From: brian@coombs.anu.edu.au (Brian)
Subject: Re: The Crimes of Nicaragua: Ending "Systematic Repression"
Organization: Computer Services Centre, Australian National University
Date:  1 Oct 92 05:02:03 GMT

jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy) writes:

>In article <brian.717809668@coombs> brian@coombs.anu.edu.au (Brian) writes:

>   jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy) writes:

>   >In article <rich.717533326@pencil> rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel) writes:

>   >   In <1992Sep22.220907.27779@oracle.us.oracle.com> mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman) writes:
>   >   >Nope.  The Sandinistas were not elected.  Moreover, when they were
>   >   >finally forced to have an election they lost.

>   >   What bullshit.  Why don't you read a book about it before you show off
>   >   your ignorance.

>   >   Rich

>   >I did read a book about it, and while Michael Friedman oversimplifies
>   >a bit, he is substantially correct. 

>		John, is one book your idea of research?  I'm
>     surprised that someone who is so willing to push the
>     complexities of mathematics on the net (in your signature)
>     is willing to accept such a simplistic explanation of what
>     occurred in Nicaragua.  You seem, in this statement to be
>     completely dismissive of the role that your own government
>     played in what occurred in Nicaragua.  Could if be that you
>     are in fact in favour of paternalistic imperialism (either
>     overt or covert) and refuse to accept the idea that the
>     Nicaraguan people themselves possess the ability to make
>     decisions for themselves WRT to what form of government that
>     they want.  Is that the impression that you are trying to
>     give?

>   >					 Moreover, the Sandinistas still
>   >don't recognize the right of the elected government to dismantle their
>   >army.

>	   There army or the "peoples' army" which could be said to be the only
>   thing which is standing between them and a return to the old oligarch



>1. Rich only asked me to read one book.


	"One book" or "a book".  However, let us not split hairs about differing
interpretation of language.  Instead perhaps we should address that you are the
one who keeps asking others to do his reasearch for him when someone points
out the fallacy of your position.  Funny that, now isn't it? 

>2. As I recall, you didn't even read that book, "Blood of Brothers"
>by Stephen Kinzer, when I sent it to you.

	One week, in a very busy period is not enough to allow me to read
a book.  As I said and explained at the time, I'd have liked longer to read
it but you were returning to the US.  However, going by what I did read in
it whilst flicking through it, it simply reinforced my view that the Sandinista
were no where as bad as what had preceeded them.  However, instead of seeing
that you seemed to have zeroed in on the view that the Sandinista were the
biggest monsters Latin America had ever seen, which reinforced your view of
how you were predisposed to see the Sandinista.  

>3. The book did deal with the role of the U.S. Government, but it
>also dealt with the Sandinista oppressiveness.  Kinzer had been
>pretty much a supporter of the Sandinistas when he went to Nicaragua
>as the _New York Times_ correspondent, and he was the man who
>found the Contra camps in Honduras that the U.S. and Honduras were
>trying to hide.


	So?  I've never denied that the Sandinistas couldn't be heavy-handed
at the worst possible time John.  However, again they never committed the same
systematic TERRORISM that the Contras did, in order to gain the support of the
Nicaraguan people, now did they?
	In addition whilst Kinzer might have written about the "role of
the US government"(tm), its something that you seem to gloss over whenever
_you_ write about the Sandinistas John.  Insteresting that, now isn't it? 

>4. Anyone with an army can say anything about what that army is for.
>However, democracy does involve the control of the armed forces by
>the winner of the elections.

	In a _stable_ democratic state, yes, I'd agree with you.  However,
a _transistional_ democratic state like Nicaragua, you have to expect some
degree of mistrust between different groups.  Tell me John, if you were
a Nicaraguan who had fought in the revolution and the contra war and had
supported the Sandinistas the whole time (and I know I'm asking the difficult
from you to put yourself in someone else's shoes for a moment) would you
trust a government which had been elected under duress and which contained
the same old Somozists, mouthing the same old tired promises about their
"respect" for the principles of democracy? 


>5. My signature doesn't refer to higher mathematics.  The arithmetic
>I mean is that which, for example, enables one to go from the amount
>of megawatts produced by windmills to the fraction of American electricity
>requirements they produce.  In a speech urging his fellow engineers to
>get into politics, John Sununu said, "Congress needs more people who
>know the difference between a million and a billion."

	But do Americans know the difference between a thousand million and
a billion John?


--
Brian Ross____________________________________________________________________
	"If this is the revolution, why are the drinks so fucking expensive?"
		- unsigned Graphitto, Paris, 1968
______________________________________________________________________________