A New York Times article indicates an outsized role of U.S. forces in Honduras, but does not utilize relevant information from previous reports; progressive news and commentary highlight the alarming decline of Honduran sovereignty. 

In response to Venezuela opposition candidate Henrique Capriles’s campaign rally on June 10, news outlets contrasted Capriles’s vigor with Hugo Chávez’s frailty, while conveying Venezuelans’ disgruntlement. So it came as no surprise that just one day later, the U.S. press reported that Chávez’s own rally to officially inaugurate his presidential campaign attracted a crowd an entire order of magnitude smaller than that of Capriles.

Activists protested outside a May 7 event held by the Congressional Hispanic Leadership Institute to celebrate illegitimate Honduran leader Porfirio Lobo. As a result, EFE, a major Spanish news agency, filed a story on the gala with the headline (translated from Spanish): “Lobo seeks greater backing in the U.S., while activists organize protest.”

It's obvious that the U.S. government has set the agenda for The New York Times’ coverage of Honduras. As a likely result of the State Department’s relative silence on the ongoing human rights crisis in that country, The Times has deprived its readers of crucial news that could have provided some context for a recent U.S.-Honduras drug raid that likely killed innocent civilians.