The end goal is not to get Zelaya back into power, but rather to get the country back on proper democratic footing. Neither he nor the interim government seem to care more about that goal than their short-term political interests. Zelaya refused to give the interim government ministers because they wouldn't reinstate him, so the interim government went ahead and formed a government without Zelaya's ministers and therefore the US brokered compromise collapsed. And frankly, the US has limited influence in this arena; you complain about how we trounce around and inappropriately interfere in everyone else's business, but suddenly it is our duty to sort out Honduras. The end of the "American empire" literally entails that we limit our actions in this kind of scenario and let other countries sort their own political messes out. More often than not, when a foreign power gets heavily involved it does so to the detriment of its own reputation and even fortune. So we have kept our distance from it and simply tried to be a good arbitrator. It isn't our problem to solve, it is theirs. If the press is allowed to be free and left leaning candidates are allowed to run then the mess is over with if the elections are fair, regardless of what happened to Zelaya. The chief end of those involved in this, which involves the US at the world's behest, should be to clean up the mess and that is it. The left will know better than to defy the constitution by seeking to rule as a man rather than a party or coalition, and the military and supreme court will thereby lack an excuse to do what it did again. If the elections do turn out as I said above, then we should recognize the government. If they don't, then we shouldn't recognize it.

Where, exactly, do Wayne Madsen's ultimate national loyalties reside? With the United States of America? Or elsewhere?