I just got back from spending a month in Nicaragua with my school working with local NGO's and living in families and all sorts of other cool stuff.

Needless to say the experience really struck me and I found the country, it's history and politics fascinating.

So I started a thread in hopes of discussing the country and hearing what experiences or observations others might have.

In the very recent municipal elections which occured across the country the Sandinistas took control of almost all the large cities and a majority of municipalities.

Seems like there's some potential for a serious comeback over the corrupt Liberales and the current president's fledgling party, APRE.

With Ortega or without? Can they win with him? Should the Leadership change? Can the Sandinistas withstand the inevitable US interference? The US is concerned enough they've already dispatched advisors to the Liberals and Bolanos (current prez).

I didn't go.

Also here's a recent but depressing dinner conversation with Fr. Ernesto Cardenal, perhaps the most respected leader of the Sandinista movement.

Perhaps the Pentagon putting the "Salvador Option" back on the table for Iraq will revive dark memories of how hope there was not just killed as put by William Blum, but raped, tortured, mutilated, and brutally murdered in the killing fields of Central America. This should be a shocking reminder for everyone with memories of that period that US policy remains fixed on building ever more charnel houses across the world.

I have the impression it was much more than just "an extension"

Isn't there a World Court judgement against the USA (which it ignored of course) in relation to Nicaragua?

So it is hardly surprising that the impression I got of Sandinista chances in 2006's national elections was extremely positive.

I think the most honest idea we got was from Carlos Chammoro, son of a murdered anti-Somoza journalist and icon of the revolution named Pedro Chammoro. He was a longtime Sandinista leader and editor of their paper "Barricada" as well as leader of the 1990 campaign against his mother, Violetta Chammoro, for president.

He felt that if the right split between the Liberals, exposed as corrupt and supporting their jailed leader Arnoldo Aleman, and other parts of the right such as Current president Carlos Bolanos and other dissident Liberals the Sandinistas would win easily. If the right unites he felt Ortega could not win the election and that a new leader, like the wildly popular mayor of Managua, was neccessary. He also felt that this could not happen because of Ortega's hold on power within the party.