2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Okay Here it Is. The whole interview with Bernie about Latin America. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED [View all]CajunBlazer
(5,648 posts)Check out the Wikipedia entry "Sandinista National Liberation Front". You will find it is a well balanced account of the history of SNLF. It also points out the organization's attempts to improve the lives of the Nicaraguan people. However, I listened to Sanders' entire account of his trips to Nicaragua and Cuba and he spoke only in glowing terms of both governments, dismissing their murders and suppression of the rights of the own people by saying that they had their problems. Such a one sided account was an attempt of a young socialist to defend tyrannical socialist governments.
Everyone is aware of the situation in the 1980's in Cuba. If you are unsure of dark nature of the SNLF read the section of the Wikipedia article which I provided above at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandinista_National_Liberation_Front:
Specifically read these two sections:
7 Human rights violations by the Sandinistas
8 US government allegations of support for foreign rebels
I am certainly not going to defend the Reagan administration's attempts overthrow the Sandinista government which was certainly no worse that the right wing dictatorship that they replaced. And the Iran/Contra affair was one of the worst stains on our history. But Sanders' account of his observations of the SNLA and Castro's government were at the time at best naive and at worst disingenuous. I tend to think the was naive because they obviously showed him only what they wanted him to see, but he became their propaganda tool.
Regardless, his failure to disavow or at least explain those remarks during the debate will be taken as a direct insult to Cuban Americans and many immigrants from South American who fled from the brutality of socialist governments in their native countries. I don't need to remind you that we need the Hispanic vote to win the White House. That failure not only damaged Sanders' campaign, but also our chances of winning the general election if he manages to win the nomination.