Ortega: the anti-democratic option

One important difference between the Sandinista candidate Daniel Ortega and his rivals, is that he did not want a second round run-off election that would have given Nicaragua a president with majority support -- very important in a country as divided as Nicaragua is.

The manipulation of the election law between Aleman and Ortega made it possible for the Sandinistas to take power in the 2006 election even though a majority of the people opposed them.

Of course, all the 2006 polling data shows that there still would have been a run-off -- and Ortega would have been defeated, again -- if it were not for the tragic fact that a rival candidate, the very popular former mayor of Managua and ex-Sandinistas Herty Lewites died four months before the election. His immediate cause of death was cardiac arrest -- his heart stopped -- which can occur either by natural causes or can be readily induced. Some people continue to speculate on whether he might have been murdered, especially as he had warned in the press earlier in the year that Ortega might have him killed.

One commenter to this blog, with a very militant tone, gives data regarding the 1984 election won by Ortega, which only supports the point that the anti-Ortega vote hit an all time high 22 years later in 2006. Of course, he omits the detail that the leading opposition groups boycotted the 1984 election.

Has anyone else noticed that there is a large brigade of self-proclaimed progressives who have a great fondness for corrupt and militaristic regimes, just as long as they position themselves on the "Left"?