[click image]Sliming penguins....
Doomed dairy....
Goldstone gives in....
BP drilling in the Gulf....
The war drones on as though it's stopping tomorrow....
Polymer didn't work....
Information that will not land on your synapses....
Worse than Dubya....
Corbett Report....
The banks....
UNSPEAKABLE....
Fidel....
For Phil....
[click image]REFLECTIONS OF FIDEL
NATO’s inevitable war (Part II) — (Part I)
WHEN Gaddafi, aged just 28 and a colonel in the Libyan army, inspired by his Egyptian colleague Abdel Nasser, overthrew King Idris I in 1969, he implemented important revolutionary measures such as agrarian reform and the nationalization of oil. The growing income was dedicated to economic and social development, particularly educational and health services for the small Libyan population located in a vast desert territory with very little arable land.
An extensive and deep sea of "fossil water" existed beneath that desert. When I heard about an experimental cultivation area I had the impression that, in the future, those aquifers would be more valuable than oil.
Religious faith, preached with the fervor that characterizes Muslim nations, in part helped to compensate for the strong tribal tendency which still survives in that Arab country.
Libyan revolutionaries devised and implemented their own ideas in relation to legal and political institutions, which Cuba, as a principle, respected.
We totally abstained from expressing any opinions concerning the concepts of the Libyan leadership.
We can clearly see that the fundamental concern of the United States and NATO is not Libya, but the revolutionary wave unleashed in the Arab world, which they wish to prevent at all costs.
It is an irrefutable fact that relations between the United States and its NATO allies in recent years were excellent until the rebellion in Egypt and in Tunisia arose.
In high-level meetings between Libya and NATO leaders, none of the latter had any problems with Gaddafi. The country was a secure source of high-quality oil, gas and even potassium supplies. The problems which arose between them in the early decades had been overcome.
Strategic sectors such as oil pumping and transportation were opened up to foreign investment.
Privatizations were extended to many public enterprises. The International Monetary Fund exercised its beatific role in the implementation of those operations.
Logically, Aznar was fulsome in his praise of Gaddafi and after him, Blair, Berlusconi, Sarkozy, Zapatero and even my friend the King of Spain, paraded past the sardonic regard of the Libyan leader. They were happy.
Although it might seem that I am mocking that is not the case; I am simply asking myself why they now want to take Gaddafi before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
They are accusing him 24 hours a day of firing on unarmed citizens who were protesting. Why did they not explain to the world that the weapons and, above all, the sophisticated machinery of repression possessed by Libya, was supplied by the United States, Britain and other illustrious hosts of Gaddafi?
I strongly oppose the cynicism and lies currently being used to justify the invasion and occupation of Libya.
The last time that I visited Gaddafi was in May 2001, 15 years after Reagan attacked his very modest residence, where he took me to see what was left of it. It received a direct hit from the aircraft and was considerably destroyed; his little daughter three years of age died in the attack: she was murdered by Ronald Reagan. There was no prior agreement on the part of NATO, the Human Rights Committee, or the Security Council.
My previous visit had taken place in 1977, eight years after the beginning of the revolutionary process in Libya. I visited Tripoli; I took part in the General People’s Congress in Sebha; I toured the first agricultural experiments with water pumped from the vast sea of fossil waters; I visited Benghazi, I was the object of a warm reception. It was a legendary country which had been the scenario of historic battles in World War II. It did not as yet have six million inhabitants, nor were its enormous volumes of oil and fossil waters known. The former Portuguese colonies in Africa had already been liberated.
We had fought for 15 years in Angola against mercenary armies organized along tribal lines by the United States, the Mobutu government, and the well-equipped and trained racist apartheid army. This army, following U.S. instructions, as is now known, invaded Angola in 1975 in order to prevent its independence, reaching the outskirts of Luanda with its motorized forces. A number of Cuban instructors died in that brutal invasion. Resources were sent with all urgency.
Expelled from that country by Cuban internationalists and Angolan troops to the border of South African occupied Namibia, the racists were given the mission of eliminating the revolutionary process in Angola.
With the support of the United States and Israel they developed nuclear weapons. They already possessed them when the Cuban and Angolan troops defeated their land and air forces in Cuito Cuanavale and, defying the risk – using conventional tactics and means – advanced toward the border with Namibia, where the apartheid troops were attempting to resist. Twice in their history our forces have been at risk of attack by those kinds of weapons: in October of 1962 and in southern Angola, but on that second occasion, not even deploying those nuclear weapons that South Africa possessed could they have prevented the defeat which marked the end of the odious system. Those events took place under the government of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Piet Botha in South Africa.
There is no talk of that and the hundreds of thousands of lives which the imperialist adventure cost.
I regret having to recall those events when another great risk is hovering over the Arab peoples, because they are not resigned to continue being the victims of plunder and oppression.
The Revolution in the Arab world so much feared by the United States and NATO is that of those who lack all rights in the face of those who flaunt all privileges, and thus is destined to be more profound than the one unleashed in Europe in 1789 with the storming of the Bastille.
Not even Louis XIV, when he proclaimed that he was the state, possessed the privileges of King Abdullah bin Abdul-Aziz of Saudi Arabia and far less the vast wealth that lies below the surface of that almost desert country, where yankee transnationals determine the pumping and thus the price of oil in the world.
When the Libyan crisis began, extraction in Saudi Arabia rose to one million barrels a day at minimum cost and, in consequence, by that concept alone, the income of that country and those who control it has risen to one billon dollars a day.
No one should imagine that the Saudi people are swimming in money. There are moving accounts of the living conditions of many construction workers and those in other sectors obliged to work 13 to 14 hours a day for paltry wages.
Shocked by the revolutionary wave which is shaking the prevalent system of plunder, in the wake of what took place with workers in Egypt and Tunisia, but also unemployed youth in Jordan, the occupied territories of Palestine, Yemen and even Bahrain and the Arab Emirates with higher per capita income, the upper echelons of the Saudi hierarchy has been impacted by the events.
As opposed to other times, today the Arab peoples receive almost instantaneous information on events, albeit exceptionally manipulated.
The worst thing for the status quo of the privileged sectors is that those persistent events are coinciding with a considerable increase in food prices and the devastating impact of climate change, while the United States, the largest producer of corn in the world, is wasting 40% of that product and a significant part of soy production on biofuels to feed automobiles. Lester Brown, the best informed American ecologist in the world on agricultural products, can surely give us an idea of the current food situation.
The Bolivarian president, Hugo Chávez, is making a valiant effort to find a solution without NATO intervention in Libya. The chances of his attaining that objective would improve if he can achieve the feat of creating a broad movement of opinion before and not after the intervention takes place, and the peoples do not have to see the atrocious experience of Iraq repeated in other countries.
End of Reflection.
[click images]In contrast with what is happening in Egypt and Tunisia, Libya occupies the first spot on the Human Development Index for Africa and it has the highest life expectancy on the continent. Education and health receive special attention from the State. The cultural level of its population is without a doubt the highest. Its problems are of a different sort. The population wasn’t lacking food and essential social services. The country needed an abundant foreign labour force to carry out ambitious plans for production and social development.
For that reason, it provided jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers from Egypt, Tunisia, China and other countries. It had enormous incomes and reserves in convertible currencies deposited in the banks of the wealthy countries from which they acquired consumer goods and even sophisticated weapons that were supplied exactly by the same countries that today want to invade it in the name of human rights.
The colossal campaign of lies, unleashed by the mass media, resulted in great confusion in world public opinion. Some time will go by before we can reconstruct what has really happened in Libya, and we can separate the true facts from the false ones that have been spread.[click images]Saturday's appearance will be particularly interesting because the last time Fidel Castro attended parliament was a month before his health emergency. Since then lawmakers have convened with an empty chair set aside for Fidel.I hate to say it, but I feel things beginning to shift into place. I think Fidel does too.
The special session will deal with a topic followed closely by the elder Castro brother: the threat of global nuclear war.
A brief statement read on state television's Friday night newscast did not say if Castro would address the assembly, which will be broadcast nationwide. But it's hard to imagine that he won't since he requested the special session.
"’You are backing a country that has hundreds of nuclear weapons [Isreal] but you are saying that you want to stop Iran, which could possibly have them some day…’"I am pretty sure Fidel meant for Obama to use his prerogative NOT to inspect Iranian ships, to NOT go so far as to force Iran to protect herself. I admit that is not so clear from this wording, but the rest of it, here, and in everything he's written over the years, doesn't make sense if he is urging Obama to provoke the Iranians.
The Iranians have stated that they will fire 100 rockets against every one of the U.S. and Israeli ships that are blockading Iran, as soon as they inspect any Iranian merchant ship.
In that way, when Obama gives the order to comply with the Security Council resolution, he will be decreeing the sinking of all the U.S. warships in that area.
Never before has such a dramatic decision fallen upon a president of the United States. He should have foreseen that.
On this occasion, for the first time in my life, I am addressing United States President Barack Obama:
You must know that it is in your hands to offer humanity the only real possibility of peace. Only on one occasion can you make use of your prerogatives by giving the order to fire.
It is possible that later, on the basis of this traumatic experience, solutions might be found that will not lead us once again to this apocalyptical situation. Everybody in your country, including your worst adversaries of the left or the right, will doubtless be grateful to you, and also the people of the United States, who are not in any way guilty of the situation created.
I ask you to deign to hear this appeal that I am conveying to you in the name of the Cuban people.
I understand that a rapid response cannot be expected, nor would you ever give one. Think it through well, consult your specialists, ask your most powerful allies and international adversaries for their opinion on the matter.
I am not interested in honors or glories. Do it!
The world really can be liberated from nuclear weapons and also conventional ones.
The worst of all the variants will be nuclear war, which is already virtually inevitable. PREVENT IT!
Castro noted that after months of warning of the risks of nuclear war over the enforcement of sanctions against Iran — he even gave a deadline in June — he's now less pessimistic.So I guess we settled that one anyway.
"At first I thought that the imminent danger of war had no solution possible," he said. "I am sure, however, that it will not happen that way and that, on the contrary, the conditions for a solution (...) are being created at this time."
"One man alone will have to make the decision: The president of the United States," Castro said, because Iran will not bow to U.S. and Israeli demands to halt its nuclear program.
If Obama approves an attack on Iran, he added, he will trigger a war that will spread through the Middle East and Asia and cause "the instantaneous death of hundreds of millions people, among them an incalculable number of people in his own country."
The "established order of the planet ... will inevitably collapse, the reigning social order will disappear abruptly" and all currencies will be worthless, he added.
Castro noted that "as luck would have it,'' Obama's father was Muslim and his mother was Christian and added he hoped the U.S. president will become conscious of the threat to world peace.
In comparison, he called Richard Nixon a "cynic," branded Ronald Reagan and Harry Truman as "ignorant" and called Jimmy Carter "a decent person."
"Fidel attracts more people. There's nobody better than him," said Pedro Gonzalez, a 90-year-old retiree who watched the session of parliament on a nationwide broadcast. "Look how well he's recuperated. It's incredible. Fidel makes us feel better."Me too, Pedro, me too.
While it was the first time the brothers have appeared together publicly since Fidel fell ill, neither made any effort to approach the other, and they never even seemed to make eye contact.
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[click image]BP says approximately 210,000 gallons of oil are spilling into the Gulf per day. But John Amos, a geologist at the West Virginia-based nonprofit SkyTruth, says that at least 1.1 million gallons of oil is leaking out of the well every day. His calculation is based on early NASA images of the slick that showed it covering 2,200 square miles of the Gulf, and on the estimated thickness of oil needed for the slick to be visible from space. "If it really is just 210,000 and they can't handle that—you've got to be kidding me," says Amos, who has tracked the changing estimates of the spill on his blog. "One of the world's biggest oil companies plus the Coast Guard has been beaten by 210,000 gallons a day—do they really want us to think that?".
But even this figure may be on the low end. Under pressure, BP for the first time released video of the sea floor spill site this week. Steven Wereley, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University, analyzed the tape and told NPR this week that the oil flow is likely closer to 3 million gallons a day. If that's the case, the situation in the Gulf would equal more than two Exxon Valdez spills every week. The Exxon Valdez incident was, until now, the worst oil spill disaster in US history.
And the absolute worst-case-scenario? According to government data on daily production at another Gulf well, the BP spill could spew 6 million gallons per day if the wellhead that's currently restricting the flow breaks.
[click image]“The document that you, Mister Chairman, repeatedly claimed that did not exist shows up now. […] we have seen drafts circulating surreptitiously and being discussed in secret meetings…”The representatives of the countries had been given only one hour to present their views. This led to complicated, shameful and embarrassing situations.
“…I deeply resent the way you have led this conference.”
“…Cuba considers the text of this apocryphal draft extremely inadequate and inadmissible. The goal of 2 degrees centigrade is unacceptable and it would have incalculable catastrophic consequences…”
“The document that you are unfortunately introducing is not binding in any way with respect to the reduction of the greenhouse-gas emissions.”
“I am aware of the previous drafts, which also through questionable and clandestine procedures, were negotiated by small groups of people…”
“The document you are introducing now fails to include the already meager and lacking key phrases contained in that draft…”
“…as far as Cuba is concerned, it is incompatible with the universally recognized scientific view sustaining that it is urgent and inescapable to ensure the reduction of at least 45% of the emissions by the year 2020, and of no less than 80% or 90% by 2050.”
“Any argument on the continuation of the negotiations to reach agreement in the future to cut down emissions must inevitably include the concept of the validity of the Kyoto Protocol […] Your paper, Mister Chairman, is a death certificate of the Kyoto Protocol and my delegation cannot accept it.”
“The Cuban delegation would like to emphasize the preeminence of the principle of ‘common by differentiated responsibilities,’ as the core of the future process of negotiations. Your paper does not include a word on that.”
“This draft declaration fails to mention concrete financial commitments and the transfers of technologies to developing countries, which are part of the obligations contracted by the developed countries under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change […] Mister Chairman, by imposing their interests through your document, the developed nations are avoiding any concrete commitment.”
“…What you, Mister Chairman, define as ‘a group of representative leaders’ is to me a gross violation of the principle of sovereign equality consecrated in the United Nations Charter…”
“Mr. Chairman, I formally request that this statement be included in the final report of the works of this regrettable and shameful 15th session of the Conference of the Parties.”
“…both, those who were involved in the elaboration of the document, and those like the President of the United States who anticipated its adoption by the conference…as they could not disregard the decision to simply ‘take note’ of the alleged ‘Copenhagen Agreement,’ they tried to introduce a procedure allowing the other COP countries that had not been a part of the shady deal to adhere to it, and make it public, the intention being to pretend such an agreement was legal, something that could precondition the results of the negotiations that should carry on.”Tomorrow our attention will be focused on the National Assembly.
“Such belated attempt was again firmly opposed by Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia. These countries warned that a document which had not been adopted by the Convention could not be considered legal and that there was not a COP document; therefore, no regulations could be established for its alleged adoption…”
“This is how the meeting in Copenhagen is coming to an end, without the adoption of the document surreptitiously worked out in the past few days under the clear ideological guidance of the US Administration…”
[click image]Message to the president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
DEAR Hugo,
Today is the 15th anniversary of our encounter at the University of Havana’s Aula Magna on December 14, 1994. The previous night, I had waited for you at the foot of the steps of the plane that brought you to Cuba.
I knew of your armed uprising against the pro-yanki government of Venezuela. News had reached Cuba of your ideas when you were still in prison and, like us, you devoted yourself to intensifying the revolutionary ideas which brought you to the uprising of February 4, 1992.
At the Aula Magna, in a spontaneous and transparent way, you voiced the Bolivarian ideas that you carried within you, and that led you, in the specific conditions of your country and our times, to the struggle for the independence of Venezuela against the tyranny of the empire. After the effort of Bolívar and other great men who, filled with dreams, fought against the yoke of Spanish colonialism, Venezuelan independence was merely a ridiculous pretense.
No moment in history is the same as any other; no idea or human event can be judged outside of its own era. Both you and I share concepts that have evolved throughout millennia, but which have much in common with distant or recent history in that the division of society into masters and slaves, exploiters and the exploited, oppressors and the oppressed has always been antipathetic and odious. In the present day, it is the source of the most profound shame and the main cause of human suffering and unhappiness.
When productivity, now supported by science and technology, has increased tenfold and, in certain aspects, even hundreds or thousands of times more, such unjust differences should disappear.
You, I and millions of Venezuelans and Cubans share those ideas.
You started with the Christian principles that were instilled in you from an early age and a rebellious nature; I, from the ideas of Marx and a likewise rebellious nature.
There are universally recognized ethical principles which are valid for both Christians and Marxists.
From that starting point, revolutionary ideas are constantly enriched through study and experience.
It is appropriate to note that our sincere and revolutionary friendship emerged when you were not the president of Venezuela. I never asked you for anything. When the Bolivarian movement won its victory in the 1999 elections, the price of oil was less that $10 per barrel. I remember that well because you invited me to your inauguration ceremony.
Your support for Cuba was spontaneous, just as our cooperation with the sister people of Venezuela has always been.
In the midst of the Special Period, following the demise of the USSR, the empire intensified its brutal blockade of our people. At a certain point, fuel prices rose, thus making it difficult for us to obtain supplies. You then guaranteed a safe, steady commercial supply to our country.
We cannot forget that after the political coup against the Bolivarian Revolution in April 2002 and your brilliant victory in the oil coup at the end of that same year, oil prices rose to $60-plus per barrel. You then offered us fuel supplies and credit facilities. Bush was already president of the United States and the mastermind of those illegal and treacherous attacks on the Venezuelan people.
I remember how annoyed you were at his demand that I leave Mexico as a precondition for his landing in that long-suffering country, where you and I were attending a United Nations international conference in which he also should have participated.
They will never forgive the Bolivarian Revolution for its support for Cuba at a time when the empire imagined that our people, after almost half a century of resistance, would once again fall into their hands. In Miami, the counterrevolution demanded three days’ license to kill revolutionaries as soon as the transition government demanded by Bush was installed in Cuba.
Ten years of exemplary and fruitful cooperation between Venezuela and Cuba have passed. The ALBA was born in that period. The U.S-promoted FTAA had failed but the empire was once again on the offensive.
The coup d’état in Honduras and the installation of seven U.S. military bases in Colombia are recent events that occurred after the inauguration of the new president of the United States. His predecessor had reestablished the 4th Fleet, half a century after the end of the last World War, when the Cold War was over and the Soviet Union no longer existed. The real intentions of the empire are obvious this time, behind the amiable smile and African-American face of Barack Obama.
Yesterday, Daniel Ortega explained how the coup in Honduras determined the weakening and conduct of the members of the Central American Integration System.
The empire is mobilizing the right-wing forces of Latin America to strike at Venezuela and, with that, the other ALBA member states. If the considerable oil and gas resources of Bolívar’s homeland were once again seized, the English-speaking Caribbean countries and other nations in Central America would lose the generous supply conditions today offered by revolutionary Venezuela.
Just a few days ago, after President Barack Obama’s speech at the West Point military academy announcing the deployment of a further 30,000 troops to the war in Afghanistan, I wrote a Reflection in which I described as "an unprincipled act" his acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize when he had already adopted that that decision.
On December 10, during his acceptance speech in Oslo, he made statements that were an example of imperialist logic and thinking. "… I am responsible for the deployment of thousands of young Americans to battle in a distant land. Some will kill. Some will be killed," he affirmed in trying to present as a "just war" the brutal carnage taking place in that distant land, in which the majority of those who perish are defenseless villagers struck by bombs dropped from drone planes.
After those phrases, which were among the first that he spoke, he devoted more than 4,600 words to presenting his massacre of civilians as a just war. "In today's wars," he affirmed, "many more civilians are killed than soldiers."
More than one million non-combatant civilians have now died in Iraq, Afghanistan and along the Pakistan border.
In that same speech, he praises Nixon and Reagan as distinguished individuals, without stopping to recall that one of them dropped more than one million tons of bombs on Vietnam, and the other one had the Siberian gas pipeline blown up by electronic means so that it would look like an accident. The blast was so great and devastating that nuclear test monitoring equipment registered it.
The speech he gave in Oslo differs from that of West Point because the latter was better crafted and recited. In the Norwegian capital, the speaker’s face demonstrated that he was aware of the insincerity of his words.
Neither the timing nor the circumstances were the same. Oslo is located close to Copenhagen. In that city, the extremely important Climate Change Conference, which I know that you and Evo are planning to attend, is taking place. The most important political battle in human history is being fought there at this very moment. There, one can appreciate in all its magnitude the scope of the damage that developed capitalism has inflicted on humanity. Today, the conference must desperately fight not just for justice but also for the survival of the species.
I have closely followed the ALBA meeting. I congratulate you all. I very much enjoyed seeing so many beloved friends outlining ideas and fighting in a united way. I congratulate you all.
¡Hasta la victoria siempre!
A warm embrace.
Fidel Castro Ruz
December 14, 2009
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[click image]'Fit' Fidel appears on Cuba TV
Fidel Castro, Cuba's former president, has appeared on state television for the first time in a year, suggesting that his once-failing health has improved.
The footage, broadcast on Sunday, showed the 83-year-old Castro meeting students from Venezuela at an undisclosed location a day earlier.
His picture was also appeared in a newspaper the same day.
Castro has not been seen in public since July 2006, when he underwent intestinal surgery for a still-undisclosed ailment. His health is considered a state secret.
In February 2008, he stepped down as president, ceding power to his brother, Raul, and he last appeared on state television in June that year.
Planet's future
In Sunday's television broadcast he appeared in good health, telling the students that he was worried about the future of the planet, under threat from global warming.
"Even the Pentagon has become involved," Castro said.
"It has included the climate among things that threaten the security of the United States."
The students presented Castro with a T-shirt and sang: "We love you, Fidel. We love you."
Castro, wearing a blue track suit, told the students that Cuba stood by the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez, a close friend and ally of Castro.
Meeting with Correa
The footage followed a front-page photograph of Castro meeting Rafael Correa, the Ecuadorean president, published in the official Juventud Rebelde newspaper.
A brief official note said Castro and Correa spoke for a number of hours on Friday about recent developments in their respective countries, Latin America and the world.
As Cubans gathered at kiosks on Sunday morning to pick up the paper, word spread that Fidel's photo had appeared.
"I'm waiting for the paper to see him because it's been a long time since a photo was published and I want to see how he is," said Arturo Martinez, one of those waiting for the paper to arrive a few blocks from Communist Party and government headquarters.
[click image, Zelaya supporter in Managua]I am halting for a moment the work on a historic episode that I have been writing for the last two weeks to express my solidarity with the constitutionally-elected president of Honduras, José Manuel Zelaya.
It was impressive to see him on Telesur, haranguing the people of Honduras. He energetically denounced the blatantly reactionary attempt to prevent an important popular referendum. That is the "democracy that imperialism defends. Zelaya has not committed the slightest violation of the law. He did not engage in any act of force. He is the president and commander-general of the Armed Forces of Honduras. What is happening there will be a test for the OAS and for the current United States administration.
Yesterday a meeting of the ALBA took place in Maracay, in the Venezuelan state of Aragua. The Latin American and Caribbean leaders who spoke there shone out both for their eloquence and for their dignity.
Today I was listening to the solid arguments of President Hugo Chávez, denouncing the coup action on Venezolana de Televisión.
We do not know what will happen tonight or tomorrow in Honduras, but the brave conduct of Zelaya will go down in history.
His words reminded us of the speech by President Salvador Allende as warplanes bombarded the Presidential Palace, where he heroically died on September 11, 1973. This time we were seeing another Latin American president entering an air base with his people to demand the ballots for a popular referendum, spuriously confiscated.
That is how a president and a commander-general acts.
The people of Honduras will never forget that gesture!
On Tuesday the OAS General Assembly will hold a special session to address the issue and take whatever decisions it considers appropriate, in accordance with the Charter of the Organization of American States, international law, and the provisions of the Inter-American Democratic Charter.---------------------------------------------------------
Country members of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas, ALBA meeting in Managua, Nicaragua also condemned the coup perpetrated in alliance with the “oligarchy and reactionary forces of Honduras”.
“We demand the immediate return to the rule of law and restitution of President Manuel Zelaya to his constitutional functions”, added the statement.
ALBA is made up of Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Saint Vincent and Grenadines, Antigua and Venezuela.
[click image]"They kidnapped him like cowards," Melissa Gaitan, 21, an employee of the official government television station, screamed as tears streamed down her face. "We have to rally the people to defend our president."President Go Fuck Yourself is expressing his, surprise, concern... again. Some accounts say it was not only the president of Honduras but ambassadors of other countries as well.
Honduras's Zelaya says US helped thwart coup-paper
Sun Jun 28, 2009 7:12am EDT
MADRID, June 28 (Reuters) - Honduran President Manuel Zelaya told Spain's El Pais that a planned attempt to wrest power him was thwarted after the United States declined to back the move.
"Everything was in place for the coup and if the U.S. embassy had approved it, it would have happened. But they did not ... I'm only still here in office thanks to the United States," he said in the newspaper interview published on Sunday.
"Last (Friday) morning, at around 1 or 2 a.m., Congress was passing a decree to incapacitate me and the armed forces were mobilised. But phone calls were made -- I can't say by who or from where -- but these calls stopped the coup," he said.
Zelaya, an ally of Venezuela's socialist President Hugo Chavez, is holding an unofficial vote on Sunday to gauge public support for lifting constitutional limits on presidential terms despite objections by courts and the military.
Sunday's vote will hold no legal weight after a court ruled it invalid.
Zelaya told El Pais he had no intention of re-running for the presidency. Opposition groups say the referendum is designed to keep him in power after the national election in November.
"My government ends January 27, 2010 ... but I want to make it possible that a president can be re-elected in the future. Although I don't know whether I'll be available then," he said.
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[click image]Fidel Castro: Obama 'misinterpreted' Raul's words
2 hours ago
HAVANA (AP) — Fidel Castro says that President Barack Obama "misinterpreted" his brother Raul's sentiments toward the United States.
Raul Castro prompted widespread speculation last week that the U.S. and Cuba could be headed toward a thaw in nearly a half-century of chilly relations, when he said Cuban leaders would be willing to discuss "everything" with the U.S., including human rights, freedom of the press and speech, and political prisoners.
Obama responded by saying Washington seeks a new beginning with Cuba but he also said that Cuba should release some political prisoners and reduce official taxes on remittances from the U.S. as a sign of goodwill.
Fidel Castro wrote in an essay on Tuesday that Obama "without a doubt misinterpreted Raul's declarations."
[click image]Analysis: Obama gores foreign policy oxI mean, was, like, that a threat?
by STEVEN R. HURST, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 11 mins ago
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama has gone abroad and gored an ox — the deeply held belief that the United States does not make mistakes in dealings with either friends or foes.
And in the process, he's taking a huge gamble both at home and abroad, for a payoff that could be a long time coming, if ever.
By way of explanation, senior adviser David Axelrod describes the president's tactics this way:
"You plant, you cultivate, you harvest. Over time, the seeds that were planted here are going to be very, very valuable."
While historic analogies are never perfect, Obama's stark efforts to change the U.S. image abroad are reminiscent of the stunning realignments sought by former Soviet leader Michael Gorbachev. During his short — by Soviet standards — tenure, he scrambled incessantly to shed the ideological entanglements that were leading the communist empire toward ruin.
But Obama is outpacing even Gorbachev. After just three months in power, the new American leader has, among many other things:
• Admitted to Europeans that America deserves at least part of the blame for the world's financial crisis because it did not regulate high-flying and greedy Wall Street gamblers.
• Told the Russians he wants to reset relations that fell to Cold War-style levels under his predecessor, George W. Bush.
• Asked NATO for more help in the fight in Afghanistan, and, not getting much, did not castigate alliance partners.
• Lifted some restrictions on Cuban Americans' travel to their communist homeland and eased rules on sending wages back to families there.
• Shook hands with, more than once, and accepted a book from Hugo Chavez, the virulently anti-American leader of oil-rich Venezuela.
• Said America's appetite for illegal drugs and its lax control of the flow of guns and cash to Mexico were partly to blame for the drug-lord-inspired violence that is rattling the southern U.S. neighbor.
• Said that "if our only interaction with many of these countries is drug interdiction, if our only interaction is military, then we may not be developing the connections that can, over time, increase our influence" — neglecting to mention U.S. health care, education and humanitarian relief efforts in Latin America.
At a news conference ending the three-day Summit of the Americas on Sunday, Obama was asked to explain what a reporter called this emerging "Obama Doctrine."
He said that first, he remains intent on telling the world that the United States is a powerful and wealthy nation that realizes it is just one country among many. Obama said he believes that other countries have "good ideas" and interests that cannot be ignored.
Second, while the United States best represents itself by living up to its universal values and ideas, Obama said it must also respect the variety of cultures and perspectives that guide both American foes and friends.
"I firmly believe that if we're willing to break free from the arguments and ideologies of an earlier era and continue to act, as we have at this summit, with a sense of mutual responsibility and mutual respect and mutual interest, then each of our nations can come out of this challenging period stronger and more prosperous, and we can advance opportunity, equality, and security across the Americas," the president said.
Critics, especially those deeply attached to the foreign policy course of the past 50-plus years, see a president whose lofty ideals expose the country to a dangerous probing of U.S. weakness, of an unseemly readiness to admit past mistakes, of a willingness to talk with unpleasant opponents.
"I think it was irresponsible for the president to be seen kind of laughing and joking with Hugo Chavez," said Sen. John Ensign, a Nevada Republican. "This is a person along the lines with Fidel Castro and the types of dictatorship that he has down there in Venezuela and the anti-Americanism that he has been spreading around the world is not somebody the president of the United States should be seen as having, you know, kind of friendly relations with."
At his news conference Obama said he didn't think he did much damage to U.S. security or interests by shaking the hand of Chavez, whose country has a defense budget about one-six hundredth the size of the United States, and depends upon it's oil reserves for solvency.
But beyond specific attacks on his new foreign policy are the deeper philosophical challenges emerging from the still powerful, if diminished, conservative political structure in the United States. Such opponents can play havoc with Obama's attempts to change domestic policy and will work to weaken his 60-plus percent approval among Americans.
Obama brushes that aside:
"One of the benefits of my campaign and how I've been trying to operate as president is I don't worry about the politics — I try to figure out what's right in terms of American interests, and on this one I think I'm right."
So thought Gorbachev. But being right is not always politically healthy.
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Steven R. Hurst reports from the White House for the AP and has covered foreign affairs for 30 years.
Obama says reaching out to enemies strengthens USI am queazy about this whole thing. I'm with Hugo. I want everyone to be friends... and that is the setup for egregious disappointment....
By BEN FELLER, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 19 mins ago
PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad – Defending his brand of world politics, President Barack Obama said Sunday that he "strengthens our hand" by reaching out to enemies of the United States and making sure that the nation is a leader, not a lecturer, of democracy.
Obama's foreign doctrine emerged across his four-day trip to Latin America, his first extended venture to a region of the world where resentment of U.S. power still lingers. He got a smile, handshakes and even a gift from incendiary leftist leader Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, and embraced overtures of new relations from isolated Cuban President Raul Castro.
"The whole notion was that if we showed courtesy or opened up dialogue with governments that had previously been hostile to us, that that somehow would be a sign of weakness," Obama said, recalling his race for the White House and challenging his critics today.
"The American people didn't buy it," Obama said. "And there's a good reason the American people didn't buy it — because it doesn't make sense."
Still, Obama made sure to inject some go-it-slow caution and clear expectations for U.S. foes as he capped his trip to twin-island nation of Trinidad and Tobago with a steamy outdoor news conference.
On Cuba, he said Castro should release political prisoners, embrace democratic freedoms and cut fees on the money that Cuban-Americans send back to their families. Obama has lifted some restrictions on Cuba, and Castro responded with a broad, conciliatory overture.
"The fact that you had Raul Castro say he's willing to have his government discuss with ours not just issues of lifting the embargo, but issues of human rights, political prisoners, that's a sign of progress," Obama said. "And so we're going to explore and see if we can make some further steps."
He did not, though, offer any sign of lifting the crushing U.S. trade embargo on Cuba, as many Latin American and U.S. leaders want. Obama acknowledged that the U.S. policy in Cuba for the last 50 years "hasn't worked" but said change will be gradual.
In Washington, both Democrats and Republicans said Sunday that they wanted to see actions, not just rhetoric, from Cuba.
"Release the prisoners and we'll talk to you. ... Put up or shut up," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.
"I think we're taking the right steps, and I think the ball is now clearly in Cuba's court," said Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. "They need to respond and say what they're willing to do."
As for Venezuela, Obama's friendly encounters with Chavez at the summit drew intense publicity — partly, Obama said, because Chavez is good at getting in front of TV cameras. Chavez's anti-American rhetoric has, in the past, led Obama to call him a demagogue.
Obama returned to Washington early Sunday evening. But even before he got back, Obama was facing condemnation from some Republicans about how he dealt with Chavez. "I think it was irresponsible for the president to be seen kind of laughing and joking with Hugo Chavez," said Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev.
The president brushed that aside, noting that Venezuela has a defense budget about one-six hundredth the size of the United States' and owns the oil company Citgo.
"It's unlikely that as a consequence of me shaking hands or having a polite conversation with Mr. Chavez that we are endangering the strategic interests of the United States," Obama said.
Venezuela and the United States expelled each other's ambassadors last September. But during the summit, Chavez approached Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and said he was restoring his nation's ambassador in Washington, voicing hopes for a new era in relations.
"We ratify our willingness to begin what has started: cementing new relations," Chavez said Sunday in remarks broadcast on state television. "We have the very strong willingness to work together."
Obama's dealings with Chavez spoke to his broader message: dismissing arguments of the past, and respecting other democratic governments even if he opposes their economic and foreign policy.
"If we are practicing what we preach, and if we occasionally confess to having strayed from our values and our ideals, that strengthens our hand," Obama said. "That allows us to speak with greater moral force and clarity around these issues."
He said of his doctrine for engagement: "We're not simply going to lecture you, but we're rather going to show through how we operate the benefits of these values and ideals."
The president said he found it interesting that many of the leaders talked about how Cuban doctors have dispersed throughout the region, and their countries depend on them.
"It's a reminder for us in the United States that if our only interaction with many of these countries is drug interdiction, if our only interaction is military, then we may not be developing the connections that can, over time, increase our influence," Obama said. He neglected to mention that the U.S. Agency for International Development provides many services in Latin America, including health care, education and humanitarian relief.
Central American leaders who met with Obama said they pressed him on immigration reform. They also said that Obama promised to consider providing better notice before the United States deports dangerous criminals back to their nations.
Even Nicaragua President Daniel Ortega, a critic of U.S. policy, said he found Obama receptive to dealing with the issues raised. Ortega said Obama "is the president of an empire" that has rules the president cannot change. Nevertheless, Ortega said, "I want to believe that he's inclined, that he's got the will."
Both Graham and McCaskill spoke on "Fox News Sunday." Ensign was interviewed on CNN's "State of the Union."
No one has to "marry" anyone else politically; no one has to embrace every tenet or belief that an anti-imperialist ally might hold. You simply have to say: "All of us, regardless of our other views, believe this truth to be self-evident: dismantling the empire will bring immediate and enormous benefits to our nation and to the world."
If in your travels you meet the Buddha, throw him through your tv set.
—Davis Fleetwood
I've found that culture, however useful and important, is neither the foundation nor the ceiling of human experience, even if it is commonly used for walls.
I really consider President and Mrs. Mubarak to be friends of my family. So I hope to see him often here in Egypt and in the United States. —Hillary Clinton
