Lobbyist Lanny Davis Seeks a Rematch with Obama over Honduras Coup (tags)
"And Zelaya is right. Playing along with such talks with an illegitimate coup regime any longer than they've gone on already would be folly. Diplomacy is for dealing with legitimate governments, not for criminals and terrorists. And, Mr. President, even if that story blows over in the news media, because Honduras is a relatively small country, you just know that if the Honduras coup succeeds in remaining in power that other military generals in other Latin American countries are going to take it as a green light to do the same. And when that happens, the next coup - in Bolivia, perhaps? El Salvador? Nicaragua? Or completing the circle from 1955, Guatemala, Señor Presidente? - will be known far and wide as “Obama’s coup,” because your administration will then be accurately perceived as having not lowered the boom – in all the economic, political and judicial ways that everybody knows you can and must do - on its predecessor. Worse, they’ll say you got beat by Lanny Davis. They’ll even say that kooky Lanny fellow was right about you in 2008. Those are his chips on the card table. Now show us yours. ----- Most Damning: Many will come to see that that (facilitate the coups) was what you were "hired" to do?" General Joe
Obama's Real Plan in Latin America (tags)
At first glance Obama seems to have softened U.S. policy toward Latin America, especially when compared to his predecessor. There has been no shortage of editorials praising Obama’s conciliatory approach while comparing it to FDR’s ”Good Neighbor” Latin American policy. It’s important to remember, however, that FDR’s vision of being neighborly meant that the U.S. would merely stop direct military interventions in Latin America, while reserving the right to create and prop up dictators, arm and train unpopular regional militaries, promote economic dominance through free trade and bank loans, conspire with right-wing groups, etc…