OPINIONS & EDITORIAL

Monday, July 27, 1998 Online Edition 116

Each day nearly a quarter of a million people are born into the world. Today there are 6 billion people more or less living on the earth. A study on population done by the United Nations Population Fund estimates that 10 percent of these births take place with mothers who are between the ages of 15 and 19.

This tragic situation is caused by a number of things that include a lack of education, deprivation of basic rights for women, family violence, and the effect of certain religious teachings by different denominations that encourage families to have many children.

It is not possible to suppose that human societies can support such continual and staggering population growth without grave damage to the quality of life, and in fact we see the effects of this in the daily statistics and reports concerning rising crime rates, deforestation, and numerous other social diseases and problems that contribute to the general deterioration of society. All of these evils are directly related to over-population, and the poverty that is its inevitable result.

In these dark days we are destroying the atmosphere, the air we and all life must breathe through the massive release of destructive gasses into the atmosphere, and thus are depleting the ozone layer as well as creating the frightening threat of global warning.

Our favorite technology, the automobile, as well as the airplane, are major contributors to this situation. At the same time, we are threatening the great ocean that surrounds the five continents. If present trends continue, and there is little reason to suppose they won't, the ocean will become contaminated throughout its surfaces and depths, and when the sea dies, when we have poisoned the common origin of life, our ancient home, the life on land must inevitably follow.

This sober warning is not incendiary in the least, but only describes what will happen if there is not a dramatic turn-around. It is only a matter of time.

Normally, this concern for the environment and the future of the planet is expressed with a certain detached calm, but we are here expressing it a most passionate manner because it is so urgent that we face up to the choices we must make, and make soon. We must elect quality over quantity, and liberate ourselves from the disgraceful condition into which we have fallen, the condition of being the despoilers of the earth.

There are organizations that call themselves pro-life, which idealize and sentimentalize the family, and which preach against the use of contraceptives and regard abortion as a violation against the laws of God. Very well. Let these organizations put their money where their mouth is. Suppose they provide the poor people who are captives to their ideology with certificates that will guarantee that the organization will provide for the well-being of every child born to a particular woman or family beyond the number of two, and will do so until the child is 18 years old. This would be the responsible thing to do, taking up the burden of responsibility for their beliefs.

There are two few institutions that like the United Nations understand the dimensions of the problem. Too few have come to grips with the necessity of making the protection of nature an absolute priority before which all other interests and values must take second place, even, yes even, over economic growth, that sacred cow of modern societies. The traditional teachings and dogmas of religion need to yield before a spiritual command that all religions and creeds need to hear as the unmistakable voice of God. If life on this planet becomes insupportable, what values or traditions will be left. The vultures, the rats, and the ubiquitous cockroach will inherit the earth.

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MED EDUCATION STANDARDS PATHETIC

I applaud your call to improve the standard of the medical profession in Honduras.

May I suggest that before anything can substantially improve, standards for medical education must be set. Honduras has no academic achievement qualification for admission to medical school. A student straight out of high school (which they call "college") can merely enroll in medical school...no high school standing, no SAT, no ACT, no proven performance. There is no pre-medical academic period to evaluate suitability and academic excellence. No competitive striving for acceptance into a medical school. In Honduras, it is automatic. In most civilized countries, it is considered imperative to observe prospective physicians carefully before admission to medical school. The selection process allows a variety of professors to observe character, academic performance and personal suitability to undertake the study of medicine.

The entire medical education procedure is expensive and time-consuming. Failure to pre-qualify applicants burdens the facilities with less-than-suitable students, thus diluting the educational process. No society can afford this flagrant abuse of resources.

Honduras is destined to remain among the poorest of the poor until they value education enough to drastically upgrade the entire system. It is pathetic.

Donald Steele, MD
French Harbour, Roatán

Dear Editor:

Howard Rosenzweig has always been an adept observer of Honduran issues affecting us, and especially, tourism. His contributions have been well-written, valuable, entertaining and fair. His rare criticisms have been constructive in nature, and inevitably balanced out by positive commentary that shows a sincere fondness for the country that he has chosen for his home.

The Honduran Constitution guarantees the right of free speech. To every free person in the Republic. We all have a right to our personal opinions and, with that right we are also obligated to respect the opinions of others.

History has taught us cruel and bloody lessons, one of the being that repression and censorship of opinion and free speech lead to totalitarianism, a police state contaminated with self-righteous and pseudo-intellectual watchdogs and informers.

What special credential does Mr. Gerardo Flores (Readers' forum, June 27) possess to repress Mr. Rosenzweig's right to an opinion? Just what is his problem with Rosenzweig's living in Copán? (Is Flores suggesting in his "biggest question" that Rosenzweig shouldn't be there, or people should be restricted in their movements within the country?) And what does Copán's historical significance (Mr. Flores said "sacred") have to do with expressing an opinion? Freedom of speech, opinion and movement are cornerstones in a free society such as Honduras.

Your letter writer Flores said, "All of this (referring to illiteracy, ignorance and corruption) (is) due to many [foreign] occupations..." All of it! My goodness! that is quite a blanket indictment. Children and immature people are usually the first to blame others for their problems. Mr. Flores might look in the mirror. Another lesson from history: People usually end up with the governments they deserve. Illiteracy and ignorance are not foreign imports. Corruption, by definition, originates from within and needs a domestic component.

Racists and self-appointed watchdogs represent a step backwards in free society, yet ironically they too are entitled to their opinion, as I am. Fortunately, as a whole, the majority of the populace is more reasonable. Or does Mr. Flores have a problem with another foreign import: Democracy?

Ed Elsner
Tela

Just wanted to let you know that instead of letting my subscription expire in October, I plan to renew based upon what I see as editorial hope on the horizon. Your printing of the Lorenzo Belveal article indicates to me that Honduras This Week has value and needs to be followed. Thanks for not avoiding the difficult realities.

Franklin Schilling
Houston, TX

Monday, July 20, 1998 Online Edition 115

Freemasonry:
an easy target for extremists

By W. E. GUTMAN

From its earliest origins, Freemasonry has met with political, economic and religious opposition, often unrelenting and violent, in response to its advocacy of liberty, fraternity and equality, and to thwart the propagation of Masonry's fundamental principles: Free Thought and enlightenment.

Persecution of Freemasons has always been intense in times of social and religious turmoil and during those great upheavals that have led men to war -- periods marked by an absence of Light, by a pronounced decline in the civilizing effects of reason and by fits of collective madness.

The Inquisition, the Vatican, Hitler and Stalin, to name a few, were all rabid enemies of Freemasonry. Hitler feared the fraternity, along with Jews, Gypsies and homosexuals, all of whom he consigned, in the name of his Final Solution, to the gas chambers and crematoria.

Stalin, a schizoid-paranoiac, saw in Freemasonry a destabilizing tool of international democracy. Freemasonry had already been dealt a mortal blow in the 1917 Bolshevik uprising. Fearful that clandestine Lodges may have survived in Russia, Stalin reinforced the ban on affiliation under penalty of death. Freemasonry disappeared or lay dormant in post-war satellite nations until the collapse of the Soviet empire. It is still banned in theocratic and other repressive societies.

As long as Freemasonry exists, it will continue to mystify and draw the ire of the uninitiated, especially religious fundamentalists who oppose Free Thought and absolutists who cannot abide universalistic principles.

Enemies of Freemasonry point to the French Revolution as an unmistakable evidence of its insidious and evil influence. After all, they justifiably claim, it was inspired and engineered by philosophers and Freemasons. What they forget is that, in many cases, the same philosophers and Freemasons inspired and engineered the American Revolution 13 years earlier. No one will argue that these historic upheavals helped purge an infant America and a tired, corrupt and bankrupt France from the debilitating clutches of kings, aristocrats and clergy.

The truth, alas, is no match against deep-rooted bias, ill-will and ignorance, and the anti-Masonic crusade blazes on. Fire-and-brimstone evangelical preachers can be heard haranguing against Freemasonry on short-wave radio and in houses of worship everywhere. Lacking hard facts, they spin yarns filled with mind boggling untruths, myths, rumors and innuendoes. It may not be altogether a coincidence that the objections they raise and the platitudes they spout can be found, almost verbatim, in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other anti-Semitic and anti-Masonic tracts.

Some of the enormities leveled against Freemasonry are so outlandish as to defy rational discourse. I am often tempted to invite those who say that "Freemasonry is up to something behind the scenes," or that "sinister cabals take place inside a Lodge," to fill out a petition and join the Craft. They would find the experience both enlightening and reassuring. But I abstain. Obstinacy, dogmatism, intransigence, and a predisposition to flirt with gossip, rather than embrace the truth, are vices inimical to the Masonic ideal.

Political parties in Honduras are in the habit of feeding off the salaries of public service employees.

The fact is that high ranking political authorities who are currently authorizing 5 percent deductions in the salary of civil servants are treating the Public Ministry with contempt.

Employees are supposed to be laboring for the common good of all, and should not be viewed as part of the partisan machinery that insures enough funds for the next election. Money earned by employees in their service to the state is not money ill gotten, it is earned honorably in public service, and it places a stigma on it if deductions are made in favor of political parties. This practice should be eliminated.

Authorizing employees to donate (non-voluntarily) is like authorizing them to feel justified when they commit acts of corruption, thus compensating themselves for their loss of hard earned money donated to the political party. This practice should be stopped immediately; if it continues it will be understood that the Ministry of Finance is the public cache of the political party in power.

Our concept of public administration should be that of a sacred place where permanent training of the 40,000 plus members of the Honduran labor force is a priority, thus providing private enterprise with qualified, efficient personnel. To the contrary, private enterprise is afraid to give ex-government employees jobs because of their reputation for corruption as well as the above mentioned partisan factor. Employees should be given jobs according to their capacity and not because they belong to a political party. When a politician's recommendation can be enough to have someone fired or hired, it is difficult to build a tradition of integrity and service.

Monday, July 13, 1998 Online Edition 114

License to kill
The slow death of a young woman caused by the negligence of doctors who performed a Caesarean section on her is just the latest horror story in the long history of medical incompetence in this country. Infection spread as a piece of unremoved compress festered within her for seven months. The operation was performed at the Hospital Escuela or Hospital School, where Honduras' future doctors are trained.

This unforgivable error has once again sparked public concern regarding the abilities of medical practitioners. In the face of the accusers, hospital employees hide behind the excuse of human error, claiming that after hundreds of operations one mistake is bound to occur.

In more civilized countries, this small error would have cost them their license and maybe even a jail sentence. However, in Honduras, a pact between the justice system and the medical profession allows doctors to acquire an immunity similar to that attained by congressmen; with a license to kill without being judged.

The lack of a law governing medical malpractice is one of the difficulties faced by the criminal justice system when trying physicians. The Honduran Medical Association, despite much internal competition, remains ferociously united.

It seems much is lacking in the mentality and ethics of many Honduran doctors, who take their responsibilities too lightly inasmuch as they are not held accountable by the legal system. For some time now, we have been declaring in our editorials the need to overhaul the health care system in this country. The medical profession in Honduras enjoys too much immunity, while needy patients suffer the consequences of their carelessness. Part of the solution to this problem is to require doctors and hospitals to carry liability insurance, so that in cases of severe malpractice, some protection is afforded the victim.

The population needs better health care, available services are scarce, the quality and the quantity of medicines is inadequate and the lack of organization within the system is obvious.

The public health sector needs a leader capable of adequately guiding doctors accustomed to practicing medicine carelessly, someone who could inspire a higher standard of performance.

NO WINNERS IN TAX PROGRAM

Dear Editor:

I wish to take issue with Overton M. Whittaker's letter concerning Flores' sales tax hike. He says it is "pro-government" and "anti-consumer." I disagree.

In the tax program spelled out by President Carlos Flores, there are no winners: Not government. Not consumers. Not business. Everybody loses because, in view of the Honduras tax bases, the taxing formulae set forth by Flores simply can't work.

Anyone who doubts this might check out my WebSite and read the article titled "Flores Tax Plan - Theater of the Absurd", at: http://www.goodfelloweb.com/lorenzo/

Considering President Flores impressive educational background, I can't believe he does not understand this much better than most. For a single example, the reduction of the banana tax from 50 cents, to 4 cents per 40-pound box is a gratuitous disservice to Honduras solvency -- and a magnificent gift to the fruit companies. My mail and telephone calls are the clearest indication that a great many intelligent people are wondering what the incentive for this economic outrage might have been.

My prediction: Time will clarify this absurdity to everyone's satisfaction. In the meantime, it stands as a flagrant assault on economic reason.

Bananas are the biggest agricultural export Honduras has. Bananas also represent one of the largest and more dependable sources of tax revenue available to La Republica. Perhaps President Flores would like to explain the arithmetic he used to arrive at his decision to virtually exempt bananas from export taxes.

Is this just part of the flawed notion that "What's good for the fruit companies is also -- automatically -- good for Honduras"?

Lorenzo Dee Belveal
lbelveal@foreigner.class.udg.mx

MISINTERPRETATION

Dear Editor:

In response to Wendy Griffin concerning the ethnicity of the ancient populations of eastern Honduras:

Once again, there has been some misinterpretation or misunderstanding of my position. I never said there was no Mesoamerican influence -- actually the opposite. I said there exists a lot of evidence of Mesoamerican influence, and even Mexican influence after about AD 900/1000. Despite all of the evidence of influence, there is no good archaeological evidence of migrations of Mesoamerican or Mexican populations. There is some evidence of Mexican presence in certain areas at the time of contact, but this does not show up in the archaeological record in earlier periods.

I would avoid saying that the archaeological sites are Pech -- we have no idea of the variety of groups that may have existed prehistorically. What I have always said is that the Pech and other eastern Honduran groups (Tawahka) are in all likelihood descendants of the prehistoric cultures.

Your use of Pech myths/stories as a historical source is problematic. Most of these sites are around a thousand years old. Remember the myth of the Mound Builders that existed in the United States -- the indigenous groups of the Southeast U.S. were not recognized as the builders of the mounds that were abundant in the area. The oral history of the extant groups at time of

contact did not include anything about these constructions. The Europeans thought that the simple 'savages' could not have built anything so complex, and hypothesized that a disappeared race had built them (some thought Lost Tribes of Israel). Now we know that it was the ancestors of the very indigenous groups that lived in the area when the Europeans arrived.

You are making a similar mistake. The political situation was complex in the past -- there were various groups, and various 'classes' of people in eastern Honduras. The stories of the Pech, if they have any connection with historical events, would reflect this complexity. You must also keep in mind the extreme and profound changes that have happened since AD 500, including a dramatic demographic collapse in central and western Honduras around AD 800-900 (the Maya collapse), the migration of Nahua-speakers into Central America, and the arrival of the Spanish. All of these, directly or indirectly affected the eastern Honduran cultures. Perhaps the most significant was the dramatic decrease in population in the first half of the 16th century. It is not surprising that the modern cultures in eastern Honduras display significant changes over the last 1000 years.

The question is not "are the sites Pech", because 'Pech' may not have been a meaningful category a thousand years ago. The question is, do the prehistoric culture look basically Lower Central American (that is, like those from areas inhabited by Macro-Chibchan speakers) with some Mesoamerican overlays, or are they essentially Mesoamerican. Aside from an elite architectural complex (including plazas, ballcourts, etc) and ideological elements that were adopted by many groups throughout Lower Central America (including feathered serpent motifs and other 'Mesoamerican' symbols), everything looks Lower Central American. The ceramics are largely incised and monochrome, with forms that are not typical of Mesoamerica. Most importantly, the utilitarian ceramics never look Mesoamerican. The lithic assemblage is not typically Mesoamerican -- there are typically very few lithics, and little obsidian (more as you move further west).

In short, the simplest explanation is that numerous Mesoamerican elements were adopted by essentially non-Mesoamerican, Lower Central American populations. All good evidence suggests that the modern indigenous groups in eastern Honduras descended from the ancient groups in the same area.

Wendy -- in order to avoid the harsh criticism you received when you presented your ideas in 1992, you may consider a more rigorous approach that utilizes various sources of information, and consulting the literature on inferring migration from archaeological materials. A review of the literature would be the best step, allowing you to learn from the mistakes of others without having to make them again yourself.

Chris Begley
CTBegley@aol.com

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Help shut down the SOA

By W. E. GUTMAN

Supporters of peace in Guatemala were horrified to learn that Bishop Juan Gerardi, coordinator of the Archbishop's Office of Human Rights was assassinated last April, barely two days after a human rights report entitled, "Guatemala: Never Again," was published. It was a culmination of four years of work by investigators who took testimony from thousands of survivors of massacres carried out by the Guatemalan Army.

The report confirms that graduates of the U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA) played a key role in planning and initiating the brutal counterinsurgency strategies used during the war in Guatemala. Over 200,000 people were killed and 400 villages were razed to the ground.

Throughout the war, the Guatemalan intelligence agency, D2, was involved in systematic human rights abuses, including torture, assassinations and extrajudicial executions. Ten of those named in "Guatemala: Never Again," as key leaders in D2 are SOA graduates. Another graduate, Gen. Benedicto Lucas Garcia, is cited as responsible for the creation of the civil militias which carried out numerous human rights violations and massacres during the 80's "contra" war. The militias are described in the report as a "permanent control apparatus."

Two of the three military officers named in the report as the intellectual authors of the assassination of Guatemalan anthropologist, Myrna Mack, are SOA graduates: Juan Oliva and Godoy Gaitan.

An investigation into the 1990 assassination of U.S. citizen Michael Devine by Col. Juan Alpirez -- also responsible for the torture-murder of Jennifer Harbury's husband, rebel leader Efrain Bamaca -- was blocked by two SOA graduates, Cesar Cabrera Mejia, a member of D2, and Luis Miranda Trejo.

SOA alumni have taken innocent lives and caused havoc throughout Latin America and, more recently, in the Chiapas region of Mexico. The U.S. Congress can end the legacy of this school for assassins by closing it down. HR 6711 and S980 need the support of all peace-loving Americans. I urge them to write to their representatives and ask them to show prophetic leadership by becoming co-sponsors of these bills before the August recess.

Has the military changed?

By ERLING DUUS

A while back I was teaching at a school in La Ceiba. One day I elected to read for my students an eloquent and passionate essay by W.E. Gutman about the dirty little war elements of the Honduran military had carried out against Hondurans during the tempestuous 80s. I read as dramatically as possible Gutman's description of kidnappings, torture, and murder, because I wanted the students to be impacted and hopefully shocked.

Afterward, there was a stone silence which neither I or the students broke. When the class was over one young man came up to me." But Mister Duus, those people were Communists. They had to be eliminated." Normally, I welcome student dissent of all kinds, but in this context I am afraid that I became angry.

In an old copy of Honduras This Week, I read extracts from the speech given by Gen. Luis Discua Elvir upon his assumption of the command of the Honduran Armed Forces. It was a defensive speech, and at the same time aggressive. Plainly, he was responding to perceived critics. The speech closed with a clenched fist. The military would continue to combat the internal enemies of the state. In that time and place, roughly l990, the meaning was clear. The criticism of what had been done during the 80s was heating up, and not only was the general not admitting to any error, but was saying that the military stood ready to do the same sort of thing again. Under the guise of protecting the state, the military reserved to itself the right to deprive Hondurans of their civil and human rights.

These events took place quite a few years ago, and there have been changes. During this last week Gen. Hung Pacheco found himself in a position where he was forced to apologize to President Flores for over-stepping his authority. That would not have happened a few years ago. But the question that I am asking is whether or not the changes that have been made are basic, fundamental, and irrevocable. This involves in its turn at least two questions: Has the military really given up the notion that it has ultimate authority for the state, and do Hondurans feel that their right to dissent is protected? I do not know the answers to these questions.

There are a great many Hondurans who feel that radical change is needed in this country. Unfortunately, they are very pessimistic about whether or not this change will come. They feel that the people who have the power in the country essentially wish to continue to run it for their private benefit, and will not tolerate serious change. If necessary, they believe, the military and police dictatorship will be revived to protect the status quo. I do not know if this is the truth, but I do know that it a widely held perception, and that it cripples the fortunes of the nation.

It has always been the case that real and necessary change in societies is brought about by idealistic and radical young people, who have come to find certain things intolerable, and who are prepared to rattle the very foundations of the state in order to achieve an alteration. The energy thus released into society is essential for rejuvenation and revitalization. From it comes the capacity to achieve those important and difficult changes which are opposed by the establishment, but gather and animate the hopes of the people. It is the life blood of liberty and democracy.

Finally, the issue is trust. Not very many people in a society are going to give themselves to the creative processes of change if they suspect that the price to be paid is martyrdom. And so there are few questions more important for Honduras and its future than what rises from these: has the military really changed, and do the people really believe it has changed?

Monday, July 6, 1998 Online Edition 113

Two weeks ago, Carlos Roberto Flores set about doing what Honduran presidents have been expected to do since La Republica began holding scheduled elections instead of unscheduled revolutions: Namely - Go get some money.

"Getting some money" is a never-ending project in Honduras. Only the techniques vary, depending on the ingenuity and imagination of the incumbent occupant of the Palacio Presidencial.

Each repeat performance calls for a tighter script and more inspired performances, because Honduras operates under some serious and increasing hardships, whether as a supplicant for international charity, or a potential borrower. Indeed, whether the money is donated or loaned, it will likely cost the benefactors about the same amount, because the record of Honduras defaults (on both interest and principal) makes for highly discouraging and repetitious reading. Operating from a current base-line indebtedness in excess of $4-billion dollars, it is unlikely that this sorry record of non-performance on financial obligations will improve any time soon.

On May 10, 1998, this journalist wrote an editorial entitled, "The Flores Tax Plan -- Theater of the Absurd". That economic appraisal declared in general terms that, in the view of anyone who could do simple arithmetic, the Flores tax proposal had to be seen as a "talking paper" for more borrowing, rather than a program for making Honduras solvent and economically self-sufficient.

The Flores meeting two weeks ago with seven of his cabinet principals validates my earlier pessimism concerning the fiscal master-plan for his term in office. With Don Carlos as the point man, and seven cabinet loyalists completing the roster, the game plan calls for "blitzing" the heads of state who were on hand for the recent "Americas Summit."

It is to be presumed that all manner of firm friendships and good vibrations were generated among the distinguished invitees to that conclave. More particularly, since it was at this international pow-wow, that President Flores made Honduras the seventh signatory to the "Anti-Corruption Convention", he personally basks in a complimentary -- if ever so conditional -- public relations light. The largest question now looming in the minds of many interested observers is whether Don Carlos has the stomach or the political clout to fly in the face of long-established political practice by taking his anti-corruption pledge beyond the mere formality of signing it.

If President Flores can summon the courage to take a firm and highly visible stand against political and judicial corruption in his own administration -- and make it stick -- Honduras will surely reap great benefits in terms of enhanced international respect. Should he fail to promptly begin making good on his anti-corruption promise, the signing of same will be quickly written off as just one more hollow public relations gesture. In which case he would have been much better advised to not have signed it at all.

However this may play out in weeks and months to come, it is presumably from this base that El Presidente hopes to immediately begin rounding up untold millions of dollars with which to bankroll a variety of good works to benefit the economically bled-white and credibility-strapped Republica de Honduras.

Announced plans for this grand tour in search of lots of dollars include efforts to generate both "cooperation from sister countries" (read: non-repayable cash grants), and "financing" (read: loans) from governmental and international sources. (This language is broad enough to include everything from national treasuries, to multinationals like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund -- in whose hallowed halls Honduras will certainly not arrive as a stranger.)

While wishing this group of international treasure-hunters nothing but the best, in their efforts to gain entry into the pockets of the more affluent nations and organizations in our hemispheric neighborhood, I see some difficulties standing in their way. At the risk of being deemed a faithless crepe-hanger, when unbridled optimism should be the order of the day, some of the hurdles that will have to be overcome on the way deserve to be recognized. Laying eager hands on the many millions -- or billions -- needed to transform President Flores' rose-colored vision for Honduras, into real bricks, school books and mortar, will surely prove to be easier said than done.

The first consideration that could prove to be a serious impediment to tapping into international largess, is the hard fact that Honduras doesn't repay its borrowings. It never has. This is how the monstrous arrears -- in excess of $4-billion dollars -- has been accrued. Default on interest and principal obligations has been the rule, rather than the exception, in Honduras financial dealings. While there are a variety of exculpatory explanations offered up to soften the fiscal reality, excuses do not change the bottom-line. Honduras is a rotten credit-risk. Potential lenders know this, which information is not going to encourage them to come up with the heavy money required to undertake such costly projects as revitalizing and diversifying Honduras agriculture, restructuring and upgrading Honduras public education, and -- mirabile dictu -- constructing an inter-oceanic highway!

The international banking community realizes that the betting odds are something like 7-to-3, that any amount of money sent to Honduras, under whatever kind of arrangements, will never be seen again. This long record of non-performance will surely constitute a hard spot to get over in any kind of credit-line negotiation, but it is not the worst impediment to Honduras borrowing.

The Honduras judicial system is widely and consistently viewed as no more than a bad joke. This is the unflattering opinion of a broad cross-section of private investors, commercial developers, and international lenders that your reporter has recently interviewed. People who manage large financial resources -- whether their own or the assembled wealth of others -- are smart enough to realize that, without laws to protect their contractual interests, there is no such thing as a good or a safe deal.

Forget such conventional investment considerations as asset-appreciation and return-on-money. These phrases become just confidence-game come-ons, cheese in the borrower's mousetrap, unless the court system that underpins everything else is trustworthy. This single, crucial, consideration leaves Honduras in a kind of investment purgatory, because -- as virtually the entire international financial industry has come to understand -- Honduras courts are without statutory integrity, and Honduras judges regularly write their rulings without reference to law or logic. How could it be otherwise?

Bear in mind that the president of the Honduras Supreme Court is paid US$1,197 per month. Supreme Court Justices are paid US$845 per month. A judge of letters (equal to a District Federal Court Judge) gets US$1,038 per month, and fiscals (equivalent to a government prosecutor) take home US$538 each month. Other elective and appointive officials' salaries are equally penurious.

To compensate for these starvation-level salaries, all elected and most appointed office-holders are covered under a blanket of constitutional immunity for the full range of both civil and criminal wrongdoing. The message here can hardly be missed: To live decently, a Honduras official of any grade, is expected to augment his or her official salary with "tips", bribes, or outright thievery. By conferring legal immunity on him or her, bribe-taking, forging official documents, etc., present golden opportunities for illicit enrichment, but without the reciprocal threat of fines, imprisonment, and other legal penalties that regularly punish breach of public trust in more law-abiding venues.

Honduras officials are above the laws of the land that ostensibly apply to everyone else. Small wonder that such poor paying political positions are in such great demand at election time! Basic salary is not important when a government job comes with a built-in license to steal.

How can any reasonable person expect public officials to remain honest and functionally circumspect, in the face of such powerful inducements to corruption, and all without personal risk?

This combination of criminal incentives and legal protections add up to the reasons that this reporter has declared, "Other Latin American countries have corruption in their political systems. In Honduras, corruption IS THE SYSTEM."

With this as a background, one must wonder about what kind of lures President Carlos Roberto Flores and his cabinet ministers hope to dangle in front of either lenders or investors. Without a reputation for honesty, reliability and fair performance on prior obligations -- and lacking an honorable judicial system to act as a trustworthy referee between commercial interests, why would any sensible person or institution consider undertaking any kind of financial commitments in Honduras? Except perhaps in the name of sweet charity, itself?

Before going out on his quest for some really big money, El Presidente, should be giving serious thought to cleaning up the sovereign act. A high degree of commercial confidence must exist on the part of those whose investments Honduras so desperately needs, in order to catch up with the rest of the world. The bitter truth is that Honduras has, long since, depleted its national and commercial credibility. As a sovereign nation, Honduras has repeatedly shown its erstwhile friends and neighbors that it neither respects nor feels any pressing need to comply with the laws, protocols, domestic and international restraints, that circumscribe the behavior of reasonable people and civilized countries, everywhere.

There is, however, one law that Honduras cannot ignore. It's the law of diminishing returns. This immutable law is asserting itself in every facet of Honduras political, commercial, and private life. It's a sad and highly visible economic -- and human -- reality. And it's too bad!

But worse, infinitely worse, is the fact that those individuals prominently positioned in the ranks of national leadership don't seem to care enough for Honduras, or its future, to get serious about leading the way out of dead-end social and economic oblivion.

Does global mean good?
Many economic experts in the world today are expounding the theory of globalization.

The same theory provides the rational for a numerous economic agreements and proposals. Honduras, it is said, should join forces with El Salvador and Guatemala forming a northern triangle that should then annex itself to Mexico. Then, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama will be forced to unite with this bloc and once this has been accomplished, the Mexican-Central American strip will join forces with other Caribbean nations and we will enter the great North American market. South America will then be easier to dominate, as they will be forced to sell to us at prices controlled in the north.

After establishing this American Chain, the European Union will send their representatives; then will come the Asians, and last the Africans. This means we will all become part of the global market.

What it is not clear is whether the gains will come from the process of globalization, or from the act of waiting for the realization to be brought about, or from our own expectations of what globalization will bring. To explain myself better, we could develop a theory about the dynamics of waiting or expectation. While globalization is being accomplished, merchants come to feel new economic pressures, are forced into a uniformity of product and a conformity to either existing or anticipated market forces. All this can take place simply from the anxiety or having to compete in the new situation, regardless of the realities, and the economic results cannot be predicted.

No, we are not opposed to globalization, but the problem is that we are disadvantaged in a global economy because we have so few products to sell, and what we do have such as bananas and coffee are regulated by prices imposed by multi-national companies and the international commodities market. In other words, our country is regulated by international demand. Will these companies globalize the prices of our production?

Further, we should ask ourselves if globalization is obligatory. The answer to this question gets very complicated. Without a doubt globalization was spread by word of mouth until reaching universities and other centers of information and opinion. What is a fact is the humans of this galaxy want something less complicated and intricate than this sophisticated and high-powered system. These wants are basically three meals a day, a roof over their heads, and clothing and education for their children. Will globalization meet these needs?