Cuba on Nov. 25-2017

Miami on Nov. 25-2017:

Photo courtesy: Alejandro Ernesto/EFE/Getty Images.

       The photo above is used to highlight an article posted today -- Nov. 25-2017 -- in El Pais, the powerful international newspaper in Spain. The article, written by Pablo de Llano, has a Miami dateline. El Pais was commemorating the one-year anniversary of the death of Cuba's revolutionary icon Fidel Castro at age 90 on Nov. 25-2016 in Havana. The article is entitled: "Fidel No Ha Muerto, O Eso Parece" or "Fidel Has Not Died, or So It Seems." It is a very interesting article.

     America newspapers cannot publish such articles, especially from Miami where the Batistiano-Mafiosi remnants from Cuba's overthrown Batista-Mafia dictatorship have been headquartered in their Little Havana base since January of 1959. But Spain's El Pais can publish such an article pointing out that...even after the death of Fidel Castro, Revolutionary Cuba is still pugnacious and sovereign Cuba while the rich and powerful Batistianos and Mafiosi -- though still supported by the Superpower United States in the U. S. Congress and in all Republican presidential adminstrations -- are still unable to regain control of the coveted and vulnerable nearby island.

           For the most part, propagandized Americans HAVE NO COMPREHENSION of what an unbiased El Pais journalist wrote about from Miami on Nov. 25th, 2017 -- the first-year anniversary of Fidel Castro's death. But I believe Pablo de Llano is merely expressing a true fact: Since 1959 there have been two generations of Cubans on the island who do not want a return of the Batista-Mafia rule that brutalized and fleeced the island from 1952 till Jan. 1, 1959. The photo that illustrates the El Pais article from Miami shows a Cuban schoolboy proudly holding up a photo of Fidel Castro. The Cuban narrative in America since 1959, promulgated from Little Havana, claims that the schoolboy has been brain-washed and programmed by the Revolutionary government. El Pais seems to suggest that he has been educated by his parents and grand-parents who remember the Cuban tracks left by the Batistianos and Mafiosi.

    The international newspaper giant, El Pais, is based in Madrid, Spain. Thus, its journalist -- Pablo de Llano -- was free to write an article from Miami today on Nov. 25-2017, the first anniversary of Fidel Castro's death, that tells both sides of the two-sided Havana-Little Havana story. In the U. S., unfortunately, only one-side is generally told -- the Little Havana side. In other words, the precious U. S. democracy has changed drastically since 1959. El Pais seems to agree with the yearly vote in the United Nations that universally condemns America's Cuban policy since 1959. Perhaps more Americans should consider that condemnation and even muster up enough courage and patriotism to challenge the current Rubio-Trump cruelty that targets totally innocent Cuban women and children in the guise of hurting and exacting revenge on Castro for booting them off the island -- all the way to Miami!!

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True Rhythms of Cuba

Chronicled by great Photos!!
{UPDATED FOR: Friday, Nov. 24th, 2016}

      The photo above, and all the photos in this essay unless otherwise noted, were taken by one of the world's very best photographers -- Roberto Suarez. To comprehend the rhythms & pulses of the fascinating, beguiling, beautiful, and often misunderstood island of Cuba, I believe Roberto Suarez's photos are essential.

This is Roberto Saurez. 

     This photo shows Roberto Suarez rowing with friends on the Toa River near Baracoa, Cuba. Roberto's Cuban photos are the products of a great photographer and one who knows the island intimately. Two of his favorite subjects are talented and influential young broadcast journalists -- Cristina Escobar and Rosy Amaro Perez.

    Speaking Spanish or English, Cristina Escobar is an absolutely brilliant television news anchor in Cuba and in the region. In fact, she is a part of U.S.-Cuban history as the only Cuban to ask questions at a White House news conference in Washington. She has also spoken eloquently about U.S.-Cuban relations and broadcast journalism at three U. S. universities. Her fans included Andrea Mitchell, the veteran Chief Foreign Correspondent for America's NBC News. For her college thesis, Cristina astutely predicted the impact U. S. President Barack Obama would have on Cuba, tagged with a caveat about when and if a Republican president replaced the Democratic Obama. Respected for her talent and her comments, Cristina is responsible for perhaps the two most pertinent statements related to current U.S.-Cuban relations: {1} "Cuban journalists have more freedom to tell the truth about the U. S. than U. S. journalists have to tell the truth about Cuba;" and {2} "Cuba's fate is up to Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami and Washington." Americans who dispute those two comments because Cristina is a Cuban on the island are not interested in both sides of a tumultuous two-sided story.

     The healthy and well-educated young-adult generation of Cubans on the island are extremely influential now and becoming more so after the Nov. 25-2016 death at age 90 of revolutionary icon Fidel Castro and prior to the Feb.-2018 retirement of Raul Castro as Cuba's President. Young adults like the ones shown above will likely predicate the island's future above and beyond what the richer and more powerful Cubans in Miami and Washington have in store for the much-coveted island. This is a Roberto Suarez photo. Second from the right is Cristina Escobar, the sensational young-adult broadcast journalist that Cubans admire...and with ample reasons.

     Right behind break-through superstar broadcast journalist Cristina Escobar came another wave of superbly talented, well-educated Cuban journalists and anchors, led by Rosy Amaro Perez. She too has a massive following on the island. On April 16th Rosy watched the live telecast of President Trump's speech in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood in which, raucously applauded by the hardest of the Counter Revolutionary hard-line Cuban exiles, he excoriated Revolutionary Cuba. Then Rosy posted this comment on her Facebook page: "The Cuba President Trump described is not the Cuba I know. And I've lived here all my life." Almost immediately, Cristina Escobar replied, "May I quote you?" The Cuban narrative in the United States since 1959 has almost exclusively been dictated by remnants of the ousted Batista-Mafia dictatorship or their self-serving sycophants such as the Bush dynasty. So today...Trump and Miami's U. S. Senator Marco Rubio primarily dictate America's Cuban narrative, and their lies are slanted toward justifying the unjustifiable -- the U. S. embargo of Cuba that was first imposed in 1962 to starve, deprive, and make miserable the lives of Cubans on the island to induce them to rise up and overthrow their Revolutionary government. Since 1962 the embargo...Cuba calls it a blockade...has remained in place to fulfill its originally stated goal. Obama has been the only U. S. President with the guts and patriotism to slice into that travesty but the current Trump presidency has essentially anointed Rubio as America's latest Batista-like American dictator of Cuba. So, intelligent Americans need to decide whether Trump-Rubio are more truthful about Cuba than two highly respected Cubans on the island -- namely, Cristina Escobar and Rosy Amaro Perez.

      This is a Roberto Suarez photo that helps define Cuba's rhythms & pulses. Of course, one of Roberto's favorite subjects is Rosy Amaro Perez. He spotted her at a concert this week and, with a devilishly beguiling grin, she spotted him spotting her.

     Also at this week's concert, Roberto Suarez took this photo of Yanet Perez Moya who was sitting beside her dear friend Rosy Amaro Perez. At concerts, baseball games, and many other fun & work activities, Yanet and Rosy are usually side-by-side. And like Rosy, the beautiful Yanet is an awesomely skilled broadcast journalist. The two young women co-anchor a very popular television newscast on the island.

Rosy & Yanet co-anchoring.

     This gorgeous photo shows the two co-anchors -- Rosy Amaro Perez and Yanet Perez Moya -- at a baseball game. Sandwiched between them is Rosy's Mariana.

Mariana and her squeezable friend Diego.

Roberto thinks Rosy is very photogenic.

 And so do other photographers.

     Yuliat Danay Acosta took this classic photo of Rosy and her lookalike daughter Mariana in their classy lookalike dresses.

Roberto's pensive Rosy & inquisitive Yanet.

Roberto's "Joy of Selfie" photo.

Roberto Suarez's caption for this photo was:

"Havana is full of cats."

        Roberto captures a Cuban, Lissett Izquierdo Ferrer, finding something very amusing on her Smart Phone. Like most great photographers, Cuba's Roberto Suarez gravitates toward exquisite beauty and, as he defines the rhythms & pulses of Cuba, there is much to be found on his cozy Caribbean island.

     But for every beautiful and joyful photo that Roberto Suarez takes in Cuba, there are sad ones like this too. These are Cubans begging...praying...for vile Americans and Cubans in the United States to stop punishing them, reminding the Superpower United States that its embargo-blockade is the longest and cruelest embargo-blockade ever imposed by a powerful nation against a weaker nation. Great photographers make great statements with their photos. I believe Cuba's Roberto Suarez is making a great statement with this sad but pertinent photo.

    The image above is also credited to Roberto Suarez. He uses it to tell a truth, like the truths his photos of Cuba and its people tell. This truth, of course, resonates in near unanimity worldwide -- in fact, in 2016 the blockade was condemned 191-to-ZERO at the United Nations. Yet, in these closing days of 2017 the American people are still programmed to accept the lies from Trump & Rubio that not only support and justify the genocidal intent of the embargo-blockade but supposedly justify their ongoing efforts to strengthen it. And so, for what it's worth, I'll close with the photo below that Roberto Suarez took this month as he chronicled the rhythms & pulses of everyday Cubans.  

      OF COURSE, any accurate appraisal of the rhythms & pulses of EVERYDAY life in Cuba must include the EVERYDAY struggles of EVERYDAY Cubans. The island's world-class photographer, Roberto Suarez. took this photo this month in rural Cuba. It shows a schoolboy and his older friend hitch-hiking. As I discovered when I was in Cuba, NEVER will a Cuban driving a car or truck fail to stop to pick up Cuban hitch-hikers. Also note in this photo the adult Cubans back in the shade that is being provided by a make-shift wooden hut to protect themselves from the hot tropical sun. That roadside hut is where those Cubans try to sell fruit or vegetables to passers-by. Anxious to meet EVERYDAY Cubans, I asked my driver Jose to stop AT EVERY such opportunity...to chat and to purchase things like bananas. To his credit, Roberto Suarez added this caption to this photo: "The U. S. blockade is aimed at the people of Cuba." Back in America since 1959, LIARS like Donald Trump and Marco Rubio claim the embargo-blockade is to "punish the Castros." And self-serving LIARS like Trump & Rubio, who have never been to Cuba, are still getting away with such lies because intimidated or cowardly or unpatriotic Americans LET them get away with it. "The U. S. blockade is aimed at the people of Cuba," so says a great photographer who lives on the island and chronicles the lives...and the pulses and rhythms...of Cubans.

     Cubans still fondly remember the visit from U. S. President Obama in March of 2016. And well they should. He was the first U. S. president to visit the island since Herbert Hoover arrived in 1928 on a warship to stress the U. S. dominance of the island since America's victory in the 1898 Spanish-American War. Cuba's startling revolutionary victory over the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship on Jan. 1-1959 established Cuba as a sovereign nation, a status it has pugnaciously maintained although remnants of the Batista-Mafia reign who fled to the U. S. have tried on a daily basis for over half-a-century to regain control of the island...usually with the backing of the nearby World Superpower. Since 1959 only Obama's 8 years as U. S. President -- 2009 till 2017 -- provided Cuba a respite from assaults from the USA.

     On his very historic visit to Cuba in March of 2016, President Obama went on island-wide television to sincerely make the above promise to the Cuban people: "Cuba does not need to fear a threat from the United States." But the U. S. has a two-party political system -- Democrats and Republicans. A small band of Counter Revolutionary extremists -- headquartered in Miami's Little Havana section -- dictate the Republican Party's Cuban policies. On Jan. 20-2017 the Democrat Obama was succeeded by the Republican President Donald Trump.

     President Donald Trump has essentially anointed two Counter Revolutionary U. S. Congressmen from Miami -- Marco Rubio and Mario Diaz-Balart -- America's new co-dictators of Cuba, similar to the Batista-Lansky dictatorship on the island from 1952 till 1959. But, at least at the moment, Rubio & Diaz-Balart are based in Washington and Little Havana, NOT IN HAVANA. Cuba tenuously & truly hopes to keep it that way.

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YES, CUBA IS STILL STANDING

And It Might Survive Rubio & Trump!!
{Updated for: Wednesday, Nov. 22nd, 2017}

Photo courtesy of: Al Diaz/Miami Herald.

      The photo above was used this week -- Nov. 20th-2017 -- to illustrate an insightful and well-balanced article in the Miami Herald written by Mimi Whitefield. It is entitled: "Yes, You Can Still Travel to Cuba -- But Make Sure You Know the Rules." The photo shows a street in Havana with backed-up traffic mainly consisting of old vintage American cars from the 1950s. Ms. Whitefield wrote: "In the five months since President Donald Trump appeared in Miami and said he was reversing all of President Barack Obama's Cuba policies...a devastating hurricane raked Cuba's north coast, and the U. S. State Department issued a warning against traveling to Cuba. Some people just scratched the island off their list as a potential destination."

    The next three informative photos from this week's Mimi Whitefield article were taken by Emily Michot for the Miami Herald. This one shows the Carnival Cruise Lines Paradise arriving at Havana Harbor. Ms. Whitefield pointed out that the latest harsh sanctions against Cuba announced on Nov. 9th by the Trump administration have, as usual, resulted in U.S.-based groups -- Cuba One Foudation, Insight Cuba, etc. -- reacting positively on behalf of Cuba and keen American business interests.

     This Emily Michot photo shows a worker sweeping up at the Five-Star Gran Hotel Manzana Kempinski in Old Havana. On November 9th-2017 the new Rubio-Trump rules made it illegal for Americans to stay at this 5-Star gem and other Cuban hotels. But they're available for Canadians, Mexicans, and citizens of ALL OTHER nations who have the freedom to travel to Cuba to judge it freely for themselves.

      This Emily Michot photo shows Niuris Higueras, a feisty Cuban woman, hugging her daughter Ysabella. Thanks to decent overtures from former President Barack Obama, Niuris opened this splendid restaurant and it thrived, making money for Niuris and the other Cubans who worked for her. But the Nov. 9th rulings by Rubio-Trump coupled with the U. S. State Department's warning to Americans not to visit Cuba severely hurt Niuris's business, but it has recovered somewhat. And now Niuris and dozens of other private entrepreneurs have fired off a letter to Senator Marco Rubio in Washington inviting him to come to Cuba and meet with them and then maybe Rubio might not be so emphatic about hurting innocent Cubans in the age-old guise of hurting -- seeking revenge -- ON THE CASTROS. Mr. Rubio has had time to respond to that letter but as of this week he has not done so. Meanwhile, decent Cubans on the island like Niuris are trying desperately to support their families despite Rubio and Trump targeting them from the Superpower United States.

     The extraordinary back-patting {or back-stabbing?} influence Miami's dangerously ambitious United States Senator Marco Rubio now has on his former dire enemy in the 2016 Republican presidential race, President Trump, is in 2017 reminiscent of the extraordinary influence vehement Counter Revolutionary Luis Posada Carriles had on President Nixon and vehement Counter Revolutionary Jorge Mas Canosa had on the Bush economic-presidential dynasty. Similarly, Senator Rubio's economic & political bread is buttered by extraordinarily wealthy Counter Revolutionary Cubans in Miami as well as at least three right-wing American billionaires. The Nixon-Carriles and Bush-Canosa alliances thrived economically and politically without hindrance from American citizens, so the Rubio-Trump nexus can assume, I believe, that, regarding Cuba, continued apathy or cowardice from U. S. citizens will enable them to punish two very precious entities: {1} Innocent Cubans on the island like Niuris Higueras and her daughter Ysabella and {2} America's reputation around the world.

And meanwhile:

      This photo, taken yesterday, shows that Cubans on the island will continue to be Cubans, and that means their love for such things as music can't be denied by Rubio & Trump. This photo was taken by a music fan at a concert who is also a fan of the photogenic music-lover Rosy Amaro Perez who was momentarily distracted from concentrating on the stage. She is a popular and talented television news anchor on the island, so her appearances at two of her favorite venues -- concerts and baseball games -- sometime upstage the performers and the athletes. The photographer this time was rewarded with a beguiling and beautiful smile from Rosy Amaro Perez.

     This photo shows Rosy Amaro Perez at that concert this week gazing off to the right of the stage at some distraction. Whatever she does is important, I believe, because it serves as a microcosm of what is happening in Cuba day-by-day even as ultra-powerful Counter Revolutionaries in Miami and Washington try omnipotently to reclaim the island. Rosy's own home was damaged by the recent devastating hurricane BUT she also has to be cognizant of the man-made hurricanes hurled daily at her island from Washington. Back on April 16 the observant Rosy watched a live telecast of President Trump excoriating Cuba during his speech before the Counter Revolutionary choir in Miami's Little Havana section. Then Rosy immediately posted this comment on her Facebook page: "The Cuba that President Trump described is not the Cuba I know. And I've lived here all my life."

         In other words, when Americans are inundated with comments about Cuba from the likes of Senator Rubio or President Trump, two Counter Revolutionaries who have never been to Cuba, I believe Americans should also consider the comments of Cubans on the island...like the aforementioned entrepreneur Niuris Higueras and like...Rosy Amaro Perez. I assume Rosy is smarter than Rubio and Trump and I know damn well she knows more about Cuba than they do. Remember, she has lived there all her life and she'd rather that foreigners not reclaim it as their piggy-bank.

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U. S. Cuban-Extremists

Hurting Good Cubans in Cuba!!
{Updated for: Monday, Nov. 20th, 2017}

    The magnificent photo above was taken by Santiago Barriero for the superb National Geographic Magazine {which I subscribe to} and the photo is also featured on its excellent website, which I visit often. It shows a student at Cuba's National Ballet School holding up her baby sister just outside the school. The older girl, sweetly and poignantly, was merely bidding good-bye to the baby before she entered the building to continue her grueling but beloved ballet training. It's a typical scene in Cuba -- beautiful, touching, and...bittersweet. That's because, having been to Cuba, I am aware that some bad Cubans in America have been allowed, since 1959, to hurt some good Cubans in Cuba, like the ballet student above and her baby sister.

           A native of Chesapeake, Virginia, Rachel Brown is a superb writer and producer at National Geographic Magazine. On Nov. 13-2017 Rachel included the photo of the ballet student and her baby sister in a major article that reminded me of the cruelty and injustice of bad Cubans in the U. S. being allowed to punish good Cubans in Cuba since 1959, the year the Cuban Revolution overthrew the vile U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. That statement is not anti-America; it's very much pro-American because no other topic has hurt America's worldwide image as much as its Cuban policies have in assaulting Cubans on the island for over half-a-century on behalf of a handful of two generations of Cuban-Americans. Oh, yes!! The rest of the world agrees with my assessment as evidenced by the yearly vote in the United Nations that condemns America's Cuban policies. It appears that Rachel Brown agrees with that international unanimity of opinion. That's why, I believe, she included the photo of the little ballet girl in Cuba saying a brief good-bye to her beloved and precious baby sister. Ms. Brown explained in her Nov. 13-2017 National Geographic article that, on Nov. 9-2017, the U. S. government had issued another round of cruel Executive Orders that, as always, mostly hurt the most innocent Cubans on the island -- like the ballet student and her baby sister. The fresh round of Executive Orders on Nov. 9th-2017 were signed by President Trump at the insistence of a few bad Cuban-Americans in the U. S. Congress from Miami -- especially Senator Marco Rubio and Representative Mario Diaz-Balart but also Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Carlos Curbelo. Is it permissible or healthy for me to express such an opinion knowing that Emilio Milian -- a top Cuban-American newsman in Miami -- was car-bombed for criticizing terrorist acts by Counter Revolutionary Cubans against totally innocent Cubans? I don't know, but I still think it's worthwhile. Rachel Brown's article explained that National Ballet School children in Cuba were excited about their SCHEDULED trip to Tampa, Florida, where they would have performed for an appreciative audience BECAUSE MOST CUBAN-AMERICANS STRONGLY DESIRE NORMAL RELATIONS WITH CUBA and, in fact, Cubans in the U. S. send billions of dollars each year to Cubans in Cuba, something else that bad U. S. Cubans in Congress are determined to stop. BUT Rachel Brown's article said that the Rubio-fueled Nov. 9th-2017 assaults from Washington will probably prevent the Cuban ballet students from performing in Tampa. Rachel Brown thinks such cruelty by rich Cuban-Americans against vulnerable and poorer Cubans in Cuba is wrong. And, I believe, every decent American and Cuban-American agrees with Rachel Brown. And yet, decade after decade it is allowed to continue in the name of the United States of America. Now, if you will, go back to the top and study the photo of the National Ballet School student and her baby sister. I think you'll agree they are not America's enemies and they should not be punished all their lives by a few bad U. S. Cubans. Of course, propagandized Americans supposedly disagree.

     One of the world's greatest journalists, Marc Frank works for London-based REUTERS, the world's best news agency and one that treats Cuba fairly.

REUTERS covers Cuba expertly with real journalists.

     From behind the scenes in Havana, Marc Frank's books, like Cuban Revelations, are classics. And so are his truly great articles for REUTERS from the Caribbean island.

     The photo above was taken by Alexandre Meneghini. It illustrates a Nov. 17-2017 article by Marc Frank for REUTERS. It's entitled "Cuban Businesswomen Seek Rubio Meeting as U. S. Policy Bites." Those decent and totally innocent Cuban businesswomen, like Niuris Higuera {in the red dress}, are well aware that President Trump has anointed U. S. Senator Marco Rubio, the self-serving Counter Revolutionary zealot from Miami, as the new American dictator of Cuba. On Nov. 9-2017 Rubio's latest very cruel assaults on hard-working Cuban women like Niuris became U. S. law. She had, thanks to the decency of former President Obama, a thriving restaurant that catered to tourists like the ones she is shown hosting at her table above. But Rubio's new rules -- made legal by President Trump's Executive Orders -- aim to destroy Niuris's livelihood and that of other totally innocents on the island. Propagandized Americans are supposed to think Rubio is only hurting "the Castros" while every fair-minded and insightful person on the planet, like Marc Frank, well know that Rubio knows he is only hurting the most innocent people in Cuba, like Niuris Higueras and her children. That's why Marc Frank tells us about a heart-wrenching letter women like Niuris have written directly to Senator Rubio pleading with him to consider their plight and begging him to at least meet with them and hear them out. Rubio, of course, has met with fierce Counter Revoutionary Cubans in Washington but it's unlikely he'll meet with decent Cubans like Niuris, except maybe to lecture them for not having defected to Little Havana.

 The Nov. 17-2017 article by Marc Frank for REUTERS included the photo above of Nidialys Acosta who, thanks to Obama, had opened a thriving business renting vintage cars to tourists. She is shown asking Marc Frank why the American people have allowed Trump and Rubio to destroy her business that was supporting her family and the families of her workers. Marc Frank reports that Nidialys and a whole association of Cuban women like her signed the letter sent to Rubio begging him to meet with them. Decent people in America and around the world believe rich and powerful people in a rich and powerful country SHOULD NOT be allowed to feather their own political-and-economic nests by hurting much weaker-and-poorer people in another country. But Rubio in the U. S. Congress has that salacious permission.

     The Marc Frank Nov. 17th article also includes the photo above of a heart-broken Julia de la Rosa. Julia too signed that letter begging for a meeting with Rubio. Thanks to Obama, Julia owned a thriving 10-bed Bed & Breakfast that employed 17 other Cubans. In the photo above, Julia asked Marc Frank and REUTERS why Rubio has destroyed her business AND WHY do the American people allow him to do it.

     With tears in her eyes in the above photo, Julia de la Rosa had earlier told Andrea Mitchell of NBC News: "By ruining my business the U. S. is hurting not only my family but the families of the 17 Cubans that worked for me. Mr. Obama had made my successful business possible." Study the photos, if you will, of the Cuban women that Senator Rubio is so severely hurting IN AMERICA'S NAME. And then...oh, YES...go back to the top and study the photo of the little Cuban girl and her baby sister that Rubio is also hurting. And the tears in Julia's eyes are courtesy of MARCO RUBIO.

     For Republican political reasons, President Trump's anointment of Senator Marco Rubio as essentially America's new Cuban dictator not only severely hurts totally innocent Cubans on the island, it severely hurts most Cuban-Americans who favor normal relations with Cuba. And, of course, it severely hurts America's and Democracy's images in the entire world, something Rubio could care less about.

       The photo above deeply saddens 11 million innocent Cubans on the island. It deeply saddens the majority of the 2 million Cuban-Americans in the Miami area, many of whom send money to poor Cubans. It saddens every nation in the UN that voted 191-to-ZERO to condemn America's Cuban policy. And IT SHOULD SADDEN every democracy-loving American. This photo shows President Trump in Miami's Little Havana cowardly appeasig the choir by signing documents whereby the United States punishes totally innocent Cubans to sate the revenge, economic, and political goals of a handful of Cuban-American extremists. MOST HAUNTING OF ALL about the above photo is Marco Rubio peering directly over Trump's right shoulder as Trump signs and legalizes the anti-Cuban AND anti-American papers.

     The photo above, I believe, is Pulitzer-worthy. It was taken by Greg Kahn for National Geographic. It shows a young Cuban standing on a rocky ledge overlooking Havana's famed Malecon seawall. The background includes other Havana landmarks such as the famed Hotel de Nacional de Cuba that, up until 1959, was a favorite hangout for Mafia kingpins like Al Capone and Lucky Luciano as well as A-list Hollywood-Las Vegas celebrities such as Frank Sinatra who also flocked to the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia playpen. In 2017, however, the young Cuban above seems to be gazing across the Florida Straits toward the nearby United States. I...wonder why?

And speaking of Frank Sinatra:

      On Nov. 7-1951 -- with the Mafia in firm control of Cuba just before Fulgencio Batista officially became dictator with the Mafia's and America's wonderful blessings and strong-arm support -- Frank Sinatra married another Hollywood superstar, Ava Gardner. They actually got married in Philadelphia and quickly flew to Havana for their whirlwind honeymoon. The cake-cutting above occurred on Nov. 8-1951 at Havana's Montmarte nightclub and they spent the night at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba where Sinatra maintained a suite and where he once famously insisted he saw a ghost.

     In the 1950s prior to the 1959 triumph of the Cuban Revolution, any even slightly sinful American longed to travel to Cuba where Mafia-directed gambling, drugs, and prostitution were massive lures and where rich American businessmen were also eagerly partaking in the spoils of the Mafiosi playpen. That, of course, included Hollywood superstars like Frank & Ava as well as every U. S. college student who had some money as well as some wild oaks to sew. CONFESSION: I was in college in 1958 and longed to go to Cuba, but I was too poor. But my roommate's rich family in 1958 purchased two sets of round-trip Pan-Am tickets for his Cuban trips. I got so sick-'n-tired of his raving about his promiscuity delights in Cuba that one day I actually doused him with hot coffee, which resulted in a new roommate. As for Cuba-loving Frank & Ava...they got divorced in 1957...maybe because they had just HEARD THAT FIDEL CASTRO HAD RETURNED FROM MEXICO AND JOINED CELIA SANCHEZ'S REBEL ARMY IN THE SIERRA MAESTRE MOUNTAINS OF EASTERN CUBA, meaning that Cuba as a BRUTAL Mafia playpen/piggy bank was doomed!!

      This Bettmann/Corbis photo of Frank Sinatra and Ava Gardner honeymooning in 1951 was used in the London Daily Mail, which said that, "Ava, a passable actress, is considered the most beautiful animal in the world. Frank is a New Jersey Italian known as a talented singer who has a deep fascination with the Mafia." And the accuracy of that sentence has resonated in various forms in many Frank and Ava biographies.

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