Obama's Cuban Speech

3 Historic Days!!

        President Barack Obama tonight ends his historic three-day trip to Cuba, the first by a sitting U. S. President since 1928. First off, he was awakened prior to daylight to be informed and updated about the deadly terrorist attacks at the airport and metro station in Brussels, Belgium. The rest of the day has been quite crowded for the President, highlighted by his major 50-minute speech at Havana's Grand Theater, which was filled and had Raul Castro looking on and occasionally clapping from a balcony. The speech was televised live by Cuban state television. At times President Obama's admonition to the Cuban people and references to the Cuban Revolution were tough, but fair and hopeful. He reiterated that Cuba's future should be determined by the Cuban people themselves, not the United States. He acknowledged that the U. S. embargo, in place since 1962, continues to harm everyday Cubans and he believes the U. S. Congress should end it, which both he and Cuba realize Congress will not do. Again he noted "the differences" the U. S. government has with the Cuban government while extolling the virtues of America's democracy and urging "young Cubans" to create an elective government.
          After his 10:00 A. M. speech, President Obama met with Cuban dissidents at the U. S. Embassy, which was reopened in Havana in 2015 for the first time since 1961. The President's last major appearance in Havana will take place at Latin American Stadium tonight when he watches an American Major League team, the Tampa Bay Rays, take on a Cuban national team. Then Air Force One flies him to Argentina.

       This Desmond Boylan/AP photo shows President Obama delivering his important speech today before a packed crowd at the Grand Theater in Havana with Raul Castro in attendance and with millions of Cubans watching on television. President Obama said: "I have come to bury the last remnant of the Cold War. It's time for us to leave the past behind." It was one of the best-written and best-delivered speeches of his career although he devoted the first of the 50-minutes to the latest terrorist attacks in Brussels, Belgium.

     Josefina Vidal, Cuba's Minister of North American Affairs and the island's top negotiator on all things related to the United States of America, was among the Cuban delegation that welcomed President Obama to Cuba Sunday afternoon. She earnestly appreciates his visit and his efforts to normalize relations with the island, which she considers "part-way there." She told CNN in a long interview, "We are neighbors. Although we might have profound differences, we have many values we share. It is beneficial for Cuba and the United States to have normal relations. Normal relations means you are ready to respect the other party's differences and have a peaceful co-existence."

  It was Josefina Vidal, in four high-profile diplomatic sessions with America's Roberta Jacobson, who hammered out remarkable advances in U.S.-Cuban relations, starting with her insistence that Cuba be removed from the U. S. list of Sponsors of Terrorism. After that, other overtures included the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington for the first time since 1961. Since then, President Obama has defied Miami Cubans and the U. S. Congress by greatly opening up travel and commerce with the island. Yet, Vidal says, "We are not there yet, not close, really. The continuation of the blockade from 1962 till today is a major blockage. The U. S. Congress still routinely funds regime-change schemes. The U. S. Congress still routinely funds and encourages dissidents in Cuba. The U. S. must be willing to discuss the return of Guantanamo Bay to Cuba. If those issues are addressed, we can normalize relations. If not, we can't. If a few hateful members of Congress can dictate an American Cuban policy that the entire rest of the world opposes, that is a problem for Cuba. But it is probably a bigger problem for America."

     Some journalists in America have provided Americans with fair and unbiased coverage of President Obama's trip to Cuba, but that is the exception and not the rule. Julie Pace of the Associated Press has filed the best reports from Havana this week. Ms. Pace began one dispatch with these words: "Stepping into history, President Obama opened an extraordinary visit to Cuba on Sunday, eager to push decades of acrimony deeper into the past and forge irreversible ties with America's former adversary." While most U. S. journalists adhere to the politically correct mantra of emphasizing the few U.S.-backed Cuban dissidents, competent reporters emphasize the opinions of everyday Cubans. Julie Pace interviewed Cubans like 79-year-old Odilia Collazo who told her, "Obama wanted to come to Cuba with all his heart. Let God will that this is good for the Cubans. It seems to me that Obama wants to do something good before he leaves office."

      Rich, powerful, and revengeful Cuban-Americans like Ted Cruz have, unfortunately, punished Cubans like 79-year-old Odilia Collazo all of her adult life. Cruz, a first-term Senator and leading right-wing Republican presidential contender, was asked by CNN's Wolf Blitzer about President Obama's Cuban trip. As usual, Cruz showed zero respect for the President and for the office of President. Blitzer asked Cruz about Obama's overtures to Cuba and about whether Congress should ease the embargo, follow Obama's lead regarding travel and commerce to and with the island, and maybe even discuss the return of Guantanamo Bay to Cuba. Using his best Harvard lawyer two-faced countenance {above}, Cruz, as always, answered each question from Blitzer with the cruel, nonsensical claim that "Obama is breaking federal law in dealing with Cuba." When he harps on the ease with which hard-line Cuban-Americans can punish Cubans on the island with whatever laws they want the U. S. Congress to mandate, Cruz is assuming that the American people are either too stupid or too intimidated to question whatever he says. The Founding Fathers instituted Checks-and-Balances within the fabric of their democracy, including Executive Privileges for Presidents that Obama has used more astutely and more decently than anyone to try to reign in the cruel assaults on innocent Cubans dictated in Congress by self-serving, Batistiano-like Cuban-Americans and their sycophants, such as Jesse Helms and Dan Burton of Helms-Burton fame.

      This photo of U. S. Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart in Miami is courtesy of Fox News. During Obama's trip to Cuba, Congressman Mario has been all over the cable networks and right-wing radio demeaning the President regarding anything that remotely bespeaks of helping Cubans on the island. Like Cruz, Congressman Mario's comments assume the American people are either too stupid or too intimidated to object...and, for sure, there are no broadcast journalists in the U. S. with the courage to challenge them.

       Mario Diaz-Balart is one of the four sons of Rafael Diaz-Balart. Rafael, in the middle in the above Washington Post photo, was an important Minister in the Batista dictatorship that was overthrown by the Cuban Revolution on the first of January in 1959. Rafael, like many others, quickly became one of the richest and most powerful anti-Castro zealots in Miami. His four sons include Mario on the far right and Rafael Jr., a rich banker, on the far left. At his father's immediate left is Jose, an anchor on three major networks -- MSNBC, NBC, and NBC-owned Telemundo. On his father's immediate right is the Havana-born Lincoln, who preceded Mario as a fiercely anti-Castro member of the United States Congress from Miami.

       The above quotation by United States Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart of Miami sounds democratic. But, of course, he never has to explain why only anti-Castro zealots -- Ros-Lehtinen, the Diaz-Balarts, Rubio, Curbelo -- can get elected to Congress from Miami although most of America's 2 million Cuban-Americans, including those in Miami, support President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba.

        The significance of this quote by Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart is self-evident. To the chagrin of democracy-lovers, a handful of Cuban-Americans have easily forged an array of laws in the U. S. Congress that grossly favor Cuban-Americans and grossly discriminate against all non-Cuban Americans, particularly Cubans still on the island. Those laws include Helms-Burton, Torricelli, The Cuban Adjustment Act, Wet Foot/Dry Foot, etc., etc. Cubans and only Cubans are encouraged to defect to the U. S. where Cubans and only Cubans are immediately home free once they touch U. S. soil and are immediate recipients of financial and other benefits not available to anyone else, including those with more legitimate reasons to immigrate to the United States. Yet, Americans are not supposed to questions such laws, nor question whatever Congressmen like Diaz-Balart say about a U. S. President who is rightly trying to correct such things.

       As mentioned, President Obama concludes his scheduled events in Havana tonight when he attends the baseball game at Latin American Stadium. It pits the American Major League Tampa Bay Rays against a young Cuban national team. Just in the last few years, over a hundred of the best baseball players in Cuba have defected and signed with the 30 U. S. Major League teams. The Major Leagues and baseball-rich Cuba are currently trying to work out a plan for Cubans to sign with U. S. teams without having to defect.

        President Obama invited 93-year-old Rachel Robinson to fly with him to Cuba. Rachel is the beloved widow of baseball legend Jackie Robinson who broke the color barrier in Major League baseball in 1947. President Obama wanted Rachel to be with him at tonight's game in Havana featuring the Tampa Bay Rays.

       This AP/Getty Images photo was taken at Latin American Stadium in Havana in 1946. On the left is Brooklyn Dodgers manager Leo Durocher. Leo is shaking hands with Jackie Robinson who was then with the Brooklyn Dodgers' Triple-A farm team, the Montreal Royals. The Dodgers in those days played exhibitions and took spring training in Havana. The year after this photo was taken, 1947, Jackie broke the Major League color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers and he was the National League Rookie of the Year.

        This photo shows Jackie Robinson and his beautiful bride Rachel the year they were married, in 1946, the year before he became the most talked-about athlete in America as the star player for the famed Brooklyn Dodgers. Jackie, before he broke the color barrier, played some of his best baseball in the Negro League and in the Dodgers' farm system. But he was Rookie of the Year in 1947, Most Valuable Player in 1952, and in 1955 he helped the Brooklyn Dodgers beat the mighty New York Yankees in the World Series. Rachel, at age 93, is with President Obama in Cuba and tonight they will be at Latin American Stadium in Havana where emotions will fill her heart because she knows Jackie once played in that very stadium.

        Jackie Robinson was born in Cairo, Georgia, in 1919. He was a four-star athlete at UCLA before turning pro as a baseball player. He was married to the love of his life, Rachel, from 1946 till he died in 1972. His most famous quotation was: "A life is not important except for the impact it has on other lives." By that definition, Jackie Robinson is one of the all-time most impactful and most important Americans. Rachel's memories of him tonight in Havana will be precious treasures for her and President Barack Obama.

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