Mexico City — When people say “Latin America,” they mean different things. Mainly they mean the 30 or so countries that stretch from Mexico down to Tierra del Fuego — not forgetting assorted islands in the Caribbean. In Latin America, there is a great political variety. Consider two neighbors in Central America: Costa Rica and Nicaragua. The former has long been a model of democracy, pretty much; the latter is an outright totalitarian state. Some 300,000 Nicaraguans have crossed the border into Costa Rica for refuge.
Nicaragua’s dictator, Daniel Ortega, has abolished civil society and independent media. He has made good on Mussolini’s slogan “All within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.” He is backed to the hilt by Russia, China, and Cuba — also Iran, North Korea, etc. Recently, he changed the constitution to make his wife, Rosario Murillo, “co-president” with him. They are not unlike Nicolae and Elena Ceaușescu in Communist Romania.
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