Extremists Cuban-Americans Dictate!!
For almost two decades, the best and most insightful journalism reaching the outside world from Cuba has been provided by Fernando Ravsberg. So, not surprisingly, his Cartas Desde Cuba/Letters From Cuba blog is also the best. Over the years even the fair-minded, London-based journalism giant The BBC has depended on Fernando's Cuban expertise and fairness to understand what's happening in Cuba and what the island's contentious relationship with the United States really entails.
In being both precise and fair-minded in reporting from Cuba, Fernando Ravsberg has incurred the ire of the Cuban government and U.S.-based counter-revolutionaries in about equal doses, which indicates his journalistic qualifies are indeed top-notch. The best Cuban article this month -- October of 2017 -- is "The Target: Tourism in Cuba" by Fernando Ravsberg. He explains that the Trump administration's targeting of Cuban tourism is merely the latest attempt by Cuban-American extremists to starve and deprive Cubans on the island to induce them to rise up and overthrow their Revolutionary government. Ravsberg is referring to de-classified U. S. documents that confirm the U. S. embargo against Cuba was imposed way back in 1962 to starve and deprive Cubans on the island to do something the Batistiano-Mafiosi exiles had been unable to do even with the economic and military support of the United States. This was Ravsberg's first paragraph in that article:
"In the 1960s the U. S. State Department produced a document that reflected the strategy to follow in Cuba. It said in a subtle way they should provoke hunger, misery and desperation among the people to push them to rebel and overthrow their government. That has been the guide to U. S. policy since Eisenhower to date."
After that succinct preamble, Ravsberg explained the many embargoed tactics since 1962 the U. S. government, on behalf of the counter-revolutionary extremists, had carried out against Cuba to punish the totally innocent Cubans on the island to persuade them to overthrow their government. The cruel tactics have failed decade after decade but, as Ravsberg explains, President Trump's subtle warning this month to Americans to not visit Cuba merely continues a half-century of abject failures in cruelly punishing Cubans on the island to sate the revenge, economic and political motives of only the most extremists Cuban-American counter-revolutionaries.
As shown above, Fernando Ravsberg has infuriated the Cuban government by reporting on Cuban dissidents, but he has been fair enough to also point out that some are genuine but many are funded and supported from the United States.
The photo above was used by Ravsberg to illustrate his article updating the latest Trump administration ploy to starve and deprive Cubans on the island to induce them to overthrow their government so, presumably, the U.S.-based Batistiano-Mafiosi dictators can FINALLY RETURN. Like hotel bombings in Havana in the past were admittedly designed to discourage tourism, a Cuban lifeline, many believe the so-called "sonic wave attacks" now being blamed on Cuba are for the exact same reasons. Surely the hotel bombings and perhaps the "sonic-wave attacks" bespeak of U.S.-based corruption that reflect more poorly on America than on targeted Cuba.
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| Photo courtesy of Collin Laverty. |
And speaking of corruption, the photo above highlights the lies counter-revolutionaries like Senator Marco Rubio can spout-off in the U. S. media on a daily basis. Taking full advantage of a lapdog or intimidated U. S. media and a propagandized U. S. citizenry, Rubio and his ilk claim that maintaining or expanding the embargo and other cruel measures is absolutely necessary to keep every dollar that reaches Cuba from going into the Castro bank accounts. Well, Rubio and his kind haven't hurt the Castros but they have hurt many totally innocent Cubans like Carla Leon, shown above with her parents. Carla runs a Bed & Breakfast in Havana that was thriving with mostly American customers booked via the U.S. AirB&B network that evolved in Cuba thanks to the brave and decent overtures to the island rendered by former President Barack Obama. But Carla says she began getting many cancellations as soon as Trump, goaded by the likes of Rubio, "warned" Americans not to visit Cuba. In other words, as Fernando Ravsberg opined this month, America's Cuban policies "since the 1960s" have been predicated on lies and corruption, which seems to be hallmarks of a corrupt world in which anti-corruption crusaders are out-numbered as confirmed almost daily.
This great lady is dead. Her name: Daphne Caruana Galizia. Thus, some corrupt politicians on the Mediterranean island of Malta are feeling safer. Daphne was Malta's greatest investigative journalist and a fearless anti-corruption crusader. Her popular blog scared every corrupt politician in Malta. From her home her very last blog comment was: "There are crook's everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate." She then got into her car to drive to work and exactly one-half hour after typing those two sentences, a remotely detonated bomb ended her precious life.
The Prime Minister of Malta is Joseph Muscot. He is 43-years-old and has been in office since 2013. Daphne Caruana Galizia, the now-dead corruption-crusader, had targeted Muscot, who released all of the appropriate statements after her murder.
The great corruption-crusader Daphne Caruana Galizia is shown above with her husband and their three sons. The sons have demanded that Joseph Muscat resign as Malta's Prime Minister. Copies of their long and heart-wrenching letter are now included at memorials for their mother all across the grieving island of Malta.
The beautiful, lush Mediterranean island of Malta no longer has its great corruption crusader, but she will not be forgotten. Malta has about 440,000 citizens and they speak English and Maltese. The island is a major tourist attraction.
This great lady is still alive. Therefore, Jamaica -- the Caribbean island just south of Cuba -- still has its greatest corruption-crusader. Her name: Paula Llewellyn. Addressing the top Jamaican politicians this week, Paula said, "Crime is doubling and tripling in many of our parishes. Successive Jamaican governments have not corrected the justice system. Part of the problem is the fact that the justice system has never been as sexy for you legislators as building highways and doling out public money." Paula's corruption crusade in Jamaica is helped by a newspaper, The Jamaica Observer, that is not reluctant to be a vessel for her crusades. The energetic Paula in Jamaica and the murdered Daphne in Malta should remind us, I think, that women, who are historically far less corrupt than men, should be the top politicians...not just the top corruption-crusaders...in a more civilized world.
And speaking of corruption, USA Today yesterday -- Thursday, Oct. 19, 2017 -- had this across-the-page Page One headline and sub-headline: Taxpayers Left In Dark On Russia Costs; Inquiries' price tag in millions -- but that's all we know." The first paragraph said: "Congress spends millions of dollars on investigations of Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election, but it's impossible to tell from public records exactly how much the inquiries cost taxpayers -- and the committees running the investigations refuse to talk about it." OF COURSE NOT!! Surely democracy-loving American taxpayers who pay for all that secrecy have no business WHATSOEVER knowing where all their tax dollars are going!!
On August 17, 2017, the top Editorial in USA Today screamed this headline: "STOP DRUG MAKERS FROM GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER." Then the Editorial, of course, lamented the fact that the obscenely rich Pharmaceutical Industry is a giant lobbying faction in a lobby-mad U. S. government, and pleading to "stop the drug makers from getting away with murder" will not happen in what many believe is a bought-and-paid-for Congress. Corruption in Malta? Corruption in Jamaica? Corruption in the USA?
Perhaps not coincidentally, the biggest corruption trial in the United States of America for the past few months concerns the 18 federal corruption-bribery charges against entrenched and ultra-powerful Cuban-American U. S. Senator Robert Menendez. He has long been one of the most stringent counter-revolutionaries pounding Revolutionary Cuba. After weeks of testimony, the U. S. government rested its case; the high-priced Menendez defense attorneys then asked the judge to dismiss the charges but the request was denied regarding all 18 corruption charges.
The Menendez corruption trial is taking place in his power-base -- Newark, New Jersey. Few observers expect any omnipotent Cuban-American politician to be convicted in Newark or Miami courtrooms but after years of expensive investigations, the United States government is trying real hard to make an exception regarding Robert Menendez. A torrid relationship with Miami millionaire Salomon Melgen has resulted in the Menendez trial resurrecting reminders of the long-established Florida-Cuban-Mafia triangle connecting Miami, Newark, and the Dominican Republic. When the Cuban Revolution overthrew the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship on the first day of 1959, Dictator Batista's getaway airplane first stopped in the Dominican Republic where another U.S.-backed vicious dictator, Rafael Trujillo, ruled. Most other key Batistianos, such as Rafael Diaz-Balart, fled to Miami with Newark as a secondary target. So, it is perhaps appropriate that the Menendez corruption trial stresses the age-old Miami-Newark-Dominican Republic nexus that has shamed America and targeted Cuba for many decades.
The Miami Cuban Mafia, from January of 1959 till today -- October of 2017 -- has maintained a tight grip on America's Cuban policies, policies that many consider corrupt and that currently are condemned in the United Nations with a 191-to-0 unanimity, which Americans are programmed to ignore. This has persisted because corrupt right-wingers in the Eisenhower administration who sicced the Mafia on Cuba in 1952 were still around when the Batista-Mafia dictators were booted off the island -- all the way to Miami and Newark, as it turned out -- by the Cuban Revolution in 1959.
The original right-wingers targeting Cuba as a piggy-bank in the Eisenhower administration were greatly boosted by two Vice Presidential terms and three Presidential terms of the Bush dynasty, which in turn begat a U. S. Congress that has, since the 1980s, been a virtual fiefdom for the hard-line Cuban-American counter-revolutionaries. This has resulted in Batistiano-favorable laws that only Congress can overturn, and that can't happen when a handful of vicious Cuban-Americans can so easily dictate Cuban policies to the 535-member U. S. Congress.
To be sure, most Cuban-Americans since 1959 have been outstanding citizens like Emilio Milian and today most Cuban-Americans even in Miami favor normal relations with Cuba although, of course, only vicious counter-revolutionaries get elected to the U. S. Congress. Emilio Milian was the top Cuban-American newsman in Miami in 1976 when he bravely condemned a devastating spat of terrorist acts against innocent Cubans, such as the bombing of the civilian Cubana Flight 455 that killed all on board, including two dozen teenage athletes. But that bravery got Emilio Milian silenced by a car-bomb. Since 1989, after the Bush dynasty propelled Havana-born Miami counter-revolutionary Ileana Ros-Lehtenen to the U. S. Congress, where she remains to this day, it seems only extreme counter-revolutionary Miami Cubans are eligible for top elective positions -- such as members of Congress like Marco Rubio, Carlos Curbelo and the Diaz-Balart brothers whose father Rafael Diaz-Balart was a key Minister in Cuba's Batista dictatorship and then, after 1959, one of the richest and most fervent counter-revolutionaries in Miami. Such things as the Emilio Milian car-bombing in Miami have certainly also rendered the mainstream United States media a Batistiano lapdog as opposed to being fair-minded, critical journalists.
In fact, Hollywood movies such as Scarface have been much better at telling the truth about the Miami Cuban Mafia than the intimidated or lapdog U. S. media.
But truth be known, even before the U. S. sicced the Mafia on Cuba in 1952 at the start of the second Batista dictatorship, the Mafia had already had a firm grip on Cuba virtually since the U. S. gained dominance over the island via the easy victory in the 1898 Spanish-American War. The graphic above, for example, chronicles the famed Mafia summit in 1946 that featured the all-time most powerful Mafiosi leader, Lucky Luciano, who also, of course, was a Mafia dynamo with Batista from 1952 till the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959. Yet, the U. S. government and the U. S. media today will give Revolutionary Cuba no credit for being Mafia-free, something American cities such as Miami and Newark would have trouble claiming.
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