Nicaragua, Ortega and US Government Hypocrisy

It's back to the future in Nicaragua:

Daniel Ortega wins Nicaragua presidency
By TRACI CARL, Associated Press Writer

MANAGUA, Nicaragua - Former Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega appeared headed for victory Monday in his longtime quest to regain power, 16 years after a U.S.-backed rebellion helped drive the former Marxist revolutionary from office. Early results from Sunday's presidential election gave the Sandinista leader a strong lead over his four rivals. His victory, if confirmed by final results, would expand the club of leftist Latin rulers led by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who has tried to help his ally by shipping cheap oil to the energy-starved nation.

Ortega, who led Nicaragua from 1985-1990, has repeatedly said he is not the Marxist revolutionary who fought U.S.-backed Contra rebels, a war that left 30,000 dead and the economy in shambles.

But while he has toned down his leftist rhetoric and pledged to continue free-trade policies, the United States remains openly wary of its former Cold War foe. Washington has threatened to withhold aid to the nation, fearing a return to the socialist economic policies of the 1980s.

The race has generated intense international interest, including a visit by Oliver North, the former White House aide at the heart of the Iran-Contra controversy. That effort to oust Ortega's Moscow-leaning Sandinista regime created a huge scandal in the United States when it became known that Washington secretly sold arms to Iran and used the money to fund and arm the Contra operation.

With 15 percent of polling stations counted, Ortega had 40 percent of Sunday's vote, compared with 33 percent for his closest challenger, the wealthy banker Eduardo Montealegre....

[Snip]

Ortega's supporters flooded the streets, setting off celebratory fireworks, waving the party's red-and-black flag and swaying to the candidate's campaign song, set to the tune of John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance."

The U.S. Embassy said it was too soon to "make an overall judgment on the fairness and transparency of the process..."

Here are the things that strike about this story. The following quote, for instance:

We are receiving reports of some anomalies in the electoral process, including polling stations that opened late and closed early, the [US] embassy said.

Oh, henny-penny! Heaven forbid! So, if these anomalies happen in US elections it's no big deal at all. No threat to democracy or anything. Long lines and late opening polls are all just a natural part of democracy and freedom, you know. Any suggestion to the contrary is a crazy conspiracy theory! But in Nicaragua the exact same thing is an indication of fraud according to the US govt. Imagine that!

I suppose it's important to note that Ortega's party is NOT the ruling party in Nicaragua at this time. Nicaragua's current government is controlled by Ortega's opposition. Now why would THEY, of all people, rig an election for Ortega?

OK, then there's this:

At stake are millions of dollars in potential investments, many from foreign companies drawn to Nicaragua by its cheap labor, low crime rates and decision to join the new Central American Free Trade Agreement"

Please take the time to see The Corporation. I'm watching it now (yet again). It covers all this kind of stuff. Apparently these are the only things some people care about.

This news item touches on Daniel Ortega's history as a communist leader, his seizure of property and so forth. So, many Americans may wonder how such a person, with such a background can retain so much political popularity? I'd like to suggest a possible answer. Perhaps the alternatives, like the death squads that the opposition, with massive help from the US government, unleashed on the countryside had something to do with it.

The authors here go out of their way to give the impression that the civil war in Nicaragua was something Ortega alone brought to the country with his rule. But really all his regime did to start that war was to win an election. The US, either directly or indirectly, did the rest. Remember Iran-Contra? The Contras themselves? Those were our boys, so to speak. This story gives short shrift that fact, so I thought it was worth pointing out.

So, to summize, what Nicaraguans see on the one hand is this communist movement overthrowing a tyrranical, murderous US-supported regime like the Samoza dynasty . On the other hand they see the US government responding to this by helping to create, fund, train and assist death squads in the name of capitalism and "free trade". Now, years later, Ortega is back and "free trade" is again the issue. If you're an everyday Nicaraguan, who looks like a bad guy in this context?

The ugly truth is that our government's policies that promote strict, laissez faire, "free market" capitalism at the point of a gun (or missile, or rocket, or cluster bomb) and insist on its implementation as an exploitative rape of a nation's people and resources, promoting ideologies that exhault profit above human lives, are the biggest recruiting pitch the socialist/communist set could ever have. That's why you see all these socialist and semi-socialist movements making a comeback in Latin America. We, by our policies, make capitalism look like the big, bad wolf to the impovershed people of the world. What's worse, in all honesty, is that in it's current form, the way we push it to the "third world"... it is.

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So now we all agree now, right?

I have watched with great amusement the recent parade of neo-conservative pundits and politicos across my television screen denouncing Bush and Rumsfeld for their "incompetence" in handling the war. Here we have nearly the entire body of the neo-con movement stumbling over themselves to hold a televised John Kerry-alike contest. Watching people Andrew Sullivan and Richard Pearl attack Bush's Iraq War policy is something akin to watching the flying monkeys attack the Wicked Witch of the West. A lot of liberals seem to be taking a false sense of comfort in this development.

But is this latest trend really a vindication of the "incompetence" argument as a winning political position? Of course, complaints about the Bush Administration's incompetence are manifestly true and certainly deserve examination but is it all there is?

On the surface it may appear to some that this flip-flop on the part of the neo-cons represents some kind of mea culpa or an acknowledgement that there was something wrong with the war itself. But that's not really what's happening here. Instead, what I think this spectacle does is bring into sharp relief the weakness of the "incompetence" argument advanced by many Iraq War opponents. That weakness lies in the calculated, weak-kneed decision on the part of the some of the Democratic leadership to frame the debate around the "incompetence" of the conduct of the war instead of the the real issue -- the wisdom, necessity and morality (the lack thereof) of the war to begin with.

Focusing on the competence issue to the exclusion of the greater issues concerning the morality gap, the wisdom gap and the necessity gap of this war comes with a heavy price that we see being exacted today. It comes with the implication that we all agree the war was the right thing to do. It suggests that the only remaining question is how to go about fighting it. Because of that this tact is just fine by the neo-cons. It represents an unwarranted and unforgivable surrender of the debate by the so-called opposition party, providing an easy-access political escape hatch for everyone involved.

"It's not the war that's wrong, it's the handling of it that was wrong," they can say.

So, with the Bush administration's political ship, as represented by poll numbers, sinking like a lead balloon, the main cheerleaders for this war are free to abandon ship, attach themselves to another vessel and pursue of the exact same agenda. That is what is happening now.

In the meantime, because so many Democrats have chosen to fight this battle on the on the grounds that the is simply a question of incompetence, ignoring the immoral, unnecessary and foolish aspects of it, they find themselves without a retort as these right-wingers gleefully usurp their argument completely, pretzelize it beyond all recognition and use it to promote the very agenda it was supposed to speak against.

So it goes that the neo-cons will come to say: "So, we're all agreement then, right? Great! On to Iran!"

The Lesson: You can not attempt to win a debate by conceding your strongest points at the very outset. The Dems who poo-pooed their anti-war constituents as "out of the mainstream" are now having their traingulating asses handed to them in the grand scheme of things. The sheer volume of Bush/GOP crimes may yet allow them to win control of the congress (we can only hope). But their own refusal to be a true opposition continues to hamper their progress on the major issues and enables, even excuses, the high crimes and misdemeanors of the Bush administration.

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Back Down to Earth

I really enjoyed this little baseball-induced hiatus, I must tell you. Watching my favorite boys of summer throw a big pie in the faces of all the supposed experts was very, very satisfying. Watching Jeff Weaver's moment in the sun, shutting down his old team to deny them the World Series title they seemingly felt entitled to was absolutely priceless. Yes, I enjoyed this quite a bit.

After having spent the past month in ostrich mode, burying my head in the sand of the baseball playoffs and pretending that our nation wasn't being transformed for the worse and the scary around me, I've come to a better understanding why a lot of people live their entire lives this way. It's just plain easier on the nerves. It's easier to submerge yourself into your own life, your own interests, family and problems and not let all the external ugliness bother you than to worry about events out of your personal control. Life is short, right? There's enough stress to go around without going out looking for more of it. This was the most relaxing and soothing month for me mentally because of that. It helps to unplug from all the ugliness we're seeing in the world and in our government and rejuvenate one's self. This month really drove that point home for me.

But guess what? We can't afford the luxury, folks. Not for long we can't.

Someone once said "May you live in interesting times," or something to that effect. I had always taken that saying as a kind of toast, wishing for excitement and dynamism in your life. I'd never considered it's darker implications and the reason I hadn't, I think, is because until recently I didn't consider the times we live in to be particularly interesting. Well, lo and behold, we are indeed living in interesting times today and now that they're here I feel forced to reconsider the whether that seemingly harmless wish was a toast. When you look back through history the most interesting times to read about are the ones of great suffering for the people who lived through them. They're engrossing and entertaining for the reader, no doubt, but hell on wheels for the actual participants. So this wish is actually a curse.

We as a nation, as a generation, are experiencing the beginning of our own "interesting" time and it is being ushered in with our own unwitting, blissfully ignorant consent. We cannot allow this to continue. We do so at our own peril So, I for one am coming down off my high and delving back into this darkness.

Don't misunderstand me. I know I'm a political, social and intellecutal nobody in the grand scheme of things. I have virtually no readership or influence to do much of shit other than shake my fist at the wind. But I will shake this fist with everything I have and I will join with others who see and feel the same things I do. If that makes me less fun at parties then so be it. This exercise will at least reach the small group of people in my own circle and, if nothing else, provide an outlet to express these concerns and preserve my sanity. Any additional benefits will be considered a bonus.

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One for the Other Thumb

2006 World Series Champions!




Tigers - 2
Cards - 4 FINAL
St. Louis WINS 2006 World Series 4-1

The St. Louis Cardinals wrapped up their National League best 10th World Series title tonight with lights-out pitching, 2-out hitting and the federally-mandated throwing error by a Tiger pitcher.


The Real Story

How WRONG were all the experts? The word at the outset of this series was "Tigers in 3". The Cardinals were cast as a weak pitching team with a one-man offensive show, an injured group of core players and a shaky bullpen. They would wilt under the Tiger assault according to conventional "wisdom".


A funny thing happened on the way to the Tiger coronation.

As I mentioned before this series began, this series came down to a battle of nerves and the team with the nerve to stare into the face of World Series pressure without flinching would prevail. The deciding factor was the Cardinals' experience. In 2004 a far more loaded 105-win Cardinal team experienced the worst of World Series collapses vs Boston. They'd suffered through it, survived it and made it back to the show in 2006. They were the tougher team mentally because of it.


Dream Weaver

Jeff Weaver is born-again hard. This is not the same guy I saw pitch for the Dodgers against the Cardinals in the 2004 NLDS and literally melt down under the pressure. This Jeff Weaver could watch Chris Duncan make two potentially fatal Curly Joe plays in right field -- plays that would have broken the old Jeff Weaver -- shake it off, bear down and get out of the inning with the lead and eventually the win. That was pitching. That was will. Check out the line:

8 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 9 K

Carpenteresque. Great job by a much-maligned man on a mission to stick it to the team that bad-mouthed him for years. Congratulations to him.


Pressure cooker

A lot will be made of the Tigers many errors and lapses in the series. The 8 team errors, 5 by pitchers in each game, were unprecedented. But what must be remembered is that their errors were borne of the pressure the Cardinals put on them. Leadoff doubles, well-executed sacrifices, numerous situations with runners in scoring position, 2nd & 3rd, bases loaded with less than 2 outs, hard-hit balls and the stress of being shut down offensively combined to crack the Tigers' will and shake their confidence. There are no errant throws by pitchers without runners on base to press the issue. The Cards did all of this, mind you, with an uncharacteristically scant offensive contribution from the one-man gang, Albert Pujols. In this series, the Tigers thought they could win but the Cardinals knew they could. Experience and heart won out.


The Rundown

In Game #2 Anthony Reyes came out and showed that this Tiger line-up wasn't as scary as advertised. It could be pitched to. Reyes did just that stole home-field advantage from Detroit. Even in Game #2, the game the Cards lost, Weaver pitched well in defeat but was out-dueled by a red-hot Kenny Rogers, who'd apparently prepared for his start by hugging Tony Snow's tar baby.

Then came the lockdown. Chris Carpenter pitches brilliantly Game #3 and cruises to a 5-0 win to take command of the series. Jeff Suppan bends but doesn't break to keep the Cardinals close enough to take a come-from-behind win in Game #4, setting up Weaver's Game #5, series clinching masterpiece.

Go crazy, folks!

Game balls:

David Eckstien earned the series MVP award by turning up the heat in the last 3 games and stroking the big hits in prime time.

Yadier Molina for being "that guy", the "it" guy, coming from nowhere to perform as the Redbirds' most reliable hitter throughout the post-season. He takes his place among the great "it" guys of World Series history as noted in my previous post.

Adam Wainwright is a grown man. This kid wasn't even supposed to make the roster this year but he pitched his way into the bullpen and moved up the ladder all season long making great major league hitters look like head-slapping idiots repeatedly. The way he grew into the closer's role on an emergency basis was one of the most impressive transformations I've ever seen. What a starting rotation we'll have next year when this guy steps in with Reyes, Weaver, Carpenter and whichever veterans the Cardinals retain and/or acquire in the offseason. This experience will be invaluable.

Tony LaRussa actually earned the "genius" label this year. Towards the end of the year his every move came up roses.

The Bullpen emerged from the dead to pitch light's out ball for the entire postseason. Guys who looked shaky going to the playoffs showed up like seasoned veterans. In addition to Wainwright, Tyler Johnson, Josh Kinney, Randy Flores and Braden Looper came through with flying colors. Great job!

This one makes up for the 2004 October catastrophe. For me the 2004 season is finally over. After two consecutive season of being the best team in baseball only to be foiled by a wild card team the word was the Cards would fall short again. Their roughtly 290 wins over 3 season were to go to waste. But they got into the post-season with the worst record in the playoffs and won it all.

That's poetic.

It's just.

It's the 10th World Series title.

One for the other thumb.

Best Fan Sign: "Hit it to the pitcher!" LOL!

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Game 3 Underway

Chris Carpenter looks sharp early. Tiger fans overconfident. Good signs...

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Jeff Weaver Returns to Detroit

Tigers closer Todd Jones was kind enough to provide all the bulletin board material we could hope for:

"I am the wrong guy to ask about Jeff Weaver... I am not a big advocate of his, and I wasn't a big advocate of his when he was here... He was a good pitcher who never really panned out here. Maybe he found a home in St. Louis, but there's no love lost here [now] that he's gone."

Thanks, Todd.

Weaver for his part, when told of the comments during his press availability responded, "I've got nothing but good things to say about him."

Good answer. Play ball!

Game #2 will be soggy. Jeff Weaver is coming... NEXT!

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Reyes of Light

2006 World Series
Beertown vs Motown
The Drunk Driving Series
Game #1

Cards - 7
Tigers - 1 FINAL
Cardinals lead series 1-0

Wow, I stopped just short of calling the hell out of this one.

For those keeping score at home, THAT was the Anthony Reyes the Cardinals had tabbed as their top pitching prospect going into spring training. THAT was the Anthony Reyes who one-hit the White Sox and filled in so admirably early in the season. Strange delivery, goofy socks, flat-billed cap and nasty stuff. This experience is going to do wonders for this kid's confidence and helps set him up nicely to move into the rotation next season.

In other news, how long did anyone think Albert Pujols was going to go without driving in runs? Talk about a guy being due. Ditto Scott Rolen, helping the Cardinals bounce right back after Detroit took the early lead with that timely solo bomb in the 2nd. This was the St. Louis Cardinals of '04, '05 and the first half of '06. The imposters of August and September have vanished (thank goodness). Very exciting stuff.

Game #2 tomorrow: Jeff Weaver returns to Detroit...

Update 10/22/2006 6:11pm: I forgot to add, in my earlier post before this game I mentioned how I thought Game #1 could boil down to a contest of nerves. Well, in the first round the Tigers definitely looked like a nervous, rattled team. Maybe they'll shake it off in Game #2 but, either way, the difference in post-season experience showed in this game.

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Beertown vs Motown: The Drunk Driving Series

Every year there is a lame-0 mayoral or gubernatorial wager that is staged between the competing cities in major sports championships like the World Series. Another annual ritual is the naming of the series with something catchy symbolizing both cities. For example, the Mets and Yankees had the "Subway Series", the Cardinals and Royals had the "I-70 Series" and so forth. For this year's World Series I humbly suggest the moniker, "The Drunk Driving Series". To inaugurate it, we can have the Mayor of St. Louis can put up a cold one and Detroit's mayor can wager a Chrysler Pacifica.

They can partake of the spoils and hit the road...

...a winding mountain road...

...like the ones in the car commercials.

That sounds fair to me.

It's a rookie face-off tonight. Anthony Reyes of the Cardinals vs Justin Verlander of the Tigers. We all know what Verlander can do: 100+ MPH fastball, a change-up, good breaking curveball. Reyes doesn't come with that kind of heat but his change-up is nasty when it's on and he's shown himself to be a strikeout pitcher.

Reyes has been pitching the second half of this season with what is being called a "tired arm", but the good news for the Cardinals is that he's only pitched once this month. That outing in Game 4 of the NLCS was shaky. He struggled with his command. But he surrendered only two runs in just under 5 innings. It could be that the outing helped him shake the rust off after a long rest and he could be sharper today.

If that's the case and he shows up as the Anthony Reyes of the first half of the season he's capable of matching Verlander pitch-for-pitch. He pitched a one-hitter against a tough White Sox club in June but took the loss in tough luck, 1-0. If he turns in that kind of performance the game will come down to a battle of nerves between the two teams with the Cardinals holding the lion's share of postseason and World Series experience and a lot less of the pressure, being widely regarded as huge underdogs this time around.

I'm not predicting the upset in this game. Just don't be surprised if it happens.

Game #1 of the 2006 World Series is coming up... NEXT!

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Sup'd Up!

National League Championship Series:

Cards - 3
Mets - 1 FINAL
Cardinals win NLCS 4-3

What can I say about Jeff Suppan? The man is money in the postseason. I can forget about how he gets tagged in April, May and June. Come July, the man is on the money. By postseason he's incredible. They've got to re-sign this guy. Find a way to keep him around. A guy who pitches like this in the big time situations is priceless. He's the anti-Marquis.

From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Molina's lightning bolt against a drizzly Queens night stunned a crowd of 56,357 but didn't come in time to make a winning pitcher of series MVP Jeff Suppan for his seven-plus innings of two-hit ball. It didn't have to. Suppan already had established himself as an October rock by starting the Cardinals' third clinching victory in three years.

"I never thought I'd be in a situation like this," said Suppan, who has risen from an "innings eater" to a certified big-game pitcher in three years with this current team...

[Snip]

Suppan, a guy who reached the Cardinals via free agency three Decembers ago as a 62-75 pitcher, dueled for six innings with enigmatic lefthander Oliver Perez, a Pittsburgh Pirates castoff deemed too excitable and too much an injury risk to ever match his sizable potential.

The Mets reached him for a 1-0 lead with two outs in the first inning.

Beltran beat left fielder Preston Wilson's throw for a two-out double. Suppan then walked cleanup hitter Carlos Delgado for the first of three times before third baseman David Wright flared a single short of right fielder Juan Encarnacion.

The Cardinals' first chance came after Edmonds led off the second inning with a single. Advanced to third base by Molina's parachute single to left, Edmonds was in position to score when No. 8 hitter Ronnie Belliard perfectly executed a safety squeeze on a high fastball.

There the game froze as Suppan didn't allow another hit before being lifted in the eighth inning.

The Mets loaded the bases with one out in the sixth when Delgado walked, Rolen threw wildly into the first-base stands on Wright's ground ball and right fielder Shawn Green was walked intentionally.

Adopting a soft, softer, softest approach, Suppan struck out second baseman Jose Valentin as his velocity decelerated through the at-bat. Chavez, poised to join New York's line of October icons, instead ended the threat with a fly ball to center field.

Thursday's performance left Suppan with one run allowed in 15 innings this series. In five NLCS starts for the Cardinals, Suppan has allowed six earned runs in 32 innings for a 1.69 ERA.

Wow.

And then there's the poetic justice. This frozen moment:



Now, I ask you, what's better than that? Carlos Beltran has been killing us in the postseason for years now. It's like he's Godzilla and Cardinal pitching is Japan. I hated seeing him come to the plate in that situation but now, given the way it worked out, I'd wouldn't have had it any other way. That was PERFECT!

PS - Adam Wainwright is a beast.

PPS - And, like Jeff Suppan, Cards catcher Yadier Molina is the "It Guy". He's that guy, the one who comes from out of nowhere to dominate the postseason. Other "It Guys" from past years include Mark Lemke of the Atlanta Braves of the early '90s, Jim Leyritz of the San Diego Padres & NY Yankees in the mid-90s, Mickey Hatcher of the Los Angeles Dodger in 1988 and Billy Hatcher of the Cincinnati Reds in 1990.

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Good Carpenter, No Wood

Nuts!

Cards - 2
Mets - 4 FINAL

The Cardinals mostly got what they needed from their ace, Chris Carpenter, but were let down by their bats. Two wasted opportunities early sandwiched around a solo-shot by Jose Reyes to lead off the bottom of the first were the first several bad omens for the Cards. Carpenter left the game having surrendered only two runs but the Cardinals had none on the board despite putting runners in scoring position with less than 2 outs twice in the early innings. Having found ways not to score in those situation they found themselves pressing to compensate the rest of the way.

This was, without a doubt, the game the Cards wanted to win rather than extend it to a do-or-die Game 7 on the road. However, if I had to face a Game 7 I'd like to face it with the matchup we have tonight.

It'll be a tough game and Jeff Suppan tends to be less effective on the road. Still, in light of his late-season and post-season history, the Cardinals have to feel better about relying on him in this situation than the Mets feel about Oliver Perez. Despite the hype and his Game 4 win, Perez was not impressive in his first outing at the new Busch. He gave up 5 runs in just over 5 innings but benefited from the batting practice session tossed by some members of the Cards bullpen that day. His job was reduced to holding the Cardinals short of 12 runs which isn't exactly a high-standard.

Of course, because I said that, the bum will probably end up throwing a no-hitter... But I hope not.

Game 7 for the all the National League marbles... NEXT!

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