left the senate and boycotted the vote, which I have always held as an idiotic thing to do in a democracy. This allowed the 102-member body to pass the resolution with 56 votes in favor and two against.

This is terrible news for Latin America; it does not matter whether Uribe’s government is left or right-leaning. The “will of the people” that socialists everywhere use as their mantle, is fickle and easily swayed. The people must be protected from their government, and also from their own foolishness.

Term limits are a very wise thing to have in a constitution. An incumbent president is very hard to defeat. Should he or she be corrupt, and not above fraud to remain in power, they become almost impossible to defeat. Then the opposition is weakened, and democracy becomes a farce, as it was in the Soviet Union, and is in Cuba, and to a lesser degree, in Venezuela. Communist nations always held elections and had an active legislature; the difference was that only the ruling party was allowed to participate.

Now the supporters of Chávez and Zelaya can gleefully pounce on their opponents and call us hypocrites. Some have already begun pointing out the Wall Street Journal and Anastasia O’Grady’s silence on the issue. She has been one of the brave few journalists to publicly approve the decisions of the Honduran Congress and Supreme Court in removing Manuel Zelaya.

I hope those who have defended Honduras would join me in speaking out, judiciously defending democracy even against presidents who may be worthy of reelection, to protect us from present and future autocrats unworthy of it. We must silence our critics by speaking more wisely than they do.

Image by Daniel Horacio Agostini, used with a Creative Commons license

Yesterday, a day after Mexican President Felipe Calderón received him with honors and gave him the keys to Mexico city, Manuel Zelaya made a verbal gaffe that cost him access to the press today as he was leaving. He said that in Mexico, it was “better to feel one was president than to be president. I say this to López Obrador, who is listening” he added.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador, pictured above, is a former mayor of Mexico City. He and his followers claim he is the legitimate President of Mexico after a narrow loss to Felipe Calderón in the 2006 presidential election. Mr. Zelaya could hardly have said something more insulting to Calderón, his host. It was a small wonder the Mexican government implemented damage control in keeping him away from the press that was waiting for him at the airport.

Apparently, this was a response to a question by a reporter about Zelaya’s six presidential bids. Zelaya had placed himself in an uncomfortable position by holding a meeting with the political leaders of the Mexican left, who support Obrador. Very unwise.

Yesterday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs called Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Iran’s “elected leader”. The wording is almost exactly the same as Obama when he called Manuel Zelaya Honduras’s “elected leader”. But, Gibbs has now corrected his statement saying that he “misspoke”. Here are his words:

“He’s been inaugurated. That’s a fact. Whether any election was fair, obviously the Iranian people still have questions about that, and we’ll let them decide about that.”

Should I harbor the hope that eventually Washington will reverse its support of Manuel Zelaya?

Image by Grufnik, used with a Creative Commons license

Porfirio Lobo Sosa, the presidential candidate for the opposition party, the National Party, has been interviewed on CNN. His position is that no decision that comes from outside should be binding, because this will cause many deaths. He repeatedly said that he supports any decision, even the return of Zelaya, if it comes from the mediated dialogue in Costa Rica. He counseled that it is in the best interest of everyone that Zelaya and Micheletti be flexible.

Today the interim government of Honduras restored the curfew that was lifted on Monday, after Zelaya and Chávez both called for generalized “insurrection” in Honduras to keep pressure on the government. CNN omitted this statement in their report of Zelaya’s speech, preferring to highlight the words “weekend activities”.

The crisis has boosted Zelaya’s popularity to 46% favorable from a low of 30% two weeks ago, according to the most recent Gallup poll. Nevertheless, 41% of Hondurans agree that Zelaya’s removal was justified, 31% were unsure, and only 28% said that it was unjustified.

The AP news agency has reported Micheletti made an offer to resign, stressing that he would do so only if Zelaya would not return to power. I have searched for this in Honduran and Venezuelan news, but only this AP article is reporting this. The New York Times published the article, stating its source as the AP