Peru is another solid member of the hard-line scumbag block, but is rarely mentioned as such.

"The last straw came in November 2009 when the Obama administration brokered a deal for the return of Zelaya, and then joined the dictatorship in reneging on it."

Here the author is lying. The agreement Zelaya agreed to(yes he agreed to it) was that the Honduran Congress would decide whether or not he would be restored as President.
Zelaya simply assumed the Honduran Congress would support him.

Now if Latin America can truly take a path to independence from the United states and from the Religious tyranny of the Catholic fundamentalists, especially in Nicaragua. They may have a chance to develop a real democracy. I might say the same for the U.S., as far as corporations and the fundamentalists are involved, in American government.

Latin America will rise together, while the fascist amerikan empire crumbles.... fuerte a La Luche !
tioche, Mexico

I believe that in the interests of remaining even-handed, Weisbrot is being assertively circumspect in characterizing Team Obama's overall response to the Honduras coup as ambivalent.

I'm always looking to pounce on some indication that a writer is being overly generous to the government, i.e. Team Obama and the players from the White House, State, etc. I credit Weisbrot, though, for setting forth evidence that Team Obama's ambivalent polices and practices served an overall US strategy of supporting the coup.

I repeat what I perceived all along: Team Obama praised the coup with faint damns. The US took a stance of benevolent neutrality, piously declining to "rock the boat" by taking hard-line steps such as promptly declaring the coup to be just that, and triggering serious economic sanctions that would fatally undermine the golpistas-- exactly as the law meant it to do!

This affected "non-intervention" superficially appears to be a welcome antithesis to a revenant imperialist, triumphalist Uncle Sam presumptuously intruding into the affairs of a sovereign nation and imposing its preferences.

The showy and ostentatious US declaration that it was removing its thumb from the scales in order to facilitate local resolution of the crisis is a disingenuous diversion from the deeper truth that the scales were already tipped in favor of the golpistas' fait accompli.

The bogus "high road" of diplomacy constructed and marketed by the US was a bridge to nowhere that persistently and deliberately marginalized Zelaya and his supporters. Recall that, had President Zelaya not forced the issue with a courageous act of defiance and returned to Honduran soil, Secretary Clinton and her boss would've preferred that Zelaya cool his heels far away from Honduras until Hell froze over.

Conversely, the ostensibly-benevolent US diplomatic efforts, in which the US discreetly functioned as a resource rather than a referee, allowed the coup to retain and cement its illegal and criminal usurpation of power.

The US didn't just fumble or double-clutch on Honduras. Team Obama is objectively pro-coup.

I'm heartened by news that vigorous anti-capitalist politics are flourishing in South America, and I'm rooting for the leaders standing up to utterly decadent and reprehensible US imperialism.

The US-encouraged forces of reaction may have won the battle in Honduras, but they won't win the war.

· Yr Obd't Servant

The OAS is DEAD! Long Live the Latin American People!

Another step toward democracy which could be taken would be for the majority of members of the so-called United Nations to take a stand against the global dominators in the so-called Security Council.

That the individual members of a small elitist group can have veto power over the entire United Nations is one of the main sources of injustice globally. The arrogance of the few nations with veto power has repeatedly and consistently prevented social and economic progress for the majority.

Viva.
Fuerte a La Luche.

The time has come to replace the OAS completely.

Were there no clearer sign, the following should suffice:

"Arturo Valenzuela, the US state department's top official for Latin America, said that the new organisation 'should not be an effort that would replace the OAS [Organisation of American States]'".

the falklands war of 1982; interesting that reagan did not invoke the monroe doctrine and tell lady margaret to take her ships and planes back to england. instead, he made the contest a war game, watching the performance of all the various weapons and other manufactures of war that competed before the british lion gasped its last imperial orgasms. later ones had to be assisted by the united states. now britain is like the rowdy and aging uncle trying to keep up with its rambunctious nephew, a/k/a/ the united states of america.

This article and Bill McKibbens' article on CD today both reflect the same phenomenon:

The pasty-white anglo-saxon protestant cobras in neckties/pearls running the North-Merka Imperial Steamroller-To-Hell are finding their karmic boomerang, finally.

It's been happening for a decade now, and they are FRANTIC. This explains why they chucked the role-o'law and now aimlessly muck around in the swamps of corruption and racketeering. They have no future, they bet it all on the wrong hand, and they face imminent defeat.

The primary theme underlying political change in South America is the elimination of five hundred years of Euro/American hegemony since the time of Columbus. Indigenous Peoples are reclaiming "their" culture and their resources based upon a belief system that is not Western, but Indigenous.

America's lack of respect and knowledge of American Indian Culture which in very fundamental ways is similar to South American Indigenous Culture serves it poorly and will undoubtedly lead to mistaken policies that will further accelerate America's decline. The long Genocide is finally being confronted and brought to a conclusion.

Obama is on the wrong side of History.

From the article:

"The US has become increasingly less important as a trading partner for the region, especially since the recent recession as our trade deficit has shrunk. The region also increasingly has other sources of investment capital. The collapse of the IMF's creditors' cartel in the region has also eliminated the most important avenue of Washington's influence."

The US loses, freedom and equality increase. The IMF loses, economic justice increases. This is precisely why I advocate economic collapse.

Take down Wall Street, deal with the mess, move on to a better future. It will be well worth the price.

This may become a revolutionary historic event: the foundation of a Latin American Common Market eventually with a common currency and eventually political union. These countries start with numerous advantages over the European Common Market. Their Union will have only two major languages: Spanish and Portuguese. Politically most have gone almost simultaneously from a slave-based economy via rabid capitalism protected by dictatorships towards a social-democratic future if not present already. They can learn from the mistakes made by the European Market and Union. They have declared that they will no longer dance to the tune of the USA and Canada. They have oil, copper, diamonds, and many other raw materials aplenty.
The Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños, or, in Portuguese Comunidade de Estados Latino-Americanos e Caribenhos includes every sovereign country on the mainland between the Magelhaes (Magellan) Straits and the US-Mexican border. It does not include the former Dutch Surinam. Washington must have almost fainted when it learned that Cuba and several other Caribbean States are members too!
After years of dismal news about wars and US imperialism this is news that warms my cockles. May you prosper Comunidade de Estados Latino-Americanos e Caribenhos!

It's encouraging to see US thuggery losing influence in Central American and South America as countries there throw off the smothering blanket of US corporate and political exploitation and set their own courses. It's about time.

It would be great if the organisation had been given a name, or have I missed something?

Google turns up nada.

In 2008 most Latin American and Caribbean leaders met in Rio de Janeiro to talk about the creation of a regional organization of Spanish, Portuguese, and French speaking countries. This year they met again in Cancun, Mexico. The organization will probably be called (“Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños” or “Community of Latin American and Caribbean States”).

This year Presidents Chávez (Venezuela) and Uribe (Colombia) almost came to blows and a commission had to be set up to deal with their differences. It is certainly a healthy initiative; however, I do not believe it will either facilitate or hinder Latin American democracy.

I find it worrying that many on the U.S. left seem to have a knee-jerk need to criticize their own country and side with what has been declared as an emergent left in Latin America. I myself identify with leftist policies, but much of this emergent phenomenon in Latin America is really the materialization of the far right in disguise. In my opinion it is similar to what happened in Italy under Mussolini: an inclusive rhetoric hides exclusive policies. Governmental structure in these countries is tightly linked to presidential prerogatives and dissidence is increasingly difficult. Unfortunately the opposition to these authoritarian figures lacks viable proposals of its own and can only denounce what has become a perturbingly totalitarian tendency in Nicaragua, Ecuador, and Venezuela. (And I do not dismiss the other side of the coin: Colombia’s far-right militarism and the drug-controlled economies in both Colombia and Mexico.)

There are probably many reasons for all this; the main one is a predictable reaction to what has been an atrocious and centuries-old inequality in these countries.

Dismantle the OAS - enough of US' ,and now Canada's, dictatorships.