He writes that “Ortega’s landslide victory was never in doubt,” becaus...
Citations (1)
- Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media whole source · open book
He writes that “Ortega’s landslide victory was never in doubt,” because “the opposition was splintered” (and, as he fails to observe, had no popular base, in contrast to the well-organized Sandinista party), and “because the Sandinistas controlled the electoral machinery.” Neither he nor anyone else has offered a particle of evidence that Sandinista control over the electoral machinery made the elections a sham, or to contest the conclusion of the LASA delegation that “the FSLN did little more to take advantage of its incumbency than incumbent parties everywhere (including the United States) routinely do.” A few days earlier, Kinzer had quoted Arturo Cruz as observing that the Sandinistas deserve credit for having overthrown Somoza and “having broken barriers in Nicaragua that had to be broken, and that is irreversible,” because “the Sandinistas were working in the catacombs while we in the traditional opposition were out of touch with the rising expectations of the masses.” As Kinzer knows, but will not write, the same was true at the time of the 1984 elections, which is why the Sandinista victory was never in doubt.
chapter: 3 Legitimizing versus Meaningless Third World Elections: El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua