The U. S. Embassy In Havana

"An Insult To Israel!!"
Updated: Friday, July 3rd, 2015

      This week -- July 1st, 2015 -- America's brave and decent two-term President, Barack Obama, made modern history by officially announcing that the United States will open an embassy in Havana and Cuba will open an embassy in Washington. That's the now white-haired President Obama above flanked by two first-term Cuban-American U. S. Senators, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio -- both of whom are "top tier" Republican presidential candidates bidding to succeed Mr. Obama in the White House as President and Commander-in-Chief. Within moments after the historic presidential announcement yesterday, Cruz and Rubio, not unexpectedly, were quick to issue flagrant and, frankly speaking, very stupid and very undemocratic tirades against the President, who is merely and very bravely doing what most Americans, most Cuban-Americans, and most people in the world want him to do in regards to Cuba. The Cruz and Rubio comments are too brazen and uncalled for to repeat here, except for the stupidest, most unpatriotic, and most outrageous one. Senator Ted Cruz said that the opening of a U. S. embassy in Havana "is an insult to Israel." A U. S. embassy in Cuba will be an insult to Israel? That's what he said and we're supposed to believe it.

    The "insult to Israel" comment by Ted Cruz illustrates anew that Cruz and Marco Rubio actually believe they can say anything and do anything in regards to Cuba and it would not and will not cost them a single vote or a single donation on their paths to the White House. Their assumptions, of course, are based on the fact that, since 1959, Cuban-American extremists and their right-wing sycophants in the U. S. Congress and in the Bush dynasty have reserved the right unto themselves to make all rules and all laws related to the annihilation of Revolutionary Cuba and the recapture of the plush island. Those assumptions are based on the belief that the majority of Americans are too ignorant or too scared to even express sane opinions on the subject of Cuba. For example, in 1976 when George H. W. Bush was CIA Director, a child-laden Cuban civilian airplane was blown out of the sky by famed CIA/Cuban exile operatives. When Emilio Milian, Miami's top Cuban-American newsman, complained about such things, he was car-bombed. When Jim DeFede, the Miami Herald's top columnist, excoriated members of the U. S. Congress from Miami for coddling and protecting {to this day} the most famed and most vicious Cuban-American terrorists, he was fired. Today -- in July of 2015 -- there is not a single mainstream journalist in the United States that has either the courage or the integrity to even ask Cruz, Rubio, Jeb Bush, etc., about their associations with the most infamous anti-Castro Cuban Americans in Miami, including Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles. Therefore, a Cruz, a Rubio, or a Bush in the White House beginning in 2017 would signify that the Batistianos had captured the United States before re-capturing Cuba. Yet, pusillanimous Americans -- propagandized to accept any assault on Cuba, including Cubana Flight 455 -- still probably wouldn't utter a peep regardless of what the next Commander-in-Chief after Obama does to Cuba. Also, programmed Americans, with the demise of mainstream journalism in the U. S., accept flagrant ignorance such as Ted Cruz's "insult to Israel" comment in denouncing Obama's opening of an embassy in Havana. As "USA Today" explained again this week, Cruz and Rubio are successfully courting a bevy of famed Jewish billionaires and reaping tons of money for their presidential campaigns. Thus, expect more pro-Israel than pro-American comments from Cruz and Rubio, even as they assume there is nothing they can say or do related to Cuba that Americans will either understand or oppose. It's been that way for decades in the United States.

Of course.....................

.........you'll never see this expression on Jeb Bush's face.

        If television journalists asked tough questions, they would never get talking-head pundits, politicians or publicists on their sets. Then they would have to actually go out and cover the news, which is a lot more expensive than self-promoting talking heads at an anchor desk. So relax, Jeb. You have over a billion dollars to buy your own ads to tell us why America needs another Bush in the White House. Plus, as a celebrity talking head coveted by all the cable news outfits, you can have an additional millions of hours of free airtime...without ever having to be asked about Orlando Bosch or anything of that unsavory nature. 

       And, of course, Jeb, as a young politician in Miami trying your best to ingratiate yourself to the most extreme anti-Castro zealots, you never asked your father, the President, to do you any big favors in that regard, such as asking for and receiving a pardon for Mr. Bosch. Of course, not. That would have been using your last name as your lone asset in making political and economic headway in Florida...right, Jeb? 

    One thing Americans don't comprehend about U.S.-Cuban relations is this: Many of the highest profile Cubans on the island -- including key minister Josefina Vidal and top journalist Cristina Escobar -- would actually prefer either Rubio or Cruz in the post-Obama White House than Jeb Bush. Vidal and Escobar have made it a point to become experts on all things American, because they believe Cuba's existence as a sovereign nation depends on such expertise. Vidal's rationale is this: If another Bush is Commander-in-Chief, Cuba will prepare for war; if Rubio or Cruz becomes Commander-in-Chief, Cuba will continue to use diplomacy in its contentious dealings with its superpower neighbor. Escobar, on the other hand, is among the influential Cubans not too enthused about the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington. Escobar's rationale is this: Even in Democratic administrations and especially in Republican ones, the U. S. has used its 7-story Interests Section building in Havana to fund, create, and encourage dissidents on the island. In a U. S. Embassy, Escobar believes, more U. S. spies will fund and create more dissidents. She also believes that, soon after the embassies open, Cuba will resist the cultivation of dissidents and expel some U. S. diplomats; then the U. S. will expel a like number of Cuban diplomats in Washington. That will, Escobar believes, continue and expand until both sides agree to close the embassies. Also, Escobar agrees with Vidal that even a Rubio or a Cruz would be preferable to another Bush in the U. S. White House.

        Josefina Vidal, Cuba's Minister of North American Affairs, led the Cuban diplomacy that has, incredibly, led to the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington. President Obama defied the Cuban-American extremists when he accepted Vidal's primary demand: That Cuba be removed from the U. S. State Department's Sponsors of Terrorism list. Vidal for several years longed to send the imprisoned American, Alan Gross, back to his Maryland home but she believed his continued imprisonment pleased the extremists in the U. S. because they could use it to assail Cuba. Yet, Vidal managed to send Gross home, where he quickly received a $3.2 million check because, uh, the people who sent him to Cuba on a "dangerous" spy mission were apparently responsible for his 15-year sentence. And Vidal, amazingly, negotiated the release of the famed Cuba 5 from U. S. prisons. Vidal's diplomatic skills and Obama's desire to change a Cuban policy that had harmed America's image for decades combined to create the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington, which Ted Cruz, uh, calls "an insult to Israel." Meanwhile, Vidal has expressed to President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry that she is "more than a little displeased with the incredible number of U. S. agents masquerading as diplomats currently operating in the Interests Section so they can fund and encourage dissidents." She has been told that such undiplomatic behavior will be curtailed and that "dissident activity will not be a prime feature of the new U. S. embassy in Havana." That pacified a still-skeptical Vidal but it is one she will closely monitor. She told U. S. counterpart Roberta Jacobson, "The United States will not tolerate anti-American activity from Cuban diplomats in Washington, nor should it. And we will not tolerate further anti-Cuban activity from U. S. diplomats in Havana. If that is not understood, Roberta, why are we even discussing expanding Interests Sections into full-fledged, possibly explosive embassies that we'll both regret?"

     
      Gerardo Hernandez was the most famous, or infamous, of the Cuba-5, the five young Cubans sentenced 15 years ago by a Miami court to long prison terms in the United States. Gerardo was sentenced to two life terms plus 15 years. He was firmly incarcerated in a maximum security prison in California. No one expected him to ever be released. But that was underestimating Josefina Vidal's negotiating skills and President Obama's determination to normalize relations with Cuba. Gerardo arrived back in Cuba as a heralded national hero on December 22, 2014.

      This AP photo shows Gerardo Hernandez touching the stomach of his beloved and very pregnant wife Adriana. She had not seen Gerardo in fifteen years but the child inside Adriana was his. It turned out that a friendly U. S. Senator, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, had somehow arranged for Gerardo's frozen sperm to be flown from California to impregnate Adriana at her request. She wanted a baby by a husband she never expected to see again. When he arrived in Havana on Dec. 22-2014 she was almost ready to give birth to their beautiful and healthy daughter, just another unforgettable chapter in the enigmatic U.S.-Cuban saga. 

    Cuba's twentysomethings, as epitomized by Cristina Escobar, seem poised, if necessary, to take on the post-Obama Bush-Rubio-Cruz craze atop the U. S. government. She is already Cuba's most popular and most influential journalist, ubiquitous on Cuban and regional television. Fluent in English and a consummate Cuban patriot, Cristina is tightly attuned to the U. S. treatment of Cuba. Back in December she spent 10 days at journalism seminars in California. At the last Vidal-Jacobson diplomatic session in Washington, she stunned her media counterparts with her beauty, talent, and audacity as she fired a series of tough but pertinent questions at White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest during a crowded and informative news conference.

      This Bloomberg News photo shows Josh Earnest as he recognized that the blistering series of questions was coming from a rather attractive and inquisitive Cuban female. Her most significant question was: "Will the U. S. diplomats at a new embassy in Havana be respectful of Cuba?" Earnest gave a detailed and scripted reply, but the tone of Cristina's question had alerted all to the fact that she didn't believe U. S. embassy personnel would respect Cuba based on what she considered the "disrespect" U. S. diplomats at the U. S. Interests Section in Havana have long shown to Cuba. She concluded her statement-like questions with this: "Can we expect President Obama to visit Cuba in 2016?" Earnest indicated that the President would "love to visit Cuba, especially Havana." From that point on, it has been assumed that President Obama, who is very popular on the island, will indeed visit Cuba in 2016. He has already announced that Secretary of State John Kerry will be in Cuba to open the U. S. embassy. Pope Francis will in Cuba in September, President Obama in 2016.

     Young Cubans like Cristina Escobar and her boyfriend, shown here on vacation, will predicate the future of Cuba...unless nefarious forces off the island dictate otherwise. It has been reported that she has been offered "many tax-free dollars" if she will defect to the U. S. where her photogenic and telegenic image alone would "insult" Cuba...even more than the opening of a U. S. embassy in Havana would, as Ted Cruz opines, "insult Israel." But it appears Cristina is not for sale. During her recent journalistic trip to Washington, she went out of way -- in one-on-one interviews and during speeches around town -- to stress that, "The lies the U. S. media tells about Cuba hurts everyday Cubans the most." Twentysomething Cubans like Cristina and her boyfriend are well educated, healthy, and patriotic. They want to leave their imprints on Cuban sand, not in Miami's Little Havana. President Obama is trying to afford them that opportunity...without, uh, "insulting" Israel.

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US-Cuba Breakthrough Today!!

Embassies Will Open

        Today -- Wednesday, July 1, 2015 -- will be an historic day in U.S.-Cuban relations. President Raul Castro in Havana and President Barack Obama in Washington today will announce that the two nations have agreed to open embassies in the two capital cities, marking a historic normalization of relations that had been officially severed in 1961. This Reuters photo was taken in April at the Summit of the Americas in Panama. At the culmination of this historic handshake, the two Presidents agreed to do what they will officially announce today -- the opening of embassies. Both nations have been upgrading the so-called Interest Sections buildings in Havana and Washington. President Obama must give Congress a 15-day notice before opening an embassy, and that notice will be given to Congress today.

      Ultra-powerful Cuban-Americans in the U. S. Senate still vow to block all pro-Cuban funds and prevent any Presidential nomination of a U. S. Ambassador to Cuba, and they have enough right-wing support in the Republican-led Congress to thwart much of what President Obama plans to accomplish. But, a brave and decent President -- especially one who has strong support nationally, internationally, and even in the Cuban-American community -- has executive authority to combat many of the self-serving tactics of a minority faction that seeks to keep U.S.-Cuban relations serving a few while opposing the wishes and best interests of the majority.

       In the homestretch of his second term as President of the United States, Barack Obama has done what no President in the last 5-plus decades has been able to do or, indeed, dared to do. In defiance of anti-Castro Cuban-American zealots in Miami, Union City, and the U. S. Congress -- and in defiance of powerful right-wing Republican sources -- President Obama's official announcement today about reopening a U. S. embassy in Havana and fully accepting a Cuban embassy in Washington is an earthshaking accomplishment that no one believed he could pull off. Reaching this point today is a tribute to President Obama's courage and integrity.

       Despite today's monumental announcement about the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington, rest assured that the forces that have successfully dictated America's Cuban policy since the 1950s are stronger, richer, and more vindictive than ever before. The Cuban-American and right-wing Republican collaboration in the U. S. Congress still, for example, can dictate a continuation of the embargo against Cuba that dates back to 1962 and has since been strengthened by the Cuban-America/right-wing Torricelli Bill and Helms-Burton Act. President Obama has asked Congress to lift the embargo that even the majority of Cuban-Americans also want lifted, as does the rest of the world. Yet, even after the opening of embassies, the embargo will remain in place because, as always, it sates the revenge, financial, and political appetites of a handful of extremists, a situation that embarrasses America's best friends around the world who are amazed that the U. S. democracy, when it comes to Cuba, is not strong enough to bend to the will of the majority of Americans and Cuban-Americans.

     But today -- Wednesday, July 1st, 2015 -- U.S.-Cuban Relations will take a giant positive step forward, thanks to a decent and brave President of the United States who has shown both the skill and guts to stand up to powerful deviant forces.

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Pro-Cuba Is Politically Correct

U. S. Politicians Becoming Aware

         Kasim Reed is the very ambitious Mayor of Atlanta, Georgia. He arrived in Cuba at the head of a large business delegation on June 27th and they will not fly back to Cuba until later this week, on July 1st. "My plan," he says, "is to make the city of Atlanta and the state of Georgia the gateway to Cuba." He has taken note of President Barack Obama's "brave, democratic, and righteous overtures to Cuba." And he has also taken special note of polls in South Florida showing that even "the majority of Cuban-Americans in Miami's Little Havana sector now support the President's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba, starting with the lifting of the cruel and ancient embargo against the island." Mayor Reed added, "This island, this sovereign country, is truly beautiful. It's a part of history. History links Cuba with the United States. Good people, not bad people, need to manage that history." Mayor Reed of Atlanta seems to qualify as one of the "good people."

        Atlanta's feisty mayor Kasim Reed has national political ambitions. He believes that aligning Atlanta and Georgia to Cuba will enhance his current base and help spearhead his goal for an even higher office. His 5-day stay in Cuba this week plans to build on the antagonism "a few in Florida dictate to Congress to keep a Cuban policy that more sane and decent Americans disdain." He told the Atlanta Business Council, "We don't have the political drag that Florida has with all the interactions with Cuba. I am in Cuba to get to know people and to send a clear message that we want to establish a relationship." Mayor Reed runs a U. S. city that features the world's busiest airport and some of Fortune 500's most impressive companies, such as Coca Cola and Delta Airlines. Mayor Reed says, "Atlanta and the Port of Savannah are positioned to be great business partners for the positive changes taking place on the exceedingly promising island of Cuba. I want Delta flying back and forth to Cuba. I want Coca Cola bottling plants back on the island. Most of all right now, I want the well-educated and talented Cubans on the island to know that we love and admire them. Keeping them down may benefit a few but lifting them up will benefit all of us not benefiting from hubris. Atlanta's boat already sits high in the water but lifting Cuba's boat will also lift ours here in Georgia."

       The Florida ports of St. Petersburg/Tampa, Miami, and Key West are best positioned geographically to do business with Cuba, which is by far the largest and most populated island in the Caribbean, as well as being the most beautiful and the most promising. But every U. S. port north of South Florida is presently trying to take advantage of the political animosity between South Florida and the nearby island. That's one reason this week Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed is in Cuba touting his city and the Port of Savannah.

          All U. S. ports along the Eastern Seaboard of the United States want to do business with Cuba, as do every farm entity and most businesses in the United States. They believe they deserve the freedom to do so. Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed this week is telling Cubans that the Port of Savannah "is best positioned to deliver the building and construction material from Atlanta that your island will need as the Cuban economy expands and as tensions with the U. S. ease." If you study the above map, you will note that the Port of Savannah is second only to the Port of Norfolk {Virginia} when it comes to total tonnage of cargo handled -- 29.2 million metric tons for Norfolk to 27.9 million metric tons for Savannah.  Mayor Reed has good talking points, but so do all the other Mayors and Ports north of Miami's Little Havana neighborhood. 

"Lifting Cuba's boat will also life ours"

{Kasim Reed; Mayor of Atlanta, Georgia}

"We come with a constructive spirit,
trying to close the gap between the parties."
{Josefina Vidal, Cuba}

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Declining Power of Cuban Extremists

Decline Triggered 15 Years Ago

       For the past quarter century, much of the best coverage of the Caribbean and Latin America has come from the insightful penmanship and expertise of Tim Padgett. That has particularly been so since he joined Time Magazine in 1996. He now also contributes gems for the Miami-based "WLRN Public Radio and Television." This past Sunday -- June 28th -- marked the 15th anniversary of a seminal event in U.S.-Cuban history, one that Mr. Padgett has minutely covered. That was the day when Cuba came out victorious in the tug-of-war that returned 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez to Cuba with his father. On Sunday, June 28th, Tim Padgett penned a major article entitled "How The Battle Over Elian Gonzalez Helped Change U.S. Cuba Policy." Mr. Padgett believes, correctly, that the Elian Gonzalez saga, which dominated both U. S. and international news at the time, enlightened Americans to the fact that Cuban extremists in Miami, many of whom fled the Cuban Revolution's victory over the U.S.-backed Batista dictatorship, believed they could defy the U. S. government in their anti-Castro fanaticism, which included U.S.-backed assassination attempts against Cuban leaders and U.S.-tolerated terrorist acts, including the bombing of a child-laden Cuban civilian plane that killed all 73 people on board and was heralded in the Miami media as "the biggest blow yet against Castro." The American citizens -- programmed to vilify Revolutionary Cuba and sanitize the gross brutality famously perpetrated by Batista's Cuba and the Cuban exiles -- capitulated for decades to the Cuban narrative dictated by the Cuban extremists in Miami. That began to change, according to the knowledgeable Tim Padgett, 15 years ago when Elian Gonzalez finally raised American eyebrows.

         This Alan Diaz/AP photo remains seared on the psyche of Americans...and Cuban-Americans. It captured the frightful moment when armed U. S. agents forcefully removed the traumatized 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez from a closet in a home in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood. Cuban-American politicians had believed they could over-rule the U. S. government and keep Elian in Miami instead of allowing him to return to Cuba with his father. Elian had washed up on Florida's shore on an inner-tube after his mother had drowned at sea. One of the many U. S. laws related only to Cubans permits any Cuban who touches U. S. soil to remain, with instant benefits. But in Elian's case the U. S. government ruled that his sole remaining parent, his father, had the right to take Elian back to Cuba. The Bush dynasty and all Republican administrations since the 1950s had strongly aligned with Cuban extremists, whether in Havana or Miami. But the Elian saga evolved in the administration of Bill Clinton, a Democrat. Cuban extremists in Miami had never had any trouble with Republicans and they weren't prepared for the forceful removal of Elian. In his June 28th article, Tim Padgett wrote: "By refusing to hand the boy over, Cuban-Americans had hoped to humiliate Castro." That motive, and not the best interests of the boy, eventually began to dawn on Americans who had earlier shamefully accepted such things as the bombing of the child-laden Cuban airplane as "the biggest blow yet against Castro!" Tim Padgett concluded: "In its wake, he {Elian} left a Cuban-American community in disarray. It backfired badly. The world called Miami a banana republic."

           The sheer terror on the face of 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez 15 years ago shed a new light on the U.S.-Cuban conundrum as it defined the good guys and the bad guys. Tim Padgett's 15th anniversary recap pointed out that it even changed the minds of some Little Havana hardliners who realized that, maybe, Banana Republic power on U. S. soil had some restrictions, after all, when it came to "humiliating Castro."

          "The Raid, the Reunion, and the Fallout" of the Elian Gonzalez saga is considered by some to be Fidel Castro's third most important victory over the Batistianos, right behind the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959 and the Bay of Pigs win in 1961. The Elian fallout has been far more subtle and gradual but Tim Padgett's analysis pinpoints how it helped grease the way for President Obama in 2015 to at least attempt to right some of the major wrongs of America's Cuban policy. Yet, it should be noted that Elian's experience in Miami occurred during a Democratic presidency, Mr. Clinton's, and the current efforts to bring sanity to U.S.-Cuban relations is taking place during a Democratic presidency, Mr. Obama's. Since the 1950s all Republican administrations have fully supported the most extreme elements of the Batista rule in Cuba and the Batistiano rule in Miami. That will not change post-Obama with the next Republican administration, whether that comes in 2017 or later. {Disclosure: I am a lifelong democracy-loving conservative Republican, but I am not too pleased with the right-wing dominance of the Republican Party}

        Speaking of Elian Gonzalez, he is now 21-years-old and finishing off his engineering degree. He is shown above taking a selfie with his fiancee, also a college student. Jim Avila of ABC-TV News recently reported on Elian's life in Cuba. He is happy, focused, and anxious to start a young family. He has traveled abroad but Avila asked him, "Where would you most like to go?" He replied in Spanish, "Los Estados Unidos"/"The United States."  Avila asked him why. He then said in broken English, "I want to give my love to the American people." Yet, America has allowed Cuban-exile extremists to harm young Cubans like Elian.

       This ABC News photo captured the now 21-year-old Elian Gonzalez showing off one of his prized possessions -- a copy of Jose Marti's "La Edad de Ora." It was a gift from his friend Fidel Castro, whose handwriting dominated the title page. Young Cubans like Elian are fascinated by the United States and have no ill feelings towards Americans. Yet, in 1962 Cuban-exile extremists teamed with right-wing Republicans to impose a harsh embargo on Cuba after a bevy of assassination attempts and the 1961 Bay of Pigs attack failed to overthrow the island's revolutionary government. Declassified U. S. documents reveal that the purpose of the embargo was to starve and deprive the Cuban people to entice them to rise up and overthrow their government. Some 53 years later, in 2015, the embargo is still in place and still with that mandate: To starve and deprive the Cuban people to entice them to rise up and overthrow their government, presumably to return a second or third generation of benevolent Batistianos to power, a rule that once again would allow rich Americans to rob the island blind. Elian Gonzalez and young Cubans like him have suffered, and are suffering, because of an archaic Cuban policy dictated by right-wing Republicans and Cuban-American extremists who still benefit from efforts to starve and deprive Cubans.

        Despite the efforts of good people such as President Barack Obama, the cruel U. S. embargo against Cuba has been in effect since 1962 -- 53 years! This image reflects the fact that -- in the year 2015 -- President Obama is being forced by right-wing zealots in the U. S. Congress to enforce the embargo that he and the entire world opposes, as reflected by a vote in the United Nations each October. This image embarrasses America's best democracy-loving friends all around the world. Unfortunately, it still does not embarrass enough Americans. In America's two-party political system, it is also unfortunate that no legitimate Republican presidential candidate has the guts or the integrity to denounce the embargo. 

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New Day Dawns In Cuba

More U. S. Senators Visit
Posted: Sunday, June 28th, 2015

           Another contingent of U. S. Senators has checked out the island of Cuba  -- on Saturday, June 27th. They hailed the progression of friendship and detente since Presidents Obama and Castro announced back on December 17th that the two nations had agreed to try to normalize relations for the first time since the 1960s. This Reuters/Enrique De La Osa photo shows Senators Dean Heller of Nevada, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, and Ben Cardin of Maryland holding a news conference yesterday at the Saratoga Hotel in Havana. They had met with everyday Cubans and found them to be very receptive and enthusiastic about improving relations with the economic and military superpower just off the island's northern coast. Leahy and Cardin are Democratic Senators while Heller is a Republican...a rather unusual Republican.

      Dean Heller, the Senator from Nevada, is among a growing number of independent Republicans in the U. S. Congress advocating closer ties with Cuba, the largest nation in the Caribbean and a neighbor that is on friendly terms with all other countries in the region with one lone exception -- the United States. Senator Heller believes that more normal relations with Cuba will benefit a plethora of American businesses and, moreover, he is aware that foreign powers that compete with the U. S. -- including China and Russia -- are longing to take more advantage of the Republican-mandated hostility towards Cuba. Yesterday in Cuba Senator Heller told the Reuters news agency, "I think the United States Senate can move the House of Representatives regarding Cuba, but the Senate's going to have to act first." 

   
     This photo reflects the dawning of a new day in Cuba. 55-year-old Miguel Diaz-Canel has already been named the post-Castro leader of Cuba. Quite significantly, the three U. S. Senators -- Heller, Leahy, and Cardin -- who visited Cuba this weekend first asked and were granted permission to talk privately with Miguel Diaz-Canel. Born in the Cuban city of Santa Clara, Diaz-Canel ascended politically in Cuba because he is a favorite of everyday Cubans.

          This photo shows powerful U. S. Senator Patrick Leahy greeting Cuba's future leader Miguel Diaz-Canel in Havana yesterday -- Saturday, June 27th. Democracy-loving veteran members of Congress, like Senator Leahy, have long advocated that decency and sanity -- as opposed to bellicosity -- should be directed at the island's innocent people from the United States. Now Senator Leahy and others are taking advantage of the early success of President Obama's sane and decent overtures to the Cuban people.

        Earlier this month U. S. Senator Jeff Flake, the Republican from Arizona, led a group of politicians to the island and again, as shown above, Senator Flake particularly wanted to size up Cuba's future leader, Miguez Diaz-Canel. Meanwhile, anti-Cuban zealots from Miami and Union City are still trying to milk anti-Castro zealotry for all its worth, and it indeed has been worth a whole lot in the U. S. since the 1950s.

         This AP photo reflects the dawning of a new day in Cuba. This is Miguel Diaz-Canel -- Cuba's future leader -- flanked by two powerful but elderly figures from the Cuban Revolution. That is Ricardo Alarcon on the left and Ramon Valdes on the right. Prior to the transition to Diaz-Canel's leadership of Cuba, the island is making numerous economic and social changes -- creating thousands of entrepreneurs on the island as well as a billion-dollar Mariel Economic Zone 28 miles southwest of Havana that is signing foreign contracts with major investors. This week a company in Alabama is requesting permission from the U. S. government to build a tractor factory in that Zone on an island that spends almost $3 billion a year to import food that could mostly be grown in Cuba if it had modern tractors and other equipment. This week it was announced that Cuba's economy, which grew by 1% in 2014, is growing by an impressive 4% in 2015. Top economists in Miami agree with that 2015 statistic and attribute it to the "15 percent increase in tourists from the U. S. since the December 17th detente announcement." The three U. S. Senators in Cuba this weekend recognize that Cuba is changing...for the better. Republican Senator Dean Heller of Nevada is among a growing list of brave, patriotic U. S. politicians who believe that the obvious changes in Cuba "will benefit everyday Cubans and...everyday Americans." The transition to President Miguel Diaz-Canel is underway...even if self-serving zealots still benefiting from archaic Cold War tactics strongly disagree.

In other words...................

        ......................for the first time in decades, the Bush dynasty, eternally aligned with a handful of anti-Castro zealots from Miami, is finally being challenged in the dictation of a self-serving Cuban policy that has harmed millions of innocent Cubans and millions of innocent Americans. In that milieu, the bombing of a child-laden civilian Cuban airplane was hailed in Miami as "the biggest blow yet against Castro," and propagandized Americans were too timid to object. Perhaps...at last...more enlightened, and braver, Americans and Cuban-Americans are beginning to object, as indicated by the increasing support of President Obama's Cuban overtures.

        A bold President Barack Obama -- in the homestretch of his historic two-term presidency in June of 2015 -- has engineered some legacy-making political accomplishments that the pundits said he couldn't pull off in the face of the right-wing dominance of Congress and the blistering threats of the Miami Cubans. His Trade Bill this month was monumental. So was his getting Supreme Court approval of his Universal Health Care program, which might one day be mentioned as a legacy-making event equal to FDR's Social Security Bill in 1935 and LBJ's Civil Rights Bill in 1964. But, perhaps, President Obama's most significant legacy will be his monumental effort to normalize relations with Cuba, a process that he has already moved further along than the easily quashed efforts of all previous Democratic presidents. President Obama, confronting a Congress that is mostly bought-and-paid-for by lobbyists, has accomplished a lot for the vast majority of Americans who cannot afford to pay lobbyists. That, along with his universal health care plan and his bravery regarding Cuba, will, I believe, crown his legacy. A Republican presidency in 2017 will attempt to undo much of the good President Obama has done, but at least he righted some wrongs and forged ahead with some refreshingly bright ideas that were long overdue in America's tattered and tarnished but still precious democracy. 

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America and Latin America

An Historical and Topical Nexus

        The above photo shows President Barack Obama awarding the 2014 Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor the U. S. can bestow on a civilian, to Isabel Allende. Now 72, she is the cousin of Salvador Allende, the beloved democratically elected President of Chile...till he died in a U.S.-backed coup in 1973.

        Isabel Allende was born on August 2, 1942, in Lima, Peru, where her father was a Chilean diplomat. She was very proud when Salvador Allende, her cousin, was democratically elected President of Chile in 1970. She was heartbroken when President Allende died in 1973 trying to fight off the CIA-aided coup using an engraved AK-47 rifle that his friend Fidel Castro had given him as an inauguration gift. Isabel Allende did not want to live in Chile under the brutal Pinochet dictatorship. She fled to Venezuela where, beginning in her late 30s, she became a novelist, one of the best Latin America has ever produced and reportedly the most-read Latin American writer. Her books have been translated into 35 languages with sales of about 60 million copies. Her 20th novel, "Ripper," was released in 2014. In the 1980s she married California lawyer and novelist William C. Gordon. She became a U. S. citizen in 1993 and still lives in San Rafael, California.

Isabel Allende's first novel -- "House of the Spirits -- was made into a major movie.

       Meryl Streep, shown here with Isabel Allende, was the star of "House of the Spirits."  The two ladies met again when President Obama honored both women with the coveted Presidential Medal of Freedom.

       Isabel Allende is a democracy-lover. The quote above attests to her intrinsic love of equality and freedom. The U.S.-backed Pinochet regime in her beloved Chile to this day reminds her of the difference between the democratically elected Allende and the dictator Pinochet. Now as a democracy-loving American citizen, she believes all Americans should know and learn from Latin American history.

      This photo shows the beloved democratically elected President of Chile, Salvador Allende, with his daughter, Isabel Allende -- not to be confused with his cousin Isabel Allende, the renowned novelist.

Isabel Allende, the daughter of Salvador Allende, is today the President of Chile's Senate.

      This is Salvador Allende's daughter, Isabel Allende, congratulating Michelle Bachelet after Ms. Bachelet's re-election as President of Chile. You may want to study this photo. Isabel Allende today is the first woman to be President of Chile's Senate. Michelle Bachelet today is the first woman to be President of Chile. Isabel's father was Salvador Allende, the democratically elected President of Chile who died on September 11, 1973 trying to fend off the U.S.-backed coup that installed Augusto Pinochet as Chile's murderous dictator for the next 17 years. Isabel's father died in that coup; Michelle's father was later tortured to death in the Pinochet dictatorship. The two women shown here are now the two most powerful people in Chile, reflecting how much President Allende was loved and Dictator Pinochet was hated.

        This is one of the most iconic and saddest photos in Latin American history. It shows Salvador Allende's broken glasses. They were found on September 11, 1973, next to his body in the presidential palace -- Palacio de la Moneda -- in Santiago, Chile. His death broke the hearts of democracy-lovers.

    Chilean President Allende with the AK-47 rifle that Cuba's Fidel Castro gave him.

           This is the body of Salvador Allende on Sept. 11-1973. Firing from the window of his office at the La Moneta Presidential Palace, Allende resisted the coup till he ran out of bullets for his rifle. To this day Chile's Salvador Allende is remembered as the most beloved democratically elected Latin American President. His successor, Augusto Pinochet, is remembered as Latin America's all-time most brutal dictator.

      The day this photo was taken -- according to Colombian-born Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Latin America's greatest author -- Fidel Castro told President Salvador Allende of Chile, "Nixon, Kissinger, the CIA...they have a long reach. You must know that you are targeted for the same reasons they are targeting me." President Allende, according to Garcia Marquez, replied, "I know that, Fidel, but I still must be President."

          Today the most important hospital complex in Cuba is named for Salvador Allende. It's the location of Escuela Latinoamericana de Medicina {ELAM}, The Latin American School of Medicine. It is the largest medical school in the world and is famous for its educational quality and because Cuba awards free 6-year scholarships to poor but qualified students from many foreign countries, including the United States.

        A recent international article written by Sam Laird/Mashable updated U. S. students taking full advantage of Cuba's largess in providing medical degrees with all six years totally free. Cuba only asks that the graduates return to their poor neighborhoods to work for at least five years. This photo shows Lilian Burnett -- of Oakland, California -- on the way to her classes at the Salvador Allende complex.

        Americans today, if they indeed care about their democracy, may find it ironic that, back in 1973, America's top foreign policy expert, Henry Kissinger, greatly admired Augusto Pinochet, the murderous dictator of Chile, while Cuba's Fidel Castro dearly loved Salvador Allende, Chile's democratically elected President who was murdered in a coup supported by Nixon and Kissinger, helping to make their friend Pinochet Chile's U.S.-friendly dictator for 17 brutal years. And if, indeed, Americans find that ironic, perhaps they should do a little Googling to research and learn from Latin American history. Waves of democracy finally swept Pinochet aside in 1990 and he died of old age {91} on December 10, 2006. Kissinger was born in Furth, Germany, in 1923 and at age 92 he is still a very rich and very powerful lobbyist/consultant.

       This is one of the last photos ever taken of Fidel Castro with his dear friend Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who was born in Colombia and became Latin America's greatest and most admired author. Garcia Marquez died in Mexico City at age 87 on April 17, 2014. Fidel Castro turns 89 on August 13, 2015. Garcia Marquez, who visited Cuba frequently, wrote: "Mercedes {his wife} and I love to talk with our dearest friend Fidel. We share with him a hatred of America's favorite dictators -- Batista in Cuba, Somoza in Nicaragua, and, especially, Trujillo in the Dominican Republic and Pinochet in Chile. The two most ruthless killers were Trujillo and Pinochet." While he was teaching a literary class in Havana, Garcia Marquez was asked by a student to "elaborate" on that written statement. He paused, studying the students, before adding, "If you do not understand that statement, then I would suggest that you spend more time studying Latin American history."

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