As Cubans Suffer, Some Rejoice

And Many Americans Don't Care!

    Cubans on the island had something else to mourn this past weekend. The bus shown above {the photo is courtesy of the BBC and Reuters} crashed while carrying 40 passengers...18 Cubans and 22 tourists from the UK, US, Canada, France, Netherlands, and Spain. The dead included one German and one French tourist. Overall seven people died and the other 33 were injured in the tragic disaster.

      The bus crashed soon after leaving Baracoa in Guantanamo Province on its long trip back to Havana. Baracoa is the oldest city in Cuba. It was founded shortly after Columbus landed at that spot in 1492, declaring it in his diary as, "The most beautiful land these eyes have ever seen." Because of its history and its incomparable beauty, Baracoa is a favorite destination for tourists flying into Havana. But on an island that has been the victim of the vicious U. S. Batistiano Economic Boycott since 1962, the transportation system in Cuba is dangerous...and in Washington this past week two Cuban-American U. S. Senators seemed intent on trying to make the island's transportation system even more dangerous than it currently is for Cubans and visitors.

     This past week Senator Bob Menendez, from the Batistiano-bastion of Newark, and Senator Marco Rubio, from the Batistiano-bastion of Miami, combined to introduce YET ANOTHER gutless bill in the Republican-controlled United States Senate designed to strengthen the six-decades-old gutless Embargo against Cuba. As I will discuss later, neither the mainstream United States media nor the majority of Americans have the guts to challenge the continuing and unchecked cruelty of self-serving miscreants like Bob Menendez & Marco Rubio.

    Cuba as of April 19th-2018 has a new President. His name is Miguel Diaz-Canel. He was born after the January 1st-1959 triumph of the Cuban Revolution over the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. It appears Diaz-Canel is determined to protect Cubans from Cuban-Americans like Menendez & Rubio who hide lavishly behind the skirts of the world's nearby Superpower. President Diaz-Canel mourned this past weekend with Cubans across the island after the deadly bus crash. The photo above was taken on May 18th-2018, exactly a month after Diaz-Canel became President of Cuba. That day he rushed to the site of a deadly plane-crash on the edge of Havana, a plane destined for Holguin, Cuba. The crash killed 112 on board with the lone survivor being a 19-year-old Cuban girl who is still recovering, under meticulous care, from her horrendous injuries. The plane crash and now the bus crash have reminded Diaz-Canel of his most urgent priority -- improving the safety of Cuba's highway, railway, and air transportation systems. To that end this week, just prior to the bus crash, Diaz-Canel demoted Cuba's elderly Transport Minister and replaced him with a much younger, more energetic, and hopefully more effective Transport Minister. 

      This photo also illustrates President Diaz-Canel's eagerness to solicit help from Cuba's friends to "construct and to help rebuild a transportation system that will be much safer for everyone, Cubans and visitors." On the left is Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez shown shaking hands with Diaz-Canel in Havana on March 22nd, 2018.

     This photo shows the very moment Cuban President Diaz-Canel asked Spain's Prime Minister Sanchez if he would consider helping Cuba improve the island's transportation system, including the "roads, highways, bridges, railways, airways...any way you can?" To his credit and to his country's credit, Prime Minister Sanchez replied, "Mr. President, as long as I am the leader of Spain, I will do all in my power to help you with those enterprises." A kind reply from a very decent leader.

     There was a time in the past seven decades when even the United States...for one brief, shining moment...had a leader that had similar decency and courage to match that of Spain's current leader Pedro Sanchez. That American leader, of course, was President Barack Obama. As America's leader, as shown above, Mr. Obama had the guts and decency to go to Cuba and speak directly to the Cuban people...on the streets, at a baseball game, and on state-wide television. He told them: "Cuba does not need to fear a threat from the United States." He was not lying, he just did not anticipate that his administration would be replaced by another Batistiano-aligned Republican administration.

    Thus, one of Donald Trump's first shameful acts as President and Commander-in-Chief of the United States was to go to Little Havana in Miami and vow to reverse all of President Obama's sanity and decency in regards to Cuba. He made that pledge, as shown above, while standing in front of a Brigade 2506 Assault Banner, which reflects the shame and humiliation the U. S. sustained way back in April of 1961 with its stupid and cowardly and LOSING air-land-and-sea BAY OF PIGS attack on Cuba. Such gutless Trump pandering in Little Havana  to a handful of Counter Revolutionary Cubans proves two things about the Batistiano-propelled deterioration of the once-proud American democracy: {1} Even the mainstream left-wing U. S. media that is engaged in an all-out media conspiracy to dethrone Trump prior to the next election does not have the guts to criticize Trump for his most egregious acts that relate to Cuba; and {2} a third generation of Americans since the 1950s has neither the guts nor the patriotism to even weigh-in seriously on Cuban policies that shame America, Democracy, and Decency...yet this generation of Americans has been propagandized to sanctimoniously criticize a China or a Russia if such large nations remotely target innocent people in a much smaller nation for one day not to mention six+ decades when it's U.S. vs. Cuba.

   Thus, for 6+ decades now, Counter Revolutionary extremists like Senators Menendez and Rubio have been permitted, within the bowels of the U. S. democracy, to whet their revenge, economic, and political appetites by trying to starve, deprive, and make miserable the lives of everyday Cubans on the island...while using even the mainstream U. S. media to promote their repetitive refrains about...trying to help Cubans on the island. And such repetitive propaganda -- supported by left-wing, right-wing, and mainstream media sources -- is incredibly effective.

     While trying to severely punish everyday Cubans on the island, Rubio & Menendez -- as shown above -- are quite willing to host in the hallowed offices and hallways of the U. S. Senate any well-known Cuban dissident strongly opposed to the Cuban government.

    Even the world's most famed Cuban dissident, Yoani Sanchez, can fly from Cuba to Miami to the U. S. Congress...and then back to Cuba. Allegedly...please, PLEASE remember that I said "allegedly"...after such lucrative sessions with Senators Rubio & Menendez as shown above Yoani Sanchez returned to Cuba with enough money to powerfully staff and powerfully promote what remains today the most powerful digital dissident anti-Cuban blog-newspaper in the world. In other words, anyone who holds up their hands and vows to help overthrow Revolutionary Cuba's government can ALLEGEDLY expect bundles of tax dollars, especially as long as the likes of Rubio & Menendez are allowed to make such decisions with unlimited amounts of tax dollars.

      The now 61-year-old Ken Silverstein is enshrined as one of America's all-time greatest investigative journalists and authors.

     For decades Ken Silverstein has earned lofty journalistic credentials and accolades working for such respected organizations as...Harpers Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, and the Associated Press. So, it's not surprising that Ken Silverstein has done the best investigative reporting on Senator Marco Rubio, whom the cowardly right-wing, left-wing, and mainstream U. S. media usually promotes as a choirboy from Little Havana in Miami. In an almost book-length essay on Rubio, Ken Silverstein calls Rubio "head and shoulders above everyone else in Washington when it comes to corruption and chicanery." In that exhaustive investigative report Ken Silverstein documents a plethora of names, dates, and incidents to prove his case. And as far as I know, no one has denied a single word nor has Ken Silverstein been sued by Rubio's well-heeled and well-funded publicity machine.

     If you Google "Ken Silverstein and Marco Rubio" you will be put in touch with the above graphic that fronts the aforementioned Ken Silverstein article on Marco Rubio...who typically this past week teamed with the also very controversial BOB MENENDEZ to introduce YET ANOTHER "Let's Punish Cubans in Cuba" bill in the U. S. Senate.

    United States Senator Bob Menendez is shown above on the Batistiano-friendly Fox News Network after he had barely escaped a long prison sentence. For years the U. S. government investigated Menendez on serious bribery and corruption charges related to shenanigans in Miami and the Dominican Republic. And then there was a long and expensive federal trial, which ended in a hung jury. The federal justice system, which had spent a ton of tax dollars already on first the investigations and then the trial, vowed to retry Menendez, but then changed its mind, apparently believing another expensive hung trial would result. Political incumbents and court trials in Newark or Miami, you see, tend to sort of favor Counter Revolutionary Cubans and disfavor those who might oppose them. Shortly after his emotional reaction depicted above, Menendez, of course, was re-elected to another 6-year term in the U. S. Senate. And, of course, because Cuba is a foreign country and in the Western Hemisphere, Congressional Counter Revolutionaries like Menendez and Rubio make bee-lines to become Chairman of the Senate's Foreign Relations and Western Hemisphere Senate committees...all the better, of course, to punish innocent Cubans on the island!! A wonderful democratic system for the Newark/Miami-to-Washington/Congress pipeline? It kinda seems that way for Cuban-Americans like Rubio & Menendez, doesn't it?

     Now allow me to ask a question. As a democracy-loving American, during the longest-ever government shutdown while millions of Americans are suffering from an amalgam of ills caused by a dysfunctional and money-crazed Congress, my question is: How in the hell can Senator Menendez and Senator Rubio be allowed to prioritize HURTING innocent Cubans on the island as opposed to HELPING Americans, including Cuban-Americans. I know, I KNOW...Menendez is from Newark and Rubio is from Little Havana, so they'll never be voted out of office. But that does not excuse the cowardice of the mainstream U. S. media and the gutlessness of most U. S. citizens for allowing...even this past week...Senators Menendez & Rubio to introduce YET ANOTHER "Let's Punish Cubans in Cuba" bill in the U. S. Senate. That latest Menendez-Rubio insult to democracy makes me wonder if Menendez and Rubio wouldn't be far better suited as Ministers in the long-ago Batista government than as Senators in today's USA.

Cuba...Cuba...Cuba!!!!!

        {The only topic in the entire world that could possibly get the United States and Democracy unanimously condemned 191-to-0 in the United Nations. BUT...if you're an American...you're not supposed to have enough guts to even think about that, let alone mention it. And where we are today is precisely where we've been regarding Cuba for 7 decades.}

   Yet, on the island of Cuba this past weekend...as Cubans mourned the bus crash and as Rubio & Menendez tried harder to use U. S. laws to punish Cubans in Cuba...pugnacious and resilient Cubans still found reasons to smile...perhaps because Rubio and Menendez weren't dictating their lives, at least not yet. That's Cuban journalist Rosy Amaro Perez above and her 5-year-old daughter Mariana. Professional photographers Norbel Lazcano and Adriana Robreno chronicled their mother-daughter outdoor togetherness around Havana on 01-13-2019.

Notice above:

Dressed identically, including the shoes.

    In this photo Mariana is whispering, "Mama, por que nos estan tomando fotos?" {"Mama, why are they taking so many pictures of us?"}.

      Like other little girls, Mariana looks up to her mother and likes to wear very smilar clothes. And Rosy tries to accommodate Mariana.

In Havana Saturday, Rosy & Mariana.

Best of friends, mother & daughter.

      These six photos from Havana this past weekend remind me that Cubans on the island, like Rosy & Mariana, don't deserve to be targeted unfairly by anybody on their island. And MOST ESPECIALLY they don't deserve to be unfairly targeted by greedy, sanctimonious, and revengeful Cuban-Americans OFF the island, such as the rich, powerful, and unscrupulous United States Senators Rubio and Menendez.

*&***********************&*

USA's Cuban-American Embarrassments

Anti-Cuba AND Anti-Democracy?
{Updated: Saturday, January 12th, 2019}

    At midnight on January 11th, 2019, the United States set another all-time record: The longest government shutdown in American history. Prior to that insult to Democracy, many millions of non-rich Americans were already in dire need of assistance from the 535 members of the mostly lobbyist-dictated U. S. Congress. In the 100-member Republican-controlled U. S. Senate reside two vicious Counter Revolutionary Cuban-Americans -- Marco Rubio from Batistiano-dominated Miami and Bob Menendez from Batistiano-dominated Newark. As the government shutdown drags on and as many millions of non-rich Americans are hurting, guess what appears to be dominating the political and economic minds of Rubio & Menendez? The answer, unfortunately, seems to be this: Rubio & Menendez are far more concerned with punishing totally innocent Cubans on the island than with helping the many millions of non-rich Americans, including non-rich Cuban-Americans. This week as the shutdown dragged on and many other correctable obstacles confronted Americans -- Rubio & Menendez filed yet another LET'S PUNISH CUBANS ON THE ISLAND BILL. Exacerbating such anti-American and anti-Democracy cruelty is the fact that the intimidated mainstream U. S. media and the equally timid and propagandized U. S. citizens either don't give a damn or are simply too afraid to counter whatever Rubio & Menendez concoct to hurt Cubans on the island while also continuing to feather their own economic and political nests.

    The United States of America got permanently reconfigured beginning in January of 1959 when the victorious Cuban Revolution chased the leaders of the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship to U. S. soil -- especially to Miami and Newark. Thus, since 1959 Americans have been propagandized to believe that Counter Revolutionary Cuban-American zealots like Rubio & Menendez are great "Hispanic Role Models" and THEREFORE whatever they do to harm innocent Cubans on the island must be accepted as acceptable U. S. laws. In other words, folks, the American democracy has been reconfigured since January, 1959.

******************

     Within minutes after posting the latest anti-American absurdity from Rubio & Menendez in the U. S. Senate, I got a reply from Vivian Mannerud Verble, one of the all-time greatest and most famous business-owners in Miami. Vivian's exact words were: "It is unfortunate that these two are in Congress. As I reminded {a friend} in a letter, the Constitution of the United States says 'any member of Congress that pledges allegiance to a flag of another country should be tried for treason.' These two have consistently put American values aside in their quest for what they believe should happen in Cuba. Boy how I wish I could take this to the Supreme Court. We would win. Our Cuban policy is un-American. Thank you for your vigilance." {Exact words to me from Vivian Mannerud Verble after she read my above update on Rubio-Menendez}.

    This is the Miami Herald photo of Vivian Mannerud Verble the day her business -- Airline Brokers Company, Inc. -- was bombed out of existence in Miami, apparently because she had a single VERY LEGAL involvement with Cuba. As usual in Miami, it's never been solved.

      But the democracy-loving Vivian Mannerud Verble has persevered with her business -- Airline Brokers Company Inc. I am totally convinced that if America had more brave and intelligent democracy-loving women like Vivian, a handful of self-serving Counter Revolutionary zealots like Rubio & Menendez would not be permitted to so easily dictate America's Cuban narrative AND America's Cuban laws.

*&***********************&*

Revolutionary Hero Dies

Legendary Rebel Commander!!

    One of the last of the great rebel Commanders in Cuba's Revolutionary War and later at Cuba's smashing Bay of Pigs victory has died this week. Brigadier General Jose R. Hernandez passed away at age 95. He was instrumental from 1952 till 1959 in Cuba's stunning revolutionary victory over the U.S.-backed Batista dictatorship and in April of 1961 he was the military leader that Fidel Castro first called on to help defend Revolutionary Cuba when the U.S.-backed Cuban-exile air-land-and-sea military attack known as the Bay of Pigs threatened to overthrow the vulnerable island's nascent Revolutionary government.

    Always a favorite of Fidel Castro, both during and after the triumph of the Revolution, Jose R. Fernandez has been widely quoted by historians about what he said happened on January 12th, 1959 -- 12 days after ousting the Batista dictatorship: "Fidel summoned me and asked me what position I wanted in the new government, and he meant anything I would ask for." The modest General Fernandez served the Revolution faithfully...as a military leader and adviser but also as Vice President...for the next six decades. Next to Fidel Castro's death at age 90 on Nov. 25-2016, the death at age 95 this week of Jose R. Fernandez is the latest major update on the always struggling Cuban Revolution.

*************************&* 

BEST Cuba Article THIS WEEK

And Maybe You Should Read It!!
{UPDATED: Friday, January 11, 2019}

     A famed Cuban-American journalist, Albor Ruiz is as gutzy as Cuban-American journalist Emilio Milian was in Miami. {When Emilio criticized well-known and well-protected Cuban terrorists in Miami for killing innocent Cubans, Emilio was routinely silenced by a car-bomb}. But the equally brave Albor still has a journalistic voice. For decades Albor was a top Editor and Columnist for the New York Daily News in English and El Diario in Spanish. He graduated from the University of Florida and he is in the National Association of Hispanic Journalists Hall of Fame. To this day Albor, incredibly, has the courage to write honest columns regarding both his native Cuba and U.S.-Cuban relations. For example, his Jan. 8th-2019 column is entitled: "Cuba: Europe Against the Embargo." Instead of meekly being propagandized by Rubio-type Counter Revolutionary extremists, perhaps Americans should Google a more decent and more intelligent Cuban-American's Cuban insights, namely Albor Ruiz's insightful column this week.

   The EFE photo of President Donald Trump fronted the aforementioned Jan. 8th-2019 article by the highly regarded Cuban-born journalist Albor Ruiz. To counter the Batistiano-dictated Cuban narrative, I hope Americans will read what Albor wrote, such as: "If looking at the chaos prevalent in Washington you get the disquieting feeling that the U. S. -- the world, for that matter -- is in the hands of a cabal of heartless, bigoted, greedy fools, you are not alone. Trump and his advisers on Latin America -- namely the insanely hawkish National Security Adviser John Bolton and Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, who is mainly notable for his opposition and his embrace of every measure intended to make the lives of his parents' compatriots in Cuba as difficult as humanly possible."

  The harsh depictions of Marco Rubio and John Bolton by the great Cuban-American journalist Albor Ruiz is, of course, 100% accurate. For the mainstream U. S. media and 315 million U. S. citizens to sit back and allow President Trump to anoint the likes of Rubio and Bolton as the chief architects...the primary dictators...of America's Latin American and Cuban policies shames both America and Democracy. And the main culprits for allowing it to happen are the pundit/propaganda-driven mainstream U. S. media as well as the most cowardly and the most undemocratic generation of Americans in America's history.

     Most Americans agree that the majority of their 535 Senators and Representatives in the U. S. Congress are in politics for the money and the enormous benefits that ensue...and that those members of Congress answer to the untold thousands of unsavory lobbyists in Washington who dole out millions of political dollars to put and keep  their bought-and-paid politicians in office to do the bidding of the richest Americans. To exacerbate that dilemma, the U. S. democracy no longer has an unbiased mainstream media, most of which are owned by biased billionaires who used their powerful forums as pundit-driven propaganda tools, not news-gathering sources so vitally needed in the USA. That includes especially...NBC, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, Fox, the NY Times, and the Washington Post, with the latter former great newspaper now owned by the all-time richest person in the world -- Cuban-American Jeff Bezos. If you feel any of that is not true, ask real Americans or real Hispanics-Americans like the ones depicted above. In his Jan. 8th-2019 article and previously for decades, Hall of Fame Hispanic journalist Albor Ruiz points out that the deterioration of the mainstream U. S. media and the lack of concern for their Democracy by American citizens paves the way for...a Trump, a Rubio, and a Bolton to egregiously impact the lives of everyone, including Hispanics, in an American society ruled by extreme right-wingers and extreme left-wingers...leaving the more decent 80% majority mostly out in the cold and voiceless. For that to happen...again it is worth noting that a biased or incompetent mainstream media and a cowardly or undemocratic generation of Americans are the prime culprits, not just the ruthlessly cruel benefactors such as the unchecked Marco Rubio.

   This New York Times photo shows the parents of Marco Rubio {front-row center} on their wedding day in Havana in 1948. Now go back and contemplate the exact words that the great Cuban-born and U. S. Hall of Fame journalist Albar Ruiz wrote in his scintillating column on Jan. 8th-2019: "...Marco Rubio who is mainly notable for his opposition and his embrace of every measure intended to make the lives of his parents' compatriots in Cuba as difficult as humanly possible."

            In other words, while Americans have been programmed not to know or not to care, the U. S. Hall of Fame/Cuban-born Hispanic journalist Albor Ruiz is abundantly aware that the U. S. embargo against Cuba, first imposed in 1962 and continuing to this day, has been implemented and enforced by a few ruthless, self-serving, revengeful, and malicious Cuban-Americans like Marco Rubio who get free passes from the mainstream U. S. media. As Albor Ruiz references above, Rubio's Cuban parents...like most Cubans and most Cuban-Americans...almost certainly wouldn't approve of their "compatriots" back on the island being punished decade-after-decade by a handful of self-serving miscreants. Rubio himself, of course, has never been to Cuba so why should such a greedy individual care about Cubans on the island, a point that the Cuban-born Albor Ruiz points out. Albor Ruiz also knows that, according to de-classified U. S. documents, the purpose of the Embargo is to starve, deprive, and make miserable the lives of everyday Cubans on the island to induce them to rise up and overthrow their revolutionary government. Rubio is fine with that; Albor Ruiz and decent Cuban-Americans like him ARE NOT.

     In his blisteringly anti-Rubio Jan. 8th-2019 article, the great Albor Ruiz quotes Federica Mogherini, the Political Leader and High Representative of the 28-nation European Union. Born in Rome 45 years ago, the ultra-powerful Ms. Mogherini has railed against the cowardice and ignorance of U. S. citizens for allowing people like Rubio to dictate "decade after decade" a Cuban policy that "drastically harms" women and children in a "much weaker nation" to "please or benefit a few rich people in a strong nation," to quote Ms. Mogherini who has a worldwide forum from which to speak. And in his Jan. 8-2019 article Albor Ruiz quotes Ms. Mogherini as saying what she has said repeatedly: "The U. S. embargo, or economic blockade, against Cuba is both cruel and illegal." And Ms. Mogherini, like Albor Ruiz, has pointed out that sanctimonious Americans are quick to condemn a Russia or a China if those countries would mount a genocidal economic embargo against a much weaker nation for six DAYS and not for six DECADES.

   The Executive Director of the Washington-based Center for Democracy in the Americas is Emily Mendrala, a Cuban expert and former key U. S. government official. Emily Mendrala tirelessly echoes the words and expertise of great people like Albor Ruiz and Federica Mogherini in their condemnation of the United States for allowing unchecked miscreants like Rubio to dictate America's insanely "cruel and illegal" Cuban policies. But largely because of an incompetent or afraid mainstream U. S. media, the sane words and expertise of people like Albor Ruiz, Federica Mogherini, and Emily Mendrala are drowned out within the bowels of the world's Superpower Democracy.

   The aforementioned Jan. 8th-2019 Albor Ruiz article used the above photo of Marco Rubio in its evisceration of Little Havana's choirboy being allowed to dictate U. S. policies designed to eviscerate totally innocent  Cuban men, women, and children on the nearby island. The extreme left-wing U.S. media -- NBC, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, the NEW YORK TIMES, and the WASHINGTON POST -- spend almost all of their airtime and print-space condemning Trump for such things as harming immigrant children, but that same left-wing media doesn't have the guts to even criticize Trump or Rubio for harming Cuban children on their sovereign island. Democracy-loving Americans should ignore the gutless left-wing/right-wing mainstream U. S. media and study the Jan. 8th-2019 article written by Hall of Fame journalist Albor Ruiz while also studying the above photo of Rubio that illustrated the article. When a Rubio is unchecked in dictating America's Cuban policies, America and Democracy are ACTUALLY the primary losers.

*&***********************&*

Cuba Exposes USA Myths

David Reveals Goliath's Lies!!
{Wednesday, January 9th, 2019}

    The little guy above has a scientific name. It's Anurogryllus Celerinictus. But he is better known just as Cricket. This week -- Jan. 8th, 2019 -- Cricket was featured in a GIANT and LONG headline in America's top newspaper -- USA Today. The headline: "Remember That Mysterious 'Attack' On U. S. Diplomats In Cuba? Scientists Think It Was Crickets." And to be specific, the cricket in question is Anu Cele...to shorten his real name.

   Two years ago as the Batistiano-aligned Republican presidency of Donald Trump was replacing the decent Democratic presidency of Barack Obama, it was known that the Batistiano remnants in Miami and in the U. S. Congress would have another GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY to finally recapture Cuba after being chased to U. S. soil by the Cuban Revolution on the first day of 1959, going on 7 decades ago. But even Batistiano zealots operating freely in the U. S. need excuses...also known as pretexts...to have U. S. tax dollars and U. S. Congressional laws to mount all-out assaults on Revolutionary Cuba. The BIG pretext during Trump's first two years as Commander in Chief has been accusations against Cuba for "Sonic Attacks -- the new kind of Warfare" against U. S. "diplomats" stationed in Havana at the U. S. Embassy, which the brave and decent President Obama had reopened for the first time since 1961. Cuba and most unbiased people maintained all along that the Sonic Attacks were perpetrated by Cuba's enemies, were bogus, or merely were a pretext crafted by Miami and Washington right-wingers to reverse the mammoth normalization efforts Obama courageously mandated prior to the weird election of President Trump. All along for two years Cuba has begged for the USA to work with Cuban and Canadian experts to determine the cause of any alleged "sonic attacks" harming Americans. And Cuba and many others pointed out that Cuba itself was suffering from the allegations and Cuba's enemies in Miami, Newark, and Washington were rejoicing as the winners. So...if there were sonic attacks at all, who might be responsible, the government of Cuba that was the punished victim or the ones who benefited and were rejoicing about them?

   President Obama's reopening of the U. S. Embassy in Havana for the first time since 1961 had greatly helped Americans, Cubans, and especially all the decent Cuban-Americans who regularly react with Cuban relatives on the island. But the U. S. Cuban policies since the 1950s have been designed to whet the greedy and revengeful appetites of a few extremist Cuban exiles and their political and economic sycophants, such as the Bush dynasty. And the latest Republican present, Trump, has surprised no one by capitulating to the Batistiano extremists. Thus, Trump gutted the embassy entirely as one of the first uses of the "sonic wave" pretext, and many more pro-Batistiano/anti-Cuban/and anti-American punishments against Cuba, meaning everyday Cubans, have followed in the past two Trumpian USA years.

    While the mainstream U. S. media will not admit it and U. S. citizens are programmed to deny it, President Trump's most egregious, but least controversial, decision has been to anoint the greedy, self-serving, Little Havana "choirboy" Marco Rubio as America's latest Cuban dictator.

     When former President Barack Obama very bravely opened the U. S. embassy in Havana for the first time since 1961, democracy-lovers in America and around the world rejoiced.

    But as the above photo indicates, Senator Rubio can go back to Little Havana in Miami and LAUGH, while addressing his usual choir, about how easy it is for a handful of extremists from Little Havana to dictate "U. S. POLICY TOWARDS CUBA." Although it is NOT LAUGHABLE to democracy-lovers around the world, that's the way it has been for decades now as, somehow, the island of Cuba, the quintessential David, has remained a sovereign nation since 1959 even as the quintessential Goliath, the United States, has put "U. S. POLICY TOWARDS CUBA" into the greedy hands of Rubio-types.

    When he reopened the U. S. Embassy in Cuba for the first time since 1961, President Obama -- as shown above with First Lady Michelle -- named the perfect person to be America's Ambassador to Cuba...and not a single decent person in Washington disagreed with that. And that decent, perfect man shown accepting the appointment was the extremely dedicated Cuban expert and brilliant diplomat Jeffrey DeLaurentis. But very quickly Marco Rubio, as one biased and revengeful U. S. Senator, blocked that appointment forever...revealing once again how an extremist minority of pro-Batistano Cubans can dictate the U. S. Cuban Policy to suit their revenge against Cuba while enhancing their economic and political fortunes.

    Incredibly, the quintessential David...the island of Cuba...has remained an independent nation since 1959 although the quintessential Goliath...the Superpower United States...is a mere 90 miles to the north, as the above map shows. On the southeastern tip of the island, this map also shows the dimensions of the U. S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The U. S. stole that luscious land and port "in perpetuity" way back in 1903 simply because it could. Five years earlier, after the easy victory in the 1898 Spanish-American War, the U. S. had replaced Spain as the dominant imperialist power reigning over Cuba. Anytime from 1898 till 1952 the U. S. could have made Cuba a democratic jewel as the largest and most beautiful Caribbean island. The U. S. chose not to do so, preferring other forms of Cuban governments that would be better suited for rich Americans to plunder the island, while a democracy would have prevented much of that thievery in deference to helping Cubans on the island.

    In 1952 a handful of right-wingers in the Republican Eisenhower administration sicced the Mafia on Cuba, again so rich Americans could partake in the robbery of the island.

    Beginning in 1952 the U.S.-backed Mafia dictatorship in Cuba was led by the highest echelon of the U. S. Mafia -- from left-to-right Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky, and Fulgencio Batista. While getting kick-back dollars from major U. S. businesses, the Mafia in Cuba feasted on its evil enterprises such as drug trafficking, prostitution, and gambling. All the while, U. S. muscle propped up the Mafia in Cuba, including its then-secretive ARMY OF THE AMERICAS where the U. S. was beginning to train soldiers and police from friendly dictatorships -- Batista's in Cuba, Trijillo's in the Dominican Republic, Somozo's in Nicaragua, etc. -- and then send them back so those friendly dictators could stay in power...and help rich U. S. businessmen plunder helpless nations.

      But beginning in 1952 the right-wingers in Washington and the Mafia leaders in Cuba did not have enough intelligence to even throw some crumbs at the majority peasants on the island. A case in point is the photo above that was typical of the peasants' plight in Batista's Cuba while rich Batistianos, Mafiosi, and Americans ravished the island.

     But this photo...and many like it...document what fueled the first Revolution that would threaten a U.S.-backed dictator. In order to supposedly quell dissent, the Batista dictatorship...as challenged by these brave Cuban mothers...murdered Cuban children as warnings. The sign above says: "STOP THE ASSASSINATIONS OF OUR CHILDREN. CUBAN MOTHERS." Extremely brave marches like this fueled the Cuban Revolution far more than the extreme poverty as depicted in the previous photo.

     History registers the fact that Fidel Castro's Cuban Revolution shocked the world by overthrowing the Batista-Mafia dictatorship on January 1, 1959.

     When Fidel Castro waved good-bye to the fleeing Batistiano-Mafiosi leaders in January of 1959, he thought -- as he told his friend Barbara Walters at ABC-News decades later -- that the U. S. government would be "too embarrassed about the Batista atrocities to accept them back on American soil." That, of course, was a totally wrong assumption. In the six decades since January of 1959, the Batistiano-Mafiosi remnants have waged both war and terrorism against Cuba from U. S. soil and via punitive Congressional laws in an all-out and ongoing effort to regain control of Cuba.

     On November 25-2016 Fidel Castro finally died at age 90 and his 87-year-old revolutionary brother Raul resigned as President of Cuba on April 19, 2018. Cuba's new President, Miguel Diaz-Canel, was born after the revolutionary triumph and is the island's former Education Minister. On February 24th, 2019, Cuba will get a new Constitution, its first since 1976 and one that has been meticulously discussed at countless public sessions across the island.

     Meanwhile, as noted earlier, the viciously greedy and revengeful Marco Rubio from Little Havana has full clearance from President Trump, the U. S. media, and the sufficiently propagandized U. S. citizenry to wage whatever type of war or deception he chooses to execute a regime-change in Cuba before Trump is impeached or voted out of office. 

     And meanwhile, as also noted earlier, Rubio for the past two years has used the alleged mysterious sonic wave attacks against Americans in Havana as a prime pretext, or excuse, to tighten the screws on Cuba and, as many top experts like Tracey Eaton are predicting, to actually attack Cuba perhaps by the spring of 2019. Eaton, America's top Cuban expert, recently wrote that he would "not be surprised" if the Trump/Rubio/John Bolton/Maurico Claver-Carone quartet launch an attack on Cuba "from Brazil" now that Latin America's largest and strongest nation has a new Trump-like, extreme-right wing President in Jair Bolsanaro, who is extremely anti-Cuba, anti-poor people and gays, and pro-military.

    The U. S. mainstream media is so incompetent and the American people are so propagandized that there was little outcry when President Trump named the infamous war-monger John Bolton as his top National Security Adviser. Bolton, like almost all of the extreme right-wingers in the Trump administration, is a product of the Bush dynasty where Bolton strongly advocated a regime-change in Cuba. When Bolton, as shown above, quickly flew to meet Brazil's new right-wing President, Jair Bolsonaro, many experts on U.S.-Cuban relations believed Bolton's intention was to get Bolsonaro's inclusion for a spring offensive against Cuba. AND TO REPEAT: America's top Cuban expert, TRACEY EATON, wrote that he would "not be surprised" if Trump/Rubio/Claver-Carone/Bolton launched their expected spring attack on Cuba "from Brazil." American citizens, who would pay for such ignorance, are not supposed to believe that any such thing is brewing...and when-if it happens, they are supposed to accept it...meekly, or course.

     But meanwhile, as also mentioned earlier, Rubio may have to concoct some new excuses to continue to wage warlike intrigue against Cuba. For the past two years, much of Rubio's cowardly activity against Cubans on the island has been waged from Little Havana, Congress, and the White House based on the SONIC WAVE attacks even though most unbiased people never thought Cuba would harm itself and help its enemies by perpetrating such stupidity. And now today -- January 8th, 2019 -- the USA's top newspaper, USA Today, finally screams this headline: "REMEMBER THAT MYSTERIOUS 'ATTACK' ON U. S. DIPLOMATS IN CUBA? SCIENTISTS THINK IT WAS CRICKETS." Yes, a cricket like the one above screaming loudly during the mating season to try to impress a potential female mate. But deadly U. S. excuses to harm Cuba are actually a dime-a-dozen -- and you can Google them such as...Remember the Maine in Havana Harbor; Operation Northwoods; Brothers to the Rescue Planes from Miami Dropping Items over Havana; etc. and if you are still interested after Googling those three, remember there are many more. So Rubio and his large, highly paid staff can, and probably will, quickly replace the Cricket as with other pretexts/excuses. And whatever they are, the mainstream U. S. media and the mainstream U. S. population will likely...and meekly...accept them, as always. {But USA Today's love-lorn Cricket is a cute little guy, isn't he? I hope he found a mate, or two, after all that yelling.}.

*&***********************&*