Venezuela's Chavez Says Situation in Honduras is "Explosive"

Comments below are from Walter Lippmann, CubaNews List

(Note carefully he's talking about HONDURAN military officers,
not military forces from other nations. And it's possible we
don't know about some officers there who realize that making
a coup against their elected president, Zelaya, has turned
into a giant disaster, isolating the country from most of the
countries of the world.
==========================================================

Venezuela’s Chavez Says Situation in Honduras Is ‘Explosive’
By Matthew Walter

July 12 (Bloomberg) -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said the political situation in Honduras is “explosive,” and some members of the Central American country’s military may take action to restore deposed President Manuel Zelaya.

Chavez said that Zelaya will return to Honduras and will arrive there “at any moment,” without providing more details about the ousted leader’s plans. Honduras’s acting President, Roberto Micheletti, said Zelaya violated the constitution and will be arrested if he returns.

“The situation is an explosive situation,” Chavez said today during his Sunday television program “Alo, Presidente.” “Don’t be surprised if a patriotic current comes out” of the military, he said.

Chavez said U.S. President Barack Obama should take control of the “Yankee empire,” which he said includes the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency. The socialist Venezuelan leader said the “empire” was behind Zelaya’s overthrow on June 28 because Honduras was strengthening ties with Chavez.

“The new specter that the bourgeoisie and the Yankee empire have invoked throughout the continent isn’t socialism and isn’t communism, it’s Chavismo,” he said, referring to a label used to describe Chavez’s ideology.

Obama has called for Zelaya’s reinstatement and the U.S. supported talks last week between the ousted leader and Micheletti mediated by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias.

To contact the reporters on this story: Matthew Walter in Caracas at mwalter4@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: July 12, 2009 15:05 EDT

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WALTER LIPPMANN
Los Angeles, California
Editor-in-Chief, CubaNews
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/
"Cuba - Un Paraíso bajo el bloqueo"
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__._,_.___
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=aPuDXDs_ULF4

are doing their typical rightwing number with it. Want to join me in besieging them with facts and...gasp...reason?

in this way in this forum. It's seen as planning to disrupt the forum or something.

Most of us will reply to his usual song and dance, any way.

I am always polite, respectful and open to discussion. I meant the word "besiege" ironically. It was a commentary on the rightwing mentality, which perceives facts and reasons to be an attack, because rightwing views are so often non-fact based and unreasonable. As for "organizing" a response, I was just joking. Don't I wish we had an "organized" response to the many rightwing posts at DU! It was Will Rogers who said, "I am not a member of an organized political party. I'm a Democrat!"

their skewed world view -- when they are not outright hostile.

There are unfortunately some among us who imagine it is the right of the U.S. to control without question every country in this hemisphere other than Canada, and the right to bitch about Canada endlessly every time there's a leftist leader.

Very undemocratic behavior, at all levels, we're seeing from these interlopers.

I've found myself hurrying to rec threads on the top of the left side (GP) before they disappeared into the forum, possibly to never see the GP again, or much lower down on the left side, where they would not be seen by a wider audience, especially from the smaller forums. Of course I've also unrecommended some threads that I thought had little importance etc.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6066116&mesg_id=6069111

And unfortunately the number of people among us who question our right to occupy other nations is diminishing...IMHO.

:(

I could not remember and had to find out, I knew it was a good song.

Jefferson Starship - Fast Buck Freddie
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD8mtxTiYJo

Sorry for the interuption, but the rec/unrec game requires one to Think Fast.

Rec up, then someone un recs down.

DU is no longer demcoraticunderground - it is "democratic teetertotter!!"

:crazy:

Actually, now you can't. I went in and rec'd 6 threads and they're back to zero.

That is, for me to Spend more time on other sites.

I need to start making a habit of checking this forum, I'm pretty much a GD homebody. I did add my 2 cents to the LBN thread on this same piece, fwiw.

sw

:hi:

The thing is, so far with just about every OP I've read here, I've had the thought: "Why isn't this in GD? More people need to know about this!"

Have those of you who regularly inhabit this forum decided that it's just not worth the trouble to bring these issues forward to the "Big Forums" readership, and simply resigned yourselves to low visibility? I can, in fact, understand it, since there are a remarkable number of DUers who absolutely despise leftists and leftist politics. Still, I hate to see them "win" by default through the absence of leftist voices raising these issues.

As I mentioned in another post, the difference between the attention paid to the Iran post-election protests and the Honduras coup occurring on our metaphorical doorstep is stunning. I can't fathom it.

Anyway, I'm very grateful that you folks are here, keeping the truth alive.

Thanks again for the welcome,
sw

I'm glad you're reading this forum. :)

However, I really HATE letting the bastards win. *sigh*

I try to be a good Buddhist, but I've always been not exactly mild-mannered. I can feel compassion for ignorant fuckwads at the same time I want to wrap my fingers around their throats and choke the hell out of them.

I am a woman of many contradictions. O8)

If I had a dollar for every time that I've been called Castro lover, Castro apologist, apologist to genocide, apologist of tyranny etc etc, I'd have it made in the shade.

Somehow those attacks remain in the threads but most any retort no matter how civil is disappeared by gusano loving mods.

I grew sick of it and no longer participate in LBN or GD much. Just occasionally for a taste of the poison that exists there.

The friends of the Latin America forum are great researchers, spirited debaters, and a very warm and kind group.

Don'tcha feel the warm tropical breezes here? :hi:

Will be watching news reports with renewed hope.

Here's something which is similar to what you and magbana have both discussed. I don't know if anything additional is written in this article, but I can't find the original thread either you or she posted to which I could add this article:

Honduras: army and business owners wavering?
Submitted by WW4 Report on Mon, 07/13/2009 - 18:04. The appearance of unity within the Honduran military and the de facto government is deceptive, according to statements by Argentine deputy defense minister Alfredo Forti published in the Buenos Aires daily Clarín on July 11. "People with the rank of colonel have been sending messages to the outside saying that they're at the limit of their ability to withstand the pressure and that they think a moment is coming when they'll have to separate themselves from the current position because otherwise there might be a bloodbath," said Forti, who was ambassador to Honduras from 2004 to 2007. "These are expressions of fractures within the armed forces. We don't know if it's because there are military people who support the Constitution or because they see it's a situation that's lost and they're trying to find a way out."

Forti put much of the blame for the situation on the business class, which he said "has an almost monopolistic control in many parts of the economy, and at the same time has a very strong influence on the two traditional parties, the Liberal Party and the National Party." (Clarín, July 11)

Business owners have also been influencing politics by using bribes and threats to get employees to participate in demonstrations supporting the coup, according to dozens of calls made to the Radio Globo radio station on July 7. Callers to Radio Progreso in the northern city of El Progreso told similar stories about employees at maquiladoras (assembly plants producing largely for export), municipal offices and the Granitos and Terrazos construction material company. A woman said she was "offered food and 100 lempiras in cash for wearing a white shirt." Participants in demonstrations supporting the coup wear white shirts. (Inside Costa Rica, July 9)

But the business owners appeared to have had second thoughts about the coup once they had seen the level of popular resistance it generated. Radio Globo director David Romero told TeleSUR on July 5 that the business people that had promoted and financed the coup found that the crisis was greater than they expected. He said they had been pushing for a negotiated solution in a meeting of major business owners that morning. (Prensa Latina, July 5)

From Weekly News Update on the Americas, July 13

http://www.ww4report.com/node/7577