Say Uncle, Says Reagan

For months, if not years, he has fairly itched to come out and say it, and last week he almost did. Asked at a nationally televised news conference if he wanted to "remove the Sandinista government in Nicaragua," President Reagan replied, "Well, remove it in the sense of its present structure," which he described scornfully as "a Communist totalitarian state" and "not a government chosen by the people."

Seeing that Reagan was on the verge of a startling policy pronouncement, the reporters asked four more times whether he wanted to topple the Sandinistas. < But now the President bobbed and weaved,...