U.S. Terror In Nicaragua

Very typical article - bashing the leader of a non-compliant country as 'totalitarian' for the entire first half, and then allowing us the know why it's all made up:

Leftwingers flocked from all over the world to help harvest coffee, build schools and be inspired by a government that promoted women's rights, literacy and social justice. Events turned when the Reagan administration, alarmed by Managua's tilt to Moscow, sponsored a bloody and ruinous insurrection by Contra rebels which ended in stalemate. For many it was an immoral and illegal intervention by an overweening superpower, a harbinger of today's Iraq. The Sandinistas' credibility was damaged by presiding over hyperinflation and a draft. Exhausted voters, fearing fresh US-backed mayhem, ousted them in a 1990 election, a shocking, unexpected result which reduced many to tears. The revolution was over.

So, the electorate was terrorized by U.S. sponsored Contras so much that they finally relented and voted for the U.S. candidate. They knew that if they voted for their own guy again - Ortega - they'd suffer years more of murder and terror on a massive scale. Reagan was a good guy.

Still, the article is completely absurd -- it talks in once sentence as if the U.S. backed nationwide terror, and in the next sentence as if there was no such thing. Bizarre, but that's the standard:

Three centre-right governments ruled from 1990 to 2006. The economy stabilised, combatants were demobilised and democracy took root. But corruption blossomed and the poor were forgotten. Jobs were scarce and most people scrabbled on less than $2 a day. Ortega lost consecutive presidential elections and was accused of raping his stepdaughter, Zoilamérica Narváez, since she was 11. He denied it and no trial took place because a court decided the statute of limitations applied. But his reputation was shredded, although Murillo stood by her husband.

Um, isn't that the whole point -- to appoint right-wing governments? The combatants - the terrorist Contras - we demobilised because the U.S. didn't need them to terrorize the population anymore. That the poor were forgotten was the predictable and necessary outcome of the election of a U.S. candidate - what would be the point of the invasion-by-terror otherwise?

The 'article,' of course, is unsigned, and it uses unnamed 'western officials' to bash the new lefty govenrment. We're allowed another sliver of truth in the parting sentence:

Kaufman will not turn his back on the flawed Second Coming of the Sandinistas. "Do we think [it] is better than another rightwing, neoliberal government beholden to US masters? Absolutely."

It's totally crazy. We need a people-fueled international newspaper with real resources. Indymedia is great, but it'd be better to have people getting paid so they can eat and take the time necessary to do the best work.