... except that the loss of citizenship must be agreed by the executive (the president) after conviction by competent tribunal. Which has not happened - Zelaya remains a citizen (even the de facto president still refers to him as a citizen). So his exile was unconstitutional.
This story has certainly crossed the line from possible to being actual
Exile him. Clearly the wisest choice.
Ha ha, except exiling Hondurans is expressly forbidden in their constitution. That in itself says volumes about the golpista's concern for the constitution.
AIUI, their constitution not only forbids removing the term limits, it specifies that any elected official who submits a bill to chage the constitution in that way be removed from office. If so, Zelaya had, in fact, violated their constitution and was properly removed from office.
If indeed that was what he'd done, then it could indeed have been legal to remove him from office. But that was not what he did, and the maneuvres against him were in fact manifestly illegal.
The coup was of course presented as legal by those who perpetrated it and now constitute the new de facto government (surprise surprise), but no other government anywhere has recognised the coup as a legal process. Not one. The coup d'etat has been condemned by the UN general assembly, the Organization of American States, the UNASUR, the US, the EU, etc, etc. Don't be fooled into thinking that the Honduran judicial system is some high-minded and independent branch of government. Honduras is a banana republic and has a thoroughly militarized and corrupt political system.
The new regime has tried (with some success, in the US at least) to put forward a cover story in which Mel Zelaya was unconstitutionally attempting to seek reelection and was impeached and removed legally. The tame MSM in Honduras has by and large gone along with the story (any media which haven't have been shut down by military force). But in fact Zelaya has always denied that he wanted to seek reelection. The right wing all say it was "common knowledge" he wanted to establish a "Chavista dictatorship", but this is just what they want to think: there's no actual evidence for it.
The poll which Zelaya attempted to hold was not an official referendum, in fact, but simply a public opinion poll with no official status. The constitution explicitly guarantees the right to hold such polls, by the way.
The poll merely asked Hondurans if they agreed that at the upcoming elections, there should be a "fourth ballot box" installed (i.e. alongside the 3 votes for president, congressional and municipal representatives), where voters could decide if there should be a national consitutional assembly to approve a new consitution. It did not ask what provisions any new constitution should contain. It certainly made no mention of term limits. In fact, even if the opinion poll had taken place, and if the result had favoured a "fourth ballot box", then Zelaya would've had his hands full ensuring that the ballot box actually was installed. If it were installed, and if the voters approved the idea of a constituent assembly, then there would have to have been further elections for the constituent assembly itself, then the assembly would've had to approve a new constitution. At that final point, the hypothetical assembly might hypothetically decide to remove some of the provisions which are "cast in stone" in the current constitution, and they might have run into legal trouble in so doing. But this is all "what-if" stuff
Not the case at all, I'm afraid.
Zelaya also has constitutional rights: the right to defend himself at a trial is one ("due process"). Even if duly convicted, he would absolutely retain the right to remain in Honduras. Sending Hondurans into exile is expressly forbidden in the Honduran constitution. So the maneouvres against him were actually illegal, despite their legal form. When the military illegally exiles the democratically elected president and actively prevents his return, beats up on foreign diplomats, establishes a curfew, and shoots and kills demonstrators, this is what's usually known as a coup d'etat. And this is what the official representatives of every government world-wide are calling it, in fact, not just the US government.
Hohmann orbit too mechanically stressful and expensive? Use a cheaper and slower transfer orbit.
Lumpy gravitational field? Orbit a Lagrange point instead of the Moon itself.
Too much radiation? Use supplementary radiation shielding.
and yet the world has cooled over the last 10 years so one of your assumptions is wrong. Which one is it?
Those are not "assumptions" but well-documented facts. Unlike your assertion that the world has cooled over the last 10 years, which is simply a myth.
You seem to be implying that legalizing cannabis would make people smoke it more. This is just an assumption on your part, and is IMHO very probably wrong.
OTOH, if banning a drug actually were an effective way of getting people to give up, why was the ban on alcohol in the US such a fiasco? Similarly, why has tobacco not been banned?
People have too much faith in prohibition to actually get rid of things
Mousavi was not a "relative unknown". He used to be the Prime Minister for goodness sake!
In any case, if you don't like that poll, look at the other, more recent polls listed on that Wikipedia page. Now tell me it's statistically suspicious that Ahmadinejad won. OK maybe you think those polls are bollocks, too, but you can't then claim that there's "statistical evidence" of fraud. Either you accept the statistical evidence available, in which case you have to accept that Ahmadinejad's win was to be expected, or you have to deny the validity of those polls, in which case you've got no basis for asserting there's any statistical basis for suspicions. You can still be suspicious, of course, but not on a statistical basis.
My point is: the statistics do not prove fraud.
And I would disagree. At minimum, you must admit it's odd that even in what one would call strongholds for Mousavi, Ahmadinejad still won with a landslide. Heck, Tehran apparently went better than 60/40 in favour of Ahmadinejad, despite there being a great deal of support for Mousavi there.
In fact the official figures show the ratio of the vote between the top 2 candidates in Tehran as 53/47. So, quite close, actually.
I'd certainly call that odd... definitely not incontrovertible proof (no one has that proof because, without the ballots, there can be no proof), but it's certainly statistical evidence.
It's certainly not statistical evidence of fraud!
On what basis do you say it's odd? You think Mousavi should've done better for some reason? Because you saw his mass rallies in Tehran on TV? Did you not also see the mass rallies in favour of Ahmadinejad?
Seriously, if you were an Iranian opinion pollster, and you had some opinion poll results which significantly contradicted the election result, then I'd consider your opinion "evidence". Otherwise, your opinion is really just wishful thinking. The only opinion poll results which I've seen showed Ahmadinejad with roughly a 2:1 lead over Mousavi, amongst decided voters. That poll is referenced on Wikipedia, by the way.
I'll tell you what I find really odd: that random Westerners think they have an accurate idea of the relative popularity of a bunch of politicians in some middle-eastern country!
Actually Tehran is not entirely populated by middle-class liberal types. There is a large working class majority in the city, and this is Ahmadinejad's power base, which he has been playing to with consummate political skill. People say that Mousavi (an Azeri) should've done better amongst Azeris than he did (even though he did do significantly better there than in other parts of the country). But Ahmadinejad also speaks Azeri and lived in Azerbaijan province for years, I understand. More importantly, he was responsible for policy changes which have allowed Azeris to study at universities in the Azeri language; a policy which was very popular. This is evidence that Ahmadinejad has understood the needs of his constituents and has responded intelligently. He's not the fool that the Western media likes to make him out. Westerners who've been fed a diet of anti-Ahmadinejad propaganda have misunderestimated him, but if this is statistical evidence of anything, it's that the Western media is not an objective source of news on Iranian politics.
For a start, you've quoted me out of context by cutting off the start of my sentence. I was talking about statistical evidence of vote-rigging, rather than anecdotal evidence. My point is: the statistics do not prove fraud.
Secondly, I can't see what's "highly suspicious" about a polling station running out of ballot papers (the turnout was after all surprisingly high). These things happen; you can't always predict where people are going to vote. The logistics of running elections, especially in a large country, are not simple. It's a sign of inefficiency that the polling station wasn't resupplied with ballot papers until later in the day, but it's not what I'd call "highly suspicious at best".
I understand that, but everything I've heard coming out of Iran or from people who are from Iran (but might not be there now) seems to indicate that there are some major irregularities.
Well; pause for a moment and consider if there might be a reason why that's all you've heard. Ahmadinejad is well known to be popular amongst the poor. The highly-educated, urbanised, liberal middle classes aren't his power base at all. But the Iranian masses do not really have our ear do they? Not really - the Iranians we hear from are a different bunch of people. It's hardly a surprise that expatriate Iranians are displeased with the result (the official results show Mousavi outpolled Ahmadinejad in votes from outside the country), and it's hardly a surprise that Iran's twittering classes are upset that their candidate lost. That doesn't prove there were irregularities.
I've seen screeds of hype written about "statistical anomalies" in the election, but I've yet to find any that actually show evidence of vote-rigging. Mostly it's people mindlessly repeating what they've seen on TV, on some news website op-ed or outraged blogger, repeating what they've read on Twitter.
It's all been terribly convenient for the mainstream media in the West, too. Now that Saddam is dead, Bin Laden has gone to ground, and Kim Jong-Il is on his last legs, that leaves Ahmadinejad as the current Bad Person of the Month. We've got to have someone to hate.
A'nejad officially had consistent support all across the country and all through demographics. He officially did equally well in cities vs. rural areas.
Citation required!
According to state-owned TV station PressTV, the official results from the interior ministry show no such thing. The actual figures are quoted on Wikipedia.
According to these (apparently official) figures, Ahmadinejad's support ranged from a low of 44.8% in Tehran up to a maximum of 77% in Semnan. Is that what you mean by "consistent"?
A'nejad officially did equally well among sexes, age groups, class levels, ethnic groups, everything.
I wasn't aware that there were official results broken down by sex, age, class, and ethnic groups. I suspect that you are just making it up, actually.
Exactly. And one reason why the statistical facts deviated from his model could be that the model was simply wrong. For instance, what about the people who didn't vote at all last time, but now, after having seen Ahmadinejad in action, decide to vote for him. If there were a signifant number of people in that group then it would explain the "strange" pattern. To me, that hypothesis doesn't seem "strange" at all, hence I don't see the statistics as indicating anything untoward in the vote-counting (not to say there wasn't fraud, but just that the stats don't show it).
and Amaya
To thine own self be true. (If not that, at least make some money.)
