Immigration and scapegoating

Since September 11, 2001, immigration opponents have
honed their "immigrant as criminal" narrative, knowing
that the specter of the foreign terrorist works
perfectly.

Fifteen years ago, the nation's major newspapers
refused to use "illegal" because it was dehumanizing
and inaccurate. Today, the media employs the term in
the context of an immigration debate in which
immigrants themselves have little voice, and in which
their full humanity appears to have little value.

September 11th marked a shift in the politics of race
and immigration that prevents us from adopting a plan
for legalization, much less overhauling our very broken
system to benefit either the United States or
immigrants themselves.

Currently, the Obama administration is following a
purely enforcement approach to immigration, though they
have promised investigation into racial profiling and
human rights abuses in workplace raids and the 287(g)
program that deputizes and trains local police
departments in enforcing immigration law.

Last week, 500 organizations wrote to President Obama
urging him to end the controversial 287(g) program.
But, despite the national outcry against local
officials like Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the Arizona official
accused of rounding up Latinos and checking papers
later, Homeland Security czar Janet Napolitano has
expanded the 287(g) program.

While promoting our book about the organizing of New
York City immigrant restaurant workers who lost their
jobs at the World Trade Center on September 11th, my
co-author and I met dozens of people who have suffered
from the enforcement-only approach.

There were the 18-year-olds brought to the country as
children who cannot now work or study legally. There
was the group in Minnesota working to keep open an
affordable housing complex whose best leader and his
wife were carted off at 5 o'clock in the morning,
leaving their 4-year-old son behind. There was a young
man desperately trying to find his friend who had been
taken by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) to
an unspecified detention center.

Immigrants do more than work. They raise families; they
organize to improve life for the poor; they learn new
skills and build communities. Yet, they are typically
treated as expendably "illegal" even if they aren't.

Comprehensive immigration reform would leave the
enforcement approach in place, while changing the
status of millions of undocumented people. But a little
bit of legalization won't cancel out the negative
effects of enforcement. Twenty years from now, the
undocumented population will grow again, and we will
again debate how much legalization to offer.

The traditional pro-immigrant response to
restrictionists has been to characterize immigrants as
hard workers simply looking for a decent living. Though
more benevolent, this narrative suggests that
immigrants offer nothing more than a pair of hands
available for picking, cleaning and writing computer
code.

The economic argument is not the only reason we need an
entirely new system. The one we have is terribly
broken, especially for the vast majority of poor
immigrants and immigrants of color. We need a system
that eases people's movement rather than restricts it
(thereby equalizing the power of immigrants in relation
to their employers), one that isn't fixated on
preserving some outdated notion of America as simply a
white, Christian country.

Until such time as immigration reform heats up again in
Congress, we must reclaim the debate and change our
language. For instance, we should be challenging the
criminalization of undocumented workers by labeling
them "illegal." Beyond this, we need to stand up for
full inclusion of immigrants in our educational, health
and labor systems. The struggle includes all
immigrants, including those who gave their lives at the
World Trade Center on September 11th.
________________

Rinku Sen and Fekkak Mamdouh co-authored The Accidental
American: Immigration and Citizenship in the Age of
Globalization (Berrett-Koehler 2008). Rinku Sen is the
executive director of Applied Research Center and
publisher of ColorLines. Fekkak Mamdouh is the co-
director of Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC)-
United. Mamdouh lost 73 friends on September 11th
alongside whom he worked at Windows on the World, the
restaurant at the top of the World Trade Center.

Black Parallel School Board; Sacramento

Letter from the Chair

The African American youth in Sacramento are at a state of heightened emergency in relation to their academic pursuit yet, we are not truly outraged about this. With education being one of the fundamental keys to success we must make every effort to ensure the academic key fits correctly once its placed into the hands of our African American youth.


On Saturday, September 5, 2009, the Black Parallel School Board held its monthly meeting at the Oak Park United Methodist Church in Sacramento. The meeting started promptly at 10 am and adjourned at 12 pm. One of the key items we covered was standardized testing. Readers are you aware that within the Sacramento City Unified School District during the past school year of all the African American students they are serving only 8 children of African descent are in geometry and there are only 9 African Descent youth in Algebra II. African American students overall have made little to none standardized test improvements and the same is occurring with the high school exit exam test results. Our children's ability to articulate themselves in written form is declining astronomically too.

Children of African descent are not doing well when it comes to mathematics and language arts this is a fact. Together as a community, we have a job to do. This job goes beyond the band-aid approach. When the Black Parallel School Board meets monthly we are not there in large numbers along with our children, nieces, nephews, siblings, aunts, uncles, parents and the like, yet we wonder why our children are doing poorly.

We will come together in large numbers to support concerts, ball games, and other extra circular activities; however, we neglect to use the same energy and efforts to bring about constant change when it comes to our children’s academic minds in fear of rattling the chains.

We must call ourselves to a higher place of accountability by riding ourselves of the lackadaisical attitude and by not selfishly assuming that this doesn’t impact you. Our ancestors did not bleed, die, and be dehumanized for generations for us to stop fighting.

The battle doesn’t end until we are call home. This battle is not just an African American battle it is a battle that every race is responsible for fighting for their culture individually and for other cultures too. When one is not adequately educated they will lack the tenacity needed to be positive community contributors causing the cycle of poverty to continue to perpetuate from generation-to-generation. This in and of itself is one of the key ingredients that continues to feed racism.

STAR test results are our business even if it means holding all night tutoring sessions- so well be it. Being on a unified forefront is so essential. When we come to the table to discuss education we should be on one accord regardless of our level of achievements and the accolades associated with our name(s). Our skin color is also not an item that we should constantly focus our attention, but that isn’t to say it isn’t a vital area. Our primary focal point should always be those children who are not performing at their “True Potential” even if they aren’t in our neighborhoods. We are truly living in a world where we are constantly producing lost generations who are wondering around hopelessly looking and waiting for us to take charge of them- we appear to be asleep.

Most people are quick to play the, “race card” not too many of those same individuals are willing to come into a room and set aside differences to bring about true change. Politicians want you to hear them so they can be elected yet, when elections occur, you don't see them until its election time again. The fact that there is no funding truly doesn’t matter, what matters is that we all want the best for Sacramento children; that in and of itself is enough for us to work until we can see the change verses just thinking change is going to plop out of the sky into our laps- we have to go and get it.

Those who caused things to truly happen took care of business and they did it with so much passion where they didn’t even care if that meant that they lost their lives in the mist of the fight. Our children are doing poorly in Sacramento in terms of education; I asked when wills The Next Generations Academic Failures Be Truly Televised. Years ago, survival occurred academically, physically, and financially because there was a unified effort for everyone to, “Be There Brothers/Sisters Keeper At All Cost.”

Here is a link to the Black Parallel School Board Site-www.blackparallelschoolboard.com

(please see this site for the charts covered at our most recent meeting check and it in a couple of days you can visit it now for other information)

STAR test result site-
http://star.cde.ca.gov/

I am writing as a concerned citizen who is on the battlefield for our youth regardless of their ethnicity, social economic status, religion, and/or sexual orientation.

Lailah Ameerah Muwwakkil

Chair
Black Parallel School Board

Who is Van Jones and why was he forced out of the Obama Administration ?

Foro de Sao Paulo: Latin American Left meets

La crisis financiera y el golpe en Honduras, temas centrales en el Foro de Sao Paulo
Entre los invitados están Andrés Manuel López Obrador y Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano
Alma E. Muñoz

Los partidos de la Revolución Democrática (PRD) y del Trabajo (PT) organizan la edición número 15 del Foro de Sao Paulo, cita que aglutina a decenas de partidos políticos latinoamericanos y caribeños, en busca de fortalecer la presencia de las fuerzas de izquierda en la región, como opción para superar la actual crisis financiera mundial.

Saúl Escobar, secretario de Asuntos Internacionales del Comité Ejecutivo Nacional del sol azteca, explicó que del 20 al 23 del presente mes, en la ciudad de México, representantes de algunos de esos partidos políticos impulsarán la lucha en las naciones donde no son gobierno, así como convertir el foro en un instrumento más eficaz para la discusión de los problemas que aquejan a la región, particularmente la pobreza.

En el documento base para la discusión se abunda que la actual situación económica es consecuencia del fracaso de las políticas económicas neoliberales, cuya imposición dio origen al Foro de Sao Paulo, en 1990.

Crisis alimentaria, financiera y de escasez de combustible

Se advierte, con base en estimaciones del Banco Mundial, sobre la combinación de una triple crisis: alimentaria, financiera y de escasez de combustible, que echó por tierra el objetivo de reducir a la mitad la pobreza en el mundo, el mayor objetivo de desarrollo fijado hasta ahora por la comunidad internacional, como parte de las denominadas Metas del Milenio de la ONU. El organismo estimó que en el presente año la cantidad de personas pobres podría aumentar en más de la mitad en las naciones en desarrollo. Calculó que entre 55 millones y 90 millones más caerán en niveles de miseria.

Escobar explicó que los integrantes del Foro de Sao Paulo se plantean básicamente tres tareas: defender a los gobiernos de izquierda y ganar más posiciones de poder para radicalizar las medidas para enfrentar la crisis y que no sufra la población más pobre; impulsar la lucha en los países donde no somos gobierno, particularmente en Perú, Colombia y México, así como convertir al foro en un instrumento más eficaz de lucha, abordando los principales problemas de la izquierda en América Latina.

Buscan además organizar el foro en Estados Unidos con los migrantes latinoamericanos, crear una especie de observatorio de gobiernos progresistas y de izquierda, y también un organismo que elabore encuestas electorales, envíe observadores a los comicios y apoyo para la comunicación de las campañas que desarrolla la izquierda en América Latina.

Los integrantes del foro están convencidos de que los gobiernos progresistas tienen aún condiciones para encabezar el cambio y no verse arrasados por la crisis. (En cambio) los gobiernos de derecha, como el de México, tendrán mucho más dificultades para enfrentar la crisis y lo harán desde una perspectiva conservadora.

El Foro de Sao Paulo reafirmará, además, su compromiso de continuar apoyando la lucha del pueblo hondureño, exigiendo, entre otras cosas, la liberación de los presos políticos, el fin del toque de queda en el país centroamericano y el cese de toda persecución política, tanto contra los ciudadanos que ejercen su derecho a la protesta como contra los medios de comunicación independientes que han sido clausurados y/o intervenidos.

A los trabajos, que se celebrarán en un hotel capitalino, están invitados, pero no han confirmado su asistencia, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano y el jefe de gobierno capitalino, Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon.

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Haiti Journal

Haiti Journal #2 August 18, 2009 (all journals delayed due to lack of services in Haiti)

Dear Friends,

We walked today where heros tread and angels have no shoes...we walked in Shada.

Five years ago, Children's Hope came here with a small red bag and a few medicines for the local midwife, Madame Bwa, who cried when I gave her a pair of scissors to cut umbilical cords with. Today, thanks to many small donations, many people joining hands and resources, a clinic rises above the ashes in Shada. Hoisted above the rubble are four wonderful crumbling walls supporting a bouncing colored cloth roof that almost sings as it sways and lets pass a soothing hot wind. Rows of people wait patiently, almost proudly, to see a doctor...some for the first time in their lives. Madame Bwa looked like she might just break out in laughter or tears, she was so happy. I thought you should hear the story.

Madame Bwa had no training, no supplies, no money, but she did have a willingness to serve. She showed up. When someone needed care, she showed up...she did what she could.

She mothers anyone in arms reach. She mothered me. She taught me. She showed me how to walk through the most forgotten place on earth, a place where the filth and poverty could choke the life out of you faster than the charcoal smoke that burns your lungs for days after you leave. She taught me to see the beauty there, the pride, the love and the joy. She taught me these things while I only shared how to use a thermometer, stethoscope and blood-pressure cuff.

When she delivered babies, she would use string to tie off the cord, but didn't like using her kitchen knife to cut it. I had a pair of scissors thanks to some thoughtful folks at Marshall Hospital who couldn't stand throwing once-used surgical instruments into the trash. They showed up and salvaged what they could. Your donations showed up in the mail to make delivery possible. She showed up to use what we brought...now dozens of people are involved, each thinking they only play a small part, each part as indispensable as the next. Thanks to a progression of good hearts and willing hands, a clinic is alive and teaming with little sick angels, carefully combed and scrubbed for the occasion. An exhausted young doctor, part of a visiting team of med students from Miami, presses a hard candy to the surprised hand of a grateful little girl.

Everyone is grateful, everyone is thanked...the visiting troup of student doctors leave bags of medicines for the new clinic. We add our meds to the stash, more meds are purchased the next morning by a another woman, who became interested in Haiti when her daughter, Ashley showed up as an intern to help our sister group, SOIL, build dry toilets.

Thanks for showing up, thanks for sending your regular donations to Children's Hope, it really does save lives.

(We have no internet access...but we will send out our journals when we can.)

peace, all ways and always, leisa


Leisa Faulkner
Founder, Children's Hope

Honduras Coup

CANCEL THE MEETING BETWEEN THE U.S. GOVERNMENT & THE HONDURAS COUP REGIME!
PLEASE Call the State Department (202-647-4000) on Monday August 24, 2009 …
[Ask ten friends, or fifty or more, to also call]
… AND SAY NO! to Hillary Clinton meeting with Honduran Coup Makers and Human Rights Violators.
According to State Department spokesperson Ian Kelly, an official delegation of the regime installed by military coup in Honduras is invited to Washington to meet with U.S. "officials".
The meeting will be to work "toward restoration of democratic and constitutional power in Honduras."
The regime has used State repression and terror since June 28th, including the killings of at least 10 people.
Since one day after the coup, the OAS (Organization of American States) labeled it an illegal regime and called for the “immediate and unconditional” restoration of President Zelaya and his government.
By once again welcoming an official delegation to Washington, the U.S. government would be obstructing the restoration of the legitimate government of President Zelaya and would be ‘legitimizing’ the illegal regime.
We ask everyone who cares about the right of the Hondurans to be free from a military-installed regime to call the State Department on Monday, at 202-647-4000, to ask for cancellation of any meeting in Washington with representatives of the illegal regime.
From: Committee in Solidarity with the Resistance to the Coup in Honduras, http://www.hondurasresists.org / info@hondurasresists.org / 617-610-3784

Speak out on Honduras

Over 90 Experts Call on Human Rights Watch to Speak Out on Honduras Abuses
WASHINGTON - August 21 - 93 scholars and Latin America experts from institutions such as Yale, Harvard, and New York University sent an open letter to Human Rights Watch today urging the organization to highlight various human rights violations in Honduras under the coup regime, and to conduct its own investigation. The signers, who include well-known experts on Latin America such as Eric Hershberg, John Womack, Jr., and Greg Grandin, Honduras experts such as Dana Frank and Adrienne Pine, and well-known authors including Noam Chomsky, John Pilger, and Naomi Klein, note that Human Rights Watch could help force the Obama administration to denounce the abuses and put greater pressure on the regime. Highlighting "politically-motivated killings, hundreds of arbitrary detentions, the violent repression of unarmed demonstrators, mass arrests of political opposition, and other violations of basic human rights," the letter notes that Human Rights Watch has not issued a statement or release on the situation in Honduras since July 8, a little over a week following the June 28 coup d'etat.

The signers write, "...the coup could easily be overturned, if the Obama administration sought to do so, by taking more decisive measures, such as canceling all U.S. visas and freezing U.S. bank accounts of leaders of the coup regime."

The letter comes just a day after Amnesty International issued a new report on the coup regime's violations of human rights in cracking down on protests, and as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (part of the Organization of American States) wraps up a fact-finding delegation to Honduras. The author of the Amnesty International report, Esther Major, has stated

that the report was released to call on the international community to take action to "prevent a human rights crisis occurring in Honduras."

Barack Obama on immigration

President Obama is no Dobbs or Arpaio…
By Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez

On the issue of immigration, President Obama is no Arizona Sheriff Joe
Arpaio – the face of racial profiling. Neither is he CNN’s resident
xenophobe, Lou Dobbs, whose mission in life seems to be to lead the
nation into an ethnic cleansing frenzy.

Yet up to this point, President Obama’s immigration policies simply
appear to be enhanced versions of President Bush’s anti-immigrant
policies.

Ironically, despite the hype regarding Sen. John McCain being a friend
to migrants and to Mexicans/Latinos – most peoples from these
communities overwhelmingly supported President Obama – precisely
because of the president’s humane stance on immigration.

Most everyone understands that the president is not a magician, nor is
he a dictator, but he has been more than disappointing in his failure
to provide decisive leadership on this issue. Only the mass dragnet
immigration raids have stopped… if one doesn’t count Arpaio.

Arpaio is to Mexicans/Latinos what Sheriff Bull Conner was to the
1960s civil rights movement. Arpaio has taken it upon himself – first
with the blessing of Bush, and now Obama, to conduct massive raids
that indiscriminately target Mexicans/Latinos. He is able to do this
via the government’s 287(g) agreements with local law enforcement
agencies that enable local police officers to carry out immigration
duties. Obama has taken a very bad idea and has greatly expanded it
nationwide. This is sheer politics. He and his advisers figure that to
pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill, he needs to “act tough”
and cozy up to those who think of migrants as little better than
criminals and vermin.

The president could cancel this program outright, but chances are less
than slight that anything on this front will happen until he and
Congress get around to passing the much promised reform bill in 2010 –
after he has fixed both health care and the economy. This means that
migrants will continue to be criminalized and families forcibly
separated. It also means they will continue to die in the desert as a
result of policies designed by immigration officials, precisely with
the intent of steering migrants into the most remote and inhospitable
mountains and deserts (Tucson’s Derechos Humanos’ Arizona Recovered
Bodies Project actually reports that of the more than 5,000 bodies
found dead in the desert this past decade, many of these migrants have
suffered blunt trauma to the head, i.e, killed).

Yet even if this reform bill passes, judging by the way he has acted
during the health care debate, the human rights community is not
reassured that it will be fair and humane. His inability to stand up
to conservatives and extremists on any issue does not give anyone hope
that he will go to bat for one of the communities that believed in his
message of hope and change. He might as well let Dobbs write the bill
– who would simply call for a 2,000-mile militarized wall all along
the Southern border, plus the draconian apparatus to search and
conduct massive searches, arrests and deportations of some 12 million
undocumented migrants (20 million, according to extremists). At best,
there might include a provision that would remand some of these
migrants to a state of permanent subservience, with little or no human
rights (read Bracero program).

Perhaps the president needs a reminder regarding who voted for him in
the previous election; it was certainly not the conservatives and
extremists who hate everything about him. Those are the people – along
with their views and their values – that were overwhelmingly
repudiated in that election. And yet, it is they, similar to the
health care debate, who drive and dictate the terms of the immigration
debate.

A real solution will not be forthcoming if it is based on fear, hate
and propaganda. Creating a workable solution – as opposed to a
band-aid – necessitates viewing the issue not as a criminal matter,
but rather, as a labor and human rights issue. Part of this includes
understanding the destructive effect of NAFTA – the 1994 free trade
agreement between Canada, the United States and Mexico that has
devastated the Mexican countryside. It is this agreement that has
flooded cheap corn into Mexico, making it impossible for Mexican small
farmers to compete fairly against this U.S. subsidized product.

This agreement has had the exact opposite effect of the promises of
NAFTA. Millions continue to migrate northbound. Until this issue is
addressed – and it is highly unlikely that President Obama understands
this – the U.S. will continue to fill its privatized prisons and
detention centers with people guilty of simply trying to survive.

Rodriguez, an assistant professor at the University of Arizona, can be
reached at: XColumn@gmail.com


Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez
Column of the Americas
PO BOX 85476
Tucson, AZ 85754

ARCHIVED COLUMN OF THE AMERICAS
http://web.mac.com/columnoftheamericas/iWeb/
Site/Welcome.html

Attack Against Offices of Via Campesina in Honduras

Written by Via Campesina
August 12, 2009

http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2047/68/

Last night at 11:23 p.m., during curfew which began at
10 p.m., unknown individuals driving a cream colour
Toyota Turismo with the license plate PCA1981 fired
bullets at the office of Via Campesina located in the
Alameda neighbourhood of Tegucigalpa, Honduras which is
coordinated by Rafael Alegria. The act was a clear
attack against our social organizations and leaders who
are part of the National Front Against the Coup. In
addition to the recent attack on Via Campesina, a bomb
capable of killing 15 people went off in the building of
the Beverage Workers Union (STIBYS, by its Spanish
initials) on July 26th 2009. Both organizations are part
of the National Front Against the Coup.

We condemn this incident given that the activities of
Via Campesina and the National Front Against the Coup
are completely peaceful. It is important to mention that
during curfew only police are permitted to be in the
street.

Via Campesina of Honduras calls for support from
national and international human rights organizations to
remain attentive and to continue following attacks
taking place not only against these organizations and
their leadership, but also against the human rights of
the entire Honduran people and all those who have been
protesting in the streets against the coup for the last
46 days. Rafael Alegria comments, "People's rights are
being violated and it's a truly unfortunate situation at
the moment. People have been wounded, jailed and
killed."

According to a preliminary report from lawyers assisting
the National Front Against the Coup today, hundreds of
people were wounded and more than forty people detained
following violence occurring after a peaceful mass
mobilization in the capital city on Tuesday. The group
of lawyers is seeking the liberation of those arrested
through Habeas Corpus. The leadership of the Front
insists that the disturbances were carried out by people
who were not part of the protest, but rather
infiltrators interested in provoking confrontations and
disparaging the peaceful protests that the Front has
been mobilizing. The people detained are accused of
rebellion, terrorism and treason among other crimes.

AlegrA-a emphasizes that "The National Front Against the
Coup is not responsible for these incidents. On
principle the front supports peaceful marches, peaceful
demands and peaceful mobilization. At no point do we use
or call for violent acts. It appears that these
incidents are the responsibility of groups interested in
ruining the social mobilization and they have taken it
upon themselves to provoke this situation for which we
categorically deny any responsibility."

Given what has taken place in the last 24 hours,Via
Campesina of Honduras calls out to the entire Via
Campesina network, social movements, as well as national
and international human rights organizations to send
messages or delegations in solidarity with the
resistance against the coup and for the defence of human
rights in Honduras, and to assist in bringing about an
end to so much injustice and violence against the
Honduran people.

Please send complaints and messages of solidarity to the
following addresses:

State Secretary of Public Security

Coronel Jorge Rodas Gamero

Fax: (504) 237-9070/ 220-55-47

E-mail: sseg.06@hotmail.com

Special Prosecutor for Human Rights in the Attorney
General's Office

Lcda. Sandra Ponce

Fiscal Especial de Derechos Humanos

Tegucigalpa, Honduras

Fax: (504) 221-3656

E-mail: ponce10s@yahoo.com.ar

Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CODEH)

President AndrAcs PavA3n

E-mail: andres@codeh.hn, codeh@codeh.hn

The Committee of Relatives of People Detained-
Disappeared in Honduras (COFADEH)

Coordinadora Bertha Oliva

E-mail: mail@cofadeh.org

Via Campesina of Honduras

E-mail: laviacampesina@cablecolor.hn

Comunicaciones Via Campesina en Honduras

Obama and immigration policy



Unfortunately the Obama position on immigration has not improved. U.S. corporate domination of Latin America produces immigration. This neo liberal domination was strengthened by NAFTA. During the campaign, Barack Obama said that he would ask to re-negotiate NAFTA. Now, his major Commerce dept. negotiators say that NAFTA does not require re-negotiation. That is, corporate capitalist domination is strengthened.

Corporate capitalism exploits immigration sending countries like Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras and the others. Mexico provides an example. Since NAFTA, Mexico now has a 50% poverty rate, worse than prior to NAFTA.
So, why do people immigrate- to make a living, so their families will not starve.

The political class says, “we are a nation of immigrants”, but the current immigration laws prevent the poorest of the poor from immigrating. Following the rules means getting back in line under the broken immigration system.

Getting in line from Mexico means a wait of up to 15 years for an immigration card. So the poor farmer from Oaxaca who is facing the loss of his small farm ( 5-10 acres), who faces the loss of food for his/her family, is expected to apply for immigration and to wait for 15 years. In just one year he might lose his farm and members of his family. This reality is ignored by those who say I support immigration, but it must be legal.

Brazil Urges Obama to act on Honduras

Brazil Urges Obama to Tighten the Vise on Honduras to
Get Zelaya Back

August 13, 2009

http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/11090/1/

Zelaya meets Lula in Brasília The President of Brazil,
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and ousted Honduran
President Manuel Zelaya called on Wednesday, August 12,
on the United States to use more political influence to
help solve the Honduran crisis.

Zelaya, who was received in Brazilian capital Brasília
with full head of state honors for a one day visit,
said Washington should address the issue with more
energetic measures such as trade sanctions against the
Honduran interim government. Almost 70% of the Honduran
economy depends on the United States.

Following the hour and a half meeting in Brasília,
President Lula reaffirmed support for Zelaya's
"immediate and unconditional" return to Honduras. The
Brazilian promised to talk to his US peer Barack Obama
on the issue at "an appropriate time."

Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim told the press
that Zelaya's return would largely depend on the
position of the United States.

"President Lula said that clearly: we are concerned by
the delay (in Zelaya's return), because as time passes,
the chances for President Zelaya's legitimate elections
calendar (scheduled for November) is weakening" Amorim
said. Zelaya was expected to end his term as president
at year-end.

Amorim insisted it all depends on "how the United
States will act; it must be a multilateral action. We
believe that actions should be conducted by the OAS
(Organization of American States)."

Zelaya was deposed in a June 28 coup and flown to
neighboring Costa Rica. Following the coup, Brazil
recalled its ambassador from Honduras and suspended
cooperation with the Central American nation.

The ousted Honduran president is scheduled to meet
Chilean president Michelle Bachelet Thursday in
Santiago. On Wednesday the Chilean Foreign Affairs
ministry informed that on request from the "legitimate
government of President Zelaya", the Honduran
ambassador in Santiago no longer has that status and
must "hand over his diplomatic immunities."

Meanwhile in Tegucigalpa thousands of protesters
calling for the return of deposed president Zelaya
clashed with police for the second day in a row. Youths
with bandannas covering their faces threw rocks at
police outside Honduras' congressional building. The
police, protecting themselves with riot shields,
periodically launched tear gas to disperse them.

It was unclear how many protesters took part in the
demonstration. Police placed the number at 3,000; pro-
Zelaya supporters said 10,000. There were no reports of
deaths or injuries, but police said they'd arrested at
least 43 people.

On Tuesday, Honduran authorities declared a curfew in
the capital after the protesters, many of whom arrived
by foot from outside Tegucigalpa in their largest
organizing effort yet, broke windows, looted a Dunkin'
Donuts franchise and set fire to a municipal bus.

Most commerce seemed to carry on as usual Wednesday,
though teachers and medical professionals who were
striking in solidarity with Zelaya shut down public
schools and hospitals.

___________________

Congressmen challenge Obama on Honduras

Tuesday August 11, 2009
Tucson, AZ – Congressman Raul M. Grijalva (D-AZ), together with 16 other members of Congress, recently delivered a letter to President Obama urging him to denounce human rights violations in Honduras and take further measures against the Honduran coup regime.

Over a month has now passed since democratically elected president Manuel Zelaya was deposed and deported to Costa Rica by the Honduran military and, despite widespread international condemnation and diplomatic sanctions, the de facto regime remains firmly in place. As time wears on, the human rights situation in Honduras grows increasingly worrying, with a growing quantity of reports of violent repression of anti-coup protests, extrajudicial killings reminiscent of the death squad era of the early 80s and arbitrary arrests of hundreds of peaceful demonstrators. These violations have been accompanied by far-reaching media censorship and the beating, arrest and intimidation of independent journalists by military and police.

The U.S. administration has taken important measures against the coup regime, such as halting military aid and other forms of non-humanitarian assistance to Honduras, but it is clear that further action is necessary to ensure that democracy is restored and the civil rights of Honduras’ citizens are respected.

The co-signers of the letter to president Obama believe, therefore, that it is time for the U.S. administration to send a clear signal that the human rights violations that are being perpetrated under the coup regime in Honduras are unacceptable and cannot be allowed to continue. The letter also considers that the U.S. administration should take measures that directly target those responsible for the coup.

Revoking the A-1 diplomatic visas of a few key coup officials, as the State Department did on July 29th, is a step in the right direction, but clearly not sufficient as this does not prevent those targeted by the decision from continuing to travel to the U.S. on tourist and other visas. The letter strongly urges president Obama to deny those involved in the coup entry to the United States and immediately instruct the Treasury Department to freeze their U.S.-based assets.

Obama’s Continuance of Bush Policies in Latin America is a Serious Mistake

Obama’s Continuance of Bush Policies in Latin America is a Serious Mistake

Share Mark Weisbrot
New York Times Online, August 11, 2009 International Herald Tribune, August 11, 2009

There were great hopes in Latin America when President Obama was elected. U.S. standing in the region had reached a low point under George W. Bush, and all of the hemisphere’s left-leaning governments expressed optimism that Obama would go in a different direction.

These hopes have been dashed. President Obama has continued the Bush policies and in some cases has done worse.

The military overthrow of democratically elected President Mel Zelaya of Honduras on June 28 has become a clear example of Obama’s failure in the hemisphere. There were signs that something was amiss in Washington from the beginning, when the first statement from the White House failed to even criticize, much less condemn, the coup. It was the only such statement from a government to take a neutral position. The General Assembly of the United Nations and the Organization of American States voted unanimously for “the immediate and unconditional return” of President Zelaya.

Conflicting statements from the White House and State Department emerged over the ensuing days, but last Friday the State Department made clear its “neutrality” as between the dictatorship and the democratically elected president of Honduras. In a letter to Senator Richard Lugar, the State Department said that “our policy and strategy for engagement is not based on supporting any particular politician or individual,” and appeared to blame President Zelaya for the coup: “President Zelaya's insistence on undertaking provocative actions contributed to the polarization of Honduran society and led to a confrontation that unleashed the events that led to his removal.”

This letter was all over the Honduran media, which is controlled by the coup government and its supporters, and it once again strengthened them politically. Congressional Republicans who have supported the coup immediately claimed victory.

On Monday President Obama repeated his prior statement that Zelaya should return. But by then nobody was fooled.

Obama has said that he “can’t push a button and suddenly reinstate Mr. Zelaya.” But he hasn’t pushed the buttons that he has at his disposal, such as freezing the U.S. assets of the coup government leaders and their supporters, or canceling their visas. (The State Department cancelled five diplomatic visas of members of the coup government, but they can still enter the United States with a normal visa – this gesture had no effect.)

With Clinton associates such as Lanny Davis and Bennett Ratcliff running strategy for the coup government, the Pentagon looking out for its military base in Honduras, and the Republicans ideologically tied to the coup leaders, it should be no surprise that Washington is more worried about protecting its friends in the dictatorship than about such principles as democracy or the rule of law.

But it doesn’t make Obama’s policy any more justifiable or less disgraceful. And Washington has remained tellingly silent about atrocities and human rights abuses committed by the dictatorship: the killing of at least ten opposition activists, the detention and intimidation of journalists, the closure of independent TV and radio stations, and other repression condemned by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and human rights organizations worldwide.

In addition to its failure in Honduras, the Obama administration drew public statements of concern last week from such leaders as President Lula da Silva of Brazil and Michelle Bachelet of Chile – along with other presidents – with its decision to increase the U.S. military presence at seven bases in Colombia. Washington apparently did not consult with South American governments – other than Colombia -- beforehand. The pretext for the expansion is, as usual, the “war on drugs.” But the legislation in Congress that would fund this expansion allows for a much broader role; no wonder South America is suspicious. Obama has also not reversed the Bush administration’s decision to reactivate U.S. Navy’s Fourth Fleet in the Caribbean, for the first time since 1950 – a decision that raised concerns in Brazil and other countries

President Obama has also continued the Bush administration’s trade sanctions against Bolivia, which are seen throughout the region as an affront to Bolivia’s national sovereignty. And despite Obama’s world-famous handshake with President Chávez, the State Department has maintained about the same level of hostilities toward Venezuela – mostly in the form of public denunciations – as President Bush did in his last year or two.

Obama’s policies have drawn mostly only mild rebuke because he is still enjoying somewhat of a honeymoon, and he is not Bush. And the media mostly gives him a free pass. But he is doing serious damage to U.S.-Latin American relations, and to the prospects for democracy and social progress in the region.

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in Washington, D.C. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan. He is co-author, with Dean Baker, of Social Security: The Phony Crisis (University of Chicago Press, 2000), and has written numerous research papers on economic policy. He is also president of Just Foreign Policy.

Coup in Honduras: what you can do

Dear friends,

We've been covering the coup in Honduras since before it happened—some 40 days ago now. That's the standard quarantine period, a biblical reference traditionally observed after childbirth here in Mexico. In the 40 days since the coup, diplomatic efforts to quarantine anti-democracy maneuvers by isolating the Honduran coup have not worked. That's a serious blow to the international community and has increased fears of contagion in the region. The OAS is traveling to Honduras early this week to try to retake initiative based on its resolution condemning the coup and calling for the immediate return of President Zelaya.

The message is simple: We cannot allow a return to military coups and death squads in Central America—or anywhere. Honduras today is not the time or place to play geopolitics. Diplomatic games and delay tactics only prolong the illegality that exists, entrench the coup leadership, and deepen the polarization and violence in the nation. A coup is a coup. All peaceful measures must be applied to prevent further violence and restore democracy.

There have been some lively debates on the postings here and at my blog on Huffington Post.

What's remarkable about them is the persistence of myths—particularly that the non-binding referendum proposed included an indefinite term for President Zelaya—and the idea among so many people that it's okay for the military to oust an elected president if they have a difference of opinion. We would have hoped that after the Organization of American States and the United Nations resolved to condemn the coup, and after Central American countries fought so hard to rebuild democracy, at least the terms of debate would be clear.

You can find a list of the 31 articles and blogs on Honduras below the Updater. They chronicle and analyze the development of the political crisis and include exclusive interviews and dispatches from people on-the-ground in Honduras like farm movement leader Rafael Alegria and union leader Juan Barahona (both leaders now of the National front Against the Coup), and journalist Dick Emanuelsson. They also include perspectives from former ambassador to El Salvador Robert White, president of the Center for International Policy, and Costa Rican political analyst Carlos Aguilar, as well as what I've written.

In a phone conversation this morning that was mysteriously cut off several times, Wendy Cruz of the CLOC-Central America Via Campesina described the current situation: thousands of Hondurans are marching since Aug. 5 to converge on Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula tomorrow in a nationwide protest against the coup. She noted that they are waiting to see what happens with a group of foreign ministers scheduled to arrive since the coup leaders have vacillated as to whether they will receive them or not. The coup recently said that the OAS delegation will only be admitted as tourists—a further insult to international diplomacy and law.

Cruz called on the international community to "ask the United States to take a much firmer position … and to stop sending aid to the Honduran Army. Because we know that they have only stopped a small part of the aid." Indeed, the suspension of $16.5 million is a fraction of U.S. aid to Honduras in the pipeline. Tomorrow is the International Day of Action for Honduras as the marches arrive there.

This is the time to act. The State Department sent a letter to the Senate softening its stance and has said it is not currently considering further sanctions. President Obama will be discussing the Honduran coup with North American leaders today at the Summit. Below is a partial list of U.S. links of support for democracy in Honduras compiled by one of our readers to write letters to the editor and to Congress:

http://www.lasolidarity.org

http://www.soaw.org/honduras

http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5436/t/2467/letter/?letter_KEY=184

http://www.nalacc.org/index.php?id=68&L=1

http://witnessforpeace.org/article.php?id=781#630

http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/424/t/4589/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=27704

http://www.cispes.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=604&Itemid=27

http://www.rightsaction.org/

http://www.justassociates.org/actions/honduras_action_0907.html

http://www.lawg.org/storage/lawg/documents/faith-based_and_nongovernmental_statement_on_honduras_june_30__3_.pdf

http://www.viacampesina.org/main_en/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=765&Itemid=1

Laura Carlsen

Danger on the Right

Danger on the Right.
James Zogby
There is a social movement stirring on the far right of American politics and it bodes ill for our future.
It is, in the classic sense, a movement, not an organization, with no coherent structure, no creed or litmus test for membership. Rather, it represents disparate currents, born of transformative developments and traumatic events that have impacted the US in recent decades.
This movement has manifested itself in several forms. There are the anti-immigrant armed militias patrolling our southern border keeping out "illegals." There are also the "tax party" demonstrators, many of whom have morphed into the angry chanting mobs that are now disrupting Congressional town meetings over health care reform. And there are the so-called "birthers," a not so small fringe on the far-right, that questions Barack Obama's birth in the US and, therefore, his right to hold the office of president.
If the individuals involved in these currents have anything in common, it is that they are angry and alienated and have identified "government" as a source of their problems and, therefore, as a target of their wrath.
Behind all of this discontent, of course, are real problems. The economic crisis in America did not just begin with the collapse of the financial sector in the fall of 2008. For years now, the US economy has undergone a steady transformation. The loss of our manufacturing base has resulted in dramatic social dislocation evidenced by the collapse of many once prosperous and stable communities. As factories closed, not only were jobs lost and economic security threatened, but people were forced to move, neighborhoods died and families were at risk.
All during the 1990's, despite gains on Wall Street, many middle class Americans were squeezed. Real incomes declined, costs of health care, education and basic commodities rose, resulting not only in a declining standard of living for many, but, for the 1st time in American history, a significant portion of the middle class began to question whether their children would be able to achieve the same economic status as their parents.
The trauma of 9/11 and Katrina presented a double jolt, shaking to an even greater degree American's sense of security and their confidence in the government's ability to perform.
Add to this a nativist/racist current, fueled by large numbers of immigrants from the south and fear of new foreigners (especially, after 9/11, Muslims) and the persistent presence of anti-black sentiment, and you have the ingredients of the lethal brew that is now coming to a boil.
All of this, however, did not erupt spontaneously, it was helped, fueled by fires set by those who sought, in ways subtle and not so subtle, to exploit the fears afoot across the land. Radical talk show hosts like Rush Limbaugh and Mike Savage, Fox News and even CNN's Lou Dobbs exploited these issues -- as did President George W. Bush's political adviser, Karl Rove, who used it for electoral success. Even Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign playbook tapped into these currents, as did the McCain/Palin campaign strategists.
And so here we are in the midst of a hot summer, with "birthers" fulminating about Obama's "foreignness," angry mobs breaking up town meetings, and polling numbers showing a deepening partisan divide across the nation.
All the while these events are unfolding, analysts and commentators are spending endless hours of airtime observing and pointing accusing fingers, without making an effort to understand how this came to be and where it can go. Some conservatives are surely at fault for thinking they can simply exploit this anger, turning it on and then off, at will. And some liberals, too, are at fault for dismissing the anger they see, suggesting that it is simply manufactured and artificial and, therefore, can be ignored.
I am reminded of similar developments that occurred in 1919 at the beginning of the "Red Scare." Then too, a national movement, fueled by fears of immigration, economic dislocation and wartime anti-foreign bigotry was exploited by some, ignored by others, until it got out of control, with lethal consequences.
If we are not careful and understanding, and if we do not start now, both to address this troubling anger and alienation, and to hold accountable those who are stoking the embers of discontent, we could end up in the throes of a full-fledged nativist siege that could tear apart the fabric of our nation.

Honduran Coup: The U.S. Connection

Honduran Coup: The U.S. Connection
Conn Hallinan
Foreign Policy In Focus
August 6, 2009
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/6329

While the Obama administration was careful to distance
itself from the recent coup in Honduras - condemning the
expulsion of President Manuel Zelaya to Costa Rica,
revoking Honduran officials' visas, and shutting off aid
- that doesn't mean influential Americans aren't
involved, and that both sides of the aisle don't have
some explaining to do.

The story most U.S. readers are getting about the coup
is that Zelaya - an ally of Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez - was deposed because he tried to change the
constitution to keep himself in power.

That story is a massive distortion of the facts. All
Zelaya was trying to do is to put a non-binding
referendum on the ballot calling for a constitutional
convention, a move that trade unions, indigenous groups,
and social activist organizations had long been lobbying
for. The current constitution was written by the
Honduran military in 1982, and the one-term limit allows
the brass-hats to dominate the politics of the country.
Since the convention would have been held in November,
the same month as the upcoming presidential elections,
there was no way Zelaya could have remained in office in
any case. The most he could have done was to run four
years from now.

And while Zelaya is indeed friendly with Chavez, he is
at best a liberal reformer whose major accomplishment
was raising the minimum wage. "What Zelaya has done has
been little reforms," Rafael Alegria, a leader of Via
Campesina, told the Mexican daily La Jornada. "He isn't
a socialist or a revolutionary, but these reforms, which
didn't harm the oligarchy at all, have been enough for
them to attack him furiously."

One of those "little reforms" was aimed at ensuring
public control of the Honduran telecommunications
industry, which may well have been the trip-wire that
triggered the coup.

The first hint that something was afoot was a suit
brought by Venezuelan lawyer Robert Carmona-Borjas
claiming that Zelaya was part of a bribery scheme
involving the state-run telecommunication company
Hondutel.

Carmona-Borjas has a rap-sheet that dates back to the
April 2002 coup against Chavez. He drew up the notorious
"Carmona decrees," a series of draconian laws aimed at
suspending the Venezuelan constitution and suppressing
any resistance to the coup. As Chavez supporters poured
into the streets and the plot unraveled, Carmona-Borjas
fled to Washington, DC. He took a post at George
Washington University and brought Iran-Contra plotters
Otto Reich and Elliott Abrams to teach his class on
"Political Management in Latin America." He also became
vice-president of the right-wing Arcadia Foundation,
which lobbies for free-market policies. Weeks before the
June 28 Honduran coup, Carmona-Borjas barnstormed the
country accusing Zelaya of collaborating with narco-
traffickers.

Carmona-Borjas' colleague, Reich, a Cuban American with
ties to right-wing factions all over Latin America and
former assistant secretary of State for hemispheric
affairs under George W. Bush, has been accused by the
Honduran Black Fraternal Organization of "undeniable
involvement" in the coup.

This is hardly surprising. Reich was nailed by a 1987
congressional investigation for using public funds to
engage in propaganda during the Reagan administration's
war on Nicaragua. He is also a fierce advocate for
Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles, both implicated
in the bombing of a Cuban airliner in 1973 that killed
all 73 on board.

Reich is also a ferocious critic of Zelaya. In a recent
piece in the Weekly Standard, he urged the Obama
administration not to support "strongman" Zelaya because
it "would put the United States clearly in the same camp
as Cuba's Castro brothers, Venezuela's Chavez, and other
regional delinquents."

One of the charges that Reich levels at Zelaya is that
the Honduran president is supposedly involved with
bribes paid out by the state-run telecommunications
company Hondutel. Zelaya is threatening to file a
defamation suit over the accusation.

Reich's charges against Hondutel are hardly
happenstance, as he is a former AT&T lobbyist and served
as Senator John McCain's (R-AZ) Latin American advisor
during the senator's 2008 presidential campaign. McCain
has deep ties with telecom giants AT&T, MCI, and
Qualcomm and, according to Nikolas Kozloff, author of
Hugo Chavez: Oil, Politics and the Challenge of the
United States, "has acted to protect and look out for
the political interests of the telecoms on Capitol
Hill."

AT&T, McCain's second largest donor, also generously
funds the International Republican Institute (IRI),
which has warred with Latin American regimes that have
resisted telecommunications privatization. According to
Kozloff, "President Zelaya was a known to be a fierce
critic of telecommunications privatization."

When Venezuelan coup leaders went to Washington a month
before their failed effort to oust Chavez, IRI footed
the bill. Reich, as then Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice's special envoy to the Western Hemisphere, met with
some of those leaders.

Republicans in Congress have accused the Obama
administration of being "soft" on Zelaya. Sen. Jim
DeMint (SC) protested the White House's support of the
Honduran president holding up votes for administration
nominees for the ambassador to Brazil and an assistant
secretary of state. Meanwhile, Zelaya's return was
unanimously supported by the UN General Assembly, the
European Union, and the Organization of American States.

But meddling in Honduras is a bipartisan undertaking.

"If you want to understand who is the real power behind
the [Honduran] coup, you need to find out who is paying
Lanny Davis," says Robert White, former U.S. ambassador
to El Salvador and current president of the Center for
International Policy. Davis, best known as the lawyer
who represented Bill Clinton during his impeachment
trial, has been lobbying members of Congress and
testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee in
support of the coup.

According to Roberto Lovato, an associate editor at New
American Media, Davis represents the Honduran chapter of
CEAL, the Business Council of Latin America, which
strongly backed the coup. Davis told Lovato, "I'm proud
to represent businessmen who are committed to the rule
of law."

But White says the coup had more to do with profits than
law. "Coups happen because very wealthy people want them
and help to make them happen, people who are used to
seeing the country as a money machine and suddenly see
social legislation on behalf of the poor as a threat to
their interests," says White. "The average wage of a
worker in free trade zones is 77 cents per hour."
According to the World Bank, 59% of Hondurans live below
the poverty line.

The United States is also involved in the coup through a
network of agencies that funnel money and training to
anti-government groups. The National Endowment for
Democracy (NED) and the U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID) contribute to right-wing
organizations that supported the coup, including the
Peace and Democracy Movement and the Civil Democratic
Union. Many of the officers that bundled Zelaya off to
San Jose were trained at the Western Hemispheric
Institute for Security Cooperation, the former "School
for the Americas" that has seen torturers and coup
leaders from all over Latin America pass through its
doors.

The Obama administration condemned the coup, but when
Zelaya journeyed to the Honduran-Nicaragua border, U.S.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton denounced him for
being "provocative." It was a strange statement, since
the State Department said nothing about a report by the
Committee of Disappeared Detainees in Honduras charging
1,100 human rights violations by the coup regime,
including detentions, assaults, and murder.

Human rights violations by the coup government have been
condemned by the Inter-American Commission for Human
Rights, the International Observer Mission, Human Rights
Watch, Amnesty International, the Committee to Protest
Journalists, and Reporters Without Borders.

Davis claims that the coup was a "legal" maneuver to
preserve democracy. But that's a hard argument to make,
given some of its architects. One is Fernando Joya, a
former member of Battalion 316, a paramilitary death
squad. Joya fled the country after being charged with
kidnapping and torturing several students in the 1980s,
but he has now resurfaced as a "special security
advisor" to the coup makers. He recently gave a TV
interview that favorably compared the 1973 Chilean coup
to the June 28 Honduran coup.

According to Greg Grandin, a history professor at New
York University, the coup makers also included the
extremely right-wing Catholic organization, Opus Dei,
whose roots go back to the fascist regime of Spanish
caudillo Francisco Franco.

In the old days, when the United States routinely
overthrew governments that displeased it, the Marines
would have gone in, as they did in Guatemala and
Nicaragua, or the CIA would have engineered a coup by
the local elites. No one has accused U.S. intelligence
of being involved in the Honduran coup, and American
troops in the country are keeping a low profile. But the
fingerprints of U.S. institutions like the NED, USAID,
and School for the Americas - plus bipartisan lobbyists,
powerful corporations, and dedicated Cold War warriors -
are all over the June takeover.

_____________________________________________

Honduran labor calls for a national Strike for August 6

Honduran labor centers call a national strike for August 6

National Labor Committee
Honduras’s three principal labor centrals, the Unitary Confederation of Honduran Workers (CUTH), General Workers Central (CGT) and Confederation of Honduran Workers (CTH) have called for a national strike tomorrow, August 6, 2009.

PUBLIC STATEMENT (en Español)
The three workers Confederations of Honduras, CUTH, CGT and CTH address the critical political situation that prevails in our country as product of the coup d’état that threw out of the presidency Mr. Manuel Zelaya Rosales, legitimately elected by the Honduran people in free elections that took place in November 2005.
This not a personal problem, it’s about the business sector and the vested interests who have generated a struggle between classes because of the social measures sponsored by the deposed government.
Facing this situation, our organizations condemn these facts and we do not recognize the so-called authorities of a dictatorial and de facto government.
We demand of all the governments of the world, the World Bank, the Interamerican Development Bank, the Central American Bank for Economic Integration and of USAID to withdraw all the official support and to freeze loans and projects to this coup government, imposed by the arms, which has created an atmosphere of repression and violence. We make an exception with regard to that support which goes directly to the people and organizations.
We also demand of the OAS, the UN, to maintain and strengthen the resolutions to repudiate this fascist government, product of the force of the arms, and to withdraw all support.
We ask that the Government of the United States proceed in cancelling the bank accounts and visas to all those persons involved in the coup, to freeze planned support and to withdraw diplomatic representation, for as long as institutional order is not re-established with the return of Jose Manuel Zelaya to the presidency of the republic.
For all the above-mentioned, the CUTH, the CGT and the CTH call all their organizations to an open-ended national strike beginning on Thursday August 6 of 2009, until the restitution of institutional order and the return of Jose Manuel Zelaya to the presidency of the republic.
Our organizations must remain on alert and support the patriotic march to the cities of San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa.
DEMANDS
1. The reestablishment of the democratic institutional order
2. The return of Mr. Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales to the presidency of the Republic.
3. The installation in Honduras of a Constituent National Assembly
4. That the repression against the Honduran people be ended.
ONLY UNITED WILL WE BE VICTORIOUS / HASTA LA VICTORIA SIEMPRE
Tegucigalpa, Morazán Central District, August 4 , 2009
National Executive Councils
CUTH CGT CTH
COMUNICADO
Las Centrales y Confederaciones obreras CUTH-CGT-CTH ante la critica situación política que vive nuestro país, producto del golpe militar que saco de la presidencia a don Manuel Zelaya Rosales, electo legítimamente por el pueblo hondureño, en elecciones libres llevadas a cabo en noviembre del 2005.
Este no es un problema personal, se trata de que el sector empresarial y los grupos facticos han generado una lucha de clases derivada de las medidas de contenido social que propició el gobierno que ha sido depuesto.
Ante esa situación nuestras organizaciones condenamos esos hechos y desconocemos las supuestas autoridades de un gobierno dictatorial y defacto.
Demandamos a todos los gobiernos del mundo, al BM,BID,BCIE y AID, que retiren sus ayudas oficiales y congelen prestamos y proyectos a este gobierno golpista impuesto por las armas, que esta creando un ambiente de represión y violencia. Hacemos la excepción de aquellas ayudas que vengan directas al pueblo y a las organizaciones.
Demandamos también de la OEA, la ONU que se mantengan y se fortalezcan las resoluciones de desconocimiento a este gobierno fascista producto de las fuerza de las armas y que se retire todo tipo de ayuda.
Al gobierno de Estados Unidos que proceda a la cancelación de cuentas y visas de todos esos personajes golpistas, que congele las ayudas previstas y que retire su representación diplomática, mientras no se restablezca la institucionalidad con el regreso del presidente legitimo de los hondureños José Manuel Zelaya Rosales.
Por todo lo expuesto anteriormente, la CUTH, la CGT y la CTH convocan a todas sus organizaciones a un paro nacional, por tiempo indefinido, a partir del jueves 6 de agosto del 2009, hasta que se restituya la institucionalidad y el regreso de José Manuel Zelaya a la presidencia de la República.
Que nuestras organizaciones se mantengan alertas, y apoyen la marcha patriótica hacia las ciudades de Sn Pedro Sula y Tegucigalpa.
DEMANDAS:
1. Restablecimiento de la institucionalidad democrática
2. Regreso de Don José Manuel Zelaya Rosales a la presidencia de la República
3. Que se instale en Honduras una asamblea nacional constituyente
4. Que cese la represión en contra del pueblo hondureño.
SOLO UNIDOS VENCEREMOS, HASTA LA VICTORIA SIEMPRE
Tegucigalpa, M. D. C. Agosto 4,2009.
CEN-CUTH CEN-CGT CEN-CTH
From Talking Union blog. http://www.talkingunion.wordpress.com

Obama's immigration policies

August 01, 2009
Greetings!

OBAMA IMMIGRATIION ENFORCEMENT
MORE EFFICIENT THAN BUSH'S
Protests against President Obama's immigration enforcement policies are beginning to sweep the country. In some areas the protests are directed at Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, the instrument of the enforcement policy execution, and in other areas President Obama is clearly the target. Some activists have argued that the main criticism and advocacy for a moratorium of such enforcement should be directed at Napolitano, the cabinet member responsible for defining the policy and taking it operational. Others argue that Obama is ultimately responsible for the policy and has in his hands the executive discretion to immediately put a stop to such rampant enforcement. The growing and pressing demand is for an ENFORCEMENT MORATORIU until fair and humane immigration reform is enacted.
No other presidential administration since 1986 has enforced employer sanctions through the named I-9 audits of personnel files of employers as broadly and efficiently as has the Obama administration. The system of employment verification, short-named eVerify, which allows employers to verify the legal status of their employees against federal government databases, has taken on a new vigorous life under Obama. The fall-out of such enforcement has been massive terminations of long and short-term immigrant workers from their employment during the worst economic down-turn in the country since the 1930s. In one company alone, American Apparel, the largest clothing manufacturing firm in the U.S. with over 10,000 employees, an estimated 1,800 workers are listed for termination. The multiplier factor of Latino family size results in a devastating economic impact on close to 10,000 lives in the Los Angeles region.

Some have exclaimed that the efficiency of these "desk-top" ICE raids and deportations under this administration mirrors the efficiency with which candidate Obama ran his presidential campaign. These raids are more pervasive, sweeping, pernicious, and devastating in terms of the numbers of individuals impacted than anything executed under President George Bush.

To the degree that the Obama administration declares that it is a crime to work, and pursues and persecutes those workers who are employed in millions of companies throughout America - making incredible economic contributions by their labor and paying the corresponding taxes - than the policy of this president is one of criminalizing immigrant workers and treating them as nothing less than common criminals. This is anathema to all that candidate Obama promised on the campaign trail, which now clearly contradicts the actions of President Obama. Which Obama is to be believed?

Obama loses immigration allies

Activists picket, feel betrayed by administration policies
By Stephen Dinan (Contact)
Originally published 04:45 a.m., July 30, 2009,
updated 03:01 p.m., July 30, 2009

Three years after President Obama marched alongside Hispanic and immigrant rights activists, they took to the streets Wednesday to march against him, saying he has betrayed them by embracing George W. Bush administration efforts to stem illegal immigration.

Activists marched in Los Angeles and picketed Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's appearance in New York, angered over the administration's recent embrace of an electronic verification system for employers and a program that allows local police to enforce immigration laws.

The protests highlight the tough political spot Mr. Obama faces: He enjoyed strong support from Hispanics in last year's election, but activists say he's now risking their support in the future.

"I see the sense of betrayal creeping up," said Chung- Wha Hong, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition, which organized the protest against Ms. Napolitano.

The coalition said the administration is using the right words on immigrant rights but taking the wrong actions to boost enforcement.

"A lot of people see the actions of Secretary Napolitano going in the opposite direction of the reform President Obama promised," she said.

The protests erupted as a report by the Center for Immigration Studies says stepped-up enforcement since 2007 has helped cut the illegal immigrant population in the United States.

The group advocates the reduction of illegal immigration through strong enforcement measures.

The report, being released Thursday morning, says the illegal immigrant population peaked at 12.5 million in summer 2007, or just as Congress was debating a legalization program, but has since fallen to 10.8 million.

Steven A. Camarota and Karen Jensenius, the report's authors, said the fact that legal immigration has not declined shows that enforcement, not the economy, is responsible for the decline in illegal immigrants.

The authors said the electronic employment verification known as E-verify and the police enforcement program were among the key enforcement tools that expanded after 2007 and contributed to the drop.

Speaking in New York to the Council on Foreign Relations, Ms. Napolitano defended the White House's decision to move forward with a crackdown on illegal immigration.

"We are expanding enforcement, but I think in the right way," she said. In particular, she defended the local police enforcement program - known as 287(g) because of the section of law that authorizes it - saying it was created by the Clinton administration but went astray. She said the Obama administration has taken steps to add accountability and protections to the program and to push local police to focus on dangerous criminal illegals.

As former governor of Arizona with experience handling this thorny issue, Ms. Napolitano is supposed to help Mr. Obama navigate immigration by helping him craft an enforcement strategy in the near term even as she helps him push Congress for a broader bill in the long term.

Mr. Obama has called for a broad immigration agreement that legalizes most illegal immigrants. He voted for both legalization bills in both 2006 and 2007, and during last year's presidential campaign Mr. Obama repeatedly told Hispanic audiences that he was proud to have marched with them during the nationwide immigrant rights marches on May 1, 2006.

Immigrant activists suffered a similar disillusionment under Mr. Bush, who supported the 2006 and 2007 efforts to overhaul immigration but, after they failed, said he would instead boost enforcement.

Ms. Hong said the Obama administration is using all the right words about backing a broad immigration bill but is taking "massive enforcement actions."

She also said stepping up enforcement of "dysfunctional and unenforceable" laws is not a solution, and said the activists hope to push Mr. Obama away from enforcement and back toward his campaign promises.

"Today was the one event that we didn't want to have," she said. "We didn't want to be protesting President Obama's immigration policy and Napolitano's policy, it really pains us to be picketing."

One immigrant rights group said it expects Democratic senators to introduce legislation this week rolling back some of Mr. Obama's new enforcement plans. Republicans have had mixed reactions to Mr. Obama's immigration efforts, but on Wednesday they praised him after the New York Times reported that his administration would not issue rules that would allow immigrants being detained to challenge the conditions of their detention.

"This decision will prevent a flood of frivolous lawsuits aimed at paralyzing the detention system," said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee.

But Ms. Hong and other activists blasted the move, saying that if Mr. Obama continues to pile up enforcement without any action on legalization it will cost him politically.

They pointed to several recent studies that questioned the costs versus benefits of the local police enforcement program and that accused U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement of violating immigrants' rights in home raids.

Frank Sharry, executive director of advocacy group America's Voice, said frustration with the Department of Homeland Security is growing, adding that while Ms. Napolitano has taken some positive steps "she needs to pay attention to the growing chorus of voices ... that are calling for reform of current enforcement strategies and swift action on comprehensive immigration reform."

"Not doing so could carry a heavy political cost for the administration," he said.

Enough is enough!
Tell Secretary Napolitano that it's time for real reform!

Imagine waking up to pounding on your front door, you and your kids forced to the floor in your pajamas, heavily armed agents rifling their way through your home as the kids scream out in terror.

Now, imagine armed federal agents barging into your home without legal consent.

Last week, the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law called the government's pre-dawn immigration raids on family homes "unconstitutional" and said that a "cowboy mentality" over at the Department of Homeland Security has been doing serious harm.

So far, Homeland Security has refused to investigate or acknowledge these and other serious charges.

Watch a new video by our friends at America's Voice, and Sign the petition to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano saying, "Enough is enough!"

It's time for real immigration reform, not more "cowboy" enforcement tactics.

When you sign, you will be joined by communities from California to New York, whose leaders will hand- deliver all of the signatures to Secretary Napolitano's offices across the country.

Thank you for speaking up and helping to spread the word.

Honduras Coup

War Times on the coup in Honduras and the Obama Administration
But the battle of ideas is not fought only "in general." It pivots around specific policies and issues. And these, besides shaping and reshaping opinion, have outcomes which are crucial in and of themselves.

Right now, three such pivotal battles stand out.

The first concerns the coup in Honduras. Much is at stake not just for that country, but for all Latin America. The entire region is moving leftward, it is the center of gravity of the most diverse and dynamic grassroots-driven radical efforts in the world today. Right wingers and oligarchs - and their backers in Washington - have been on the defensive and trying to figure out a way to reverse the tide. Economic levers for many do not seem to be enough; they want to return to the days of naked military force. The stakes in Honduras thus go even beyond the fate of the Honduran people. If the coup stands, the reactionaries will be emboldened and - as movements and governments throughout Latin America are saying - the question will be where military coup-makers strike next. If on the other hand the coup is reversed, popular movements will be strengthened and the progressive wave will gain even more momentum.

As of this writing the outcome is in doubt. A great deal depends on what pressures can be mounted here in the U.S. So far the Obama administration has played a mixed but principally negative role, and there are signs of division in the highest echelons of D.C. Evidence is overwhelming that the golpistas had the blessing of U.S. operatives carried over from the Bush years (for example, Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens, who was Bush's top Venezuela advisor at the time of the failed 2002 coup). Obama at first denounced the coup, but since then Washington has orchestrated talks in a way that treats the coup-makers as legitimate leaders and supports anti-democratic conditions on any prospective return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya. Washington has refused to cut off military aid to the generals or take other steps that would make it all but impossible for the coup to stand. The right (aided by power-brokers close to Hillary Clinton) have been engaged in an all-out media campaign to legitimize the coup. Counter-pressure from our side is an urgent priority with so much at stake for Honduras, for Latin America, and for the coming years' posture of the Obama administration.
War Tiems

Gates response to the meeting at the White House

'An Accident of Time and Place'
"...I thank God that I live in a country in which police officers put their lives at risk to protect us every day, and, more than ever, I’ve come to understand and appreciate their daily sacrifices on our behalf."
By: Henry Louis Gates Jr. | Posted: July 30, 2009 at 8:20 PM
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I would like to applaud President Obama for bringing Sergeant Crowley, me and our families together. I would also like to thank the President for welcoming my father, Henry Louis Gates, Sr., who for most of his life has been a Republican! My dad turned 96 this past June, and the fact that he worked two jobs every day is the reason that my brother, Dr. Paul Gates, and I were able to receive such splendid educations. I am honored that he chose to join me at the White House, along with my fiancée, my daughters, and my brother.

SGT. CROWLEY: "We Agreed to Move Forward."

Sergeant Crowley and I, through an accident of time and place, have been cast together, inextricably, as characters – as metaphors, really – in a thousand narratives about race over which he and I have absolutely no control. Narratives about race are as old as the founding of this great Republic itself, but these new ones have unfolded precisely when Americans signaled to the world our country’s great progress by overcoming centuries of habit and fear, and electing an African American as President. It is incumbent upon Sergeant Crowley and me to utilize the great opportunity that fate has given us to foster greater sympathy among the American public for the daily perils of policing on the one hand, and for the genuine fears of racial profiling on the other hand.

Let me say that I thank God that I live in a country in which police officers put their lives at risk to protect us every day, and, more than ever, I’ve come to understand and appreciate their daily sacrifices on our behalf. I’m also grateful that we live in a country where freedom of speech is a sacrosanct value and I hope that one day we can get to know each other better, as we began to do at the White House this afternoon over beers with President Obama.

Thank God we live in a country where speech is protected, a country which guarantees and defends my right to speak out when I believe my rights have been violated; a country that protects us from arrest when we do express our views, no matter how unpopular.

And thank God that we have a President who can rise above the fray, bridge age-old differences and transform events such as this into a moment in the evolution of our society’s attitudes about race and difference. President Obama is a man who understands tolerance and forgiveness, and our country is blessed to have such a leader.

The national conversation over the past week about my arrest has been rowdy, not to say tumultuous and unruly. But we’ve learned that we can have our differences without demonizing one another. There’s reason to hope that many people have emerged with greater sympathy for the daily perils of policing, on the one hand, and for the genuine fears about racial profiling, on the other hand.

Having spent my academic career trying to bridge differences and promote understanding among Americans, I can report that it is far more comfortable being the commentator than being commented upon. At this point, I am hopeful that we can all move on, and that this experience will prove an occasion for education, not recrimination. I know that Sergeant Crowley shares this goal. Both of us are eager to go back to work tomorrow. And it turns out that the President just might have a few other things on his plate as well.

Henry Louis Gates Jr. is Editor in Chief of The Root.

Honduras, School for Coups

By Fr. Roy Bourgeois, M.M., and Margaret Knapke
July 22, 2009
Foreign Policy in Focus
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/6285

The day after Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was
deposed, President Barack Obama cautioned against
repeating Latin America's "dark past," decades when
military coups regularly overrode the results of
democratic elections. Obama went on to acknowledge, in
his understated way, "The United States has not always
stood as it should with some of these fledgling
democracies."

In fact, the U.S. government has often stood with - or
at least behind - the coup-makers. Examples include
Guatemala in 1954, Brazil in 1964, Chile in 1973, and
Venezuela in 2002 (this last coup attempt, against
President Hugo Chávez, was reversed). Also, throughout
most of the 1980s, the Reagan administration subsidized
and helped direct the "contra" (meaning counter-
revolutionary) war against the Nicaraguan government
and people.

Notably, the June 28 coup against Zelaya and the
Honduran electorate traces back to the U.S. Army School
of the Americas (SOA). Originally established in Panama
in 1946, the school was the U.S. Army's premier site
for training Latin American officers and soldiers in
military intelligence and combat operations, supposedly
within the letter of the law.

Within 20 years, however, it was known in Latin
American military circles as "la Escuela de Golpes" -
the School of Coups. And in the early 1980s, Panamanian
President Jorge Illueca declared the SOA "the biggest
base for destabilization in Latin America." The "School
of Coups" moved to Ft. Benning, Georgia, in 1984.

School rosters obtained through the Freedom of
Information Act show that General Romeo Vásquez Velá
squez, leader of the recent Honduran coup, trained
there in 1976 and 1984. He was assisted in deposing
President Zelaya by General Luis Javier Prince Suazo,
head of the Honduran Air Force, who in 1996 rather
presciently took an SOA course in Joint Operations.

Fingerprints

But the school's fingerprints have long been evident in
Honduras. A death squad known as Battalion 3-16 was
organized in the 1980s and operated clandestinely for
years - kidnapping, forcibly disappearing, and
torturing political opponents, and killing at least 184
of them. Nineteen members of Battalion 3-16 are known
to have graduated from the School of the Americas,
including three generals who directed battalion
activities.

School officials have long insisted that its graduates
who flaunt the rule of law do so despite their
training. They are, according to that argument, just
inevitable "bad apples."

But, to the contrary, documentary evidence indicates
these students have learned their lessons well. In
1996, for example, President Bill Clinton's Defense
Department revealed that training materials used from
1982-1991 at the School had instructed Latin American
military officers and soldiers to target civilian
populations and use torture, intimidation, false
arrest, extrajudicial execution, blackmail, and more
inhumane tactics.

So, while SOA training has emboldened golpistas (coup-
makers) to act against legitimately elected heads of
state, it also has provoked crimes against citizens
challenging illegitimate or antidemocratic powers. As
Berta Oliva - who coordinates the Committee of
Relatives of the Disappeared in Honduras (COFADEH) -
said of soldiers repressing anti-coup protests: "They
view those who demand their rights as if they were
enemies."

Oliva will never forget the Battalion 3-16 years. She
founded the COFADEH after her husband was kidnapped and
disappeared in 1982. About the recent military coup in
her country, she observed: "They've made a return to
the 1980s.... Friendly governments who hold democratic
ideals simply cannot allow this to happen here.

Shine the Light

Arguably the only way for Latin America to avoid
repeating its "dark past" is to shine a bright light
into it, for all to see. At the fifth Summit of the
Americas last April, Obama noted the importance of
learning from history. And he declared, "The United
States will be willing to acknowledge past errors where
those errors have been made."

With H.R. 2567, the Latin America Military Training
Review Act, Rep. James McGovern (D-MA) and 57 co-
sponsors are offering us a light to shine. This
legislation would suspend operations at the Western
Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC)
- the "successor institution" to the School of the
Americas, which is still located at Ft. Benning. Then a
bipartisan congressional taskforce would investigate
decades of its activities and teaching materials.

Certainly "errors have been made." Some at this moment
are threatening to override the will of the Honduran
electorate.

It's time. It's past time. Shine the light on the
School of Coups.

Shine the light.

Father Roy Bourgeois is a Catholic priest, a former
missionary, and founder of SOA Watch. Margaret Knapke
is a longtime Latin America human-rights activist. Both
have served federal prison terms for nonviolent civil
disobedience aimed at closing the School of the
Americas and are Foreign Policy In Focus contributors.

_____________________________________________

Honduras Coup : Robert White

Why the Coup in Honduras Won't—and Shouldn't—Succeed

Robert E. White | July 14, 2009

Available in translation: No Hay Vuelta Atrás: Porqué el golpe de estado en Honduras no triunfará. Porqué no puede hacerlo.


Americas Program, Center for International Policy (CIP)
americas.irc-online.org
Honduras has suffered a coup d'état at the hands of congressional leaders and the commanding officers of the armed forces. Provided that the United States stands firmly with its partners in Latin America, this revolt against the constitutional order will certainly fall apart. To fail to restore President Manuel Zelaya to power in Honduras would risk reviving in Central America that dark era when the rights of free speech and assembly were curtailed and civilians could govern only within limits set by military leaders.


Robert E. White, president
of the Center for International
Policy.
Photo: www.ciponline.org.
Honduras is notorious for its economic inequality. The very rich hold the reins of power and are literally above the law. Very few members of the country's military and economic elites have been brought to justice for destroying the environment, stealing land and resources from the poor, using the state for personal gain, or silencing journalists who try to expose their crimes.

In fulfillment of his campaign pledge, President Zelaya quickly pushed through major legislation designed to protect the forests of Honduras from the powerful logging industry, which had enjoyed the protection of previous governments. For help with the rest of his moderate reform program, Zelaya consulted the U.S. ambassador and sought assistance from traditional Washington sources such as the Agency for International Development and the Inter-American Development Bank. His cooperation with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez did not begin until later.

Prior to Zelaya's election, I had helped found a Honduran nongovernmental organization called Democracy Without Borders, which was dedicated to making government more accountable and more responsive to the 60% of Hondurans who live below the poverty line. Decades before, I had served as chief of the political section in our embassy in Tegucigalpa. After Zelaya became president, I met often with him and his key advisers. Although foreign policy issues were discussed and sometimes hotly debated, there was never any mention of Venezuela or President Chavez.

Of the many crises that the Zelaya administration had to confront, it was the skyrocketing price of oil that pushed the Honduran economy toward the breaking point. Every week, bus lines and trucking companies demanded action, called work stoppages, and threatened strikes. President Zelaya decided he had to act. He took temporary control of foreign-owned storage terminals as part of a policy to check profiteering and lower gasoline prices. This initiative won Zelaya broad popular approval, but it brought down on him the collective wrath of the international oil companies.

While this drama was unfolding, a worried cabinet member asked me how President Zelaya should handle a surprise offer from President Hugo Chavez to supply oil to Honduras at subsidized prices. After learning all the details, I advised the minister to discuss the Venezuelan initiative with the U.S. ambassador. He should explain to him that the Zelaya administration had to act in the best interests of Honduras and ask him what Washington could do to help the government insure a dependable supply of oil at rational prices. Alas, the Bush administration offered Zelaya nothing—other than assurances that the right course was to trust in the long-term benefits of free-market capitalism.

The crisis in Honduras should remind the Obama administration that it has inherited an inadequate policy toward Central America. While President Chavez supplies cheap oil to favored regional allies, the United States supplies funding for the war on drugs and military assistance. Civilian leaders are understandably skeptical of a drug war that only seems to have increased corruption and violence in their countries. Elected presidents also worry that Washington's counter-narcotics program gives the militaries of Central America a license to intervene in the internal affairs of their nations—a role expressly forbidden by the constitutions of all countries in the region. Recent events in Honduras confirm that these fears are well founded.

The Honduran civilian and military officials who set this coup in motion have committed a collective act of political suicide. They have demonstrated that they are unfit to hold public office in a constitutional government. The future of democracy in Honduras will be brighter once they are gone.

Robert E. White, a former United States ambassador to El Salvador and Paraguay, is president of the Center for International Policy.

Repression in Honduras: Coup

Why Is Our Government So Quiet About Repression and Media Censorship in Honduras?
Mark Weisbrot
National Journal Online, July 13, 2009

The media coverage of Honduras has drawn a sharp contrast between the Obama administration’s response to the coup in Honduras and that of his predecessor to the military coup in Venezuela in 2002. But in reality there are much more similarities than differences. When the Venezuelan military overthrew Chavez in April of 2002, the Bush administration initially supported the coup. But within a day, Latin American heads of state meeting in a Rio Summit made it clear that no one would recognize the coup government; the Bush Administration quickly switched its position and opposed the coup government.

Similarly, the Obama administration’s first response to the coup differed from all other governmental responses in the world in that it did not criticize the coup. Rather, it said called upon “all political and social actors in Honduras to respect democratic norms, the rule of law and the tenets of the Inter-American Democratic Charter.”

For those who know anything about diplomatic language, this really makes it clear that the Obama administration is not on the same page as the rest of the world, when it comes to this coup. The coup leaders only need to run the clock for the few months remaining in Zelaya’s term, and everything that this administration has done so far is consistent with this goal – including the arrangement of a mediation effort with Costa Rican president Oscar Arias, which was doomed to fail from the beginning.

Looking forward, Washington will still play an important role. Zelaya will likely return to Honduras, setting up the political confrontation that the coup leaders hoped to avoid by taking him out of the country. The only way they can win this political battle will be through repression. As reported in the Miami Herald, the coup government has used widespread media censorship and repression to control information. It has shot and killed demonstrators, and yesterday there was a report that a trade union leader was murdered. The Obama administration has been almost completely silent in the face of this repression. Will they remain silent as it intensifies if Zelaya returns?

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in Washington, D.C. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan. He is co-author, with Dean Baker, of Social Security: The Phony Crisis (University of Chicago Press, 2000), and has written numerous research papers on economic policy. He is also president of Just Foreign Policy .

Ortega in Nicaragua

This is a one year old story which I just came across.
It is, however, still relevant.

Ortega's last straw in Nicaragua
The Sandinista president has gone too far in prosecuting 83-year-old poet Ernesto Cardenal.
By Stephen Kinzer 
September 03, 2008
A bitter political-cultural confrontation that exploded in Nicaragua in late August could mark the final end of the passionate romance between the world's leftist intellectuals and Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega.
Ortega, you may recall, was the leader of the Sandinista National Liberation Front when it seized power after overthrowing the 40-year Somoza family dynasty. A dashing young revolutionary who electrified liberals and leftists around the world, Ortega served as Nicaragua's president for most of the 1980s. He lost power in 1990, but after 16 years in opposition, he was elected president again in


For years -- in and out of government -- the Sandinista Front has been Ortega's private fiefdom. Most of the other Sandinistas who riveted the world's attention in the 1980s have broken with him, but he emerged with control over the party machinery, and he wields power like an old-fashioned Latin American caudillo.
Despite Ortega's recent slide into authoritarian rule, and despite his glaring failure to address the urgent needs of an impoverished nation, the Sandinista cachet continues to give him an air of celebrity in some circles. His denunciations of American imperialism (issued even as he deals easily with the U.S. military and the International Monetary Fund) still warm the cockles of many hearts.
That has changed in recent days. On Aug. 22, in a crude act of political revenge, a Sandinista judge dredged up an old case that had been dismissed three years ago against Ernesto Cardenal, the 83-year-old poet who is one of Nicaragua's most beloved figures. Intellectuals from around the world, including many with pro-Sandinista pedigree, have angrily protested what they see as a transparent effort by Ortega and the Sandinistas to humiliate and punish Cardenal.
During the wild days of revolutionary rule and Contra war in the 1980s, Cardenal -- a priest and liberation theologian as well as a poet -- served as Ortega's minister of culture, and he did much to spread the Sandinista mystique around the world. The sin for which he is now being punished is that during a visit to Paraguay last month, he had the temerity to call Ortega a "thief" who runs "a monarchy made
Cardenal was in Paraguay to attend the inauguration of that country's new left-leaning president, Fernando Lugo. He was given a warm official welcome. Ortega, in contrast, was forced to cancel his visit after Paraguayan feminists said they would dog him with protests over unresolved charges that he had sexually abused his stepdaughter.
Last week, more than 60 Latin American writers and other cultural figures issued a protest calling the judge's move against Cardenal "totally illegal." It called him "the most recent victim of systematic persecution that is being directed against all who raise their voices to protest the lack of transparency, the authoritarian style, the unscrupulous behavior and the lack of ethics that Daniel Ortega has shown since his return to power."