Distorting Cuba

An American Pastime!!!
{Updated: Tuesday, October 25th, 2016}

       My most recent issue of Smithsonian Magazine included a 15-page update on the Cuban Revolution. It was an accurate, insightful and unbiased account of that historic event that has had such a profound effect on Cuba and the United States. The Revolution, by elevating Cuba as a player on the world stage far out of proportion to its size, also has greatly affected international events, alliances and liaisons. On a Cubaninsider essay entitled "Smithsonian Updates Cuban Revolution," I reviewed that article. It reminded me that there are excellent sources in the United States that actually tell the truth about the U.S.-Cuban nexus, which is in sharp contrast to the mainstream U. S. media and the U. S. government, both of which take their Cuban directives and narratives from the most visceral elements of the Batista-Mafia dictatorship booted off the island to American soil way back on January 1, 1959. The U. S. democracy, to the sorrow of its greatest admirers, has not been able to correct shooting itself in the foot in 1952 when right-wingers in Washington teamed the U. S. with the Mafia to support the vile Batista dictatorship in Cuba.

         As with Smithsonian Magazine, I also subscribe to National Geographic Magazine and the latest edition I received today had an accurate, insightful, and unbiased 20-page update on Cuba. It was written by Cynthia Gorney and featured great photos by David Guttenfelder. It's entitled "Here Comes the Wave" and it dedicates the superb 20 pages to inform us about the "Changing Cuba" resulting from "A warming relationship with the U. S." As with the Smithsonian Magazine summary of the Cuban Revolution, this National Geographic article tells the truth about today's Cuba...the kind of truth that the U. S. media and the U. S. government will not tell you lest it might upset a few very rich and powerful Cuban-American hardliners.

           This is one of the many photos by David Guttenfelder that illustrates the 20-page update on Cuba in this week's new edition of National Geographic Magazine. It's an excellent, fair portrayal of the island.

           This photo was taken a few days ago -- on October 20th, 2016 -- in Havana, Cuba. The photographer was Ladyrene Perez. Ladyrene works for the state-controlled Cuban media. This photo, and the story behind it, became a major news item that day in Cuba -- including print, television and online pro-government blogs. International outlets such as the BBC also covered it. The photo is just as significant for the U. S. as it is for Cuba. Yet, the mainstream media in the U. S. would not touch such a photo or the meaning behind it. As a democracy-lover, that reminds me of the apparent veracity of a comment that Cristina Escobar, Cuba's impressive 28-year-old news anchor, made when she was in Washington to cover the last of the four Vidal-Jacobson diplomatic sessions: "Journalists in Cuba {working for the state-run media} have more freedom to tell the truth about the U. S. than U. S. journalists have to tell the truth about Cuba." Instead of ignoring that comment due to political correctness, I believe democracy-loving Americans should contemplate it on behalf of America and democracy. With that in mind, here's the story behind the above photo. It shows America's Secretary of Health, Sylvia Burwell, and Cuba's Health Minister, Roberto Morales, signing a joint agreement to cooperate for the benefit of Americans and Cubans.

       After the extremely important signing ceremony, this photo also taken by Ladyrene Perez shows America's Secretary of Health, Ms. Burwell, shaking hands with Cuba's Health Minister, Mr. Morales. The mainstream U. S. media and 8 Cuban-Americans in the 535-member U. S. Congress believe Ms. Burwell and Mr. Morales should be fighting each other, not shaking hands. Ms. Burwell...and most Americans, most Cubans, most Cuban-Americans, and most people in the world...believe that Cuban-American handshakes should take precedence over decades of belligerence designed to benefit a few and harm everyone else.

      America's top health official, Secretary of Health Sylvia Burwell, believes the agreement she signed with Cuba a few days ago will benefit Americans, Cubans, and people around the world. She, like leading cancer experts in the U. S., admires the vaccines Cuba's medical scientists have invented and she wants those vaccines further tested and then made available to American patients. Ms. Burwell believes Cuba's lung cancer vaccine is "a remarkable advance in cancer research that can possibly benefit Americans." She also admires Cuban research and vaccines designed to combat such diseases as "dengue, zika and diabetics." NO WAY, you say, THAT A FEW CUBAN-AMERICANS IN CONGRESS IN CONJUNCTION WITH AN INTIMIDATED OR INCOMPETENT MEDIA SHOULD DISMISS THE MAJORITY OPINION OF AMERICA'S TOP HEALTH OFFICIAL!! But such insanity and cowardice permeates the American conscience on a daily basis, while pusillanimous and unpatriotic Americans, for the most part, meekly and silently permit it to happen.

       The Burwell-Morales health agreement linking U.S.-Cuban cooperation is a brave and positive product of President Obama's historic efforts to normalize relations with Cuba. Most Americans, almost all of the citizens of the world, and most Cuban-Americans even in the Little Havana section of Miami support Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba, which would benefit millions of people in areas such as health and greatly improve America's image. Yet, a few revengeful and self-serving members of the U. S. Congress -- aided and abetted by the power of the mainstream U. S. media -- will probably succeed, as they have for six decades, in maintaining a very disastrous anti-American & anti-democracy Cuban policy.

       Miami's Marco Rubio is a fixture in the U. S. Senate and is already making his second bid to become U. S. President in 2020 after failing in his 2016 bid. Rubio's qualifications for the Senate and as a presidential candidate are two-fold: {1} He is a anti-Castro Cuban-American from Miami where it seems only anti-Castro zealots get sent to Congress although most Cuban-Americans in Miami favor Obama's Cuban decency as opposed to Rubio's Cuban belligerency; and {2} Rubio can stay a Senate incumbent and a Presidential candidate because he is the Poster Boy for courting and soliciting the deep-pocket wealth of every right-wing or conservative billionaire eager to purchase the U. S. democracy as their own toy. Yet, even minus any other qualifications, Rubio -- as the graphic above indicates -- gets "Breaking News" coverage from the mainstream U. S. media whenever he wants to assault and demean decent and sane Cuban overtures from decent and sane Americans like President Obama and like Secretary of Health Sylvia Burwell. Yes, it's the same mainstream U. S. media that doesn't have the guts or integrity to report on the important U.S.-Cuban health agreement signed in Havana a few days ago, the type of decency and sanity related to Cuba that Rubio vows in his "Breaking News" rants to "block in the Senate" and "turn back" when he {or his kind} capture the White House, which would surely also probably mean a very quick re-capture of Cuba.

      This expensive monument, and many others like it, are in the Little Havana section of Miami heralding and commemorating such great American endeavors as the..."17th April 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion."  

      This monument of a powerful lion is in the Prado neighborhood in Havana, Cuba. It is a tourist attraction, made more so the day when a gorgeous little Cuban schoolgirl decided to sit on the lion's back as she posed prettily for tourists. The photo, a superb one, is used courtesy of Havana Times.org.

      Cubans are well educated free-of-charge and, naturally, they are quite curious about worldly things. They now have more access to digital information at Wi-Fi hook-ups such as this busy street-side outlet.

      Among the notable twenty-somethings in Cuba is Cristina Escobar. At age 28 she is the most ubiquitous and most respected young adult on the island. Well-educated, bilingual and a brilliant television anchor, Escobar's two most famed quotes -- both on YouTube and left behind in Washington after her well-publicized dominance of a White House news conference -- are: {1} "Cuba's fate is up to Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami or Washington;" and {2} "Journalists in Cuba have more freedom to tell the truth about the U. S. than U. S. journalists have to tell the truth about Cuba." Now whether or not you believe Cristina, or whether or not you have plans to recapture Cuba, you might want to respect her views, which seem genuine. It's likely that young adults like her on the island will predicate Cuba's future, not a few rich and powerful Cubans in Miami and Washington. Cristina graduated from the University of Havana where she majored in broadcast journalism and U.S.-Cuban relations. Being a superb journalist and being an expert on U.S.-Cuban relations, she is often interviewed -- in Spanish or English -- on regional and international networks. At the University of Havana her senior thesis had a very interesting title: "President Obama's Expected Cuban Policies." Yes, her predictions and assessments in the thesis were eerily correct.

So, hey, America!! Instead of being force-fed Cuban information by Senator Marco Rubio or the mainstream U. S. media, you might want to hear and see what Cristina Escobar thinks. She's easy to find...on Cuban television if you happen to be able to visit the island, on regional television where she hosts a news program in English, on YouTube in Spanish or English, in international interviews, and on the Pulitzer Center website that sponsored a major Tracey Eaton-produced video featuring Cristina, a feisty and informed young Cuban who believes that Cuban news should supersede Cuban propaganda. So, do you agree that's a refreshing idea for both Cuba and the U. S.? 

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