From: harelb@math.cornell.edu (misc.activism.progressive co-moderator)
Subject: INTERNATIONAL BEHAVIOR: Was Nicaragua More Democratic than the U.S.?
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: daemon@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: misc.activism.progressive on UseNet ; ACTIV-L@UMCVMB
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 11:00:21 GMT

INTERNATIONAL BEHAVIOR: Was Nicaragua More Democratic than the U.S.?

    "To be sure, there is plenty of terrorism going on in Nicaragua and
    plenty being exported to other countries in Central America, but
    it is conducted by contra mercenaries and Honduran, Guatemalan,
    and Salvadoran death squads and military, all financed and advised
    by the U.S."
 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[From:
       ========================================================
       I s   N i c a r a g u a   M o r e   D e m o c r a t i c
       ========================================================
            T h a n   t h e   U n i t e d   S t a t e s ?
       ========================================================
                        By Michael Parenti (*)

[From: Covert Action Information Bulletin, Number 26, Summer 1986]]


======================
International Behavior
======================

Finally, in comparing Nicaragua with the United States. we might
consider the degree to which each country is interfering with the
political development and security of the other. As Reagan himself
aptly put it: "Democracies do not spend a lot of money on arms, build
large armies or invade or destabilize their neighbors." With typical

    [The World Court (quote availalbe by email) ruled the "export of
    revolution" was a sham; as Chomsky pointed out from the outset,
    however, this is hardly to say that *had* the Sandinistas chosen
    to send arms to (what, today, is far more widely admitted)
    peasants who have taken up arms, having been forced to by state
    violence [see former U.S. ambassador White's remarks in FMLN
    BACKGRND with GET] against a government employing the "`Death
    Squad' Strategy" [-- Amensty International] against them, as if
    that would have been something at all damnable in the first place
    (of course, *had* the Sandinistas *done*, something else, which
    *was* damnable, this would not justify state terrorism against
    Nicaraguan civlians, as this series documented) --HB]

Orwellian inversion he was aiming this remark at Nicaragua but it
applies most perfectly to his own administration, which spends more
money on arms and more time destabilizing and invading neighbors than
we could ever imagine Nicaragua doing. The truth is also inverted when
Reagan calls the Sandinistas "terrorists." To be sure, there is plenty
of terrorism going on in Nicaragua and plenty being exported to other
countries in Central America, but it is conducted by contra
mercenaries and Honduran, Guatemalan, and Salvadoran death squads and
military, all financed and advised by the U.S.

        [For a comparison of human rights records, use GET with      ]
        [FSLN H-RIGHTS or  LAT-AMER HMNRTS90 ; for an introduction to]
        [the meaning of a "death-squad state, see AI_REPT ELSALV for ]
        [what Amnesty International has to say about El Salvador     ]

Those "democratic socialist" critics on the left, who give qualified
and skittish support to Nicaragua, who are quick to point out how they
have "problems" with some of the things the Sandinistas are doing, who
impose flawless democratic standards upon a tiny country that is under
mortal siege from the Yankee Colossus, those critics might want to
consider the realities of the situation. It is the United States which
should be the object of their professedly democratic concerns; it is
the U.S. which falls so dismally short of practicing the democratic
pluralism it preaches to others, exporting violence and terrorism and
pummeling a smaller neighbor that is trying to develop a democratic
society of its own.

If one criterion of democracy is that a country not act like a thug
and aggressor in its dealings with another country even to the point
of refusing to show up in (World) Court to defend itself when so
charged -- then United States under Reagan comes off looking tar less
fair, less open, and less democratic than Nicaragua.

--Michael Parenti

[Email harelb@math.cornell.edu for a list of audio and video cassettes
of Michael Parenti lectures]

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
   -->  [Send the 1-line message GET FAIRNESS NICA-USA ACTIV-L to]
        [LISTSERV@MIZZOU1.BITNET for a copy of this file.         ]

   -->  [Send GET ACTIV-L ARCHIVE ACTIV-L to above address for a ]
        [listing with brief descriptions of other files available]

        [To get a file named FILE NAME from the archiver (files are ]
        [two words  separated by a space), send the 1-line message: ]

   -->  GET FILE NAME ACTIV-L

        to: LISTSERV@MIZZOU1.BITNET [or: LISTSERV@MIZZOU1.MISSOURI.EDU]
 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive