cubaninsider: Cuba Is STILL STANDING

18.11.16

Cuba Is STILL STANDING

But So Are the Batistianos!!

Twenty-eight-year-old Cristina Escobar is proof that Revolutionary Cuba is still standing. Uncommonly talented, beautiful, healthy and well-educated, she is an expert on U.S.-Cuban relations and, in fact, her thesis at the University of Havana was "HOW PRESIDENT OBAMA WILL AFFECT U.S.-CUBA RELATIONS." She was prescient enough to predict that Obama, "A decent man on the heels of the fiercely anti-Cuba Bush administration, President Barack Obama could quite possibly have a profoundly positive effect on U.S.-Cuba relations." As far as I know, no U. S. journalist -- including veterans -- was astute enough to make such a precisely accurate prediction. And now...a bit older and even wiser, Cristina has made another profound statement: "Cuba's fate is up to Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami or Washington. We Cubans on the island owe it to great Cubans who died fighting for our independence, like Jose Marti, and great Cubans like Celia Sanchez, who devoted their lives as guerrilla fighters and then decision-makers so Cuba could remain a sovereign nation, not a foreign-dominated pawn. Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami or Washington, care the most about everyday Cubans. And I believe there are enough Cubans on the island today to do what Jose Marti and Celia Sanchez did, which is to give their lives to make sure that Cuba's fate is up to real Cubans on the island. If that's the only way we stay sovereign, then so be it."

When Cristina Escobar speaks, people listen attentively.

Cuba's Cristina Escobar is an expert on journalism and the United States. She is shown here on the right in California in 2014 honing up on those passions by consulting with top professors at Cal State.

It is also a fact that in 2016 Cristina Escobar's skill as a broadcast journalist mightily impressed U. S. veterans such as NBC's Andrea Mitchell who made it a point to congratulate Cristina. The photo above shows Cristina making history by being the first Cuban to ask questions at a White House news conference, and she ended up asking six pertinent questions to White House spokesman Josh Earnest.

MY POINT IS THIS: As long as Cuba can keep producing Cubans as brilliant and as dedicated as Cristina Escobar, Revolutionary Cuba might well continue to defy the odds and remain an independent island. Dedicated to that principle, Cristina has turned down obscenely large offers to defect to Miami. The first offer only stipulated that she denounce Fidel Castro. She replied, "I will never do that on any soil." Then she got a higher second offer with the stipulation that she didn't have to denounce anyone but that her mere high-profile defection to Miami would be worth the money, presumably another pile of tax dollars courtesy of the U. S. Congress. She still refused, proving that there are Cubans unwilling to sell their souls.

Cristina Escobar interviewing Hugo Cancio of Miami, Florida.

A frequent visitor to Cuba, Hugo Cancio is a well-known Cuban-American businessman in Miami. He is among the 63% of Cuban-Americans in Miami who desire normal relations between the United States and Cuba. But Hugo says, "I am among the majority of Cuban-Americans here in Miami who are not represented by our local or congressional politicians." Still resembling a Banana Republic more than a democracy, Miami this month of Nov.-2016 easily returned its four anti-Castro zealots to the U. S. Congress although Hugo Cancio believes that any of over two million Cuban-American moderates would make better politicians.

If the photos of Cristina Escobar reveal that Revolutionary Cuba is still standing, this photo taken Wednesday, November 8th, 2016 reveals that the Batistianos are still standing too, or still sitting as the case may be. That's Marco Rubio, newly elected from Miami to a second 6-year term in the United States Senate, on the left. He is shown huddling this week in Congress with one of the most famed anti-Castro dissidents in Cuba. The photo is courtesy of Fox News Latino. Instead of using his safe lifetime {if he wants it} seat in the U. S. Senate always trying to recapture Cuba, perhaps Rubio should concentrate on dealing with nagging problems that concern his constituents and Americans. I mean, for example, Cuba, compared to Miami and other U. S. cities, is almost crime-free. Cuba, compared to Miami and the United States as a whole, has a much lower infant mortality rate. Cuba provides totally free education through college for students like Cristina Escabor but millions of Americans can't afford college and millions more are desperately trying to pay-off God-awful student loans that presumably make rich bankers richer. Cuba also provides totally free health care from birth to death while tens of millions of Americans are struggling mightily to pay for outrageously high medical expenses or criminally high medicines, presumably just so rich executives can get richer. And, of course, Cuba's position on the U. S. embargo gets all 191 worldwide votes while Rubio's position gets ZERO worldwide votes. So, Senator Rubio, instead of spending so much government time and tax-dollars trying to recapture Cuba, why not devote that time and those dollars to dealing with American issues that direly need attention, or is that question out of order, Senator Rubio?

News reports this week said that Cuban-American Senator Marco Rubio from Florida and Cuban-American Senator Ted Cruz from Texas jointly sponsored a bill honoring the anti-Castro dissident photographed on Wednesday with Rubio. Nice, but what about trying to accomplish something in the Senate on behalf of Americans instead of using the Senate to assail Cuba and to run for the position of President of the United States? In their first terms in the Senate, Rubio and Cruz accomplished nothing for Americans but, in the guise of "hurting the Castros" did a lot to hurt totally innocent Cubans on the island while continuing to funnel tons of tax dollars to Miami for such senselessly extravagant anti-Castro propaganda boondoggles as Radio-TV Marti, which has been known for decades to be -- as ABC News termed it -- "The Broadcast to Nowhere" because Cuba blocks it and because Cubans on the island have lived with Fidel Castro for 90 years and they perhaps know him a bit better than the two generations of Cubans he booted off the island. In addition to supporting anti-Castro programs with millions of dollars that could be spent on worthwhile U. S. projects, both Rubio and Cruz seen to view their Senate seats as mere platforms to continue their bids to be President. Their expensive 2016 presidential races plummeted badly but they are backed by dozens of conservative and right-wing billionaires longing to purchase the White House, so Rubio and Cruz can be expected to use most of their time in the next four years campaigning for billionaire dollars and the 2020 presidential race. If either ever makes it to White House, an appropriate conclusion might be: THE BATISTIANOS HAVE CAPTURED THE UNITED STATES before RE-CAPTURING CUBA.

Meanwhile, in Havana a young, feisty, talented and dedicated Cuban -- Cristina Escobar -- means what she says: "Cubans on the island will decide Cuba's fate, not Cubans in Miami and Washington." Rubio and Cruz dispute that sentiment as they hide behind the skirts of the world's economic and military superpower and hurl grenades at the island, grenades that hit everyday Cubans, but not Castro. So Cristina is a decisive underdog. But so was one of Cristina's idols -- Celia Sanchez -- when Celia made the Cuban Revolution viable in 1953 as both a recruiter of anti-Batista forces and a fearless guerrilla fighter herself.