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Colombian patriot and brave national hero Alvaro Uribe has now retired from the presidential office he first took in 2002... when Colombia was nothing short of a failed state. How did he do? Besides the fact that he all but defeated the FARC rebels and numerous drug cartels over his eight years, Uribe's presidential approval rating has hovered between 60-70%... as recently as 2008 hitting an astounding 91%... George W Bush honored his accomplishment, principles, and valor with a Presidential Medal of Freedom... while today's radical Democrats refuse to support Colombia's great strides with even a free-trade pact. But as...

Friday, 6/11/10 NOTE: The recent deaths of two Mexican citizens, one at the San Ysidro, CA, Port of Entry, the other between El Paso, TX, and Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, have resulted in ongoing investigations and ample coverage by the media on both sides of the border. The M3 Report will not repeat the fast moving and abundant claims and counter claims, and obviously biased and critical articles and opinion columns. A Mexican congressman, Ricardo Lopez Pescador, is now demanding that the “homicidal agents of the Border Patrol” must be extradited to Mexico and put in the hands of Mexican judges....

President Obama took the unusual step Wednesday afternoon of issuing a special denunciation of Cuba's human rights policies, after a year of advocating improved relations after nearly a half-century of political estrangement with the island neighbor. "Instead of embracing an opportunity to enter a new era," Obama said (full text below), "Cuban authorities continue to respond to the aspirations of the Cuban people with a clenched fist." As recently as last summer at a Caribbean summit, Obama and Raul Castro talked separately of opening discussions on a wide range of issues including human rights. The country's semi-retired revolutionary leader, brother...

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela's President Hugo mocked U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday as a "blond" version of her predecessor, and said a row with Spain over alleged links with rebel groups was over. Visiting Latin America this week, Clinton said the Obama administration's policies towards the region were helping blunt the criticism of the United States by leftist leaders like Chavez. "To me, she's like Condoleezza Rice ... a blond Condoleezza," said the Venezuelan, referring to former U.S. president George W. Bush's secretary of state, with whom he exchanged frequent harsh words at long-distance. Citing comments by...

Argentina was celebrating a diplomatic coup yesterday in its attempt to force Britain to accept talks on the future of the Falkland Islands, after a two-hour meeting in Buenos Aires between Hillary Clinton and President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. Responding to a request from Mrs Kirchner for “friendly mediation” between Britain and Argentina, Mrs Clinton, the US Secretary of State, said she agreed that talks were a sensible way forward and offered “to encourage both countries to sit down”. Her intervention defied Britain’s longstanding position that there should be no negotiations unless the islands’ 3,000 inhabitants asked for them. It...

What little is left of Venezuela's democracy has taken a literal beating from President Hugo Chávez's uniformed goon squads -- again. Police used a variety of weapons, from water cannons to plastic bullets, last week to disperse hundreds of student protesters who refuse to knuckle under to an increasingly desperate and unpopular president determined to remain in power at all costs...the students were protesting the deterioration of their country...the frustration level inside the country is rising as Venezuela's political and economic situation goes from bad to worse. Rolling blackouts, currency devaluation and price inflation (the worst in Latin America), water...

You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil. The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil's Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil's planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan. The U.S. Export-Import Bank tells us it has issued a "preliminary commitment" letter to Petrobras in the amount of $2 billion and has discussed with Brazil...

Sebastián Piñera, a billionaire businessman, has defeated Chile’s ruling leftist coalition to return the right to power for the first time since the return of democracy after General Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship in 1990.

Conservative billionaire Sebastian Pinera won Chile's presidential election Sunday, ending two decades of center-left rule in Latin America's most stable economy. With ballots counted at 60.3 percent of polling stations, Pinera had 51.87 percent of the vote and his leftist rival, former President Eduardo Frei, quickly conceded defeat. The victory by Pinera, a Harvard-educated airline magnate, marks a shift to the right in South America, a region dominated by leftist rulers from Venezuela to Argentina, although no major changes to economic policy are expected. Many Chileans were disenchanted with the ruling center-left "Concertacion" coalition that has governed the world's top...

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has announced plans for the deployment of new Russian-made tanks and combat helicopters on the border with Colombia, RIA Novosti reported. Ties between Venezuela and Colombia deteriorated last August after Washington signed a deal with Bogota allowing U.S. forces to run anti-drug operations from Colombian bases. Chavez has criticized the deal and called for the Venezuelan people and army to prepare for a war.

President Hugo Chávez said he ordered two F-16 jets to intercept a U.S. military plane that twice violated Venezuelan airspace on Friday in what he called the latest provocation in the South American nation's skies. Brandishing a photo of the plane, which he described as a P-3, Mr. Chávez said the overflight was the latest incursion in Venezuelan skies by the U.S. military from its bases on the Netherlands' Caribbean islands and from neighboring Colombia. There was no immediate response from the U.S. Defense Department or the White House... Mr. Chávez said the F-16s escorted the U.S. plane away after...

Speaking during his weekly television and radio program, Mr Chavez said the aircraft overflew a Venezuelan military base in the western state of Zulia after taking off from neighbouring Columbia. He did not elaborate, but suggested the plane was being used for espionage. "These are the Yankees. They are entering Venezuela," he said. "I've ordered them to be shot down," Mr Chavez said of the aircraft. "We cannot permit this."

CARACAS, Venezuela – President Hugo Chavez said Monday that Venezuela has received thousands of Russian-made missiles and rocket launchers as part of his government's military preparations for a possible armed conflict with neighboring Colombia. "They are preparing a war against us," Chavez said during a televised address, repeating a charge he has been making for months. "Preparing is one of the best ways to neutralize it." Both Colombia and Washington deny having any plans to attack Venezuela, but Chavez argues they are plotting together a military offensive against Venezuela. Chavez says his government is acquiring more weapons as a precaution....

What can you say? How often does the United States stake out a clear, unequivocal position on a major foreign policy event and then, over the course of a few months, slowly walkback from their original position to come around and embrace exactly the opposite point of view? This is the Obama administration in all its amateurish glory. When Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was invited to leave back in June, the administration took the same side as the thugs and dictators of the world, calling it a "military coup" even though the Honduran Supreme Court had ruled the action legal...

The results from today's elections in Honduras are beginning to roll in and it looks as if Porfirio Lobo,from Honduran opposition National Party, is leading in the election at least according to the local media. According to preliminary data, the 61-year-old opposition leader received around 56% of the vote. His main rival, 46-year-old businessman Elvin Santos representing the ruling Liberal Party, came second in the presidential race, with about 38% of the vote. Even if the trend continues the Liberal party will not be the big loser today, Hugo Chavez, whose imperialist goals were thwarted when President Zelaya was ousted...

Even a broken clock is correct two times a day. Ever since Honduras deposed President Zelaya in June, the United States has been on the wrong side of the issue, supporting Zelaya and his buddy Hugo Chavez, against the people of Honduras, their democracy and the country's constitution. ....The Election is next Sunday Nov.29th, former President Zelaya is still holed up in the Brazilian embassy after sneaking back into the country in September, and surprisingly the United States is indicating that it will support the results of the election.

The threat of a war between Venezuela and Colombia increased over the weekend after both countries deployed more troops along their border and President Hugo Chavez branded his Colombian counterpart a "mafioso". Tensions between the countries reached a new high after the Colombian military arrested four Venezuelan soldiers, just days after Mr Chavez told his army to "prepare for war" with Colombia. The Venezuelan ambassador to Bogota, Gustavo Marquez, said that the seriousness of the situation could not be overstated and that "there is a pre-war situation in the entire region". Diplomatic relations between the South American neighbours are frozen...

Honduras’ deposed would-be “strongman,” Manuel Zelaya called on US President Obama to send troops to help him regain control of the Honduran government. Zelaya was president of Honduras until he was removed from office earlier this year by joint action of the country’s supreme court and legislature. “Micheletti has pissed on the agreement we made to restore my power,” Zelaya angrily alleged. “He is going ahead with the scheduled elections without my approval. He has refused to include my proposed constitutional amendment to extend my term of office. A new government will be formed without my consent.” Acting President Roberto...

And then I'd like to read a statement on Honduras. Last week, Honduran negotiators came to an accord that spells out a step-by-step process for Honduras to reestablish democratic and constitutional order and move toward national elections with the support of the international community. In the wake of the Verification Commission visit November 3 and 4, the two sides made significant progress toward the formation of a unity government. For that reason, we were particularly disappointed by the unilateral statements made last night, which do not serve the spirit of the Tegucigalpa-San Jose Accord. We urge both sides to act...

Undermine our allies. Embolden our enemies. Diminish our country. If anyone doubted those nine words summed up the Obama Doctrine, look at what the president's team perpetrated last week in Honduras. Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon and Dan Restrepo, the National Security Council's senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs, visited the Honduran capital in Tegucigalpa on Wednesday to compel the country's recalcitrant democrats to make a deal with the man the latter had lawfully removed from the presidency on June 28. It remains to be seen whether, pursuant to this deal, former President Manuel Zelaya will be restored to...

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras – Deposed President Manuel Zelaya and his opponents have agreed to a U.S.-brokered deal that he said will return him to power four months after a coup shook faith in Latin America's young democracies. The power-sharing agreement reached late Thursday calls for Congress to decide whether to reinstate the leftist Zelaya. While the legislature backed his June 28 ouster, congressional leaders have since said they won't stand in the way of an agreement that ends Honduras' diplomatic isolation and legitimizes presidential elections planned for Nov. 29. Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Thomas Shannon said Friday that the two...

WASHINGTON -- The chairmen of the House and Senate foreign relations committees are asking the Law Library of Congress to retract a report on the military-backed coup in Honduras that they charge is flawed and “has contributed to the political crisis that still wracks” the country. The request, by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. and Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., has sparked cries of censorship from Republicans who say the Democrats don't like what the August report said: that the government of Honduras had the authority to remove President Manuel Zelaya from office. Zelaya has been holed up at the Brazilian embassy...

Concludes political crisis in Honduras The signing was delayed for several hours after the delegation of the deposed Manuel Zelaya gave its approval long - Updated: 30.10.09 12:50 am - Writing: Current Rating: 4 votes: 3 3 Comments Print Send Tegucigalpa, Honduras . Representatives of the government of deposed Roberto Micheletti Manuel Zelaya signed late Thursday in this capital an agreement to end the political crisis that took to Honduras in the air for 124 days. The agreement was signed under heavy pressure from the U.S. government decided to send his top heavy artillery led by the undersecretary of state...

Honduras' interim government has buckled under international pressure and agreed to allow the return to power of Manuel Zelaya, the ousted President who was toppled in a military coup four months ago. The breakthrough followed renewed pressure from senior US. officials who traveled to Honduras this week for a last-ditch effort to end the crisis. "It is a triumph for Honduran democracy," said Mr Zelaya after the rival sides agreed to a deal that could see him reinstated as President in the coming days. Earlier, Roberto Micheletti, the president of the interim government that took power after the coup on...

MADRID - U.S. President Barack Obama asked Spain to send Cuba a message about reform when he met Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero earlier this month, the newspaper El Pais reported on Sunday. Six days after their meeting on October 13 at the White House, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos visited the Caribbean island and met President Raul Castro. "Have (Moratinos) tell the Cuban authorities we understand that change can't happen overnight, but down the road, when we look back at this time, it should be clear that now is when those changes began," Obama told Zapatero, according...

CARACAS, Venezuela -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says President Barack Obama does not deserve the Nobel Peace Prize. Chavez believes Obama didn't make any notable accomplishments to merit winning the prize, saying that rather than promote peace the U.S. president is continuing the warlike policies of predecessor George W. Bush. Chavez and Obama had a cordial first encounter at a summit in April, but the Venezuelan leader has become increasingly critical of Obama.

While some Republicans saw the move as a disturbing use of power by Kerry, who became chairman of the influential committee earlier this year, several Democratic aides described the move as an attempt to rein in one of the Senate’s most obstructive members. DeMint has irked many in Congress over the years, including members of his own party, for blocking legislation, including a massive 2006 omnibus spending bill that he felt had too many earmarks. In recent months, DeMint, whom some have likened to the late conservative icon Jesse Helms, has been a particular thorn in the side of Democrats....

U.S. Rep. Peter Roskam was in Honduras Friday to meet with the torn nation's interim president as part of a Republican fact-finding mission that flew in the face of current U.S. foreign policy. Roskam, as part of a contingent headed by South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, met with interim President Roberto Micheletti. But President Barack Obama's administration is seeking to isolate Micheletti and other architects of the military coup that ousted the nation's president for allegedly trying to defy term limits. The U.S. and European Union, among many nations around the world, have condemned the ouster of Honduras President Manuel...

A spokesman for a U.S. Senator says the interim president of Honduras vowed that civil liberties would be restored in the troubled Central American country no later than Monday. Wesley Denton tells The Associated Press that South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint received the assurance in a meeting in Honduras with interim President Roberto Micheletti. DeMint led a congressional delegation that met with Micheletti on Friday. Denton says the delegation raised concerns with Micheletti's special decree limiting civil liberties including the right to assemble. He said the interim president said the freedoms would be restored by or on Monday. THIS IS...

Trade: Colombia got another brushoff Tuesday, when Commerce Secretary Gary Locke pronounced its free trade pact dead for the year because Washington is too busy with health care. Why doesn't Cuba ever hear that? Speaking at the sidelines of a conference in Chile, Locke told Dow Jones: "It's pretty doubtful that the pact will be ratified this year, although the Obama administration is pushing forward with Colombia, Korea and Panama." Yeah, sure. Pushing and pushing, it's all we've heard about from this crew. But the only visible moves on trade have a string of protectionist measures to make Big Labor...

PORLAMAR, Venezuela – Venezuela's science and technology minister said his country is working with Russia to detect deposits of uranium but withdrew an earlier denial that the country was also working with Iran. Jesse Chacon originally denied the reports that Venezuela is receiving support from Iran to seek uranium, but clarified later Saturday that his comments were only in regard to Russia and that exploration efforts with Iran fall under the direction of Venezuela's Mining Ministry. Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz said Friday Iran is helping Venezuela to detect uranium deposits and that initial evaluations suggest reserves are significant. His announcement...

Today local radio America has spread a version that states that the US embassy in Tegucigalpa would host the paralell govt. of Manuel Zelaya. The version says that the ambassador Hugo Llorenz has ready 6 limousines ready to transport the members of Zelaya's cabinet to the embassy. Some of his top officials are wanted by honduran justice.

Immediately after Manuel Zelaya was deposed on the order of the Honduran Supreme Court, Hugo Chavez, blustered, fumed and threatened an invasion. Daniel Ortega, head thug in Nicaragua, pledged to be his “bff” (“best friend forever”, for those without teen aged children). Hugo did manage an invasion. Since Zelaya will be arrested the moment he is found on Honduran soil, he moved into to the Brazilian Embassy. In any event, his return has caused some perturbations in Honduras. The capital was shut down for a day and some of his ginned up and dwindling supporters were arrested. If Zelaya intends...

Dismissal was legal, says U.S. report "In short, one of the foundations of the global community is to respect international laws," Schock said in a statement. 24.09.09 - Updated: 24.09.09 01:44 pm - AP: redaccion@elheraldo.hn RATE * Currently 2 / 5 Stars. * 1 * 2 * 3 * 4 * 5 Current Rating: 2 votes: 3 79 comments Print Send Washington, United States . A study by the Library of Congress found that the dismissal of President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras was legal and in full accordance with the Constitution. The report, released by Rep. Aaron Schock, however, also...

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Although only a couple of miles from each other, the two men who claim to be the president of Honduras passed another day without meeting on Wednesday as residents of this capital city used a break in a curfew to store up supplies and hunker down for what could be an extended political standoff. “We need to sit down face to face,” Manuel Zelaya, the deposed leader, said in a telephone interview from the Brazilian Embassy, where he has been holed up since slipping back into the country from exile on Monday. He complained of harassment of...

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Costa Rican President Oscar Arias said Monday that ousted leader Manuel Zelaya's surprise return to Honduras offers an opportunity to end the country's political crisis. "Now that President Zelaya is back it would be opportune to restore him to his position under appropriate circumstances, get on with the election that is currently scheduled for November, have a peaceful transition of presidential authority and get Honduras back to constitutional and democratic order," Clinton told reporters as she met with Arias in New York. Arias, who brokered failed peace talks between the Zelaya camp and...

Mitch - in the video - is an American who lives in Honduras. What does he thing about the controversy?

The shameful siege of Honduras continues. In the past few weeks, the United States has cut more than $30 million in non-humanitarian aid, suspended most visa services and sided with Venezuela, Cuba and other of Latin America's worst dictatorships in undermining democracy. Meanwhile, the people of Honduras are desperately trying to maintain their freedom and prevent the return of a regime that Washington is committed to forcing down their throats.

The government of Andorra has frozen “billions of dollars” in bank accounts linked to Iran, Venezuela, and a variety of terrorist groups, according to the daily Diairi d’Andorra, which publishes in Catalan. The Andorran move, announced on Thursday, was carried out in conjunction with a top secret U.S. Treasury investigation in Miami involving money laundered through Venezuelan banks that was transferred to corresponding banks in the United States. From Miami, the funds were then wired to accounts in Andorra that were controlled by Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, members of his family and his regime. But the funds were also used...

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) - Washington has revoked the visas of Honduras' interim president and 17 other top officials to pressure the Central American nation to reinstate ousted leader Manuel Zelaya, Honduras' government said Saturday. The interim government expects the United States to revoke the visas of at least 1,000 more public officials "in the coming days," Information Minister Rene Zepeda told The Associated Press. Interim President Roberto Micheletti said losing his diplomatic and tourist visas would not weaken his rejection of the return of Zelaya, who was toppled in a June 28 military-backed coup and flown into exile. Micheletti said...

When Manual Zelaya sought the Honduran presidency he knew his country’s constitution limited him to only one term. In June, 2009, Zelaya attempted to alter such constitutional limitation to allow himself another term. The only problem for Zelaya, his efforts triggered his own ouster under his country’s constitution. President Barack Obama, (BO) famous for decrying interfering in other country’s internal political systems, at least non-allied countries, now insists that Zelaya be restored to the presidency of Honduras. Not surprisingly BO’s position is shared with Daniel Ortega, Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers. Chavez has threatened military intervention to restore Zelaya....

There are some wild rumors going around and lately I don´t trust anything about Obama and am getting a bit fidgety about what may turn out to be your wreckless conduct that can make Vietnam look like a picnic you were wanting. Today in Palmerola several planes from the US Air Force landed. What is significant about that is because of Hillary and Obama´s stance that what happened here was a coup and the supposed suspension of military cooperation. Tomorrow is Sept 11 and while most people think World Trade Center and 9-11-2001 Hondurans think 9-11-1919 when the US invaded...

The Obama Administration has decided to block travel by the people of Honduras to the United States to punish their country for its Supreme Court's refusal to back the return to power of Honduras’s ex-president and would-be dictator, Manuel Zelaya, who is backed by left-wing Latin American dictators like Castro and Chavez. The Obama Administration is now blocking the issuance of nearly all visas, meaning that a Honduran grandma who wants to visit her grandkids in the United States can’t. Obama’s decision came in response to a recent ruling by the Honduras Supreme Court, ruling that the removal of the...

Insert photo caption or credit hereThe Wall Street Journal reported this week the Obama administration will invest $2 billion (or more) in drilling off the shores of Brazil, of all places. The same Dem-wits who will do anything to keep us from drilling off our own shores are now investing $2 billion in a Brazilian oil company? The question is why? It’s a POLITICAL PAYOFF TO GEORGE SOROS is why. The liberal rabble-rouser has 5.8 million of the company’s U.S.-traded preferred shares. Once again mainstream media has turned a blind eye to newest of Obama scandals. The Lone Conservative says...

Seven weeks after the Honduran military overthrew the democratically elected president of Honduras, the divide between the United States and Latin America continues to grow. The strategy of the coup regime is obviously to run out the clock on President Manuel Zelaya's remaining months in office. A presidential election, in which Zelaya is not eligible to run because of Honduras' one-term limit, is scheduled for 29 November. In response to that strategy, the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) issued a declaration on 10 August that it would not recognise any government elected under the coup regime. It is worth...

And yet Dems block offshore oil production in the U.S. Two pieces of information here. Connect the dots: 1. The Obama Administration is offering billions in loans for oil drilling off the coast of Brazil. 2. George Soros, the Dems top money man has a huge financial stake in the offshore drilling company. Obama Underwrites Offshore DrillingToo bad it's not in U.S. watersWall Street Journal AUGUST 18, 2009 You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil. The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance...

CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is "lost in the Andromeda" galaxy on Latin American policy, his chief critic in the region, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, said on Sunday, while demanding the closure of U.S. military bases. Last week Obama said critics of U.S. involvement in Latin America who are now asking Washington to do more to restore the ousted president of Honduras "can't have it both ways." "We are not asking you to intervene in Honduras, Obama. On the contrary, we are asking that "the empire" get its hands off Honduras and get its claws out of Latin...

CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is "lost in the Andromeda" galaxy on Latin American policy, his chief critic in the region, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, said on Sunday, while demanding the closure of U.S. military bases. Last week Obama said critics of U.S. involvement in Latin America who are now asking Washington to do more to restore the ousted president of Honduras "can't have it both ways." "We are not asking you to intervene in Honduras, Obama. On the contrary, we are asking that "the empire" get its hands off Honduras and get its claws out of Latin...

Diplomacy: In a quiet victory for a tiny democracy, U.S. buttinskies have stopped trying to restore a dictator to power in South America. Tiny Honduras is winning its fight for freedom.In a welcome about-face, the State Department told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Richard Lugar, R-Ind., in a letter Tuesday that the U.S. would no longer threaten sanctions on Honduras for ousting its president, Mel Zelaya, last June 28. Nor will it insist on Zelaya's return to power. As it turns out, the U.S. Senate can't find any legal reason why the Honduran Supreme Court's refusal to let Zelaya stay...