Cuban Extremists Mock Obama

Derailment of Detente Starts
Tuesday, August 11th, 2015

           Not unexpectedly, this accusatory index finger was pointed at Cuba yesterday -- Monday, August 10th. It belongs to retired Rear Admiral John Kirby. Till recently he was a spokesman for the Pentagon. Now he is a spokesman for the U. S. State Department. On Sunday, August 9th, Cuban authorities briefly retained about 90 anti-government demonstrators who disapprove of the fact that Secretary of State John Kerry will be in Havana Friday for the flag-raising ceremony at the first U. S. Embassy in Cuba since 1961. Sunday's demonstration spawned this obligatory and fully anticipated statement from Mr. Kirby on Monday: "We are deeply concerned by the round-up of peaceful activists by Cuban authorities." Well, sir, keep your index finger handy because you'll be aiming it across the Florida Straits some more this week and a lot more next week. Since 1959 counter-revolutionary tactics against Cuba have never failed to garner desired reactions in Washington, followed quickly by monetary and other reactions. Though small in number, provocateurs in Cuba are well-organized and, most agree, well-funded. Provoking Cuba into doing something that will be used to derail efforts to normalize relations with the U. S. has worked in the past and it will work again. Assassination attempts, the Bay of Pigs attack, terrorist acts, the embargo...they haven't worked to counter the revolution; and provocative demonstrations won't overturn it. But they can easily derail Obama's peace overtures. I predict Mr. Kirby's index finger will really get a good work-out in the coming days and weeks. After that...what? Miami's Little Havana moving back to Havana, perhaps?

         This is the image from Havana that flashed around the world on Monday, August 10th. The photo is courtesy of Francisco Jara/AFP. As this forum has stated repeatedly since December 17th, President Obama's Herculean efforts to normalize relations with Cuba will fail and result in more violence than peace. This past Sunday, Cuban security forces detained 90 dissidents, releasing them a few hours later. But it marks the first major salvo designed to turn back the advances Cuba and the U. S. have made in the last few months, such as the opening of embassies in the two capitals of Havana and Washington for the first time since 1961. The Cuban flag-raising ceremony at its new embassy in Washington took place last month and the American flag is due to be raised this Friday at the new U. S. embassy in Cuba, with Secretary of State John Kerry scheduled to attend the event. Since December 17th when he appeared on television in the U. S. and in Cuba to announce his plans to normalize relations with Cuba, the vast majority of Cubans have considered President Barack Obama a major hero. They have paraded his image and the U. S. flag all over the island, including on their clothing. But Sunday many of the dissidents, as shown above, wore masks depicting and mocking the U. S. President. In major articles, both the AFP and ABC-News quoted a dissident, Angel Mova, as saying, "It's his {Obama's} fault, what is happening." That, of course, is the minority opinion but, rest assured, it is the opinion that will be the coda to President Obama's brave and historic attempt to bring a degree of normalcy and decency to America's Cuban policy. In 1963 President Kennedy knew he had majority opinion on his side when he told his aides his "top priority" upon his return from Dallas was to normalize relations with Cuba. In 1996 President Clinton knew he had majority opinion on his side when he bravely tried to move in that direction too. History documents the fact that instead of moving toward normalization of relations with Cuba, the attempts by Presidents Kennedy and Clinton merely led to disasters and to post-disaster reactions that greatly strengthened the Miami-directed bellicosity towards Cuba. History is a teacher, a lesson...a precursor. That's why, from the get-go, President Obama's efforts were destined to meet the same fate as those of Presidents Kennedy and Clinton. Yes, the embassies have opened for the first time since 1961, highlighting incredible and very bold strides by President Obama. But when the smoke clears and the fog dissipates by the time he leaves office in January of 2017, his grandiose efforts to bring sanity and decency to U.S.-Cuban relations will have only spawned a setback while yet again providing a relatively easy victory for the minority that for decades has benefited -- revengefully, economically, and politically -- from a very cruel Cuban policy.

       This Francisco Jara/AFP photo was taken Sunday in Havana as the DAMAS DE BLANCO -- the "Ladies in White" -- began their anti-government demonstration. As usual it was very successful because about 50 of them were detained for a few hours, long enough to garner Monday morning headlines. It, of course, would have been vastly more successful if Cuban security forces had acted more violently. But prior to Secretary of State John Kerry's flag-raising trip to Cuba Friday, there is ample time to provoke Cuba and there are now enough Smart Phones to get audio and video of provocations. So, in defiance of President Obama, that's what Americans can expect...later this week, next week, and in the torrid months to come.

      Josefina Vidal is Cuba's Minister of North American Affairs, which means she is Cuba's top official regarding U. S. relations. She was Cuba's prime diplomat in the past two years in negotiating some remarkable advances with President Obama's representatives. They involved clandestine and un-publicized sessions that led up to Vidal's four highly publicized diplomatic meetings -- two in Havana and two in Washington -- with her U. S. counterpart Roberta Jacobson. Before, during, and after all the detente she has negotiated with the Obama administration in the past two years, Vidal has steadfastly maintained that most of her time and energy are devoted to monitoring and analyzing endless and well-funded regime-change programs. She particularly tries to assess foreign-funded and inspired dissident activity, hoping to avoid a reaction that could be used to hurt Cuba. It is for sure, on the eve of Secretary of State John Kerry's visit to Cuba this Friday, Vidal anticipated the anti-government demonstrations that occurred yesterday and, for sure, she anticipates more the rest of the week. She is abundantly aware that dissidents hope to have Smart Phone-type audio and video of incidents that will saturate U. S. television networks. Yes, Josefina Vidal...in her heart of hearts...knows that the work she and many others, including her good friend Roberta Jacobson, have put in will be in vain. Yet, she believes it was worth a try. "Yes," she says, "it's almost a no-win position for us. The perpetrators have the advantage. We know that. We also know that trying to normalize relations with the United States was a worthwhile endeavor. I will never regret that we tried." Those in Cuba and America who desire peace and normalcy are indeed mired between a gigantic rock and an impregnable hard place. It's been that way since the 1950s and it won't change in 2015, even with the opening of embassies. Echoes of Josefina Vidal's most definitive words will merely be a footnote to what good people tried to accomplish in the final two years of the Obama Presidency: "I will never regret that we tried." Like she said, the effort was...worthwhile -- for Cuba and America and the entire region.

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            This past weekend {August 7th, 2015} the Associated Press used this Desmond Boylan photo to illustrate an article written by Michael Weissenstein entitled: "BOAT BOOM: Luxury Ships Are Replacing Rafts Between Cuba And The U. S." The photo shows a woman jogging on the famed Malecon seawall with a luxury U. S. ship in the background. Unlike most Americans who have gotten their views of Cuba dictated to them by the most extremist elements from the long-ago {1959} Batista dictatorship, this woman has a first-hand view of the gorgeous, misunderstood, nearby, historic, and enigmatic island.

       Regardless of what transpires in the coming months...and a lot will transpire...President Barack Obama's Cuban legacy will last for the ages because he at least had the guts to confront powerful and dangerous forces to try to correct a blight on the U. S. democracy. More than all of the ten Presidents that directly preceded him, Mr. Obama's decency, intelligence, and guts in regards to Cuba has far exceeded the combined overtures, or lack thereof, of the American Presidents dating back to the Eisenhower administration. In 1952 the decision was made for the U. S. to team with the Mafia to support the brutal, thieving Batista dictatorship in Cuba. That decision spawned the Cuban Revolution, which in turn gave birth to the tarbaby, as depicted above, that not even Mr. Obama can extricate the world's greatest democracy from. However, let it be noted that President Barack Obama tried. And he tried really hard.

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Cuba's World-Class Health Care

Americans Could Benefit

      Good morning. Last week Margaret Chen, head of the World Health Organization, strongly suggested that Americans could benefit from Cuban health programs and from some breakthrough drugs and vaccines that treat such diseases as cancer and diabetes, if President Obama's plans to normalize relations with the island actually come to fruition. Ms. Chen, for example, repeated that one reason poor Cuba has a lower infant mortality rate than rich America is because of the ubiquitous polyclinics that saturate the island and are ready 24-hours-a-day to treat and advise pregnant Cubans free-of-charge. Ms. Chen suggests that the U. S. study and replicate those polyclinics and she suggests that Americans should have access to Cuban-developed drugs and vaccines. Well, this week another internationally renowned health professional strongly echoed Ms. Chen's words about Cuba's health methods.

     Dr. Peter G. Bourne was born in 1939 in Oxford, England. Today he is a visiting professor at the University of Oxford. In between those two milestones in his distinguished life he became known as one of the world's foremost medical experts. He got his MD degree from Emory University in Atlanta in 1962 and his MA in anthropology from Stanford in 1969. In the 1970s he was Special Assistant to President Jimmy Carter for Health Issues. He was also President Carter's Drug Czar. Today, in addition to his teachings at Oxford, Dr. Bourne is still a pilot, a marathoner, and he is Chairman of the Board of MEDICC, which stands for Medical Education Cooperation With Cuba. Since 1959 Dr. Bourne has deeply admired the health practices instituted in 1959 by Revolutionary Cuba right after the overthrow of the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. Dr. Bourne has written lavishly about that in his books, including contrasts with Batista's Cuba.

Dr. Bourne wrote a superb biography of Jimmy Carter.

      Dr. Bourne also wrote a superb biography of Fidel Castro. Since 1959 Americans have been told daily that all of the assassination attempts, military and terrorist acts against Cuba, the embargo, etc., etc., are fully justified because "every dollar we allow to reach Cuba goes into Fidel Castro's pockets or his Swiss bank accounts." Such lies, Dr. Bourne says, have hurt Cubans and Americans everyday since 1959 while sating endless revenge, economic, and political motives of extremists Cuban exiles and their sycophants. In the summer of 2015 the World Bank and the World Health Organization both praised Cuba for the extraordinary percentage of its economy devoted to education, health, and shelter on the island. Well, Peter G. Bourne has been saying that since 1959...although Americans are not supposed to pay any attention to such unbiased experts because it might anger anti-Castro benefactors.

Peter G. Bourne in the 1970s with  President Carter.

       In this first week of August, 2015, Dr. Peter G. Bourne has written another superb article, this one praising President Barack Obama for his peaceful overtures to Cuba. Dr. Bourne knows as much about Cuba's health practices as any non-Cuban in the entire world. His updated article points out how Americans can benefit from advances in medicine pioneered in Cuba and, yes, funded by Revolutionary Cuba. Dr. Bourne has a slide-show with 27 graphics to illustrate his points about Cuba's medical progress from zero during the Batista years to world-class during the Castro years.

Graphic #1 from Dr. Peter G. Bourne.

Graphic #2 from Dr. Peter G. Bourne.

        After those first two graphics, Dr. Peter G. Bourne's slide-show goes through 25 more graphics touting Cuba's health programs, and then he concludes with the above graphic. Americans to this day are supposed to believe every word the three Fox News-promoted presidential candidates -- Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Ted Cruz -- say about Cuba. And Americans are supposed to totally dismiss every word that true, unbiased experts like Dr. Peter G. Bourne say about Cuba. It's been that way since 1959. President Barack Obama's efforts have bravely attempted to correct that abomination by at least opening some cracks, some fissures, in America's Cuban policy that has shamed democracy since the 1950s. But politicos like Bush, Rubio, and Cruz -- among the many who have benefited from Batistiano-Mafiosi dictates concerning Cuba -- are determined to, by their own words, "block," "turn back," and "destroy" Mr. Obama's sane, decent approach to Cuba. If history of the last six decades is any clue, neither the American people nor the U. S. media have the courage to oppose that affront and insult to democracy. Across the ocean at Oxford University, Dr. Bourne has monitored the progress President Obama has made in U.S.-Cuban relations. Now Dr. Bourne will monitor right-wing benefactors blocking, turning back, and destroying most if not all of what a decent President has wrought.

       I'll close this essay on Dr. Peter G. Bourne with this graphic, one of the 27 in his slideshow. It shows that during Batista's rule Cuba's infant mortality rate was among the worst in the world; after the Cuban Revolution in 1959, the island's infant mortality became among the world's best, and lower than that in the United States. At the bottom of this graphic Dr. Bourne points out that the deaths of mothers during childbirth also took a precipitous dip after 1959 in Revolutionary Cuba. The lives of babies and the lives of mothers are the best indicators of a nation's health care. Bush, Rubio, and Cruz won't dispute Dr. Bourne's graphics and they won't dispute the article he wrote this week. But they'll assume Americans won't care about what unbiased experts say about the nearby island that Bush, Rubio, and Cruz will tell you was much better off when the Batistianos and the Mafiosi ruled supreme back in the 1950s.

         In their extremely well-funded, bought-and-paid-for bids for the White House, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Jeb Bush self-servingly don't seem too impressed with any Cuban positives -- including such meaningless things as infant and mother mortality rates. On the other hand, they seem to think that the glory days of Cuba came in the 1950s when Batista, Lansky, and Luciano were in charge of Cuba.

But.......................

       .............when Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky, and Fulgencio Batista ruled Cuba, they were only concerned with robbing the island and brutalizing the peasants.

But at least.............

       ........................the Cuban Revolution, after its triumph on January 1, 1959, did care about infant and mother mortality, according to renowned Dr. Peter G. Bourne.

Good night..!

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When You Visit Cuba

Normal Sights Will Fascinate
Saturday, August 8th,  2015

        This week -- on August 7th -- The International Business Times featured thirty-one magnificent photos by famed photo-journalist Alexandre Meneghini with captions written by David Sim. The photos chronicle the lives of everyday Cubans this year. The one above depicts two retirees -- 78-year-old Ernesto Arias and 81-year-old Cerola Suarez, sitting under a photo of Fidel Castro as they watched U. S. President Barack Obama announce his intentions to normalize relations with Cuba. This was at a retirement home in Havana.

           This Alexandre Meneghini photo shows two-year-old Alexo Carmono engaged in a staring contest with a white pony named Coco. The pony is one of five that the Perez family in Havana rents out for rides to children like Alexo. The other 29 outstanding Meneghini photographs on the International Business Times website Friday also captured snapshots of everyday people living their lives on the island of Cuba.

         When I was in Cuba I was blown away by the truly unique beauty of Vinales Valley. This week the London-based The Guardian included this Alamy photo of Vinales Valley among a series of Cuban scenes. The contrasting colors from the brown soil to the top of the astounding mountains are truly stunning.

The Guardian also featured this bucolic David Myers/Alamy scene in Vinales Valley.

If you visit Cuba, make sure you drive southwest out of Havana to Vinales Valley.

{My favorite Cuban city was Trinidad on the south-central coast}

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U. S. Ambassador To Cuba

A Suggestion, Mr. President

      DeWayne Wickham has been a top columnist at USA Today, America's largest newspaper, for the last thirty years, since 1985. In his Tuesday column this week he announced he is retiring from that ubiquitous, high-profile job. Now I believe President Barack Obama should appoint DeWayne Wickham as the first American Ambassador to Cuba since 1961.

       In addition to three decades as a highly respected columnist for USA Today, DeWayne Wickham has also been a commentator for CBS News and he currently teaches journalism at Morgan State in Baltimore.

        This Alan Diaz/AP photo was used to illustrate DeWayne Wickham's column in USA Today on April 20th. Marco Rubio, the freshman U. S. Senator from Miami and already a Presidential candidate, had just excoriated President Obama's Cuban overtures. Rubio wailed about Cuba's "bloody shirts," among other diatribes. DeWayne Wickham, not unexpectedly, was the only national journalist in the United States with the basic integrity and the sheer guts to take Rubio to task for falsely labeling Cuba and for self-servingly excoriating a good deed by the two-term President of the United States. Mr. Wickham devoted his April 20th column to challenging Rubio on the topic of Cuba, a challenge no other major U. S. journalist has the guts to do. He waved Rubio's "bloody shirt" back at him and he did so by asking Rubio "WHAT ABOUT LUIS POSADA CARRILES?" During a vitally important Presidential campaign, no other U. S. journalist is courageous enough to ask Rubio that question...or to ask Rubio's mentor, Jeb Bush, "WHAT ABOUT ORLANDO BOSCH?" When a Bush or a Rubio can use the U. S. media to demean a decent two-term President for his sane approach to Cuba while never having to answer questions about Carriles, Bosch, etc. in Miami, it is a reminder of how badly U. S. journalism needed the integrity and guts of Mr. Wickham.

       As this cogent White House photo illustrates, President Barack Obama listens to what DeWayne Wickham has to say. In fact, two years ago when President Obama made the final decision about trying to normalize relations with Cuba, he discussed his plans with a Cuban expert he trusted -- DeWayne Wickham. At the above session it is believed by Washington insiders that Mr. Obama asked Mr. Wickham, "DeWayne, is there anybody in Cuba other than the Castros who has power-making decisions and personal influence that I or my people can seriously talk to about normalizing relations with Cuba?" It is believed by Washington insiders that Mr. Wickham replied: "Yes, sir, Mr. President, there is such a person in Cuba. Her name is Josefina Vidal. Her title is lofty. She is Cuba's Minister of North American Affairs. But her decision-making and influence transcends that title. She is a patriotic Cuban. She is brilliant. She is fluent in English. She has lived in Washington at the Swiss Interests Section building. She has spoken about U.S.-Cuban relations at the Kennedy Library in Boston when Caroline Kennedy and some of America's top historians gave her a standing ovation. So...yes, sir, Mr. President. You can talk to Josefina Vidal. When I want to know Cuba's side of controversial issues, I fly to Havana and talk to her. She's smart. And she's honest."

           President Obama accepted DeWayne Wickham's candid suggestion regarding Josefina Vidal. At another White House session, that is President Obama flanked by DeWayne Wickham on his right and his top adviser Valerie Jarrett on his left. Mr. Wickham had again confirmed to the President that there was a Cuban, Josefina Vidal, that he and his people could talk to. The President then turned to Ms. Jarrett and solicited her opinion, which coincided with Mr. Wickham's. President Obama had his Cuban opening. For the next twenty months President Obama learned that DeWayne Wickham's suggestion regarding Josefina Vidal was valid and so he moved very boldly forward with his plans to normalize relations with Cuba.

       After President Obama accepted DeWayne Wickham's suggestion about Josefina Vidal, a suggestion that was seconded by Obama's top Latin American Minister, Roberta Jacobson, there were months of clandestine U.S.-Cuban meetings in Canada with even Pope Francis in Rome making vital telephonic suggestions. Then the world watched Vidal and Jacobson {above} hold news conferences to explain what had transpired during their four highly publicized diplomatic sessions -- two in Havana and two in Washington. These two talented diplomats astonishingly affected major changes in U. S.-Cuban relations that had been mired down in Cold War bellicosity for almost six decades. Alan Gross was freed from a Cuban prison; the Cuba 5 were freed from U. S. prisons; Cuba was removed from the U. S. State Sponsors of Terrorism list; Cuba was removed from another list that designated Cuba as a major trafficker in humans and drugs; more freedoms to travel to Cuba were relaxed; more commerce between the two neighboring nations became possible; and for the first time since 1961 they re-opened embassies in their capitals.

         None of the recent positive changes in U.S.-Cuban relations would have been possible if DeWayne Wickham had not convinced President Obama that, yes, there was in Cuba a non-Castro that he and Roberta Jacobson could talk to. Josefina Vidal lived up to the extremely high expectations of her.

    Fittingly, DeWayne Wickham's final column for USA Today this week  {August 4th} was entitled: "Witness To History For 30 Years." Also fittingly, Cuba burnished strongly in his mind. He said he prolonged his stay with the national newspaper because of the Obama presidency. He wrote: "It allowed me to push for, and chronicle, another seismic change in the political life of our nation: The normalization of relations with Cuba." Later in the column he wrote: "Afro Cubans...were the Castro government's most loyal supporters. As companies from across the world set up shop in Cuba, the U. S. embargo became a blockade against American businesses shut out of a marketplace of 11 million people. For years, I hammered away at the bad judgment that has kept this embargo in place while the United States expanded economic and political ties with communist China and Vietnam. The embargo against Cuba, I argued in my column and in meetings with White House officials, pandered to the rearguard of a Cold War that ended with the Soviet collapse." Cuba very appropriately dominated his last column.

      Mr. President, I believe DeWayne Wickham would make an excellent U. S. Ambassador to Cuba. He is your friend and Josefina Vidal's friend. In his April 20th USA Today rebuke of Senator Rubio's harangue against you, Mr. Wickham explained to his readers and to Mr. Rubio that U.S.-Cuban relations is "a two-way street," not a one-way dead-end proposition designed to benefit only a few self-serving entities. As he retires on his own terms after thirty years with USA Today, DeWayne Wickham might accept your appointment, Mr. President, as Ambassador to Cuba. If so, you could not make a better choice. Yes, anti-Castro zealots Marco Rubio and Bob Menendez in the U. S. Senate have vowed to block any such appointment but their extremist views haven't deterred you so far, nor should they. Your pro-Vidal assessment is both brave and correct. Your appointment of DeWayne Wickham as Ambassador to Cuba will, I think, be approved by enough Senators not named Rubio or Menendez. And that, Mr. President, would be a good appointment for most Americans and for most Cubans. As you have cogently stated, 50+ years of the same failed policy is 50+ years too long. It is past time, as DeWayne Wickham has advocated, for the majority, not a few, to be served by a sane Cuban policy.

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The Dawning Of A New Cuba

From Sunset to Sunrise
Updated: Wednesday, August 5th, 2015

  Cristina Escobar has some thoughts about what Cuba will look like "just five years from now." She says, "It's exciting. Transitions always are. I believe the twentysomethings on the island, not the forever pertinent Castro legacy and not selfish people in Miami and Washington, will determine what Cuba looks like in five years. That's not far off, I know. But acceleration has taken over the island. The next five years will be phenomenal...not easy, but phenomenal." Cristina's thoughts about Cuba's immediate future are important, probably more important than all the thoughts about the topic currently taking place in Miami and Washington. Cristina is 27-years-old. She is brilliant. She is 100% Cuban. All the twentysomethings on the island know her. They believe in her. She is their beacon, their shining light, and...their hope.

      Cristina Escobar is not too happy with the current state of U.S.-Cuban relations, even with the emerging detente that has resulted in the opening of embassies in the two capitals for the first time since 1961. She has closely followed those developments as Cuba's most ubiquitous broadcast journalist and anchor. She believes the upgrade from an Interests Section to a U. S. Embassy in Havana will afford the U. S. more of an opportunity to directly foment and finance dissent on the island. "I should be proud that the U. S. Embassy has opened here," she says, "but I am not. I should be cheering on August 14th when Secretary John Kerry comes here to officially raise the American flag on its new Cuban embassy, but I will not be cheering. I know decent Americans, and decent Cubans in America. I trust them. I just don't trust the Americans and the Cubans who make the laws and the decisions regarding Cuba."

      But Cristina Escobar's thoughts about ongoing and future U.S.-Cuban relations do not encompass all gloom and doom scenarios. "The enthusiasm of the Cubans on the island is palpable," she says. "I give our great Minister, Josefina Vidal, credit for that. And Mr. Obama, of course. The Cuban people deserve what Josefina and Mr. Obama have accomplished. I think there will be more positives. I think more Americans will visit the island and see for themselves how beautiful Cuba is, and how wonderful the Cubans who have stayed here truly are. I think what has prolonged the negativity between the U. S. and Cuba for all these decades is mostly a failure of the U. S. media to rise above obvious propaganda and present a true portrait of what post-revolutionary Cuba is. Yes, we who live here can see things to criticize and improve. But we are far better than the U. S. when it comes to equality. When it comes to safety. When it comes to free quality education. When it comes to free quality health care. When the World Bank praised Cuba for devoting such a huge portion of its economy to education, health, and shelter, U. S. media ignored it. When the World Health Organization praised Cuba for having a lower infant mortality rate than the U. S. and other much richer nations, the U. S. media ignored it. But the U. S. media, at least in Miami, wailed about the terrorist downing of a civilian airplane as being a huge blow against Castro while not mentioning all 73 innocents who died. Is an inept U. S. media Cuba's problem or is it America's problem? I believe you know how I would answer that question."

     Yes, we know how Cristina Escobar would answer questions about Cubana Flight 455; about Cuba's infant mortality rate; about Cuba's free educational, health, and shelter programs; and about how "the inept" or intimidated U. S. media portrays Cuba. We know because she blistered a lot of ears about her disdain for the U. S. media when she garnered headlines while in Washington covering the last Vidal-Jacobson diplomatic session. And we know how she feels, frankly, because she is opinionated and she has an effective forum -- on Cuban television but also on regional telecasts -- to air her views, as well as her extremely talented anchoring, probably the best on the North American continent. Her incisive interviews, in either Spanish or English, are nightly highlights on Cuban television but also readily available regionally on networks such as Telesur and internationally on venues such as YouTube.

  Uhhhhhhhh...did I tell you that Cristina Escobar has some thoughts about Guantanamo Bay too? She wants it back!! "It won't happen while I'm in my twenties," she says, "but it had better happen when I'm in my thirties, or there will be hell to pay." Ummmmm...? Cristina, as well as the rest of the world, is aware that Guantanamo Bay is one of the world's best and most beautiful ports, and that the U. S. simply "stole it" in 1903. She is aware that the U. S. has a major military base at Guantanamo Bay not to mention Starbucks, McDonalds, a beautiful golf course, luxury recreational and entertainment structures, and..."oh, yes!"...one of the world's most infamous prisons. It'll be hard for the U. S. to give it back and Cuba is not capable of getting it back militarily. "But," says Cristina as she mellows down a bit about the hot topic, "pressure and diplomacy should do the trick. For heavens sake, rational Americans must know how the theft of such a valuable portion of Cuban land and water is viewed by the rest of the world. Imperialism is no longer in vogue. Neither is terrorism. Neither is outright thievery, at least in civilized societies. I still believe that Americans, if they are told the truth about things such as their Mafia and imperialist heritage, they will act fairly and rationally towards Cuba. The Platt Amendment right after the Spanish-American War in 1898 and the Helms-Burton Act written by Miami extremists are viewed worldwide as undemocratic, criminal acts. If Americans don't know that, they should...especially if they care about their democracy." After a touch of calmness even about the hot topic of Guantanamo Bay, Cristina steamed up again. "Dammit!" she said, defiantly shaking a pencil at the camera, "they should! THEY SHOULD!"

         But, truth be known, Cristina Escobar doesn't trust either Miami or Washington "as far as I can throw them." Mulling her phraseology and a bit surprised by it, she laughs and adds, "And those are two biggggg cities. I've seen them. Most people, including Cubans in Miami, are nice people. Most people in Washington are nice people. I've told friends in both those cities that my problem with their democracy is...it's not really democratic. If it was, a few extremists in 1898 wouldn't have started the Spanish-American War to steal Cuba from Spain and, while they were at, 'why don't we take Puerto Rico and the Philippines too?' Would a true democracy then have stolen Guantanamo Bay in 1903 and supported a succession of puppet dictators, culminating in 1952 with a coup that put the cruelest dictatorship of all -- Batista and the Mafia -- in charge of Cuba? I say 'no' to those questions. Do you in your democracy have the freedom or the knowledge to say 'yes?' I don't think so. That's where we are today in the second half of 2015. I think, I hope, that this twentysomething generation of Cubans...Cubans on the island, my generation...will be the ones to decide Cuba's future. I believe we will. And I believe it will be a bright future. I believe we deserve it. So, there you have it. My biggest problem, my biggest regret, with the United States is that I don't believe it is a true democracy. If it is, if it were, there would have been no Spanish-American War, no Platt Amendment, no stealing of a big chunk of Cuban land, no terrorist bombings of Cuban hotels and cane fields and fishing cabins on our coasts and a Cuban civilian airplane, no unconscionable and long-term protection of the region's most notable terrorists, and so forth. Believe me, I want the United States, for Cuba's sake, to be Cuba's friend and its best trading partner. And that means I want the majority of America's people, not a few powerful and selfish criminals, making the basic decisions that will govern America's relations with Cuba. Is that too much to want? I mean...the majority of Americans still think of their country as a democracy, right? If they take pride in their democracy, I believe Cuba will have a brighter future. I believe those of us on this island deserve that. I believe, whatever the odds, we will fight for what a lot of great nations, large and small, including the United States of America, have fought for, and that is Sovereignty. So, that's where I'm coming from tonight. Now...let's get some other opinions."

     Ana Navarro is a Poster Lady for what Cristina Escobar considers an "America problem" that "hurts everyday Cubans on the island while promoting extremist Cubans in Miami and Washington." Navarro was born in Nicaragua but she is a pure anti-Cuban zealot in Miami. She graduated from the University of Miami in 1993 and she has made a fortune as a publicist for powerful anti-Cuban zealots such as Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio. And that's what she is today...a prime propagandist for Jeb Bush #1 and Marco Rubio #2, both of whom are Republican presidential candidates. She is also a highly paid "CNN political commentator" whereby CNN affords her countless hours of free propaganda time promoting Bush as America's next President to be succeeded, eight years later, by President Marco Rubio. As Cuba's top broadcast journalist, young Cristina Escobar cites Ana Navarro as "a paradigm of the American media that is nothing more and nothing less than a giant, lucrative propaganda machine...left-wingers, right-wingers, and even middle-wingers like CNN, a network with an international reach that reaches Cuba too. As a journalist in Cuba, I sometimes watch CNN and cringe." This is what makes Cristina cringe: {"And now next on CNN we present our fair-and-balanced political commentator from Miami, Ana Navarro, and she will tell you again this hour why Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio should be America's next two Presidents and why they will overturn every major program President Obama has put forth. So now, Ana, tell America all about YOUR UNBIASED VIEWS."}} Americans, of all people, should be able to separate propaganda from truth. 

        When highly paid propagandist Ana Navarro is presented to the American public by CNN as a ubiquitous "political commentator" when any intelligent person should know that she is nothing but a publicist for Bush and Rubio, one would have to agree, I think, that Cristina Escobar is correct about the sorry state of the media in the United States. In Washington Cristina garnered headlines when she directly told the U. S. media about her "utter disdain" for the U. S. media because "it hurts everyday Cubans. It doesn't hurt me and it doesn't hurt Fidel but it hurts everyday Cubans. Lies and propaganda, especially when it is not balanced with truth and facts, hurts Americans too and makes fun of their democracy. My problem with that is how it hurts everyday Cubans. I don't hurt or criticize everyday Americans but as a broadcast journalist with respect for my profession, the U. S. media is shameful." {"AND NOW NEXT ON CNN WE PRESENT ANA NAVARRO.......!!!" "THANK YOU, ANDERSON. THIS IS MY 4TH APPEARANCE ON CNN TODAY. I JUST WANT TO REMIND AMERICANS THAT THE TWO GREATEST AMERICANS ARE #1 JEB BUSH AND #2 MARCO RUBIO, OUR NEXT TWO PRESIDENTS FOR THE THE 16 YEARS BEGINNING IN 2017. AND THE WORST PRESIDENT IN HISTORY IS OBAMA AND HIS WORST MISTAKE IS TRYING TO CHANGE THE WAY WE TREAT CUBANS ON THE ISLAND. ONLY THE CUBANS IN MIAMI SHOULD MAKE SUCH DECISIONS, ANDERSON. JEB AND MARCO WILL CORRECT ALL OF OBAMA'S EFFORTS....!"} Cristina Escobar thinks propagandists should be corrected.

Cristina Escobar

Leader of Cuba's twentysomethings
Is she more powerful than the rich Cubans in Miami and Washington??
Changing topics:

       This magnificent photo is courtesy of Richard Day/Daybreak Emagery/Birds & Blooms Magazine. Five American Goldfinches and one bluebird: Healthy, beautiful, peaceful, content and very well-fed. Just like the whole wide world should be.

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A Cuba In Limbo

Transitioning To Post-Castro Cuba
As U.S.-Cuban Relations Begin To Thaw

          Arnaldo Brown has been Jamaica's Foreign Minister and Trade Minister since January of 2012. Like other Cuban neighbors, Jamaica is very interested in U.S.-Cuban relations. Brown says, "Cuba is the Caribbean's largest and most dominant nation. When the regional superpower, the United States, hurts the Cuban people, all of us are hurt by a foreign nation that should be our friend and our best trading partner." Brown, a lawyer and former member of the Jamaican parliament, remembers when a Jamaican company "unfortunately 10% owned by an American company" was fined by the U. S. for shipping a box of baby aspirin to Cuba. Brown believes the people who should have been fined are "the ex-Cubans and their bought-and-paid-for associates who make such U. S. laws." On Sunday -- August 2nd -- the Jamaica Observer carried further stinging quotes from Mr. Brown. He called the U. S. embargo against Cuba "unjust" and "a yoke." He believes the embargo, imposed way back in 1962, has unjustly harmed the entire Caribbean and is a yoke around the neck of all Caribbeans. "Americans are not supposed to understand that," he says, "and if they do they are supposed to accept it as America's imperialist right." In yesterday's Jamaica Observer Mr. Brown said: "Long live Cuba! Long live Fidel Castro! Long live the Cuban Revolution!"

         Cuba dominates the Caribbean in America's backyard. That's the island of Jamaica directly south of Cuba's southeastern tip. All the Caribbean nations oppose the U. S. embargo against Cuba and oppose what Arnaldo Brown calls "decades of Miami-Washington intransigence against Cubans who remain on the island and decades of gifts for those enticed to defect or enticed to create dissident chaos on the island." Brown says, "Obama's friendly gestures toward Cuba will last only till the next Republican takes over the White House, if that long. Stealing Guantanamo Bay in 1903 and keeping it all these decades remains a crime, like a bully in grade school stealing a little kid's lunch money every morning...because he can."  

         Now that the United States and Cuba have opened embassies in their respective capital cities for the first time in 5-and-and-a-half decades, the Cuban focus shifts to the current presidential campaigns in the U. S. The two-term presidency of Barack Obama, which has a mere 17 months to go, has been even more vital to Cuba than it has been to the rest of the world. If Obama is succeeded by another Democrat -- Hillary Clinton or maybe Joe Biden -- Cuba expects to continue transitioning to a Vietnamese-style economy that will soon have the United States as a friend and a prime trading partner. But if Obama is replaced by a Republican -- namely another Bush -- Cuba, frankly, anticipates a military confrontation of some sort.

         This AP/Getty Images montage shows the two candidates -- Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton -- who will be the likely finalists in the presidential sweepstakes. That is not the way it should be but that is the way it is. Bush and Clinton, perpetuating political dynasties that would make America's Founding Fathers cringe, are the two presidential candidates with the billions of dollars needed to win in a money-crazed election process that stuns democracy lovers worldwide with its emphasis on bought-and-paid-for candidates as opposed to quality public servant-type candidates. Billionaire donors dominate national elections in the U. S. and, unfortunately, those billlionaires favor Bush and Clinton, with the Republican Cuban-Americans Rubio and Cruz the next most favored by the billionaires because, like Bush and Clinton, they can be bought. All the while, ad agencies, television stations, and lobbyists are wildly cheering the system as they rake in their share of those anti-democratic dollars. More and more Americans, most of whom haven't bothered to vote in recent national elections, agree with the foreign assessment of unlimited and often unaccounted money gone amok deep within the bowels of the U. S. democracy. As a nearby island, since 1492 Cuba has been tightly tied to whatever transpires in America, and that includes America's bought-and-paid-for political system. Even non-billionaires who give money to politicians are shaming democracy, mocking the intentions of our Founding Fathers who cherished the sacredness of one-person/one-vote.

           This is one of the most iconic photos of Cuba when the U. S. dominated the island in the period after the Spanish-American War in 1898 up until the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959. In the 1930s a Cuban named Jose Garcia opened Sloppy Joe's Bar. It became a Cuban playpen for famous Americans.

        Famed author Earnest Hemingway was a regular at the Sloppy Joe's Bar. In this photo Hemingway was talking with actor Alex Guinness and entertainer Coel Howard. Other American celebrities who frequented Sloppy Joe's Bar were...Frank Sinatra, Ava Gardner, Nat King Cole, Fred Astaire, and many, many others. But the Cuban Revolution was not too fond of sin...gambling, prostitution, drinking, etc. So for fifty years, Sloppy Joe's Bar was closed and, like many Mafia mansions, became houses for Cuban peasants.

      Sloppy Joe's reopened in 2013. This AP photo was taken on April 13, 2013. It shows Sloppy Joe's on one side of the street and on the other a Cuban woman is drying freshly washed clothes on her balcony.

And by the way..............

          ........................I subscribe to the theory that a photo is worth a thousand words. The above photo courtesy of REUTERS/Wojazer is a case in point. It was used to illustrate a long, long article about French President Francois Hollande welcoming Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to Elysee Palace in Paris. Now we all know that Mr. Hollande is a renowned skirt-chaser, which makes this photo both hilarious and worth about a million words. Study Hollande's smirky smile and his engaging stare. He is not paying any attention to President Nieto. His attention is clearly focused on Nieto's stunningly gorgeous and very distracting wife. Her name, by the way, is Angelica Rivera. By having Angelica at his side, I believe President Nieto was purposely trying to either tease or distract President Hollande. What do you think?

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