When is a coup d’etat a good thing?

POSTED ON: 06/30/2009 On the Georgia Libertarian Party's Site

Last week the Honduran military deposed President Manuel Zelaya. President Barack Obama -- along with Venezuelan despot Hugo Chavez, Nicaraguan tyrant Daniel Ortega, Cuba’s notorious Fidel and Raul Castro, the Organization Of American States that those dictators now control, and the United Nations -- has condemned the coup as a violation of the rule of law. He says it marks a retreat from democratic liberty.

The Libertarian Party of Georgia, after rolling on the floor laughing, respectfully disagrees with our President, the OAS, the UN, and the South American dictators.

Like Chavez in Venezuela, President Zelaya of Honduras wanted to remove the constitutional term limit on his office. While the country’s constitution spells out the way to accomplish such a goal, the National Assembly declined to give the required consent. Undeterred, President Zelaya made up an extra-constitutional rigmarole to achieve his goal. When General Vasquez, the nation’s military chief, refused to use his troops to conduct an extra-constitutional plebiscite Zelaya concocted, the President sacked him. The Honduran Supreme Court stepped in to declare the firing, and Zelaya’s proposed plebiscite, illegal. Zelaya announced his intention to conduct the vote anyway, with ballots printed in Venezuela by his socialist pal Hugo Chavez.

It was at this point that the Honduran military removed Zelaya from his office. It acted to defend the national constitution and Supreme Court against the lawless acts of the President. The new acting President, elected in emergency session of the national congress, is a member of Zelaya’s political party -- as is Attorney General Luis Rubi, who has issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya should he return from exile in Costa Rica.

It is all too clear to Libertarians why dictators and organizations of countries (like the OAS and UN) are supporting Zelaya and demanding his return to office. To these people and groups, the state is the leader, and anything that interferes with the leader -- no matter how deservedly -- is a threat. But we are saddened that our own President is siding with Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers. Barack Obama is fond of quoting Abraham Lincoln, but it’s hard to reconcile “government of the people, by the people, for the people” with support for a leader who ignores his own Supreme Court. Could it be that Obama also is threatened by the defense of the rule of law against a lawless leader?

It augers ill for America’s future that our own President believes the people must endure a leader who flouts his country’s Constitution.