Reagan was right about Daniel Ortega all along (Jon Miltimore, July 25, 2026, Restoring America)
Ortega, the son of a shoemaker, first came to power in 1979 after dropping out of law school to join the Sandinista National Liberation Front, a socialist revolutionary movement. He became an unapologetic disciple not just of Karl Marx but also of Vladimir Lenin, the Bolshevik revolutionary who brought terror as well as revolution to Russia.
“I admire Marx, I respect Marx, as I also admire and respect Lenin,” Ortega told the Los Angeles Times in the 1980s.Like the Bolsheviks, Ortega had little hesitation about expropriating private property, helping himself to the luxurious mansion of a wealthy banker. Throughout the 1980s, Ortega implemented a familiar socialist playbook: nationalizing industries, redistributing wealth, and radically reallocating land, all while enjoying the spoils of what capitalists had built.
President Ronald Reagan famously dismissed Ortega as a “dictator in designer glasses.” Yet many argued Ortega was a reformer disinterested in personal power.
The desire to accommodate remnants of prior regimes–particularly the army and judges–is admirable, but disastrous.