cubaninsider: The Havana-Little Havana War

Trump-Rubio Plan Cuba's Demise!!
{Saturday, November 17th, 2018}

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel is shown above on a stopover in London this week after a grueling trip that landed him first in Paris and continued on to Russia, China, Vietnam, North Korea, and Laos. Back in Havana, Diaz-Canel is dealing with renewed Trump-Rubio-Bolton-Pompeo threats from Washington and with newly elected right-wing Presidents in Latin America who appear anxious to help Washington finally overthrow Cuba's tenacious revolutionary government.

Photo courtesy: Dado Goldieri/New York Times.

The photo above shows Cuban Doctor Maireilys Alvarez Rodriguez working at a health clinic in a rural area of Brazil. The image illustrated an Oct. 14-2018 New York Times article written by Shasta Darlington from Sao Paulo, Brazil. The article's title: "Cuba Is Pulling Doctors From Brazil After 'Derogatory' Comments by Bolsonaro." In cooperation with the Pan American Health Organization, Cuba has employed thousands of doctors in Brazilian rural areas since 2013 that often otherwise had no other doctors. But that was when the left-wing Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff was Cuba's powerful Latin American friend. Brazil's new President is Jair Bolsonaro, a very controversial right-wing extremist. That stark contrast is significant because Brazil is Latin America's largest, most populated, and richest nation, and now a nation that will work hand-in-hand with extreme anti-Cuban elements in the United States. Needless to say, the "collaboration" is of dire concern to Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel.

Like America's President Trump, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel makes use of Twitter to express his feelings. Wednesday at 2:29 P. M. Diaz-Canel posted the above Tweet for the world to see. Its translation to English, I believe, is important: "More doctors. With dignity, deep sensitivity, professionalism, dedication and altruism, the Cuban collaborators have subtracted a valuable service to the people of Brazil. Attitudes with such a human dimension must be respected and defended. We are Cuba." Diaz-Canel was referencing the decision of Brazil's new President, a renowned and controversial right-winger, to discontinue Cuban doctors working in the poorest Brazilian neighborhoods.

A rightward tilt in Latin America has hurt Cuba. Just a few years ago the three women depicted above were Presidents of Brazil, Chile, and Argentina...Dilma Rousseff, Michelle Bachelet, and Cristina Fernandez. All three were not only huge supporters of Cuba but all three worshiped Fidel Castro and his Cuban Revolution. Now that support has diminished, partially due to the economic influence of the United States, which spends a lot of money backing or buying up "friendly" nations and a lot of money undermining Cuba.

The Cuban diplomat in charge of keeping an hour-by-hour, unblinking eye on Miami's ageless and still concerted effort to recapture Havana is Carlos Fernandez de Cossio. This week he has spoken out about two particular anti-Cuban developments:

{1} Recently in Miami, the infamously war-mongering John Bolton, speaking on behalf of President Trump and Little Havana's U. S. Senator Rubio, essentially declared war on Cuba and two of Cuba's allies -- Venezuela and Nicaragua. Regarding that, Cossio said, "We knew, when the Republican Trump succeeded the Democrat Obama as U. S. President, drastic changes in Obama's reasonable Cuban diplomacy would occur. And when Trump appointed Bolton as his top National Security person, we expected Bolton to try to persuade Trump to do what Bolton tried for years to get President Bush to do, which was to declare actual war on Cuba. Bush came close but didn't quite oblige Bolton. Of course, Trump might."

{2} On November 6th, 2018, the important Mid-Term U. S. elections sharply impacted the U. S. government midway through President Trump's first term as President. Thus, those elections impacted Cuba regarding the degree to which the anti-Cuban extremists will be able to support Bolton's declaration of war. Cossio in Havana has worried mightily about what he calls "the 4-stage Perfect Storm in the United States that threatens Cuba." With that conclusion, Cossio rates the four stages, in this order: Trump, Rubio, Pompeo, and Bolton. As President, concerned with Little Havana's dominance of Florida's powerful political influence, Trump anointed Little Havana's Rubio as the director, some say Dictator, of the USA's Cuban policies. But the "Perfect Storm" evolved when Trump appointed Mike Pompeo Secretary of State and John Bolton National Security Adviser...meaning well-known anti-Cuban zealots were/are the two most powerful masters of Trump's foreign policies...and Cuba is the foreign nation the USA since 1959 has long desired to re-DOMINATE. As registered by the Miami Herald, Cossio summed up the U. S. Mid-Term elections with this quote: "It seems that an aggressive approach to Cuba doesn't win ALL the South Florida votes anymore."

Highly respected worldwide, Science Magazine and Science Magazine.org on Nov. 16, 2018, had an article entitled: "Halt Speculation on U. S. Embassy in Cuba." Related to the two-year and seemingly endless "mystery" of U. S. claims about Americans injured in Havana by sonic or microwave or...whatever...attacks, this article is well worth reading for an astute update.

In Havana Carlos de Cossio, who is in charge of Cuba's USA affairs, has also grown increasingly impatient with endless U. S. claims regarding alleged sonic attacks on U. S. diplomats in Cuba. So he called a news conference to state: "The key question is who benefited." He stressed that the allegations have gone on for over a year-and-a-half to hurt Cuba, especially regarding tourism, and "to help Rubio further target Cuba. All the while just the accusation hurts Cuba while it helps Rubio's attempt -- supported by Trump, Pompeo, and Bolton -- to torment Cubans on the island and try to recapture our country. It the U. S. media has the freedom it is reputed to have, why doesn't it ask the key question...who does it hurt and who does it help?"

"Mystery" attacks after all these months?

But as long as they hurt Cuba...

and help Rubio...

the "claims" will continue.

In other words, Pompeo seems to want the accusations against Cuba to last as long as possible because they are working for USA's Counter Revolutionary zealots and because the U. S. news media won't ask the pertinent question -- which is, who are the accusations hurting and who are they helping, and might the answer indicate who's responsible?

The U. S. news media also doesn't have the courage to question why John Bolton, after three decades of championing the overthrow of Cuba's revolutionary government, may finally get his chance to accomplish that feat as Trump's National Security Adviser. Cuba believes that Bolton, on his recent trip to Miami as shown above, declared war on the island.

Like, at last count, fifteen other powerful Trump appointees, John Bolton is strictly a product of the Bush dynasty that for many decades has been tightly and self-servingly aligned with the Batistiano-Mafiosi extremists ousted in 1959 by the Cuban Revolution. The U. S. media knows but doesn't dare mention why President George W. Bush named Bolton the U. S. Ambassador to the United Nations on a "recess" appointment but pulled back the nomination before it could be approved by the Senate. Of course, the war-mongering Bolton would never have been approved by the Senate but, with Rubio alerting Trump to all the anti-Cuban extremists from the Bush dynasty, Trump gets to anoint Bolton as America's war-mongering National Security Adviser who doesn't need Senate confirmation.

President Trump, taking his Cuban orders from Little Havana choirboy Rubio, is in the process of reversing his predecessor Barack Obama's sane Cuban policies related to universally condemned embarrassments such as...the U. S. military occupation-theft of Guantanamo Bay, the Embargo-Blockade, etc., etc. Yet, even the vast U. S. left-wing news media this is desperately trying to impeach Trump doesn't have the guts to critique or even comment on the Trump-Rubio atrocities related to Cuba.

While the thuggish right-wing U. S. media, of course, gives Rubio dire promotion and a free ride in his self-serving targeting of totally innocent Cubans on the island, even the left-wing/anti-Trump media in the U. S. is too afraid to hold Rubio accountable for his gutless assaults on innocent Cubans...a fact pointed out by Rubio's hometown Miami Herald.

The Miami Herald's top columnist and editorial chief, Cuba-born Fabiola Santiago, blasted Trump for anointing Rubio as America's Cuban dictator. Then the Miami Herald, as shown above, let four young Cuban female mothers and entrepreneurs explain in a heart-wrenching article written by the four Cuban women named above why the gutless but unchecked Rubio was being allowed to punish their families. Those four young women, as you can see above, begged Rubio to meet with them and listen to how he is hurting Cuban children but, of course, Rubio only listens to Counter Revolutionary extremists and to his litany of billionaire political donors.

Currently Rubio has his ambitious political soulmate Nikki Haley as his anti-Cuban spokesperson at the United Nations but she is resigning to better pursue the Rubio-Haley presidential ambitions while another Rubio puppet, Heather Nauert, currently at the State Department, will soon be the anti-Cuban UN Ambassador.

The Miami Herald photo above reflects the fact that the Nov. 6-2018 mid-term elections revealed that the Cuban-extremists stranglehold on Miami's and Florida's political landscape is gradually lessening. Havana-born Counter Revolutionary extremist Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, in the lower-right above, was hand-delivered to the U. S. Congress from Little Havana in Miami way back in 1989 by the self-serving Bush dynasty that wanted Jeb Bush to become Florida's governor, which happened, and then America's president, which didn't happen. Finally, after three decades in Congress, Ros-Lehtinen has just retired and her hand-picked successor was supposed to be high-profile Cuban-American television journalist Maria Elvira Salazar who is shown in the center above. But 75-year-old former University of Miami President and long-time Clinton political ally Donna Shalala defeated Salazar, proving that Ros-Lehtinen and other Counter Revolutionary zealots don't TOTALLY dictate Miami politics now.

In fact, the Nov. 6-2018 elections voted out a Miami Counter Revolutionary Cuban-American incumbent in the U. S. Congress named Carlos Curbelo who is shown above on the far-left. Curbelo was ousted by newcomer Debbie Mucarsel-Powell. But Miami is still Miami and Florida is still Florida, and that's a state with an often decisive number of electoral votes that can decide presidential elections. The whole world watched the U. S. resemble a Banana Republic in 2000 when the counting of "hanging chads" and other questionable votes prolonged the election agonizingly and then ended up putting Counter Revolutionary darling George W. Bush in the White House although Al Gore, who would have treated Cuban issues decently, got more national votes. And now in mid-November of 2018 the Nov. 6 election is undergoing the same type of Banana Republic treatment in Florida. It's not official as of Nov. 15-2018 who will be Florida's Governor and Florida's next U. S. Senator. But it is apparent that Counter Revolutionary extremists Ron DeSantis and Rick Scott, both totally aligned with the Little Havana extremists, will end up as Florida's new Senator and Governor respectively. Also, Mario Diaz-Balart, shown above second from the right next to Ros-Lehtinen, has been reelected to the U. S. Congress from Miami. Mario is the brother of Lincoln Diaz-Balart who is shown above at the podium at the Rubio love-fest. The Diaz-Balart brothers are the sons of Rafael Diaz-Balart, the former Minster in the ousted Batista dictatorship and, after 1959, one of the richest and most ardent anti-Castro zealots South Florida has ever known. For the past two decades one or both of the Diaz-Balart brothers have been in the U. S. Congress as ardent Counter Revolutionary zealots. So, if you study the photo above, you'll comprehend that the grip of Counter Revolutionary extremists on Miami and Florida politics is still omnipotent but not quite as strong as it has been since the Bush dynasty started putting a long-line of extremist Cuban-Americans like Ros-Lehtinen in the U. S. Congress beginning in 1989, with moderate Cuban-Americans seemingly not eligible for important political positions.

But rest assured, in or out of the U. S. Congress, the ultra-powerful Diaz-Balart brothers Lincoln and Mario as well as the newly retired after three decades in Congress Ileana Ros-Lehtinen will remain prime Miami puppeteers pulling the Counter Revolutionary strings in South Florida. They have the finances and the clout to do that.

And lastly, Antonio Guterres is among the latest powerful and decent international figures to point out the gutless nature of America's Batistiano/Mafiosi-directed Cuban policies. Mr. Guterres, from Portugal, is the Secretary-General at the United Nations in New York. A few days ago Mr. Guterres at a news conference condemned the U. S. Embargo-Blockade against Cuba anew. He pointed out that India was not allowed to send a shipment of children's aspirin to Cuba because the Superpower U. S. can punish nations, large or small, for "even aiding Cuban children." So all nations, as Mr. Guterres acknowledges, must be leery of defying the USA's infamous but very legal Helms-Burton Act that a very reluctant but very scared President Clinton had to sign in 1996.

I hope it doesn't bring tears to the eyes of democracy-loving Americans, but I invite them to study the photo above of President Clinton signing Helms-Burton in 1996. Please note that the big man standing near Clinton's right shoulder is Senator Bob Menendez of the powerful Counter Revolutionary contingent in Newark, New Jersey. And the lady in red appearing over Clinton's right shoulder is Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Havana-born Counter Revolutionary extremist from Miami who served in the U. S. Congress from 1989 till she retired in 2018. And, oh yes, in the upper-right is Havana-born Lincoln Diaz-Balart, the ardent son of an ardent former Batista Minister.

Now study this photo and judge it for yourself. It shows what I believe was a very scared President Clinton glancing up at the clapping Bob Menendez right after Helms-Burton was signed into law in 1996. Even the decent and determined President Obama could not blunt Helms-Burton because only Congress can do that and the Miami-Newark Counter Revolutionaries won't let Congress change it. Helms-Burton is simply too revengeful in its punishment of Revolutionary Cuba and, please understand, far too lucrative in making selected Cuban-Americans rich with bundles of unending tax dollars. {To confirm that, dial up 8 recent investigative articles by respected journalist Tracey Eaton}. And by the way, the clapping Bob Menendez is still in the U. S. Senate because he was re-elected yet again on Nov. 6-2018. His reelection was a foregone conclusion, some believe, only because the election and the massive federal government corruption trial against Menendez were both held in New Jersey.

For years the U. S. government conducted expensive investigations into alleged multiple corruption and bribery charges related to U. S. Senator Bob Menendez. But then a long, expensive trial in New Jersey ended in a hung jury and the federal government, after first vowing to retry Menendez, changed its mind. But the salacious charges, the trial, and then the reelection of Menendez to the U. S. Senate, where he has recently been the anti-Cuban Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, are reminders to many that the Cuban Revolution, by overthrowing the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship on Jan. 1-1959, has actually changed the United States even more than it has changed Cuba. After all, the United States is the world's economic and military Superpower while Cuba is merely a small but pugnacious island nation that had struggled valiantly to attain independence after suffering for centuries from foreign domination and exploitation, especially by Spain up until 1898 and by the United States from 1898 till 1959. And since 1959 the reconfiguration of the ousted Batista dictatorship on U. S. soil has evolved into 6+ decades of what is essentially the Havana vs. Little Havana War THAT HAS CONSUMED MUCH OF AMERICA'S ONCE-GAUDY INTERNATIONAL REPUTATION.