A Military Option In Cuba's Future?

The Island Doesn't Rule It Out
Updated: Friday, June 19th, 2015

         The enigmatic island of Cuba, day by day, is opening up fully to the outside world. The very influential youth newspaper -- Juventud Rebelde -- recently conducted an island-wide survey of young adults and discovered that their prime desire was to have access to the Internet. Since then the Cuban government has entertained suggestions from Goggle and Twitter executives. And Thursday's Juventud Rebelde edition reported that three dozen WI-FI spots are opening around the island this week. Also, the fees for online access have been drastically reduced. Just over one million of Cuba's 11.2 million citizens have Smart Phones and that number is increasing sharply in line with the increased Internet access.

        This AP/Desmond Boylan photo shows Adonis Ortiz speaking on his phone in Cuba to his father in the United States. Young Cubans like Adonis have told the Cuban government they want more access to Smart Phones and the Internet. And by all accounts from the island, the government is responding positively. 

       Cristina Escobar personifies the emerging influence of Cuba's young adults. The 26-year-old Cristina is the island's most ubiquitous television personality and top journalist. Extremely photogenic and telegenic, she stunned Americans when she traveled to Washington to cover the last diplomatic session featuring Cuba's Josefina Vidal and America's Roberta Jacobson. Well educated and fluent in English as well as Spanish, Cristina's journalistic skills blew Washington journalists away, as did her pro-Cuban speeches around Washington when she emphasized this point: "My personal mission to the United States is to point out that the lies the U. S. media tells about Cuba hurts everyday Cubans on the island most of all." Cristina praised President Barack Obama this week for "having the courage to stand up to the Cuban-American war-mongers in Miami and Washington. They are still there but the American President, by just not quivering before them, has allowed Cuba to open up more and, as we have reported this week, begin providing full Internet access to our people on the island. A few powerful Miami Cubans will continue to try to block any positive on the island, but at least President Obama has provided us an opening to come in out of the cold, so to speak." In Cuba when Cristina Escobar speaks, Cubans listen...especially young Cubans. At the moment, Cristina has far more influence on the island than what she calls "the well-funded Miami Cubans."

         The Cuban Revolution on January 1-1959 shocked the world by becoming the first grounds-root revolution to overthrow a U.S.-backed dictator, in this case the brutal and thieving Batista-Mafia regime.

         The chronology of the Cuban Revolution from 1952 till 1959 is now engraved on the pantheon of history. After the revolutionary victory on Januaary 1-1959, the Batista-Mafia leaders fled back to their sanctuaries, especially South Florida. The most vehement of the anti-Castro zealots, still with the backing of the U. S. government, became the leaders of what essentially was the very belligerent Cuban government-in-exile. The most radical among them -- including Jorge Mas Canosa and Luis Posada Carriles -- were quickly sent to Fort Benning in Georgia to attend the Army School of the Americas, which Americans knew nothing about, at least till it was revealed decades later during the Clinton administration. The Army School served as a training ground for soldiers from U.S.-backed dictatorships who were then sent back home to prop up those dictators in the Caribbean or Latin America. After the Cuban Revolution, the Cuban exiles at Fort Benning were trained to recapture Cuba and eliminate Fidel Castro and other revolutionary leaders. In a famous New York Times interview conducted by Ann Louise Bardach, Luis Posada Carriles thanked U. S. taxpayers and the very wealthy Mas Canosa for supporting his anti-Castro endeavors. Castro survived a myriad of assassination attempts but the prime thrust of the Fort Benning operation from 1959 till 1961 was to prepare for a military attack designed to recapture Cuba, taking full advantage of U.S.-backed anti-Castro dictators such as Trujillo in the Dominion Republic and Somoza in Nicaragua. The odds, as you may imagine, were stacked very high against Castro and Cuba in the imperialist early 1960s.

          In 1960 the neophyte John F. Kennedy administration inherited a military plan from the outgoing Eisenhower administration to launch a military attack to regain control of Cuba. The CIA famously gave Kennedy two assurances: {1} Fidel Castro would flee to his getaway airplane as soon as he heard U. S. bombers overhead; and {2} the Cubans on the island, once the attack began, would themselves rise up against Castro. With those assurances, Kennedy signed off on the Bay of Pigs shenanigans but the new President insisted on blatantly lying to the American people about the U. S. support of the cowardly attack.

         As it turned out, Fidel Castro, unlike Batista and his cronies, didn't have a "getaway airplane," so he raced to the front-lines at the Bay of Pigs to defend Cuba. The attack started on April 17, 1961, when 8 U. S. bombers left Nicaragua, which was then led by U.S.-backed dictator Somoza, to destroy Cuba's airfields. Another U. S. bomber was circling Havana for the sole purpose of bombing any residence Castro was believed to be residing. But the CIA never pinpointed which residence. When the first bombs fell on Havana's Camp Colombia airfield, Fidel happened to be at Celia Sanchez' Havana apartment, which was his normal practice. While the CIA didn't figure that out, two notable journalists -- Herbert L. Mathews of the New York Times and Cuba's Carlos Franqui -- guessed correctly and both telephoned the apartment and talked with both Fidel and Celia. Still tied to his lie about U. S. involvement, Kennedy twiddled his thumbs nervously in the Oval Office while Fidel raced to the Bay of Pigs, where he and Celia had earlier visited because they anticipated, perhaps with a pinpoint warning, that the impending ground attack would logically take place at the Bay of Pigs. Within 72 hours, Fidel's rebels had shocked the world a second time with its easy victory at the Bay of Pigs. The CIA-and-U.S.-taxpayer-trained Cuban exiles in Brigade 2506 were wiped out or captured. Kennedy and Castro later agreed to return the prisoners {above} to the U. S. in exchange for $53 million, mostly paid in medical supplies and boxes of Gerber Baby Food. A little deeper into his presidency, Kennedy famously bellowed to his aides, "I wish I could blow the CIA to smithereens." In other words, before his assassination and what would have been his easy reelection, President Kennedy had rebounded from the Republican plans that he had inherited, which was "blow Cuba to smithereens." 

         At 12:30 P. M. on Friday, November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Prior to his trip to Dallas, Kennedy had told Pierre Salinger and other key aides that his "top priority" upon his return to Washington was to "normalize relations"  with Cuba. To this day it is not known how, or if, that pledge played a role in the assassination in Dallas but it is well known that Kennedy's plans to normalize relations with Cuba resulted in him being targeted anew by elements who had blamed the young and popular President for the Bay of Pigs debacle. From start to finish, Kennedy's presidency tightly revolved around the island of Cuba, from the inheritance of the 1961 Bay of Pigs plans, to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, to the 1963 third year of his brief presidency when he felt strong enough to normalize relations with Cuba. The Kennedy saga is proof that America, Cuba, and the world would be better off if the lush island was not so mightily coveted by everyone from the Dulles brothers in the 1950s to the Diaz-Balart brothers in 2015. Kennedy once told Salinger: "What makes Cuba beautiful also makes it vulnerable, like a beautiful woman targeted by fiends. She never has time to enjoy the good life, la dolce vita, that's all around her." 

 This Wikipedia map delineates the location of the Bay of Pigs attack.

         This Wikipedia photo shows the Bay of Pigs Memorial today in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood. From 1961 until today, the Bay of Pigs remains the only U.S./Cuban-exile military attack designed to recapture Cuba. However, Little Havana's tight alliances with the Bush dynasty has resulted in Little Havana's dictation of America's Cuban policy in the U. S. Congress since the 1980s. That came about when the Bush-anointed Jorge Mas Canosa became the singular head of the Cuban government-in-exile. And then, in 1989, Havana-born Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami rode her Bush connections to become the first in a ever-growing line of anti-Castro zealots in Miami reaching the hallowed halls of the U. S. Congress. Since 1961 there have been no U.S.-backed military attacks on Cuba but there have been numerous U.S.-tolerated terrorists acts against the island, most notably the Oct. 6-1976 bombing of the civilian plane Cubana Flight 455. Since the 1960s, Democratic administrations -- Kennedy, Carter, Clinton, and Obama -- have tried but failed to normalize relations with Cuba. In all such attempts, the Little Havana stranglehold on the U. S. Congress has simply been too much to overcome. Like Presidents Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton, Mr. Obama will replicate those earlier failures. The Bay of Pigs Memorial in Little Havana, of course, has different connotations than the plethora of Bay of Pigs Memorials in Cuba, signifying the wide chasms between the two nations as well as the vast 90-miles of sea separating the two neighbors.  

For example......................

          ......................these three Miami-based Cuban-Americans in the U. S. Congress have far more influence on America's Cuban policy than President Obama. That's Mario Diaz-Balart on the left flanked on his left by Marco Rubio and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. All are entrenched anti-Castro members of the Congress although Rubio is relinquishing his first-term Senate seat to make a serious bid for the U. S. Presidency. The Havana-born Ros-Lehtinen has been entrenched in the U. S. Congress from Miami since 1989 when Jeb Bush was her Campaign Manager. Today the Little Havana and Republican control of the U. S. Congress on all things Cuban will easily over-rule yet another Democratic President, Barack Obama.

        Roll Call, one of the most popular propaganda sheets masquerading as journalism in Washington, this week highlighted a fawning tribute to Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart. The propaganda piece, written by Emma Dumain, lauded Diaz-Balart, claiming he "has spoken out for years against corruption and human-rights abuses in Cuba." Sure he has. In Miami since 1959 that is a sure way to get rich and powerful...and all the way to Washington, either in the U. S. Congress or, soon, the White House. Of course, neither the Roll Call or any of the other not-so-subtle propaganda sheets will ever mention that Mario's father, Rafael Diaz-Balart, was one of the most powerful Ministers in the Batista dictatorship and one of the richest and most powerful anti-Castro zealots in Miami. Thus, mouthpieces like Roll Call and even the intimidated mainstream U. S. media are not about to question the second generation of Miami Diaz-Balarts -- four rich and powerful sons of Rafael -- when they assault Cuba for "corruption and human-rights abuses." Of course, the inference is that the Batista-Mafia rule of Cuba was strictly by Mother Teresa-types who showered nothing but love, affection, and generous welfare on the Cuban people from 1952 till 1959 and then, once chased to Miami, have tried their best to do the same to the unfortunate Cubans still on the island. When Miami's top Cuban-American newsman, Emilio Milian, objected to that premise, he was car-bombed. When the Miami Herald's top columnist, Jim DeFede, loudly excoriated Miami's members of the U. S. Congress -- namely the Diaz-Balarts and Ros-Lehtinen -- for what DeFede deemed their shameful support of Cuban terrorists in Miami, DeFede was fired. American citizens, over time, have been strongly advised to support the Diaz-Balarts and ignore brave, patriotic people like Emilio Milian, Jim DeFede, etc., and now brave, patriotic members of Congress such as Kathy Castor of Tampa, Florida, and Jeff Flake of Arizona. For sure, it is healthier and more politically correct to side with the Diaz-Balarts, not Congresswoman Castor or Senator Flake. As far as the six U. S. networks are concerned, the Diaz-Balarts, Rubio, etc., can have unlimited airtime to vilify Cuba and glorify Batista. {Jose Diaz-Balart, Mario's brother, has his own one-hour program at 9:00 A. M. each day on MSNBC in case you want a big dose of propaganda} On the other hand, those same networks are devoted to the principle that Americans should not ever hear the Cuban viewpoints of unbiased members of Congress, like Florida's Kathy Castor and Arizona's Jeff Flake. 

         It is interesting to note, as the money-crazed presidential campaign determines the next President beginning in January of 2017, how the Bush dynasty's Cuban connections play out. Jeb Bush, because of his name and the billions of dollars that back it up, is the Republican favorite. But his prime challenger is the young Senator Marco Rubio, a protege of both Jeb Bush and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the first Cuban-American to make it to Congress way back in 1989 when Jeb was her Campaign Manager in his bid to successfully ingratiate himself with the Cubans in Little Havana, still the thrust of his political power. In the heated presidential race, Ros-Lehtinen and others like her in Little Havana would be expected to support one of their own -- Senator Rubio. But that's not the case. The Bush alliance with the Cuban-American power-brokers favors Jeb over Marco. Despite that, when the dust settles, Rubio will deny Jeb what he considers his turn to be the next Bush in the White House. And even more flummoxing and interesting.....

           .............Josefina Vidal, Cuba's U. S. expert and the island's prime decision-maker on all things American, prefers Marco Rubio over Jeb Bush as the next President of the U. S. Moreover, after pushing past Jeb, Vidal believes Rubio will upend Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton, largely because of Clinton's ties to Wall Street and foreign money associated with the billionaire Clinton Foundation. And beyond all that, Vidal believes -- in the first post-Obama Republican administration -- the "big military option will be on the table." She believes the preamble to that, to dupe easily duped Americans, will be a provocation that will force Cuba to either capitulate or to react. "We will not capitulate," she says, "so draw your own conclusions regarding the response to our reaction." Her conclusion seems obvious: The pre-text for military action can be easily provoked because there is nothing regarding Cuba Americans will oppose. How nice. Vidal remembers that media battle-cry in Miami after the demise of Cubana Flight 455: "It's the biggest blow yet against Castro!" If that didn't solicit a whimper from Americans, she surmises, what will?

         If you doubt Josefina Vidal's American expertise from her vantage point in Havana, I suggest you study Andy Gomez's Cuban expertise from his base in Miami. Gomez has a family vendetta against Fidel Castro. That qualities him to be USA Today's Cuban expert in Miami. His column Wednesday -- June 17th -- was entitled "Too Early To Judge Obama's Cuba Plan." Is that because Gomez anticipates a military option post-Obama? Gomez wrote: "Any strategy designed to topple or significantly change a government system that doesn't include military intervention is going to take time. Especially in Cuba. Fidel Castro and his brother Raul have not ruled for 56 years by pure luck." The Castro brothers, both deep into their 80s, will soon be replaced by younger non-Castros like Miguel Diaz-Canel and Josefina Vidal. It appears that Little Havana in Miami does not want that transition to take place, believing it would deny them their well-grafted anti-Castro venom. Vilifying Diaz-Canel and Vidal to justify another half-century of the embargo might be too much for even proselytized Americans to take. So, before the post-Castro transition takes place, is a military option on the table if, and when, either Rubio or Bush succeeds Obama as Commander in Chief? Vidal, the Cuban expert on all things American, believes so. And Gomez, USA Today's expert on all things Cuban, used the phrase "military intervention" to suggest that anything else "is going to take time." As I read that summation from Andy Gomez this week, I was reminded that the Little Havana hard-liners have ample reason to believe that, regardless of what they do in regards to Cuba, the American people will, as always, be compliant. In any case, on a week in June of 2015 when Josefina Vidal in Havana and Andy Gomez in Miami both mention a post-Obama "military" option, that one-word nexus across the 90 miles of the Florida Straits should be taken seriously. Vidal: "Military option." Gomez: "Military intervention." One seems to dread it; the other seems to welcome it. Americans: They don't seem to care.

           Cuba, which keeps a sharp eye on the Miami media, is reacting to what it feels are unjustified assaults on Alejandro Castro Espin, the 49-year-old son of Cuban President Raul Castro and revolutionary icon Vilma Espin. Cuba believes the anti-Castro contingent in Miami is targeting Alejandro to belittle the fact that Raul Castro has already designated 55-year-old Miguel Diaz-Canel the next Cuban leader. Alejandro is a highly educated Colonel in Cuba's Interior Ministry and he is a key adviser to his father. But he says that he, his father, and his uncle Fidel "all agree there will not be a Castro monarchy because that would go against the revolution, which we feel was justified and remain proud of." Alejandro was recently interviewed by Mega TV in Greece. He is the only son of Raul Castro and Vilma Espin, who died of cancer in 2007. But he has three sisters -- Deborah, Mariela, and Nilsa. Of the four siblings, Mariela is the best known but Deborah is the most powerful. The word out of Miami this week is that Alejandro is being "groomed" as the next Cuban leader. "That's the absolute last thing I'm being groomed for," Alejandro said in Greece. 

         President Obama's efforts to normalize relations will Cuba have resulted in some successes and will have some more...even the opening of embassies in the capitals for the first time in 54 years. But like the other Democratic Presidents since 1963 -- Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton -- Obama's efforts will fail for the reasons mentioned in assessing the Vidal and Gomez assessments. U. S. failure regarding Cuba is endemic, a failure that democracy and its taxpayers pay a steep price in order to make it perpetual. 

         While the U. S. democracy -- backed by the strongest economy and military in the world -- remains strong, that is not the case when it comes to Cuba. In his Cuban venture, Mr. Obama has the majority support of Americans, Cuban-Americans, the Caribbean, Latin America, and the world. But that's not nearly enough. Right-wingers embedded high-up in the U. S. government -- such as the Dulles brothers in the 1950s and the leaders of the current Republican domination of the U. S. Congress -- can easily thwart the democratic ideals of any Democratic President when it comes to Cuba. Thus, President Obama is no match for the hard-line Cuban-exile core in Miami that, since its 1980s empowerment by the Bush dynasty, has readily dictated Cuban policy in the U. S. Congress by easily aligning with the requisite number of right-wing sycophants -- from Roberto Torricelli to Jesse Helms to John Boehner. Yes, America, the Cuban Revolution says a lot more about America than it says about Cuba. It has been that way for a long time.

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Cuba and the White House

A 2016 Nexus
Updated: Saturday, June 13th, 2015

              Reverend Joan Brown Campbell this week, June 11th, paid a visit to her good friend Fidel Castro in his Havana home. She is the former President of the National Council of Churches USA. A spokesman for Mr. Castro said, "Reverend Campbell and Fidel have had a friendship that dates back many years. She has given countless expressions of solidarity to Fidel and Cuba. She loves Fidel and the Cuban people." Reverend Campbell has represented Fidel in the U. S. on many touchy issues over the years -- such as the return to Cuba of 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez in 2000 and the return of the imprisoned Cuba 5 to Cuba in 2014.

Fidel Castro turns 89-years-old on August 13th, 2015.
Reverend Campbell's visit may indicate his health is declining.

       This week -- Thursday, June 11th, 2015 -- in Brussels, Belgium, all the nations of the Caribbean, Latin America, and the European Union issued a stirring denunciation of the U. S. embargo of Cuba, a cruel anachronism that has defamed America's and democracy's image since 1962. In a joint statement the Caribbean, Latin American, and European Union nations stated firmly: "We expect all necessary steps to be taken towards an early end to the embargo against Cuba." The nations of the world, each October, just as overwhelmingly, make the same denunciation. Yet, decade after decade, the United States maintains the embargo to appease a handful of Cuban-Americans in Miami and Union City as well as their self-serving right-wing sycophants in the U. S. Congress. A new poll in Miami issued yesterday also reveals that a huge majority of Cuban-Americans want the embargo ended. The UN nations, the Caribbean nations, the Latin American nations, and the European Union nations are surprised and ashamed that the U. S. democracy is not strong enough to end the embargo, which to them is nothing more and nothing less than a huge, strong nation punishing innocent people in a small, weak nation. Of course, Americans are supposed to continue to ignore world opinion as expressed at the UN, Caribbean opinion, Latin American opinion, and the opinions of the European Union's 28 nations. Thus, the image of America as depicted in the above graphic will continue around the world...for another six decades or so, or at least until a future generation of democracy-loving Americans can join the pantheon of the Greatest Generations of Americans.  

       Fashion designer Stella McCartney has issued this stunning tableau to herald President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba. {Photo courtesy: Quartz/BFA}

        At precisely 3:31 P. M. Wednesday {June 10th}, Gulfstream Air Charters made history when its jet left Orlando International Airport in Florida bound for, of all places, Cuba. However, fashion designers, airlines, etc., are being a bit premature as they take advantage of the lull before the next U.S.-Cuban storm. Permit me to explain.

      39-year-old Danny Diaz has been named Campaign Manager of Jeb Bush's floundering bid to become the Republican presidential candidate. After revamping his team with Diaz the leader, Bush flew to Europe for photo ops with notables such as Germany's Angela Merkel. Diaz is a hard-charging lobbyist with  PP1 Strategies in Washington. But it was in New Mexico as a publicist and strategist for two-time Governor Susana Martinez that Diaz established his political prowess and his indelible Bush connections. In 2004 he worked tirelessly in New Mexico for the unfortunate but successful re-election of President George W. Bush.

      But if Jeb Bush, backed by billions of dollars and the vast Bush connections, emerges as the Republican candidate, behind-the-scene power-brokers like Al Cardenas will have far more to do with it than young upfront whippersnappers like Danny Diaz. Since the late 1980s when Jeb Bush launched his political career in Florida as the Campaign Manager for Havana-born Ileana Ros-Lehtinen's successful and entrenched bid for the U. S. Congress {the seminal election that began the Miami-to-Washington pipeline}, Jeb has taken his directions, and orders, from Al Cardenas. Even as a two-term Governor of Florida, if Jeb wanted something, he asked Al Cardenas. If Al Cardenas wanted something, he told Jeb Bush. Jeb's asking and Al's telling remains today the economic and political relationship between Jeb and Al, which is far, far more important than any other Jeb Bush ties or connections.

         Al Cardenas was born in Havana in 1948. For years, he dominated Miami politics. Now as one of the most powerful lawyers-lobbyists in Washington, Mr. Cardenas is capable of putting either Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio in the White House in 2016. If and when that happens, Bush or Rubio would answer to Mr. Cardenas. Although Rubio is a Miami-produced Cuban American, Mr. Cardenas seems to prefer that Bush precedes Rubio in the White House, with the understanding that the young Mr. Rubio can wait his turn.

        Josefina Vidal is Cuba's expert and prime decision-maker on all things American. While television pundits in the U. S. will spend hours each day and night filling airtime with a litany of wild prognostications and updated polls on the current presidential sweepstakes, Vidal's less commercially involved predictions in Havana have proven far more accurate when it comes to the top echelon of U. S. politics. Vidal's main concern is maintaining Cuba's independence, not selling commercials or political ads. Vidal has already decided the outcome of America's presidential race, a process that she closely relates to Cuba's existence. And she has concluded this: Rubio will edge Bush for the Republican nomination and then Rubio will edge Hillary Clinton in the final one-against-one election. In the next fifteen months, the television networks will collect billions of dollars in political ads, and hope Americans ignore the prognosticator in Havana. Privately, Vidal told a Spanish reporter-friend, "Miami already dictates Cuban policy to the U. S. Congress. So, what the 2016 presidential election will mean is this: The Miami Batistianos will have captured Washington before they re-captured Havana." The Spanish reporter didn't have a follow-up question. He had already learned to accept Vidal's prognostications when it comes to American politics.

        President Marco Rubio, effective 2016! It is believed that Al Cardenas, on behalf of Jeb Bush, tried unsuccessfully to convince Marco Rubio to wait his turn for the White House, meaning right after Jeb's two terms. It is interesting that Havana-born Cardenas in Washington prefers Jeb over Little Havana {Miami}-born Rubio. It is also interesting that Ms. Vidal in Havana prefers Rubio over Jeb...in a scenario she knows as the lesser of two evils because she considers the Bush dynasty even more vindictive. But she believes if Rubio as Commander-in-Chief backs up his Cuban pre-election rhetoric, it will essentially mean war, one pitting an island against the nuclear superpower. Vidal, Havana's prime American decision-maker, is already preparing for what she believes will be a nuclear Bay of Pigs. Of course, the pro-Rubio television pundits will insist that is ridiculous, totally out of the question because we have other ways to recapture Cuba. Regardless, the recapture of Cuba is an underlying {and understated} toxic and volatile current coursing through the bowels of America's 2016 presidential election. Josefina Vidal says Rubio will be the winner and there is no television pundit in the United States that knows as much about American politics as Vidal. If that were not the case, the recapture of Cuba would have happened back during the 8 years {2001-2009} of the George W. Bush presidency. Cuba survived that threat only because of Vidal's acute wisdom. She got a reprieve in the fast-fading two-term presidency of Barack Obama, but she anticipates another Republican -- most likely Rubio -- in the White House following Obama. It remains to be seen, after that, if Cuba, as a sovereign nation, can survive. If it does, Vidal again will be the reason.

         This photo shows Dr. Yoandra Muro {upper right} checking out a Family Health Clinic in Cuba this week. Dr. Muro is Cuba's Minister of Public Health. She says, "It is well known that we have far more Family Health Clinics, per capita, than any nation in the world. My job is to make them the best in the world."

Dr. Yoandra Muro, Cuba's Minster of Public Health.

Luis Posada Carriles this week at Miami's famed Versailles Restaurant.

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Cuba And The U.S. Media

Mostly A Barren, Biased Wasteland
Updated: Wednesday, June 10th, 2015

        Al Neuharth, a superb journalist and visionary from South Dakota, founded USA Today in 1982. Today and for the past three decades, I have subscribed to his invention, both the print version and online. I think USA Today was a great idea and remains a great American newspaper. However, when it comes to Cuba, USA Today, like the rest of the mainstream U. S. media, is extremely biased as it caters only to anti-Cuban extremists in Miami. In doing so, Americans are incessantly pommeled with anti-Cuban propaganda from self-serving politicians and promoters while opposing views are rarely, if ever, mentioned.

        Alan Gomez -- based in Miami, of course -- is USA Today's top columnist on all things Cuban. Like most of America's high profile journalists or propagandists regarding Cuba, Mr. Gomez has a serious generational hatred of Revolutionary Cuba and, obviously, somewhat of a fondness for the Batista-Mafia dictatorship that preceded it prior to 1959. This week {Monday, June 8th} Mr. Gomez's column in USA Today was entitled "Cuba In Congress' Cross Hairs Again." When he stuck to facts, he explained how vicious anti-Castro zealots in the U. S. Congress from Miami are using an underhanded tactic to, as he put it, "block the president's plan to expand trade with Cuba." Those devious tactics, which Mr. Gomez seems to champion, involve members of Congress from Miami, such as Mario Diaz-Balart, attaching anti-Cuban bills to much larger so-called "must pass" bills working their way through Congress, such as the vast Transportation Bill that needs to be passed. In his typically biased column yesterday, Mr. Gomez, in the column itself and in bold headlines above it, quoted Miami's U. S. Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart as saying, "People don't want to just give up all leverage, getting nothing in return for the United States and doing nothing for the Cuban people." Since 1959, when the Batista-Mafia dictatorship in Cuba was overthrown and quickly reconstituted in South Florida, two generations of the extremely rich and powerful Diaz-Balart family, and a handful of others like it, have successfully reserved the right to dictate America's Cuban policy, which the rest of the world and almost all democracy-lovers oppose. By never mentioning that Miami's entrenched contributions to the U. S. Congress might be more than a bit biased regarding Cuba, USA Today and the rest of the compliant U. S. media do a disservice to the U. S. democracy, just as right-wingers {such as the Dulles brothers} permanently harmed the U. S. democracy in 1952 when the U. S. government teamed with the Mafia to support the brutal, thieving Batista dictatorship in Cuba -- a disastrous imperialist adventure that spawned the Cuban Revolution, which in turn gave birth to Little Havana in nearby Miami, Florida.

        This WLRN.org photo shows three generations of Diaz-Balarts. On the left is the grandfather Rafael Diaz-Balart. He was a well-to-do mayor and legislator in Cuba. In the middle is his son, also named Rafael. In the upper-right is Rafael Jr.'s son Lincoln, who was born in Havana on August 13th, 1954, and thus Lincoln shares a birthday with...Fidel Castro, who was born on August 13th, 1926. In the lower right is Rafael Jr.'s son Mario, who was born in Miami/Fort Lauderdale in 1961. Both Lincoln and Mario were elected to the United States Congress from Miami. Lincoln resigned his entrenched congressional seat to, among other things, create a second anti-Castro La Rosa Blanca {The White Rose} organization. Lincoln's dad Rafael Jr. had created the first White Rose in 1959 as the very first very powerful anti-Castro paramilitary unit.

      This photo shows Rafael Diaz-Balart, in the middle and flanked by the infamous Masferrer brothers, attending a pro-Batista political rally in 1958. All three, soon after this photo, fled the Cuban Revolution.

        Rafael Diaz-Balart died of leukemia at age 79 on May 6, 2005, in Key Biscayne, Florida. He was born on January 17, 1926, in Banes, Cuba...the same year {on August 13th} that Fidel Castro was born on a nearby farm owned by his rich dad Angel Castro. Rafael and Fidel were later bosom buddies as classmates at the University of Havana Law School. In fact, Fidel in 1948 married Rafael's beautiful sister Mirta. But in the 1950s Rafael and Fidel went separate ways. Rafael ended up as a key Minister in the Batista dictatorship and Fidel became a rebel determined to overthrow Batista. When that accomplishment shocked the world on January 1, 1959, the first generation of Cuban exiles -- personified by Rafael -- operated freely from South Florida in massive efforts to assassinate/overthrow Fidel. That didn't happen. But the second generation of Cuban exiles -- personified by Rafael's sons Lincoln and Mario -- are to this day conducting massive efforts to topple the soon-to-be 89-year-old Fidel's Cuba. That probably won't happen either, but the effort continues to create a vast economic and political cottage industry headquartered in Miami but now also with a tight grip on the U. S. Congress that the U. S. media pretends does not exist. Rafael Diaz-Balart, with vast post-Batista holdings in Spain and South Florida, was a very, very rich man...almost on a par with other ultra-rich Cuban exiles in South Florida such as the billionaire Fanjul and Canosa families.

         Meanwhile, an ill and weak Fidel Castro, who was born far richer than Rafael was, lives in a modest Havana home with his wife Dalia and one of their five sons, Alex. Dalia and Alex are his primary caretakers. On August 13th he is due to turn 89 although some believe he is too weak to make it to...August 13, 2015. 

         Louis A. Perez Jr. is one of the world's greatest and most unbiased experts on Cuba and on U.S.-Cuban relations. That, unfortunately, is the prime reason you will never see or hear him on any of the major U. S. news networks or programs, all of whom much prefer biased anti-Cuban propaganda espoused by self-serving benefactors or promoters. The reason is two-fold -- longtime intimidation or political correctness. Louis A. Perez Jr. is a prolific journalist and author about Cuba, with the above book -- "Cuba In The American Imagination" -- among his classics. He is also the Director of the Institute For The Study Of The Americas at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. In the first week of June, 2015, the U. S. networks featured anti-Cuban vitriol from the likes of John Boehner, the right-wing Speaker of the House of Representatives, along with the usual litany of anti-Cuban Cuban-American stalwarts Rubio, Cruz, Diaz-Lalart, Ros-Lehtinen, Menendez, etc. Meanwhile the U. S. networks wouldn't touch or mention much more insightful and far more unbiased major Cuban articles penned by Sarah Stephens, the head of the Washington-based Center for Democracy in the Americas; Peter Kornbluh, the head of the Cuba Project at the Washington-based U. S. National Security Archives; and Louis A. Perez Jr., the head of the Institute For The Study Of The Americas; etc. The sheer fact that Stephens, Kornbluh, Perez Jr., etc., are America's best unbiased Cuban experts disqualifies them from having their insight or views exposed on mainstream U. S. outlets. And that, as Perez Jr. has stated, is "much more an American problem than a Cuban problem."

       Louis A. Perez Jr, now 72, on June 5th penned a long article carried by "La Prensa San Diego" and other similar publications but it was far too accurate and unbiased to be mentioned by the mainstream U. S. media, which feasted on Rubio, Boehner, Menendez, Ros-Lehtinen, Diaz-Balart, etc., viciously maligning President Obama for removing Cuba from the U. S. Sponsors of Terrorism list. Here, by way of contrast, is the first sentence of Perez Jr.'s article: "On May 29, the United States removed Cuba from the list of 'state sponsors of terrorism' as one more step toward normalization of relations between the two countries. But, historically, it is the United States that has sponsored terrorism against Cuba." Throughout that article Perez Jr., an unchallenged expert on such history, revealed in detail gruesome U. S. terrorist acts against innocent Cubans, much of it perpetrated without consequences by the most vicious CIA-trained-and-funded exiles from the overthrown Batista-Mafia dictatorship in Cuba -- such as Luis Posada Carriles, still an honored citizen of Miami. Lopez Jr. wrote: "The United States engaged in a program of extralegal paramilitary operations as part of the failed attempts at Cuban regime change all through the early 1960s. These efforts included the Bay of Pigs invasion, scores of assassination attempts against Cuban leaders and numerous other covert operations. The intent was to bring about the collapse of the Cuban government, the CIA itself explained in 1963, through a 'strategy of economic strangulation to weaken and undermine the regime.' One planned operation the CIA detailed was designed to 'control major sabotage operations targets against Cuban industry and public utilities.' Another CIA project included 'the contamination of fuel and lubricants' as well as 'the introduction of foreign material into moving parts of machinery.' One plan specifically directed that 'fuel and food supplies should be sabotaged,' while another directive prescribed 'major acts of sabotage on shipping destined for Cuba and on key installations in Cuba.' The United States especially targeted sugar production, Cuba's principal source of foreign exchange. Covert operations involved planned arson of cane fields, sabotage of sugar machinery, and acts of chemical warfare including the spreading of chemicals in sugarcane fields to sicken Cuban cane cutters." While you won't find Louis A Perez Jr. on your U. S. "news" programs, you should become familiar with his books and also go online to study his aforementioned June 5th article. The U. S. media will provide unlimited free space and air time for Rubio, Diaz-Balart, Bush, etc., to spew propaganda about Cuba while being too scared or too biased to air the views of a Louis A. Perez Jr.

    Sarah Stephens is the democracy-loving Executive Director of the Washington-based Center for Democracy in the Americas. She is, beyond question, one of the world's greatest unbiased experts on Cuba and on U.S.-Cuban relations. And that, unfortunately, is precisely why you will seldom if ever see or hear her in the mainstream U. S. media, which reserves its Cuban reporting for anti-Cuban zealots. Ms. Stephens each Friday writes the CDA's "Cuba Central" blog. Her June 5th blog again excoriated Miami congressmen Marco Rubio and Mario Diaz-Balart for using their right-wing power in Congress to prey on innocent Cubans. This past Friday she singled out Diaz-Balart for his "budget bills moving through the House to shut down President Obama's travel reforms and other features of our historic diplomatic opening with Cuba." She added, "Of course, U. S. firms can easily do business with Russia, Saudi Arabia, and China -- among many other countries -- and U. S. travelers freely visit those places as Senator Rubio's Deputy Chief of Staff did last year on an all-expense paid trip to Beijing." Rubio's hypocrisy in regards to Cuba is not supposed to be noticed by uncaring Americans but Ms. Stephens is a democracy-lover that cares. She flatly accused Rubio of "trying to starve the island and its people," presumably to enhance his economic and political positions. And this past Friday Ms. Stephens wrote, "The U. S. State Department has declassified documents documenting the role of Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles in the 1976 terrorist attack on a Cuban airplane, the Miami Herald reports. The document shows that Posada, a trained CIA informant, alerted the Central Intelligence Agency of his plans to bomb the Cuban airliner en route from Panama to Havana. The document shows that the CIA...failed to act...and failed to alert Cuba of the plans. Years of documentary evidence assembled by the National Security Archive and others put Posada at the center of the plot to bomb the airliner in an attack that killed 73 persons on board." Ms. Stephens also mentioned documentary evidence that tied Posada to other horrendous terrorist acts, and she often notes that, thanks to incredible actions by the Bush dynasty and Miami-based members of Congress, Posada is a heralded free man today in Miami, recently in the news for leading an anti-Obama, anti-Cuban tourism street rally.

         George H. W. Bush was CIA Director only one year. But that year, 1976, was by far the bloodiest year for terrorist acts against Cuba, including the Oct. 6-1976 bombing of Cubana Flight 455 that killed 73 people. The Wikipedia photo above shows Mr. Bush when he was CIA Director, which lasted 357 days -- from January 30, 1976 till January 20, 1977. That brutal year marked the nadir of CIA-related Cuban violence.

        This Wikipedia photo shows George H. W. Bush with President Dwight Eisenhower. It was the Republican Eisenhower administration that in 1960 turned over to incoming President John Kennedy the CIA/Cuban exile plans to recapture Cuba, including the Bay of Pigs attack in April of 1963 that Kennedy was forced to sign off on. Later, Kennedy did an about-face on Cuba, once famously bellowing to his staff that he wished he could "blow the CIA to smithereens!" Then in November of 1963 Kennedy famously told Pierre Salinger and other key aides that his "main priority" when he got back from Dallas was to "normalize relations with Cuba." On Nov. 22-1963 Kennedy returned from Dallas in a coffin. The above photo of George H. W. Bush with outgoing President Eisenhower in 1959 is interesting because some great investigative journalists -- including Jack Anderson and Robert Parry -- wrote that GHW Bush in the early 1960s was far more engaged with the CIA, particularly concerning Cuba, than with his oil business in Texas. In fact, while with the Associated Press and Newsweek, Robert Parry spent countless but fruitless days following GHW Bush trying desperately to ask him about his ties to nefarious Cuban projects. Parry today runs Consortiumnews and you can reach him there or just Google his award-winning investigative work.

          Robert Parry is now 65-years-old. In 1985 for his stupendous investigative reporting for the Associated Press and Newsweek Magazine, Robert Parry won the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. 

A great book by Robert Parry.

      Tim Padgett remains a rare bird in American journalism, especially considering that his home-base is Miami, the capital of South Florida's lush Banana Republic. Tim is not only a great reporter -- specializing on the Caribbean and Latin America -- but he also has the guts and the integrity to sharply criticize Castro's Cuba or to sharply criticize the vast cottage industry in the U. S. that makes economic and political hay out of unfairly assaulting and propagandizing Castro's Cuba. And Tim has been doing this for a long time. Since 1990 he has served as Bureau Chief in the Miami region for such enterprises as Time and Newsweek magazines. He currently is based in Miami for the WLRN-Miami Herald collaboration. Journalists in Miami, by their nature, are expected to say nothing but positives things about the Batista-Mafia dictatorship in Cuba and, by the same token, report on only negatives about Revolutionary Cuba, especially while serving as propagandists to support the political and economic aspirations of Miami's Cuban-Americans. Miami journalists who have departed from that axiom have paid dearly for their integrity -- such as Emilio Milian who objected to such things as the terrorist bombing of Cubana Flight 455 and Jim DeFede who got fired as a top Miami Herald columnist shortly after he wrote a scathing column excoriating Miami members of the U. S. Congress -- the Diaz-Balart brothers and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen -- for their incredible work on behalf of infamous Cuban-American terrorists, most notably Luis Posada Carriles. Most journalists, in Miami and elsewhere, got the message regarding any journalism related to Cuba. Tim Padgett, a very brave man, is the exception. His column the first week of June right there in Miami was entitled: "How Rubio Can Fix His Cuba Double Standard." Remember now, journalists in Washington and New York...not to mention Miami...are not supposed to say anything negative about Marco Rubio, the first-time U. S. Senator from Miami, now that Rubio is a major Republican presidential candidate. Padgett wrote: "I'm waiting any moment now for Marco Rubio to demand that President Obama recall our ambassador to China and shut down our embassy there." Then the very brave Tim Padgett explained how Mr. Rubio licks up to mighty China while pummeling little Cuba unmercifully to enhance his banks accounts, his PACs, and his poll numbers. For example, Padgett wrote: "Like the time -- just last year, actually -- that Beijing paid for a junket his aides took to the People's Republic for friendly talks on trade and foreign policy." Mr. Padgett, of course, implied that China paid for that junket to impress Rubio's U. S. Senate votes. Merely to write such words in a major forum of the U. S. media in 2015 separates Tim Padgett from his Miami colleagues but also from mainstream U. S. electronic, print, or online "journalists." Tim Padgett is a brave man and a great reporter, even concerning Cuba.

All of which reminds me of.........

         ..........................Cristina Escobar. At age 26, she is the top journalist in Cuba. She hosts the country's top program on state television -- The Round Table. Last month she made a star-studded trip to Washington to cover the 4th diplomatic session featuring Cuba's Josefina Vidal and America's Roberta Jacobson. Cristina, fluent in English as well as Spanish, garnered headlines of her own when she fired a series of pertinent questions at White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest during a crowded news conference. For example, she asked Earnest if he thought the U. S. diplomats at the proposed U. S. embassy in Havana "would be respectful?" She was plainly implying that she didn't think the U. S. diplomats at the 7-story U. S. Interests Section building in Havana have been "respectful" in their efforts to undermine the Cuban government. But after that introduction at the Josh Earnest news conference, Cristina made some standing-room-only speeches around the U. S. capital, presumably at pre-arranged pro-Cuban affairs. At each stop she made it plain that "my main mission to the United States is to point out that the lies the U. S. media tells about Cuba hurts everyday Cubans more than it hurts the intended target, our government. In Cuba, on my program and in talks, I feel more free to criticize my government than I believe the U. S. journalists are free to tell the truth about U.S.-Cuban relations. That surprises me, especially the lack of input from U. S. citizens." Beyond her obvious photogenic and telegenic prowess, Cristina came across as a well educated and brilliant journalist. Perhaps highlighting her Washington trip are the rumors bouncing around the Caribbean that she was offered "3 million tax-free dollars" if she would defect to Miami and denounce the Cuban government. A Jamaican journalist who knows her well said, "Trust me, such offers have interested a lot of others but that's not in Cristina's DNA."  

      On Sunday, June 7th, the Philadelphia Enquirer introduced America to a Cuban lady named Margarita Alvarez. The article was written by Michael Matza and was entitled "U. S. Executives Explore Possibilities In Cuba." Margarita is a prime example of Cubans awaiting what they hope will be a U. S. relaxation of the 54-year economic embargo against Cuba. She owns an old mansion in Havana that was splendidly built in 1901, complete with 18-foot ceilings, marble floors, etc. It's a bit worn down now but the entrepreneurial-minded Margarita uses two neat rooms in the back for a very successful Bed & Breakfast, called Casa Particular in Cuba. Recently a Cuban, obviously fronting a large wad of U. S. money, offered Margarita $400,000 for her old mansion. She quickly said, "No, gracias." It will take a much larger cash offer than that to interest Margarita. Her mansion is located within three blocks of the fabled, refurbished Hotel Nacional. It is within easy walking distance of Havana's famed Malecon seawall. Location! Location! Location! A real estate agent's and a property owner's dream! Some of the richest people in the Western Hemisphere are eyeing Cuba as an investment opportunity. Margarita Alvarez knows that. So, she's not ready to sell her old mansion for a measly $400,000 right now. But...she does have a very neat and convenient Bed & Breakfast in Havana that she would be happy to rent you at a very reasonable price.

Meanwhile, back in the U. S......... 

      ...............this is a beautiful Baltimore Oriole coming in for a perfect landing. His human friend leaves his favorite snack, strawberry jelly, in this plastic dish to make sure he shows up regularly in her backyard.

{Baltimore Oriole photo courtesy of Jill Spaake/Birds & Bloom Magazine}

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