Political Report # 1383 "It Is Not a Natural Disaster": Dana Frank on How U.S.-Backed Coup in Honduras Fueled Migrant Crisis

By Dana Frank is interviewed by Democracy Now! hosts Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez

As the United States continues to face criticism for tear gassing asylum seekers on the U.S.-Mexico border, we look at the crisis in Honduras and why so many Hondurans are fleeing their homeland. Honduras has become one of the most violent countries in the world because of the devastating drug war and a political crisis that stems in part from a U.S.-backed 2009 coup. We speak with Dana Frank, professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her new book is titled, “The Long Honduran Night: Resistance, Terror, and the United States in the Aftermath of the Coup.” Transcript JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Dana Frank, your book comes at a particularly important time as clearly the whole nation has been seeing what has been going on at the U.S.-Mexico border with the caravan of migrants from Central America, most of them from Honduras. But there is very little discussion of what is fueling, what is forcing them to leave. If you could talk about what has been the night of terror that has descended on Honduras, especially following the 2009 coup against President Zelaya. DANA FRANK: When you read the interviews or the mainstream news reports about why the migrants in the caravan are fleeing, they will say, “Well, they are fleeing gangs and violence and poverty.” And that’s true, but what’s missing from that narrative is where the gangs and violence and poverty come from. It’s not a natural disaster. It’s actually the result of the deliberate policies of this government that came to the successive post-what we call the post-regime governments that came to power in the aftermath of the coup, most recently the illegal government of Juan Orlando Hernández. So if you look at those causes, where does all the violence and the gang terror come from? It comes from this almost complete destruction of the rule of law. The coup itself was a criminal act. But it’s also that it opened the doors for every kind of conceivable criminal activity. In that context, the gangs proliferated, drug trafficking proliferated. They’re infiltrated throughout the police and military. So you have this situation in which the government itself is implicated in these gangs and in this military that people are fleeing. So it is not just random violence. It is a U.S.-backed regime that is in cahoots with this. For example, a lot of people are fleeing gangs, or small business people are-their businesses are being destroyed by gang taxes. The police are very much cooperating with the gangs in extracting those kinds of so-called war taxes that the gang members charge. So it is this lawlessness that then opens the door for this kind of terror that people are fleeing, and the government is very much part of that terror. The second factor here is poverty, because people are very much fleeing poverty, but that poverty again is not a natural disaster. It is the direct result of the post-coup policies. Because first of all, the state itself has been destroyed both by neoliberal policies of multilateral development banks like the International Monetary Fund. State services have been destroyed because the elites that run the government are just robbing it blind. For example, the president and his party stole as many as $90 million from the health service in 2013 to pay for their campaigns, and so then there’s no national health service that functions.

Political Report # 1306 The State of the Brazilian Left: Analysis from an American in Brazil

By Brian Mier COHA

During the lead-up and in the aftermath of last year’s overthrow of democratically elected Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff, several writings appeared in progressive English language publications analyzing the state of the Brazilian left. Most of them were written by members of the white middle class, based on little or no contact with the Brazilian organized left which, as a recent article in NACLA mentioned, is a long-standing problem with Northern American analysis on Latin America.[i] In an attempt to go beyond more of the same, my next four contributions to COHA’s Brazil Unit were interviews with key figures of the Brazilian organized left: a national urban social movement leader, a union federation leader, a renowned radical-left intellectual and a national leader of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (Landless Workers’ Movement, MST). [ii] [iii] [iv] [v] This article represents a systematization of the interviews and original analysis from the standpoint of an American who has lived in Brazil for 22 years and who has worked with the MST and the four largest Brazilian social movements. For clarity’s sake I will add that the I am not affiliated with any political party and that I supported Partido dos Trabalhadores (Workers’ Party, PT) candidate Lula in 2002, Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (Socialist Liberty Party, PSOL) candidate Heloisa Helena in 2006, PSOL candidate Plinio Arruda in 2010, and PT candidate Dilma Rousseff in 2014. The interviews were based on questions about changes in the political economy, last year’s soft coup, and what the left is doing to alter the current state of affairs.

Political Report # 1282 How Pentagon Officials May Have Encouraged a 2009 Coup in Honduras

By Jake Johnston,  The Intercept

FORT MCNAIR, ONE of the oldest U.S. military posts in the country, is nestled on an outcropping of land where the Anacostia and Potomac rivers meet in Washington, D.C. There, within the National Defense University, is the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies, where hundreds of Hondurans took courses over the years. In mid-July 2009, Honduran military officials sought the center's help to solve a problem that had recently arisen. The Honduran military had just dispatched of its previous problem, President Manuel Zelaya, with a military coup. Now, the Central American military was facing international and regional condemnations for a brazen display of 1970s behavior in the 21st century. The military officials needed friends in the U.S. to rally behind it, but the Americans were wary of open shows of support. The U.S. had just revoked visas from top Honduran civilian and military officials, and suspended some security assistance. Two Honduran colonels were dispatched to Washington on a mission to convince the Americans that the Honduran military's involvement in the coup was in fact constitutional. The military had reached out to the CHDS's academic dean to get help for the delegation. Officially CHDS said no, Kenneth LaPlante, CHDS's then-deputy director, told me. However, according to Martin Andersen, a former CHDS communications director who became a whistleblower, Gen. John Thompson, the academic dean, had allegedly provided "behind-the-scenes assistance in Washington, D.C., to Honduran coup plotters." Andersen's allegation was made in a complaint being investigated by the Department of Defense Inspector General, which has taken no action.

Political Report # 1186 Death of Democracy: Brazilian President Impeached by Majority of Senate Votes

Political Report # 1186 Death of Democracy: Brazilian President Impeached by Majority of Senate Votes By Hector Perla Jr., Senior Research Fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs and Laura Sholtz & Liliana Muscarella, Research Associates at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs

In a historic vote on August 31, Brazil’s democratically elected President Dilma Rousseff was formally ousted by the Brazilian Senate, surpassing the required two-thirds majority with 61 votes in favor and 20 votes against.[i] The controversial impeachment formalizes the provisional government of former Vice President Michel Temer and his Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (Brazilian Democratic Movement Party, PMDB), bringing an end to 13 years of governance by Rousseff’s own Partido dos Trabalhadores (Worker’s Party, PT). This decision not only signifies a drastic change in Brazil’s government, but it also has major implications for the country’s near-term future. Allegations of corruption continue to hang over Temer’s interim administration, including leaked audio recordings that suggest that Rousseff’s ouster was politically manipulated to halt the charges against congressmen from Temer’s cabinet and party.[ii] Rousseff’s impeachment is a devastating blow to Brazil’s democracy, constituting a “soft coup”-an undemocratic process of regime change tainted by political malfeasance, selective justice, and a non-electoral transfer of power cloaked in the guise of the rule of law. What Now? Interim President Temer and former speaker of the House of Representatives Eduardo Cunha are recognized as the primary instigators of Rousseff’s suspension in May of this year.[iii] While the two have been accused of various acts of fiscal and electoral corruption, the spotlight has been focused primarily on Rousseff’s alleged fiscal mismanagement. Following Rousseff’s impeachment, Temer was sworn in as Brazil’s president and, barring a Supreme Court intervention, receives immunity from further investigation of any crimes that took place before he assumed the presidency.[iv] Temer will likely remain in office until the end of 2018. The next presidential elections are scheduled for October 2018 and a new president would take office January 1, 2019. However, with growing discontent from actors along the entire political spectrum, including senators and constituents from Temer’s own PMDB, there has been a good deal of speculation that his presidency may not endure.[v] Another impeachment, while a remote possibility, is not unthinkable, especially given the lack of support within Temer’s own party and the potential that new allegations of corruption may be brought against him. At that point, the Supreme Court could choose to suspend Temer’s presidential immunity and allow for the initiation of impeachment proceedings against him.[vi] If Temer were to suffer impeachment before the end of 2016, the Brazilian Constitution requires that new national elections be called within 90 days. Otherwise, if he were to be removed after January 1, 2017, indirect elections within the Brazilian Congress would decide which current senator would assume the position.[vii] Considering recent strategies by the PMDB, such technicalities could easily be exploited by the Temer administration, further highlighting the murky nature of recent events and calling into question the legitimacy of Brazilian democracy. Implications for Democracy in Brazil Rousseff’s ouster sets a negative precedent for the country in two ways. On the one hand, it institutionalizes the political abuse of power by politicians seeking to avoid corruption charges. On the other, it shamefully obscures the underlying motive for removing the PT from office: a desire to return to conservative rule and neoliberalism. Both of these strategies subvert the democracy that Brazil has worked hard to uphold. First, the installation of a new administration with weak democratic standards does not bode well for Brazil, especially given the corruption that has traditionally pervaded its government. The PMDB saw an opportunity to evade charges against its leaders while simultaneously gaining the presidency-an accomplishment that has eluded them at the voting booth for more than 20 years. All they had to do was turn on Rousseff, their electoral coalition partner. Thus, PMDB’s leaders led the impeachment of the president, even though an independent federal prosecutor found that she had not violated any fiscal laws.[viii] This practice, known as pedaladas fiscais, or “accounting tricks,” has been recently employed by more than a dozen state governors without legal repercussions.[ix] Meanwhile, Temer has been convicted of electoral fraud and accused of other acts of corruption, but by assuming the presidency he evades existing investigations, such as Operação Lava Jato, that would have proven his guilt or his innocence.  Such hypocrisy and double standards seriously impugn the legitimacy of the impeachment process and the entire democratic institution. Temer’s interim government almost immediately implemented a far more conservative agenda than the Rousseff Administration with neoliberal ideals that seemed to have been waiting in the wings for an opportunity to be reinstated. Among his first actions was the naming of an all-white, male cabinet, several of whom were under investigation for corruption at the time of their appointment. Additionally, as a cost-cutting measure, Temer eliminated the ministries of culture, agrarian development, science and technology, women, racial equality, and human rights (although some were since reinstated due to popular pressure).[x] Furthermore, the interim administration wasted no time in rolling back the hallmark of the PT’s government: social programs and policies that Rousseff had fought hard to continue.[xi] Temer immediately slashed funding for programs that benefit the rural and urban poor, women, afro-descendants, the LGBTQ community, and indigenous people.[xii] These changes augur how Temer will govern now that he has been sworn into office. His radical departure from the policies of the platform under which he was elected as Rousseff’s vice president lends further credence to the claim that her ouster is the result of a political witch-hunt rather than a legitimate impeachment process for a criminal offense as required by the Constitution. It is undoubtable that the non-electoral and undemocratic ouster of Brazil’s first female president constitutes a perilous democratic regression for South America’s largest nation. In fact, the process constitutes a “soft coup” against the Rousseff presidency and a political attack against the PT.[xiii] Conservative parties came together to secure what they had been unable to achieve through popular elections: a presidential victory over the PT. By circumventing the electoral process, the impeachment strikes a huge blow to the country’s democracy, especially given the advances it has made since the impunity typical of the military government (1964-1985).[xiv] The Future of Brazil and Beyond The PT is not going to accept Dilma’s ouster without a fight. On its Twitter page Wednesday afternoon, it posted a letter from the Frente Brasil Popular (People’s Brazilian Front), which is a coalition of trade unions, progressive and social movement organizations, and political parties. In the letter, the Front promised that, “Our struggle against the coup government and its program of rolling back our achievements will be relentless.”[xv] Protests against the proceedings, which have been ongoing since the impeachment process began, have been increasing and are also likely to intensify in the coming days.[xvi] The ramifications of Rousseff’s impeachment are not limited to Brazil. The reverberations throughout the Western Hemisphere, where progressive governments are on the defensive against similar right-wing attacks, began immediately when Bolivia, Ecuador, and Venezuela recalled their ambassadors from Brasília. Progressive governments of the region see Brazil as the latest example of the epidemic of “soft coups” that have brought down Pink Tide governments that came to power through democratic elections. Increasingly, right-wing forces opposed to progressive governments and discontent with their social and economic programs-but unable to defeat them in popular elections-have turned to judicial and institutional processes to roll back the left’s hold on executive office.[xvii] Despite the rhetorical anti-corruption façade that characterized the impeachment proceedings, President Rousseff’s ouster was actually a careful orchestration designed to exploit recent public discontent with her administration’s handling of the economy. Temer is nearly as unpopular as was Rousseff, yet he and the PMDB were able to channel common grievances and direct them against President Rousseff in order to capitalize on them politically. Moving forward, Brazil is in the hands of a Trojan Horse government-one that has presented itself as one of the few hopes for democracy while subverting the very institutions that the term represents. The Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA) stands with Rousseff and echoes the statement she made while on trial: “Today, I only fear the death of democracy.”[xviii] Original article and sources can be found at: http://www.coha.org/death-of-democracy-brazilian-president-impeached-by-majority-of-senate-votes/

Political Report # 1146 Glenn Greenwald's Interview with Dilma Rousseff: Her First Since Being Suspended

Political Report # 1146 Glenn Greenwald's Interview with Dilma Rousseff: Her First Since Being Suspended By The Intercept

From the presidential palace in Brasília, the suspended Brazilian President spoke to The Intercept about her claims that she's the victim of a "coup," the accusations against her, the right-wing shift planned by the substitute government, and how she believes Brazilians should protest and fight against this subversion of democracy. Original video and sources can be found at: https://youtu.be/r1nE8E-0u5E

Abstract, The Correa Coup by Marc Becker

:::::: Abstract ::::::

The Correa Coup 
by Marc Becker

On September 30, 2010, discontented police officers and military troops plunged Ecuador into a political crisis as they took President Rafael Correa hostage, seized airports, and stormed the National Assembly building. In response, Correa declared a state of emergency and denounced what he termed a coup attempt. To outside observers, what appeared to be in process was yet another potentially extraconstitutional transfer of power in Ecuador’s tumultuous political history, with some pointing to the presence of the heavy imperial hand of the United States. Some grassroots activists, however, cast the political disruptions as little more than a labor dispute that Correa manipulated to entrench his increasingly authoritarian control over the country. At play in these competing narratives were debates over what political and economic direction Ecuador should take and whose interests those developments would benefit. Furthermore, the September 30 protests raise questions of how various domestic and international actors opportunistically exploit political developments to advance their own competing interests. Analyzing these events leads to a deeper understanding and appreciation for the compromises local social movements make, as well as the difficulties inherent in building transnational solidarity networks.

Abstract, The Correa Coup by Marc Becker

:::::: Abstract ::::::

The Correa Coup 
by Marc Becker

On September 30, 2010, discontented police officers and military troops plunged Ecuador into a political crisis as they took President Rafael Correa hostage, seized airports, and stormed the National Assembly building. In response, Correa declared a state of emergency and denounced what he termed a coup attempt. To outside observers, what appeared to be in process was yet another potentially extraconstitutional transfer of power in Ecuador’s tumultuous political history, with some pointing to the presence of the heavy imperial hand of the United States. Some grassroots activists, however, cast the political disruptions as little more than a labor dispute that Correa manipulated to entrench his increasingly authoritarian control over the country. At play in these competing narratives were debates over what political and economic direction Ecuador should take and whose interests those developments would benefit. Furthermore, the September 30 protests raise questions of how various domestic and international actors opportunistically exploit political developments to advance their own competing interests. Analyzing these events leads to a deeper understanding and appreciation for the compromises local social movements make, as well as the difficulties inherent in building transnational solidarity networks.