A Batistiano America

Can't Happen, You Say?? 
Updated & reaffirmed: Monday, Sept. 12, 2016

       Last week -- Friday, Sept. 9th, 2016 -- this REUTERS/Enrique de la Osa photo depicted a major news conference taking place in Havana. That's Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez. He made a powerful statement and took questions from the international media, such as Marc Frank of London-based REUTERS. The U. S. media doesn't cover such things because they would need permission from the tiny but dictatorial Batistiano contingent that dictates Cuban policy in both the U. S. Congress and the American media, on their way to hopefully soon capturing the White House to, it seems, gain full control of the U. S. government even before re-gaining full control of the Cuban government. But Rodriguez reminded everyone that Cuba, despite the positive results of President Obama's "historically kind gestures" toward the island, will never normalize relations with the United States as long as the embargo remains in place. Cuba only refers to it as a blockade. Rodriguez said, "The blockade imposed by the United States on Cuba in 1962 persists. The blockade is the main cause of the economic problems for everyday Cubans and continues as the primary obstacle to their development." Rodriguez said in recent months the embargo has cost Cuba "4.6 billion dollars" and he explained that is "highly significant" for an island that guarantees "totally free" educations, health, shelter and food for "all of its citizens." Rodriguez, while also praising President Obama's efforts to normalize relations, said, "President Obama still has broad executive latitude that he can use right up to his last minute in the White House, if he chooses to really help Cubans on the island and his own citizens." 

     U. S. experts who have the courage and integrity to confront the Batistiano-directed U. S. Cuban policy agree with the sentiments and statistics used by Bruno Rodriguez in Friday's news conference on the island of Cuba. When it comes to analyzing the impact of U. S. economic sanctions against Cuba, no American knows more than John Kavulich, head of the U.S.-Cuba Trade & Economic Council. He told REUTERS, "Over 100 U. S. businesses have visited Cuba since Obama's Dec.-2014 break-through announcement but they agree the continuation of the embargo prevents finalizing mutual deals."  

        And U. S. expert John Kavulich totally agrees with Bruno Rodriguez's assessment about what President Obama can do in his remaining days in office to help Cubans on the island and U. S. citizens escape the stifling injustices of the embargo. Mr. Kavulich told REUTERS, "Yes, there are approximately 12 regulatory changes that the Obama administration can implement that would have enormous impact upon opportunities for United States companies." Those are the precise words Friday from America's top authority on U.S.-Cuban trade possibilities. But Americans are supposed to ignore them because they don't comply with the vicious dictates of a handful of self-serving Cuban hardliners in Miami and the U. S. Congress.

Regarding Cuba, decent & unbiased U. S. experts don't count.

Regarding Cuba, decent & unbiased panels also don't count.

Regarding Cuba, what now counts as fairness in the United States is a handful of second generation Cuban-American anti-Castro zealots eating their fill of money-burgers lavishly provided by multi-billionaires who seem willing and able and eager to purchase the basic tenets of the U. S. democracy. Prior to this demeaning phenomenon, from 1776 till recently everyday citizens had the collective power of individual votes to sustain the greatest form of government ever crafted. But now, it seems, democracy lovers {or at least defenders of democracy} are sadly becoming a vanishing breed in the United States.

      In a great anathema wisp of time, 1952 to 1959, the U. S. democracy had gone from supporting the thieving, brutal Batista-Mafia dictatorship in Cuba to even more inexplicably allowing the overthrown Batistiano-Mafiosi rule on the nearby island to resurrect itself on U. S. soil, mainly Miami, with inevitable roots that grew into an enigmatic, tar-baby effect on the entire U. S. government with its tentacles attached to the Bush dynasty first and then like a sticky monolith to the U. S. Congress. 

*Batistianos in Cuba were wrong.

 And Batistianos in America are wrong. 

    Next month, -- Oct. 26-2016 -- Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez will once again stand in the spotlight at the United Nations in New York. He will, once again, tell the nations of the world that "The United States economic blockade against Cuba, in place since 1962, is the longest and cruelest in history ever conducted by a powerful nation against a small, weak nation. I ask the nations of the world gathered in this august forum today to agree that this blockade constitutes genocide against the innocent people of Cuba." The United States, even President Obama's administration, like a cowering puppy-dog will also stand before the UN and defend the blockade, which the U. S. calls an embargo. Then the nations of the world will vote.

        Next month at the UN, once again the nations of the world will be asked to vote on whether they agree with Cuba or the U. S. regarding the U. S. blockade/embargo of Cuba. The predictable result will again favor Cuba in an incredibly overwhelming landslide: "Yes 191, No 2, with no abstentions." The U. S., the richest and strongest nation in the history of the world, lavishes economic and military favors on friendly or unfriendly but strategic nations but, incredibly, when it comes to purchasing or bullying support for its Cuban policy, only Israel -- by far the biggest recipient of U. S. economic and military aid -- votes to support America's Cuban policy. That 191-to-2 vote each October flashes around the world, elevating Cuba's prestige worldwide and deflating America's image. Yet, the U. S. media tries to ignore it and the American citizens are supposed to be too stupid or too unpatriotic to give a damn about the near-unanimity of world opinion on a topic that creeps back into the news day-after-day, decade-after-decade.

       So, that's where we are in America on September 12th, 2016 -- as Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Friday in Havana held this blistering news conference depicted by this REUTERS photo.

     And then next month -- once again -- Bruno Rodriguez will stand before this podium at the United Nations and deliver his usual impassioned speech explaining in detail why he thinks the U.S. blockade/embargo constitutes "genocide" against the Cuban people. And -- once again -- he expects the nations of the world to support that damning accusation by a vote of...191-to-2 with no abstentions. As a democracy-loving American, that vote each October embarrasses me. Meanwhile, as I ponder the appalling lack of democracy-loving Americans, that UN vote each October reaffirms my belief that Cuba says a lot more about the United States than it says about Cuba. And what it says is not pretty, not at all.

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Cuba: Uh, Yes, CUBA

Now & Always, CUBA!!

      My passions for the United States and democracy combined to make me passionate about a Caribbean island -- Cuba. That's because I sincerely believe that Cuba says far more about the United States than it says about Cuba. That's important, because Cuba is a poor island and the United States is the world's economic and military superpower. Cuba's significance on the world stage is far out of proportion to its size, population or wealth; that's because U. S. relations with Cuba...since the 1898 Spanish-American War and especially since the 1959 triumph of the Cuban Revolution over the vile U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship, have done more than any other topic or thing to continuously demean the U. S. and democracy in the eyes of the world. The amazing thing to me revolves around the fact that two generations of Americans since the 1950s have had neither the guts nor the patriotism to rectify the democracy-debilitating aspects of U.S.-Cuban relations, which decent U. S. taxpayers have paid dearly for but which a mere handful of right-wing Americans, Cubans, and Mafiosi have effectively and self-servingly dictated all these decades.

        The endless decades of incessant arm wrestling-like tugs-of-war between poor little Cuba and the rich and ultra-powerful United States have famously included military clashes, a record-shattering number of assassination attempts against one still-living man, terrorist acts including the bombing of a child-laden Cuban civilian airplane, and a litany of United States laws designed officially in Congress to annihilate Cuba and to greatly enrich, entice and empower Cuban-Americans. Through it all, the mere survival of Revolutionary Cuba and its now 90-year-old architect Fidel Castro has resulted in a pugnaciousness that is admired worldwide, as reflected each October by a 191-to-2 pro-Cuba/anti-U.S. vote in the United Nations.

         A tiny country with one star on its red-white-&-blue flag holding off the world superpower that has 50 stars on its red-white-&-blue flag has fascinated the world and, ironically, created in its over-sized wake the dramatic waves of democratic elections beginning in the 1970s that honestly elected Fidel Castro-disciples as Presidents throughout Latin America, forever ending the preponderance of U.S.-backed right-wing dictators such as Batista in Cuba, Pinochet in Chile, Trujillo in the Dominican Republic, Videla in Argentina, Somoza in Nicaragua, etc. Ironic? Yes. True? Yes. And denying such basic facts is not being pro-American.

        Democracy-loving people trying to restore sane diplomatic relations with Cuba have easily been thwarted since 1898, and especially since 1959, by a handful of roguish people motivated mostly by greed but also by revenge. When a decent Cuban-American journalist in Miami, Emilio Milian, objected to such things as the terrorist bombing of a civilian airplane, he was car-bombed; when the top journalist at the Miami Herald, Jim DeFede, wrote a famous column excoriating Miami's representatives in the U. S. Congress for helping to make Miami a haven for well-known anti-Castro terrorists, he was fired. Since then, the mainstream U. S. media has contributed greatly to the American cowardice and ignorance that has complied with the extremist dictates of U.S.-Cuban Relations at the expense of America's image and of Democracy's veracity as the all-time greatest form of government. Greed and revenge are the winners.

        Only in the fast-fading final two years of Barack Obama's two-term, 8-year presidency has any of the last ten U. S. presidents had the courage and intelligence to try to create A New Era in U.S.-Cuba relations.

    Obama's impending legacy gets an "A" because of Cuba.

     Because of Obama, this white-haired Cuban gives a thumbs-up to the photographer while standing proudly on her balcony displaying side-by-side American and Cuban flags. For an entire lifetime, this Cuban has been hurt and deprived by a U. S. Cuban policy the American people have been told is necessary to hurt or overthrow the now 90-year-old Fidel Castro, presumably so the Batistiano-Mafiosi types can finally reclaim the island after hiding all these many decades behind the skirts of the American government.

        And yet, President Obama has bravely and astutely defied the right-wing congressional dictators and, for the first time in over half a century, executively executed some long-overdue New Cuban Policies.

     Just in the last few days, courtesy of Mr. Obama, U. S. commercial airplanes have been allowed to fly to Cuba for the first time in over half-a-century. It allows more Americans to personally judge Cuba even as anti-Castro stalwarts in Miami and in Congress huddle frantically to decide how they can end such sanity. 

    But still, even as we focus on the positives, the great Editorial Cartoonist Steve Sack reminds us that the newly opened Cuban embassy in Washington and the newly opened U. S. embassy in Havana are still at loggerheads before agreeing to finalize normal relations. As Steve Sack says, Cuba insists that the embargo end and that Guantanamo Bay, which the imperialist-minded United States stole in 1903, be returned. The U. S. counters by accusing Cuba of "human rights" violations and not addressing "property claims" such as the hotel that the Mafia kingpin Meyer Lansky hastily left behind in the dark, wee hours of January 1, 1959.

       The Bush-era prison at Guantanamo Bay still drastically harms America's image and America's security because it is used as a major recruiting tool by America's greatest enemies around the world. Additionally, the prison year-after-year costs U. S. taxpayers countless millions of dollars that would be saved if the prisoners were held in readily available maximum security prisons on U. S. soil. And additionally, President Obama was twice elected President of the United States on the promise that he would close the prison at Guantanamo, and he has tried to do that to the best of his ability. But in the closing months of his presidency, about 60 prisoners remain in the still-open prison and recruiting tool on Cuban soil that Cuba rightfully wants returned. Because of an incompetent, intimidated or politically correct U. S. media, the right-wing minority that mandates such Cuban policies are never asked, "Do you care how much such Cuban policies harm America's image around the world and how much they harm the security of America?" 

   America's best friends around the world are ashamed of this image. 

Perhaps it's time Americans are too.

      President Obama has bravely tried to chart a new course in U.S.-Cuban relations as indicated by this WH.gov/Cuba-policy graphic. With more help from brave democracy-loving Americans, he could do much more -- such as finally ending the embargo of Cuba and returning Guantanamo Bay to its rightful owner.

       In the late 19th century, brave Cubans like Jose Marti and the Maceo brothers gave their lives fighting Spanish soldiers in two losing Wars for Independence. After the 1898 Spanish-American War, the U. S. replaced Spain as Cuba's imperialist ruler. In 1959 the Cuban Revolution shocked the world by overthrowing the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. Every day since then, it has shocked the world by holding off the U.S.-backed Batistiano-fueled efforts to reclaim the island. But somehow it has remained a sovereign country. And that's why maps like the one above look skewed to many democracy-loving people. If you look closely at this map on the southeastern tip of the island, you will see "Guantanamo Bay (USA)" and it is a designation that Cuba, and the world, opposes in these closing days of 2016 when the U. S. sanctimoniously criticizes Russia and China for claiming Crimea or disputed islands in the South China Sea, etc. In 1898 in Paris, no Cuban was on hand to voice an opinion about the treaty that ended the Spanish-American War, which ended Spain's rule of Cuba but put it in perpetuity in the hands of...the U. S.

       Unlike in Paris in 1898 when no Cuban could speak as the Spanish-American War was finalized, in 2016 Cuba should be permitted to speak about its own territory -- namely, the American occupation of Guantanamo Bay. And Josefina Vidal -- Cuba's brilliant diplomat on all matters related to the U. S. -- is the person today who, when afforded the chance, speaks -- in either Spanish or English -- the most eloquently and righteously about such things. No, Vidal...unlike a handful of Cuban-Americans in Congress...is not backed by a multi-trillion-dollar economy or by the world's strongest military. But she does have right on her side when it comes to things such as Guantanamo Bay, and that...should account for...something.  

Which reminds me of:

  Penelope Purdy!!

        In a famous editorial for the Denver Post, Penelope Purdy included what I believe remains to this day the most eloquent and righteous sentence ever written about America's Cuban policy. A brilliant Latin American expert, she spent a long time detailing how the United States installed or supported vile dictators like Batista, Pinochet, Mobutu, Trujillo, the Shah, Videla, Somoza, etc., etc. And then Ms. Purdy wrote: "For all these decades, America's Cuban policy has been conducted with the IQ of a salamander."  

       Every time I think of  Penelope Purdy's analogy that infuses a Salamander with America's Cuban policy, I agree with her insightful and informed premise. At the same time, I believe it also insults the intelligence of little guys like this one. I often ride my 4-wheeler into streams or mud-puddles and see a lot of little Salamanders. For centuries they have survived human encroachments and weather-related famines as well as a plethora of skilled predators such as snakes, hawks, raccoons, etc. So their IQs have to be rather formidable. The same could even be said, I reckon, of the self-serving rogues who dictate America's Cuban policy. However, I cannot say the same for the intelligence of the American people who have allowed America's Cuban policy to shame America and Democracy since the Spanish-American War in 1898, and especially since U. S. support of the Batista-Mafia dictatorship in 1952 and particularly the Batistiano-Mafiosi support since 1959. Surely, as Penelope Purdy so eloquently suggested, this little Salamander would never agree with such an American Cuban policy. He's not a rogue and he obviously has a high IQ.

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Why Cuba Matters

Especially to Americans!!
{Updated: Thursday, Sept. 8th, 2016}

James Patterson was born in New York 69-years-ago.

James Patterson is the world's best-selling author.

              One out of every 17 hardback novels sold in the United States is a James Patterson book. Not many weeks go by without James Patterson having America's top-selling novel. He has already passed $60 million in earnings this year. With that much money, power and intelligence, James Patterson -- unlike most Americans since 1959  -- even has the guts to speak the truth about Cuba, and that's quite refreshing.

         This image shows James Patterson this week -- Sept. 6th, 2016 -- on the CBS This Morning program. He has given millions of dollars to support literacy and he was promoting a new documentary that he wrote and hosts. It is entitled "Murder of A Small Town." and it debuts September 9th. In the documentary Mr. Patterson exposes the extreme poverty, violent crime and lack of literacy that riddles two particular Florida towns -- Pahokee and Belle Glade. In the richest nation in the history of the world, the United States, he contrasts such extreme poverty, crime, and illiteracy with the extremely rich and affluent nearby areas, such as Palm Beach, Florida. AND, YES...HE CONTRASTS IT WITH POOR little CUBA -- today's Revolutionary Cuba, not Batista's Cuba back in the 1950s. Mr. Patterson Tuesday made this extremely brave comment, "In Cuba everybody gets fed, everybody gets health care, and everybody gets educated." And he wonders why everybody in U. S. towns like Pahokee and Belle Glade aren't afforded the same opportunities as the affluent people in Palm Beach OR EVEN THE POOR PEOPLE IN CUBA who, since 1962, have been maligned by a U. S. embargo designed to appease revengeful remnants of the Batista-Mafia dictatorship that fled the Cuban Revolution, mostly for the very affluent and always safe havens of Florida and New Jersey.

        James Patterson repeated that comment about Cuba Tuesday in this interview on CBS This Morning with reporter Anthony Mason. Because it was a positive comment about Cuba, it made instant headlines and -- almost as instantly -- chest-pumping, self-anointed American patriots were, not unexpectedly, strongly suggesting that he leave the U. S. for good and take up residence in Cuba, which Mr. Patterson visited a few weeks ago. You see...in the U. S. since 1959 even rich, powerful, and informed Americans such as James Patterson are supposed to be too intimidated or just too stupid to say anything good about Revolutionary Cuba...or anything bad about the Batista-Mafia dictatorship that preceded it.

          Quotes by Cuban-American U. S. Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey were quickly used by the right-wing, intimidated or politically correct U. S. media to counteract James Patterson's positive remarks about the island this week. Menendez quotes such as his boast that President Obama will "rue" his decisions to visit the island or to make friendly gestures to Cuba were juxtaposed against Patterson's comment: "In Cuba, everybody is fed, everybody gets health care, and everybody gets educated." Didn't Mr. Patterson know you are not supposed to say anything good about Cuba or anything bad about Batista? My!

     On April 1, 2015, Senator Bob Menendez was indicted on multiple corruption charges by the United States District Court because of his connections to a Miami millionaire and the Dominican Republic.

        The fact sheet on Sen. Bob Menendez includes the notation that he is one of three Cuban-American U. S. Senators, with the other two being Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas. They, like all of the Cuban-American members of the House of Representatives, are anti-Castro hard-liners. While most Cuban-Americans support President Obama's peaceful overtures to Cuba, it seems that moderate Cuban-Americans are not considered candidates for the 535-member U. S. Congress. That, and most other aspects of America's congressionally mandated Cuban policies, irks many democracy-lovers...like James Patterson.

       The graphic above states basic facts that James Patterson referenced this week on CBS This Morning. These are, of course, facts that Americans are not supposed to consider...at least not freely or openly.

       When the U. S. supported the vile Batista-Mafia dictatorship from 1952 till 1959, rich Americans like Edmund Chester, shown above with Fulgencio Batista, fared magnificently well, as did the most famed Italian and Jewish Mafia leaders from the United States like kingpins Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky.

    In Batista's Cuba, there was no support for everyday Cubans.

  This mother & these 7 children were of no concern to Batista.

      The only thing that began to embarrass the United States government was when the famed New York Times reporter Herbert L. Matthews began highlighting the street marches of Cuban mothers outraged because of the "assassinations" in Batista's Cuba of "nuestros hijos" -- which is Spanish for "our children." The killings that spawned marches like these were apparently designed to merely quell dissent, but the brave mothers like these convinced Fidel Castro that maybe...just maybe...a revolution might succeed.

        The basic facts posted above are correct, including the point that the U. S. government, with Castro's rebels marching relentlessly toward Havana, finally cut military support to Batista. By 3:00 A. M. on the very first day of 1959, after word reached Havana that the rebels had captured Santa Clara, the Batistiano and Mafiosi leaders bolted for their pre-prepared getaway airplanes, yachts and ships. Unfortunately, many of them quickly turned up in nearby Miami, Florida. A week ago, on Aug. 31-2016, the first commercial U. S. airplane flight to Cuba in 55 years landed in Santa Clara, Cuba -- marking a slice President Obama has cut out of the decades-old Batistiano dictation of a Cuban policy crafted to hurt Cuba and help Cuban exiles.

     After ousting Batista, Cuba started a massive literacy campaign.

       In 1961 Fidel Castro himself ordered that a large slice of Cuba's meager resources be devoted to educating the island's most illiterate citizens. This graphic shows it was a massively successful endeavor.

The United States has an excellent literacy rate.

But not as good as Cuba's.

Cuba's literacy rate leads the entire region.

And Cuba is the only nation embargoed by the U. S.

       These typically happy seven elementary students in poor Cuba have free and excellent educations through college and free and excellent health care for life. These children also are guaranteed free food and shelter, if needed. Somebody deserves credit for this, especially considering that the U. S. has had Cuba -- since 1962 -- under history's all-time longest and cruelest economic embargo ever imposed on a weak country by a strong country. These Cuban children {as has been the lifelong case with their parents} do not deserve to be punished all their lives by greedy or revengeful elements in a nearby foreign superpower.

        These three Cuban-American Senators -- Cruz, Menendez and Rubio -- are not accustomed to being challenged on anything related to the Cuban narrative or Cuban policy. Well, Senators, James Patterson challenged you this week -- Sept. 6, 2016 -- and Patterson's Sept. 9th documentary suggests that, instead of targeting Cuba with abuse, you perhaps should do your jobs in the Senate to help poverty stricken and crime-riddled areas that you purport to represent. Would that be asking too much of 3 highly over-paid Senators? 

This week James Patterson... 

 explained why Cuba matters!! 

It matters because Cuba says more...

about the U. S. than  it says about Cuba.

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