UPDATED: Funny the names we call things...

UPDATE 2 (posted 7/3/2009): A nice writeup from IBD called "Honduras Defiant" should go on your reading list. Here's a sample:

Democracy: Nations aren't usually put to the fearsome test to "live free or die." But Hondurans are accepting it as the world pressures them to reseat a potential dictator in office. They aren't bending.

And another from NRO, "The Honduran Counter-Coup":

At first blush, the news from Honduras sounds like a sad return to Latin America’s past: A democratically elected president has been exiled by the military. But make no mistake: The Honduran soldiers who escorted Pres. Manuel Zelaya from his home on Sunday were acting to protect their country’s democracy, not to trample it. Moreover, they had the full support of the Honduran Supreme Court, which had rejected Zelaya’s bid to hold a referendum on “constitutional reform.”

And yet another from WSJ, who is sadly the only member of the MSM that is even bothering to cover this with a semblance of objectivity, "The Wages of Chavismo":

Yet the events in Honduras also need to be understood in the context of Latin America's decade of chavismo. Venezuela's Hugo Chávez was democratically elected in 1998, but he has since used every lever of power, legal and extralegal, to subvert democracy. He first ordered a rewrite of the constitution that allowed his simple majority in the national assembly grant him the power to rule by decree for one year and to control the judiciary.

Go on, read them. You sure aren't going to hear about this from ABC/CBS/NBC/CNN/NYT/et al. And one more quote for the records, this one from the WSJ article above, "We mention these not so small details because they are being overlooked as the world, including the U.S. President, denounces tiny Honduras in a way that it never has, say, Iran." Thank you!!!

UPDATE (posted 6/29/2009): President Obama weighs in. Guess who he backs...and I'll give you a hint that it's not the same side that the Honduran Congress, Supreme Court, and military are on...

Original Post:
"Military Coup" conjures images of bloodshed, leftist and rightist (but ultimately, statist) dictators, especially when used in context of Latin America.

Which is why I'm so surprised to see that the term is being mis-used by our media, who really ought to know better. (There have been plenty of real military coups over the years, you would think they could recognized one by now.) Seems that all is not as it has been portrayed in the Western media in the Honduras.

Read this little ditty posted in the WSJ Opinion column. Huh; seems the military were hardly doing the coup thing, but rather complying with Supreme Court orders. Also, seems that the military's top commander, Gen. Romeo Vásquez Velásque, is not the acting leader in the country. One would expect that from a military coup. Instead, the Honduran Congress, acting within their constitutional authority and obligations, met to appoint an interim president (one Mr. Roberto Michelette) and set a date in November for a proper election to be held.

Again, not what one would expect from a military coup.

It seems that, besides the Western media, the only ones calling this thing a "military coup" are the Chavistas, Hugo Chavez and his leftist, thug allies. Wonder where the media's hearts are...probably waiting with ousted thug President Zelaya in Costa Rica.

Also going to toss this li'l hand grenade out there: Why has President Obama come down so swiftly and harshly against the legal actions of a Congress not wishing to see its President do an end-run around the law to place himself in position of president-for-life (a plague all-too familiar to any student of Latin American politics), yet the very same man, not a week ago, could not find in himself the courage to confront a stated enemy of our country* who had illegally (but with the legal blessing of the Ayatolah) tampered with a vote? Both were men trying to extend their political reign, but one happened to be a sworn enemy of the US and our allies who is hellbent on building nuclear bombs and is killing his own citizens in violent repression of their voice, while the other was a leftist in a comparatively inconsequential country in a slightly less explosive part of the world. I'm afraid the only logical explanation is, our President has no ca-hones.

*We didn't declare it; he did. Sorry, it's a fact. Iran has sworn us their enemy, regardless of what positions or posturing we might like to do.