Americans Have A Right to Know About Cuba

A Stronger Democracy Would Permit It

      Those of us who have been to Cuba and who have studied its people for decades are aware of a nearby very significant island that is quite foreign to most Americans. It is, in fact, the only place in the world that everyday Americans are not free to visit. And, yes, for the most part since the overthrow of the vile Batista-Mafia dictatorship way back in 1959, the reconstitution of that dictatorship on U. S. soil has tightly controlled or at least direly influenced what Americans are told about Cuba, both its history and its modernity. That basic fact, of course, says more about the U. S. government and the U. S. media than it says about the anachronistic Cuban government or the one-dimensional Cuban media. But there are elements of truth to the Cuban equation that even Americans can access, if they desire. For example, we who have been to Cuba and have studied its people are not surprised at the above photo taken this week in Havana by Franklin Reyes for the Associated Press. It shows a Cuban motorist with side-by-side Cuban and American flags prominently displayed in his vehicle. While the two governments have been actually or virtually at war for the past 54 years, if you could venture to Cuba and judge for yourself, you would observe a palpable fact: Everyday Cubans to this day remain very fond of everyday Americans and they still admire the U. S. democracy that, after the Spanish-American War in 1898, had a glorious opportunity to gift the island with a real nice and sweet democracy of its own but shamefully abused that opportunity. Instead of mandating democracy after the U. S. replaced Spain as the imperialist power in control of Cuba, right-wing American power-brokers and greedy capitalists decided that a democracy would not permit them to rape and rob the island at will. So, from 1898 till 1959 Cuba was beset with a harrowing series of corrupt leaders and brutal dictatorships that would, via kick-backs as well as direct unfathomable mandates from Washington, allow rich Americans to rape and rob the island at will.

       Contrary to fabrications of U. S. - Cuban history, America's dominance of the island from 1898 till 1959 provided rich Americans with a lush piggy-bank while creating cesspools of poverty for the helpless, majority Cubans. In 2013, it's time the U. S. democracy, without obfuscations or outright lies, admitted it.

     The uniqueness of the U. S. - backed Batista rule from 1952 till 1959 evolved when Cuba was subjected to what amounted to a triangular dictatorship composed of the U. S., Batista, and the Mafia. Batista had lucrative partnerships with both of his prime supporters. U. S. tax dollars kept Batista's treasury and military in excellent shape so U. S. businesses could siphon off the island's resources; the Mafia controlled the incredibly profitable gambling, drug, and prostitution rackets. The 1950s casino ad above appropriately promoted an appearance by George Raft, a reputed Mafia figure who also was famous for playing Mafia figures in major Hollywood movies! So naturally George was among the celebrities allowed to partake in the wholesale rape and robbery of the island...actually right up until the early morning hours of January 1, 1959, when getaway ships, boats, and airplanes finally took precedence over gluttony.

       The above photo was taken in Havana in 1954. It depicts a peasant family right after they had been informed that their home would be destroyed the next day to make room for the casino already going up in the background. Of course, the family was told to fend for itself. The United States, the powerful neighbor, could have prevented these things but, instead, supported such abominable behavior.

      Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., one of America's greatest Pulitzer Prize-winning historians, died in 2007 at age 89. He wrote about "the dark, vulgar underpinnings coarsening through our Cuban relations."

    In 1957 Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. was a top presidential advisor. In that capacity, according to such sources as the Wikipedia biography of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, Schlesinger was asked to analyze Batista's Cuba. He provided this precise answer: "The corruption of the government, the brutality of the police, the regime's indifference to the needs of the people for education, medical care, housing, for social justice and economic justice is an open invitation to revolution." So, beyond question, the U. S. government was well aware of what the Batista-Mafia rule of Cuba was all about...and continued to support it because it didn't believe any revolution could threaten a U. S - backed dictatorship. But, beyond question, Schlesinger's insightful prophecy defined a meteoric revolution that incredibly DID EXACTLY THAT!

It's known to history as The Cuban Revolution.

      In the wee hours of Jan. 1-1959 the Batistiano and Mafia leaders frantically fled Havana. By daylight jubilant Cubans {above} were destroying the ubiquitous casinos that had helped define Batista's Cuba.

Fidel Castro and Celia Sanchez captured Santiago de Cuba and seven days later claimed Havana.

Celia and Fidel on a stopover in Cienfuegos {Jan. 4-1959} on the trek to claim Havana!

       From January of 1959 till she died of cancer in January of 1980, Celia Sanchez made the decisions for Cuba -- "The big ones and the small ones," according to long-time insider Roberto Salas. Fidel Castro's prime job was to support her decisions, which he fervently did whether or not he fully agreed with her. Of course, for various self-serving reasons, that basic nuance of Revolutionary Cuba is not supposed to be shared with the American people. In the above photo, Celia appropriately is the studious one while Fidel, also appropriately, is relaxing in his rocking chair with his slippers off. But whatever decision she was concocting, he would defend...come hell or high water! To this very day, he worships her above all others.

      On another topic, today's politicians are blamed for a plethora of evil acts and, shamefully, most of the accusations are accurate. But as this Jamaica Observer cartoon gem points out, some are not.

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Iconic Cuban Photos From Alberto Korda Gallery

      The great, omnipotent photographer Alberto Korda is shown above with his daughter Norda. Mr. Korda died in 2001 at age 72. For ten years he traveled everywhere with Fidel Castro as Fidel's official photographer, taking history's most famous photos of both Fidel and Che Guevara. Now Norda, who lives in Mexico, is selling the originals of many of her dad's famed photos at an auction house in England. 

 

Fidel Castro made only about one putt in his long life but Korda made it famous.

This Korda photo in 1963 shows Fidel photographing Nikita Khrushchev and his family in Russia.

Alberto Korda took the above photo of Fidel Castro with Celia Sanchez.

      Alberto Korda's photo of Che Guevara is one of history's all-time most famous images. It has appeared on millions of t-shirts, tattoos, blankets, pillows, buildings, coffee mugs, and dormitory walls worldwide.

Alberto Korda took this photo of Fidel Castro gazing over the Sierra Maestra.

        But Alberto Korda's all-time favorite photo was not one that featured either Fidel Castro or Che Guevara. It was the one above of a little Cuban girl lovingly clutching a block of wood. Her parents were too poor to buy her a doll so the little girl pretended the block of wood was her doll. Korda said that revelation, and that photo, is the one that crowned his life as one of the world's all-time greatest photographers. His love of this particular photo, and that precious little girl, also crowns Mr. Korda as a decent, compassionate human being. He said: "I never thought of myself as a great photographer till I looked at this image of the little Cuban girl clutching her block of wood. Her mother told me she pretended it was her doll. This is the photo that made my career, my life, worthwhile. It is the only one I stare at constantly, wondering if rich little girls have as much fun with their dolls as the little Cuban girl had with hers. Little girls are heavenly, especially unspoiled, non-rich little girls."

{Click on the above photo to see enlargement}

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Cuban Women: Yoani Sanchez Against Rosa Baez

With Diametrically Opposing Views

     Yoani Sanchez {above}, the Cuban dissident blogger who has replaced Luis Posada Carriles as the Western World's favorite anti-Castro zealot, stopped off in Prague on her 80-day worldwide tour that is meticulously designed and craftily programmed to denounce her native country's government. The anti-Castro Czech News Agency {CTK} lavishly reported every scathing word without mentioning that the majority of Cubans on the island, including the pro-Castro/pro-Cuban blogger Rosa Baez, strongly disagree with Yoani Sanchez's ubiquitous depictions of the island. For example, in Prague Yoani Sanchez told the welcoming choir not to be "misled" by all the changes taking place on the island and she described conditions on the island as "appalling." But some see things in Cuba as "appealing."

      Rosa C. Baez {above} is a lifelong Cuban who is quite familiar with the Fulgencio Batista regime in the 1950s and with the regime that replaced it from 1959 till today. She is a prolific writer-photographer on her own blog and on her massive Facebook pages. Of course, the media in the Western World is not interested in what Rosa Baez has to say. Rosa, for example, says that conditions in Batista's Cuba were "appalling" and that Revolutionary Cuba has corrected "most of those sins" although the corrections are still evolving because the sins of Batista...torture-murders of children, rampant illegal drugs, prostitution that included children, wholesale thievery that left the majority of Cubans hungry and without educational opportunities and health care, etc...were so, yes, "appalling." Cuba without Batista "appeals" to Rosa.

    The above photo was taken by Rosa C. Baez, an excellent writer and photographer. She used it on her Facebook page to exemplify modern Cuba, contrasting it with Batista's Cuba. In other words, the two girls were enjoying a carefree day. They are not pampered nor are they spoiled. But they are guaranteed free educations through college and free, high-class heath care for the rest of their lives. But even more importantly, Rosa points out, the two girls above "have zero concern about their safety" because, unlike in pre-revolutionary Cuba or in the United States, "crime and brutality are not a primary concern."

       On her stopover in Prague, Yoani Sanchez said only "one-tenth" of the 11 million Cubans support Fidel Castro. Rosa says Yoani says such things only because she is a puppet {see above} of the United States and that, if only one-tenth of the Cubans on the island supported Fidel he would have either "been consigned to history decades ago or living snugly in Miami about to celebrate his 87th birthday in August." 

     The above photo shows Rosa C. Baez in Havana flanked by her two daughters. Rosa is glad her daughters have been raised in Revolutionary Cuba as opposed to Batista's Cuba. Moreover, Rosa does not want her daughters or their children to be raised in a Cuba dominated and exploited by a foreign-backed government that is only interested in mistreating the majority and robbing the island of its treasures and resources. As far as Rosa is concerned, "We have been there and done that." Rosa does not want another Batista in Cuba. 

        As far as Rosa Baez is concerned, Yoani Sanchez, like Batista, was made in the USA. In Prague the CTK news agency hailed Yoani's visit: "Castro's secret police persecutes Sanchez because she maintains the independent blog Generacio Y where she criticizes the regime's practices." Rosa says, "She has a nice apartment in Havana and the main thing the authorities worry about is her creating an incident that she can use to show Cuba in a bad light." Rosa also points out that Cuba gave Yoani a passport to travel around the world denouncing Cuba while the United States, on behalf of the anti-Castro Cuban exiles, "will not permit the average American to visit Cuba to see the island for themselves because they would see an island unlike the one portrayed by her and the Miami Mafia." Indeed, Cuba allows Yoani Sanchez to post her blog, to use gigantic Western media outlets to promote her anti-Castro books, and to go on an 80-day anti-Castro speaking tour around the world. Rosa says that's a lot more freedom than the USA affords the average American when it comes to Cuba. And...perhaps she has a point.

     Yoani Sanchez's first stopover was in Brazil where, not unexpectedly, she encountered anti-Yoani protesters. Rosa says, "Cuba does have friends around the world, maybe more than the U. S. because of the U. S. treatment of Cuba since the Mob was chased to Miami. The UN vote each year proves that but, I guess, Americans are not told about that unanimous pro-Cuban vote." NOTE: The sign above held by the Brazilian man called Yoani Sanchez an "agent of the CIA." Rosa Baez does not believe she is but Rosa is correct to point out, I believe, that millions of Latin Americans, concerned with past history, are quick to label anyone who takes the pro-American attitude towards Cuba as "Made in the USA" or "Agents of the CIA." Latin Americans are quite familiar with Fidel Castro; they are also abundantly aware of Fulgencio Batista and other U. S. - backed Latin American dictators. Rosa Baez believes it's time Americans as well as Yoani Sanchez recognize that basic Latin America reality, one that addresses both sides of a two-sided issue.

       Rosa Baez posted on Facebook the above caricature of Yoani Sanchez on her worldwide anti-Castro tour. Rosa is proud Cuba gave Yoani the freedom to make the tour but she believes it is wrong for self-serving anti-Cubans in foreign countries to finance and/or promote it. NOTE: I believe Yoani Sanchez should have the right to say whatever she wants about Fidel Castro wherever she wants to say it. But I also believe Rosa Baez, who remains quite sensitive about the foreign-backed Batista years, has a right to question whether foreign entities "created and are prolonging the Yoani Sanchez phenomenon."

      Although Yoani Sanchez's 80-day tour has been well choreographed to put her in front of friendly audiences and anti-Cuban media, she has been harassed by sentiments Rosa Baez sincerely projects.

Whether or not U. S. dollar bills are flying Yoani around the world is open to conjecture.

But my point is this: 

     The majority of Cubans on the island probably disagree strongly with Yoani Sanchez and I believe it is fair for their opinions, as well as Yoani's, to be expressed, even in the United States. The above photo shows Rosa Baez, fourth from your right, with nine of her very adult Cuban friends. They know all about Batista; and they know all about Castro. They know which one was supported by the U. S., and why; and they know which one is opposed by the U. S., and why. Moreover, they wonder why the U. S. democracy is not strong enough to allow everyday Americans to visit Cuba and judge the island for themselves and not just through the prism of, say, a Yoani Sanchez. Rosa says, "I live modestly in Havana. So does Fidel. And no one is flying us around the world. I'm not jealous of Yoani Sanchez or her lack of modesty. But I know Cuba today is not what she and the folks in Miami say it is. Do I have a right to question why she says what she says? Jose Marti and a lot of other Cubans have fought, and many have died, for my right to question anyone supporting foreigners and not Cubans. Jose Marti fought and died; Fidel Castro fought and lived."

       And that brings us back around to Rosa Baez's photo of the two carefree Cuban girls. They are a part of the Cuban youth, healthy and well educated, that will determine Cuba's post-Castro future. Yes, as Rosa admits, they would like to one day bask in the affluence that could come with the cooperation of the nearby super-power and super-rich United States. But alongside that cooperation, Rosa believes, would be ugly Batista-like accouterments such as...the Mafia, unspeakable crime, rampant prostitution, illegal drugs, greedy businessmen concerned only with what they can take from the island, and seedy gamblers over-running the beautiful island with filthy parties. Does Rosa, a Cuban grand-mother with decades of hard-earned wisdom, have a right to that opinion? And what about the two young girls Rosa photographed? Do they have a right to express an opinion? Or is that right, when it comes to Cuba, reserved for Yoani and her legion of fans that Rosa believes are self-serving, politically correct, and economically ascendant? The U. S.-Cuban conundrum is multi-faceted, not one-dimensional. Fidel Castro did not replace Mother Teresa in Cuba; he replaced Fulgencio Batista and Meyer Lansky.

There is a Cuban woman named Yoani Sanchez. There is also a Cuban woman named Rosa Baez.

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Cuba Helped End U.S. Latin American Dominance

Good for Latin Americans

Not So Good for Americans

    For the last week of February-2013 Time Magazine produced a Special Edition, written by Steven Brill, entitled: "Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us." In minute, chilling detail it explains how medical and drug operations in the United States routinely rob Americans and their government of billions of dollars in a manner that would make Mafia kingpins like Al Capone envious. As Time points out, a trip to an emergency room or a brief stay in a hospital could and does cost the patients or the U. S. government not only tens of millions of dollars but hundreds of millions of dollars hourly! Investigative reporter Brill documents such charges as: $7 for the ink used by a pen to write an "x" next to an alleged procedure; $12 for a tiny paper cup used when a nurse gives a pill to a patient; etc.; etc. All of this, of course, occurs daily because such medical and drug operations can contribute millions of dollars to members of the U. S. Congress and candidates for the White House who, in turn, lushly create laws that allow their benefactors to rape and rob Americans at will. This past summer the U. S. Supreme Court astonished democracy lovers by allowing special interests to donate huge amounts of money to politicians, thus putting and keeping bought-and-paid-for incumbents in office for decades to do the bidding of...special interests.  

       This week's revelations by Time Magazine are reminders of how (1) U. S. companies such as The United Fruit Company quite legally once raped and robbed Caribbean and Latin American nations at will and how (2) The Cuban Revolution's overthrow of the U. S. - backed Batista dictatorship on Jan. 1-1959 immediately ended such practices in Cuba and later throughout the Caribbean and Latin America.

      For many decades, the United Fruit Company and other U. S. companies, backed by the overwhelming U. S. military, unmercifully plundered helpless Caribbean and Latin American nations. The American people were kept in the dark and, when the gruesome facts filtered out, United Fruit Company changed its name to Chiquita. Thus, the graphic above resonates in the Caribbean and Latin America.

    Above is the United Fruit ship SS Abangarez in 1945 on its way to New Orleans with its plunder.

    United Fruit was headquartered in Boston but this was the facade of its New Orleans office.

    John Foster Dulles {above, right} was President Dwight Eisenhower's Secretary of State from 1953 till 1959. Dulles's law firm represented the United Fruit Company and Dulles was a major share-holder. In the 1950s Dulles and other powerful right-wingers, such as Senator Joe McCarthy and Eisenhower's Vice President Richard Nixon, made political and financial hay by accusing any and every opposition of being "communist." In that manner they could be backed by the unmatched power of the U. S. military. Thus, in Guatemala in 1954 when a democratically elected government took over and vowed to end the United Fruit Company's rape and robbery of that nation, U. S. Secretary of State Dulles, on behalf of the United Fruit Company, induced the U. S. military and the CIA to assist in the overthrow of that democratically elected Guatemalan government to install a military dictatorship that would allow the United Fruit Company to continue raping and robbing the nation of Guatemala of its resources and dignity.

       In 1954, the very year John Foster Dulles instigated the overthrow of the democratically elected Guatemalan government to install a military dictatorship, Time Magazine honored John Foster Dulles as its "Man of the Year." To this day, John Foster Dulles is often called the all-time most powerful and most brilliant U. S. Secretary of State because of sanitized school books and biased journalism.

       Allen Dulles, the younger brother of John Foster Dulles, was Director of the CIA from 1953 till 1961 when he was fired by new President John Kennedy who commented, "If I could I would blow the CIA to Smithereens!" Kennedy had inherited Allen Dulles from the Eisenhower administration and that inheritance included CIA plans to murder Fidel Castro and re-capture Cuba. And, uh, oh yes! Allen Dulles was also a Board Member and major stock-holder of the United Fruit Company that had robbed Cuba blind before Fidel Castro booted it off the island. So, like the powerful U. S. State Department run by his brother, Allen Dulles' CIA had ample reason to over-throw democratically elected Latin American governments that were attempting to curtail foreign entities like the United Fruit Company from brutally robbing their countries at will. The CIA, the Mafia, and the State Department all hated Castro!

       You can read all about Allen Dulles in Peter Grose's biography or in many other books. But a simple Google search will be sufficient. The Wikipedia bio of Allen Dulles, for example, has a major section under the title: "Involvements in Coups Against Iran and Guatemala." In Iran, the CIA teamed with British interests to overthrow the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mossadeq to put in the dictatorship of the Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi. The Shah's allowing foreign companies to loot Iran led to the Islamic Revolution that, to this day, is a huge problem for this generation of Americans. In Guatemala, the 1954 coup eliminated the still revered democratically elected President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman to make way for a military dictatorship that, thanks to kick-backs, would allow U. S. companies, like the Dulles-connected United Fruit Company, to continue to rape and rob that country blind. And -- oh, yes! -- if the U. S. military was needed to help the CIA conquests...no problem. The U. S. citizens would simply be told, "Mossadeq (or Arbenz or whomever) is a communist and his government would have started a domino effect in the region." Everyone in those helpless countries as well as history knew that was a lie...everyone, as it turned out, except us not-too-bright U. S. citizens who, for too long, were content to be kept in the dark or easily lied to. Also, all bios of Allen Dulles credit him with creating what history calls "Operation 40." In all of history, Operation 40 is one of the most vicious assassination and terrorist outfits. In the Wikipedia bio of Allen Dulles, for example, another of the major sections is headlined: "Sabotage Against Cuba: Operation 40." The sabotage against Cuba included such things as blowing up of a ship in Havana Harbor that killed 75 innocent people as well as countless assassinations and, of course, innumerable assassination attempts against Fidel Castro, the man "Operation 40" most hated. 

      Of course, even the mainstream U. S. media, such as Time Magazine, kept telling Americans what a great, great man Allen Dulles was. Long after the Dulles brothers were gone would insightful Americans begin to learn about what the coups in Guatemala, Iran, and elsewhere were all about; what John Kennedy's comment about blowing the CIA to smithereens was all about; what Operation 40 was all about; and what the United Fruit Company was all about. Rogues in the U. S. government, like the Dulles brothers, got most of their power not because they have access to the CIA and U. S. military to back up their greedy intentions in helpless countries but because men like the Dulles brothers had/have the power to "classify" data that will keep their actions secret "in the national interest." If and when that data is finally de-classified it becomes apparent that most of the "classified" material was hidden to protect individuals, not the nation. That's why investigative journalists such as Jack Anderson, James Bamford, Robert Parry, Gary Webb, Tracey Eaton, etc., were/are the best friends a democracy ever had because their work has been to crack the veils of secrecy that cover-up greedy acts by so-called public servants.

      The Colombia-born, now 85-year-old Gabriel Garcia Marquez is generally considered the all-time greatest Latin American writer. His most famous book is "One Hundred Years of Solitude." It is based on an event in Colombia when soldiers, on behalf of the United Fruit Company, massacred up to 2,000 workers who had merely asked for better wages and working conditions.

Not coincidentally, Gabriel Garcia Marquez's best friend since 1958 is Fidel Castro.

      The 85-year-old Gabriel Garcia Marquez frequently visits Havana to check on the ailing 86-year-old Fidel Castro. Gabriel Garcia Marquez says, "If it were not for Fidel Castro, I'm afraid the United Fruit Company and the CIA would still own the entire Caribbean and all of Latin America."

       The great American writer Gore Vidal was born in 1925 and died on July 31, 2012. He was renowned for his patrician manner and witty aphorisms. His great novel "Dark Green, Bright Red" -- depicting the color of a green banana and red blood -- was based on the United Fruit Company's rape and robbery of Guatemala following the coup that overturned the democratically elected government. In a famous essay, Gore Vidal wrote: "When the CIA and the Mafia started really attacking Cuba in 1960, the most pertinent words a revolutionary leader ever said were spoken by Fidel Castro. In a broadcast he told the CIA, 'Cuba is not another Guatemala.' And it seems he meant it because Cuba is not another Guatemala."

       The Cuban Revolution figures into this narrative about the United Fruit Company, the Dulles brothers, the CIA, coups in Third World nations, and Time Magazine's new Special Edition this week about how U. S. hospitals and drug companies literally and LEGALLY rob American citizens and the U. S. government blind. For two generations the U. S. media and the U. S. government have vilified and demeaned the Cuban Revolution as a means of justifying the rape and robbery of Cuba from 1952 till 1959 by the U. S. - backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. But in the year 2013 all 33 countries in the Caribbean and Latin America, in unanimity, agree that, while the Cuban Revolution can be legitimately criticized for many things, it also: (1) Inspired the rest of the Caribbean and Latin America to believe that they, too, could rebel against foreign domination; and (2) Sparked a wave of nationalism throughout the Caribbean and Latin America that eventually spawned the waves of democracy that no longer could simply and routinely be overthrown by foreign powers. Today, the democratically elected Presidents of countries like Brazil, Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, etc., were inspired to switch from being rebels to politicians because they idolized what the Cuban Revolution did to the U. S. in a David-vs.-Goliath fashion.

      For example, that's the 20-year-old Dilma Rousseff bravely facing a military court after she tried to replicate the Cuban Revolution and overthrow a U. S. - backed dictatorship in Brazil. She spent three years in a military prison where she was unmercifully tortured. She's come a long way since then.

Today Dilma Rousseff is the democratically elected President of Brazil, the Latin American superpower.

    And today...President Barack Obama wishes he and the United States had as much influence in the Caribbean and Latin America as Dilma Rousseff and Brazil enjoys. After her election, President Rousseff let President Obama kiss her but she does not let him tell Brazil what to do when it comes to the Caribbean, Latin America, or Cuba. She is a dear friend of Cuba and Fidel Castro.

    In fact, President Rousseff of Brazil is amazed that the American people have "for so long allowed their own democracy to suffer so much worldwide ridicule by permitting a few Cuban exiles to rule America's Cuban policy." An interesting but not surprising comment from a powerful Latin American lady.

   President Rousseff of Brazil likes President Obama of the U. S. and believes he is a "well-intentioned man." Yet, she told Cristina Fernandez, the democratically elected President of Argentina, she "felt sorry for him" because even President Obama is "not strong enough to fix or even dent  the U. S. Cuban policy."

    President Obama and his Secretary of State, John Kerry, both want to end the U. S. embargo of Cuba. But they can't because a handful of now second generation Cuban-Americans won't let them. Both President Obama and Secretary Kerry want to remove Cuba from the very short U. S. list of "Sponsors of Terrorism." But they can't because a handful of now second generation Cuban-Americans won't let them. President Rousseff feels sorry for the U. S. democracy because of that, and so do the Presidents of almost every other nation in the world. Inextricably linked to Cuba, it's been that way since 1959.

    In the above photo John Kerry is at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville Feb. 20-2013 making his first foreign policy speech as Secretary of State. He didn't mention Cuba because he apparently did not have permission to do so from a handful of second generation Cuban-Americans.

       And that's why my new hero is this superb investigative reporter Steven Brill. He wrote this week's Time Magazine Special Edition about how hospitals and drug companies literally and LEGALLY rob Americans and the U. S. government blind. As I read Brill's brilliant documentation, it reminded me of how, in decades past, the United Fruit Company literally and LEGALLY robbed Cuba and other Latin American nations blind until the Cuban Revolution began to show those nations that they could, indeed, resist.

     By the way, I'm a very poor man with a low IQ but my thirst for knowledge has me paying for subscriptions to Time Magazine, ESPN Magazine, and seven other magazines in addition to USA Today. In honor of Michael Jordan's 50th birthday, ESPN Magazine this week has a book-length article about the former basketball player it says has the most recognizable name in the world. The article indicates easy endorsement money, especially from Nike, has made Jordan a billionaire who owns an NBA team, his own jet, many mansions, etc. But it was Jordan's Cuban connections that intrigued me most. In the above Jeff Haynes/Reuters photo Jordan is enjoying one of his favorite pastimes...smoking a Cuban cigar, which I thought was illegal to have in the U. S. but, remember, Jordan is a billionaire with his own jet and rich enough to have his own set of rules. The rich and powerful, you know, are different from you and me.

       The Chris Weeks photo above shows Michael Jordan with his fiance. Her name is Yvette Prieto and she is Cuban-American. Unlike the Cuban cigars that Mr. Jordan also loves, she is legal and healthful.

        Michael Jordan reportedly lost $168 million to his ex-wife Juanita in their divorce settlement. But he is still a billionaire, thanks to Nike, and he still has his jets, his NBA team, his yachts, his mansions, his golf clubs and courses, his truly beautiful Cuban-American finance, and, of course, his Cuban cigars. In other words, capitalism and Cuba go together like bananas and the United Fruit Company. 

     Fidel Castro, of course, is also famous for his love of Cuban cigars. But he quit smoking in 1984 in hopes of influencing Cuban children "not to smoke because it's not a healthy thing to do."

President John Kennedy also loved Cuban cigars.

      Pierre Salinger, President Kennedy's Press Secretary, revealed in 1992 just how much his boss loved Cuban cigars. Kennedy was about to sign into law the U. S. embargo against Cuba but he told Salinger to postpone the signing until he, the President, received a box of 1200 Cohiba cigars that he had ordered from Havana, cigars that the embargo out-lawed. After getting the cigars, Kennedy signed the embargo law on Feb. 3, 1962. Notice in Mr. Salinger's right hand that President Kennedy obviously gave one of those cigars to his Press Secretary. Because it came the day before the embargo, it was a legal cigar.

       Of course, even though the embargo against Cuba remains a relic of the Cold War and a symbol of why a U. S. - backed overthrown dictatorship should not be allowed to reconstitute itself on U. S. soil, rich and powerful Americans have little trouble obtaining genuine hand-crafted cigars from Cuba. Otherwise, for the most part, the embargo Kennedy signed on Feb. 3-1962 remains in place till this very day to appease a handful of Cuban-American radicals even if President Obama, Secretary of State John Kerry, most Americans, most Cuban-Americans, and almost all of the people around the world want it ended. So much for democracy! President Dilma Rousseff of Brazil says the Cuban Revolution "exposed the frailty of the American democracy." So did mild Cuban cigars. And so did the infamous United Fruit Company. 

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