Cuba: May of 2016

Still Sovereign, Still Struggling

       Late Sunday afternoon -- May 1st, 2016 -- the beautiful Adonia left Miami, Florida and sailed to Havana, Cuba with a full-load of 700 well-to-do passengers. It enabled Carnival Cruise Lines to enter the U.S.-Cuban history books by becoming the first cruise ship allowed to leave the U. S. for Cuba in half-a-century.

        This graphic depicts the 7-day journey of the Adonia as it will circle the island of Cuba before returning to Miami. The Adonia will dock in three Cuban cities -- Havana, Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba.

The Adonia will now travel to Cuba every two weeks.

         Cuban-American Arnaldo Perez -- the top lawyer for Carnival Cruise Lines -- was given the honor of being the first person to disembark from the Adonia at the Port of Havana. Mr. Perez, like most Cuban-Americans in Miami {but unlike most politicians in Miami}, favors normalizing U. S. relations with Cuba.

        Miami-born Gabe Gutierrez had the honor of being the reporter for NBC News regarding the departure of the Adonia from Miami to Havana. That's fine, except for the fact that Gutierrez couldn't resist mocking Cuba and leaving his American viewers with the obligatory lie concerning anything related to Miami-Cuban news. Gutierrez pointed out that Cuba earlier had blocked Cuban-Americans from traveling to Cuba on the Adonia, implying it was blatantly discriminatory and spawning the obligatory lawsuit before the issue was resolved and Cuban-Americans were permitted to get aboard. The Gutierrez lie of omission ignored the fact that Cuba allows some 300,000 Cuban-Americans to fly to Cuba each year because the Cuban airports can screen incoming passengers to guard against terrorism, something Cuban ports could not do, at least without scurrying to update its ports with the necessary screening apparatuses. But Gutierrez mocking Cuba with his lie of omission and with the mainstream U. S. media having only blatantly biased anti-Cuban reporters cover Cuban events is typical, and gutless, of the U. S. media, which is not permitted to admit that Cuba has reasons to guard against Miami-based terrorism.

More Cuba shortly, but first:

        I am easily old enough to be their great-grandfather but I confess I am obsessed with the sheer talent of Kate McKinnon and Cecily Strong. Because of them, I hope I survive a lot more Saturday nights because otherwise I would miss their extremely positive contributions to my life. To my reckoning, their uniquely quintessential work on Saturday Night Live puts them in a tie at the top of the pantheon of America's National Treasures. The CNN montage above was taken recently depicting Kate in the black dress in the role of CNN's beautiful blond anchor Kate Balduan interviewing in the red dress a dumb blond Talking Head, played by Cecily Strong, who happened to be a fervent supporter of Donald Trump's presidential bid. Politically correct liberals like the two Kates are famously taken aback by Trump's alleged woman-bashing. In the above skit, Kate McKinnon playing the outraged Kate Balduan and Cecily Strong playing the pro-Trump excuse-maker constitutes, in my opinion, the best five-minutes of entertainment in television history. In other words, this particular skit jumped over the 19 others in the Top Twenty that also had been performed, individually or together, by Kate McKinnon and/or Cecily Strong, two national treasures.

     Cecily Strong & Kate Mckinnon!! 

   Cecily & Kate: Incomparable Entertainers. 

Now back to Cubaninsider:

        The above photo was taken by Gabe Gutierrez of NBC-News this past weekend -- on April 30th -- in Panama. Gutierrez used it to illustrate his report on the latest batch of Cubans and their traffickers trying to reach America where, beginning the moment they touch United States soil, they become the only would-be immigrants in the entire world who immediately begin receiving financial and political benefits as well as legal residency totally unavailable to anyone else. It was surprising that NBC-News would touch this story because, generally speaking, the broadcast media in the U. S. is too incompetent and too intimidated to report on anything that might depart from the U. S. Cuban narrative, which is a self-serving distortion that has so totally been dictated since 1959 by the hardliners from the ousted Batista-Mafia dictatorship that roiled Cuba in the 1950s till the 1959 triumph of the Cuban Revolution changed things forever.

       Panama is the latest Latin American nation to squeal VERY LOUDLY about Batistiano-Mafiosi crafted U. S. laws {in an eternally dysfunctional and bought-and-paid-for Congress} that are designed to sharply benefit Cubans while also sharply discriminating against everyone else. The American people, meanwhile, are supposed to be too scared, too stupid, and too unpatriotic to weigh in on such things as the ongoing Cuban Migration Crisis that the above map-montage depicts. Such infamously discriminatory U. S. laws as Wet Foot/Dry Foot for decades have enticed Cubans, and only Cubans, to leave their homeland and partake of the unique riches that immediately await them in the U. S. Such laws, of course, spawn unending criminal activity such as human trafficking. Blaring the falsehood that President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba will result in the abolition of some of the Batistiano-Mafiosi laws, human traffickers have convinced thousands of Cubans to rush to the U. S. immediately. For up to $17,000 paid to so-called coyotes, presumably well-to-do Cubans can take a long air-+-land route to reach the U. S. border at Mexico and then be home-free on U. S. soil to become instantly more well-to-do courtesy of U. S. taxpayers and the further demeaning of the U. S. democracy. Recently for two months 8,000 Cubans and their traffickers were stuck on the Nicaragua-Costa Rica border, but now Costa Rica has also closed its border to Cuban immigrants, as has Belize, etc. And now Panama is besieged. The map above shows the airplane route to South America and then the land trek supposedly up through Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, etc., and Mexico to reach the border cities of Brownsville, Laredo, and El Paso, Texas. Once there, Cubans are home-free but all non-Cubans -- including children fleeing unmerciful crime and poverty -- are incarcerated, carefully screened, and in most cases deported. Of course, sufficiently proselytized and scared Americans are not supposed to object to iniquitous laws like Wet Foot/Dry Foot. 

     In addition to America's Cuban laws like Wet Foot/Dry Foot causing headaches throughout the Caribbean and Latin America, other entities such as Major League Baseball in the United States are reeling from America's uniquely abominable laws related to Cuba. Recently, 150 Cubans from the baseball-rich island have signed lucrative contracts offered by the 30 MLB teams. These Cubans from age 16 to 28 have received huge, guaranteed contracts ranging from $1 to $77 million dollars. Such money attracts streams of unseemly scouts, agents, and human traffickers. MLB is embarrassed and is begging the U. S. Congress to have the guts and the decency to change its Batistiano-directed Cuban laws that so markedly benefit such criminals and so markedly discriminate against America's own prospects. How? MLB has a June draft for its 30 teams; a U. S. prospect or non-Cuban international prospect must sign with the team that drafts him, eliminating bidding competition. But defecting Cubans can receive bids from all 30 teams. Thus a top U. S. prospect might receive a $3 million deal while a Cuban prospect might get upwards of $70 million.

          For example, these are two newly minted Cuban multi-millionaires in the U. S. That's Chicago White Sox first baseman Jose Abreu on the left and Los Angeles Dodgers right-fielder Yasiel Puig on the right. They are among 150 Cuban baseball stars who have recently defected to the U. S. with the aid of human traffickers, agents, scouts, etc. Abreu got a 6-year $68 million fully guaranteed contract but it was recently disclosed that he was forced to pay $5.8 million to human traffickers. Puig got a 7-year $42 million fully guaranteed contract and before he could enjoy it he was imprisoned and threatened until he, too, paid human traffickers. Other Cubans, not nearly as talented as Abreu and Puig, have gotten much larger initial contracts -- upwards of $72 million fully guaranteed even if they don't make their Major League teams. Still in their twenties, Abreu and Puig are among the many Cuban stars in the Major Leagues who, after their initial contracts are fulfilled, can expect to really cash in. The Miami Marlins, the poorest of the 30 very rich Major League teams, recently gave right-fielder Giancarlo Stanton a $300 million guaranteed extension!

      The MLB Cuban Pipeline is designed to sate America's need for Cuba's unique baseball talent, the best in the world per capita. The island also produces the best and most superstar ballet performers, but they too have long been enticed with money to defect. The George W. Bush presidency even pushed through a law to provide bonus inducements for Cuban doctors to defect, not to help the U. S. but simply to hurt Cuba. All such tactics also, of course, fuel the human trafficking pipelines with the incredibly insane baseball contracts now topping the list. The U. S. embargo against Cuba helps promote the human traffickers. All 30 Major League teams have luscious year-around baseball facilities along with scouts and coaches in baseball-rich countries like the Dominican Republic, but not in Cuba, of course. So, to extract Cuba's incomparable baseball talent, the MLB teams must align with various criminals and traffickers.

       Hall of Famer Joe Torre turns 76 in July. As a former player and manager, he is truly an American baseball icon. Now as a top MLB executive, Joe is starkly embarrassed by the Bastistiano-directed congressional laws that, among other nefarious things, aligns his beloved MLB with human traffickers and other unsavory characters involved in the pipeline to get Cuban baseball stars to the U. S. Joe wants Cuban players to be treated like all other prospects, just as he wants all Cuban immigrants treated like others and not enticed with Wet Foot/Dry Foot money. Taking advantages of President Obama's sane overtures to Cuba, Joe this year has taken U. S. superstars -- including Puig, Abreu, newly retired Derek Jeter, baseball's $33 million-a-year pitcher Clayton Kershaw, etc. -- to Cuba for Goodwill baseball clinics. Joe also arranged for the Tampa Bay Rays to play a game this year in Havana against a Cuban team in which President Obama watched from behind home-plate. In fact, Joe believes that one day -- if sanity and decency ever returns to U.S.-Cuban relations -- Havana would be a nice city for a MLb expansion team!   

      This AP photo shows Joe Torre in Matanzas, Cuba earlier this year signing autographs for appreciative Cuban fans. He had taken his group of Major League superstars to Matanzas for a baseball clinic.

       This is Joe Torre holding the news conference the day he announced that the Tampa Bay Rays would play in Havana against a Cuban team. America still has great democracy-loving patriots like Joe Torre. 

     For many years, Cuban baseball teams dominated international competition -- including the Pan-Am Games, the Olympics, and the World Baseball Classic. But not now, not since baseball contracts in the U. S. reached obscene levels and gave birth to human trafficking pipelines that entice Cuba's native talent. The next World Baseball Classic is just a few months away in early 2017. The U. S. team, loaded with American and Cuban superstars, will be powerful, but so will Puerto Rico and especially the Dominican Republic.

         Manny Machado, the third baseman for the Baltimore Orioles, is the best baseball player on the planet. He was born 23 years ago in Miami but both of his parents are natives of the Dominican Republic. That means Manny could play for either the United States or the Dominican Republic in the 2017 World Baseball Classic. He has chosen...drum roll please!!...to play for the Dominican Republic because he believes the Caribbean teams have more enthusiasm for international tournaments. Early in his Orioles career Manny had operations on both knees. But he is healthy in 2016 and at age 23 is baseball's best overall player at a luscious time when many lesser players are making upwards of $30 million a year.

      OH, I KNOW...many fans who haven't seen much of Manny Machado believe Bryce Harper {upper-left} and Mike Trout {upper-right} are baseball's best players. But Manny Machado {bottom} is the best.

        And, by the way, Manny Machado and his beautiful bride are trying to skim by this year on his paltry 2016 salary of $5 million. But he becomes what's known as a free agent in a couple of years. The Orioles, a small-market team, are ready to offer Manny a reported $350 million for the next ten years, but that offer will likely be topped by big-market, far richer teams such as the NY Yankees and the two LA teams.

Now a majestic American pose:

Bald Eagle, courtesy of: Lisa DeJong/Cleveland Plain Dealer.

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The Nancy Pavon Story

Needs to be Told

         The 3-photo montage above encapsulates a remarkable life and tells a part of Nancy Pavon's story. Now 60-years-old, Nancy is a kind, sweet Cuban lady. The photo in the lower-right shows Nancy at age 15 on October 12, 1971 as she lay unconscious in her hospital bed shortly after the lower portion of her right leg had been operated on to repair extensive nerve damage. That portion of her leg had been blown completely off by cannon fire from a Miami speedboat as she slept beside her 13-year-old sister Angela in their coastal cabin in the tiny fishing village of Boca de Sama on Cuba's northeastern coast near the city of Holguin. The nighttime terrorist attack wounded Nancy's younger sister Angela but their older sister, Xiomara, was further up the coast on armed duty as a coastal militia guard. Two of Nancy's relatives -- Ramon Siam and Lidia Rivaflecha -- were killed in the attack. The photo in the upper-right shows Nancy two weeks later in a wheelchair on the day her doctor had told her she would never be able to wear the new red high-heel shoes that her father, a fisherman, had bought for her 15th birthday. The photo on the left shows Nancy as an adult, now a lady who understands the darkest offshoots of U.S.-Cuban relations.

       The terrorist attack that so drastically changed Nancy's life prior to daylight on Oct. 12-1971 was not a random act. That's why Nancy's older sister was on guard duty further up the Cuban coast that night.

       Since 1971 Nancy has received constant and free medical care in Cuba. She has suffered mightily because of the extensive nerve damage, not to mention being forever unable to use those red high-heel shoes that were supposed to brighten her 15th birthday. The telling of Nancy's story is a pro-American project, I believe, because it typifies aspects of the U.S.-Cuban malaise that long-propagandized Americans eventually have a right to know from a simple humanitarian standpoint.

        Nancy's older sister Xiomara, the one that was on guard duty further up the coast that night, took this photo of Nancy lying unconscious in her hospital bed on October 12, 1971 after major surgery. That one cowardly terrorist attack has affected many, many lives every day, every minute, since that seminal night.

      I mentioned that Nancy is a kind, sweet Cuban lady. She is. She doesn't hold grudges against Americans or Cuban-Americans. But she is well-known, as this photo indicates, for speaking out against "Americans and Cuban-Americans who to this day do not hold those responsible for such things, such terrible things still being celebrated in Miami." In this particular speech Nancy recalled how she was asleep beside her younger sister Angela when "the cannon ball tore through our cabin and sliced my foot off like a machete. Later, while hospitalized, I learned that the two big speedboats had been dropped off by a larger boat and after their dirty deed they radioed ahead so the Miami media could cover their victory celebration on the dock."

       Nancy's story is well-known throughout Cuba, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Thus, it is probably appropriate if Americans know it too. The photo above is from a YouTube interview in which Nancy details what happened to her and how the attack has affected "so many innocent lives for so many years."

        Nancy Pavon today is a beloved celebrity in Cuba. She is being embraced above by another beloved celebrity, Ramon Labanino. Ramon was one of the famed "Cuba 5" that were sentenced to up to life in prison by a Miami court and were kept in isolation at five different federal prisons around the United States. After serving about 15 years, the Cuba 5 were returned to Cuba as one of the offshoots of President Obama's amazing efforts to normalize relations with Cuba. The Miami courtroom accused the Cuba 5 of being spies; the Cuba 5 claimed they were in Miami only to detect possible terrorist acts against Cuba and that they gave their observations to the U. S. FBI. At the above gathering, Ramon said, "We tried to prevent things such as what happened to Nancy, her sister, and the two people who were killed that night."

       Boca de Sama today is a quaint little Cuban village with 85 very hard-working and friendly citizens. It is still a fishing village as the front cover above indicates. It is also a tourist attraction for bird watchers.

     This map shows the vulnerable location of Boca de Sama (check the upper-right} because it's located where the Sama River runs into the bay and then the ocean. As you can see, speedboats could easily enter the bay, attack, and then race back out into the sea toward their safe sanctuary in Miami.

This is the edge of Boca de Sama, Cuba.

       This is a classroom in Boca de Sama, Cuba. These children today are harmed by the ongoing U. S. embargo of Cuba but they are now considered safe from Miami terrorist attacks because of Cuba's vigilance and because of so many U. S. Coast Guard and warships in the Florida Straits. It is my hope that Americans care about these Cuban children just as I believe they should care about Nancy Pavon.

         Now and forever, The Nancy Pavon Story will be an integral part of the little Cuban fishing village of Boca de Sama. But it will also, now and forever, be a microcosm of U.S.-Cuban history and U.S.-Cuban relations. That's why I believe it's OK for Americans to know about a nice Cuban lady named...Nancy Pavon.

"The Nancy Pavon Story"

Yes, it needs to be told!!

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Rediscovering Cuba

Thanks, Mr. Obama 
Saturday, April 30th, 2016 

        On the heels of five decades of the U. S. and Cuban exiles targeting Cuba with cruel embargoes as well as both cold and hot wars, the world, including the U. S., is again opening up to the tropical island thanks to the startling effects of President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with nearby Cuba. The photo above shows American superstar actor Vin Diesel in Havana with his mammoth Hollywood crew to film the latest movie -- entitled FAST 8 -- in the wildly successful Fast and Furious series. The prodigious entourage includes other superstar actors such as Michelle Rodriguez, Dwayne Johnson, Kurt Russell, Eva Mendes, etc. Charlize Theron and Scott Eastwood have also been added to this gigantic movie.

         On an Instagram video you can see and hear Vin Diesel's euphoria about shooting his movie in Cuba. He says, "You can see how beautiful Cuba is with all the beautiful people! We are so proud to be here, man!"

         On Sunday, May 1st in the year of 2016 the Adonia -- the Pride of Cardinal Cruise Lines -- will set sail from Miami to Cuba!! It will drop anchor in Havana Harbor Sunday afternoon, becoming the first cruise ship from the U. S. to Cuba in over half-a-century. There will be 700 passengers on board the Adonia, mocking the U. S. embargo, in place since 1962, that still prohibits "American tourists" from visiting Cuba. But bold and brilliant Executive Actions courtesy of President Obama narrowly defines 12 excuses for Americans to visit the nearby island, as all other citizens of the world have the freedom to do. Thus, the 700 passengers will likely not be arrested when they get off the Adonia in Cuba nor even when they return to the USA.

       This map shows the 750-mile coasts of the main island of Cuba. After docking in Havana Sunday, the Adonia's 7-day visit will circle the island and dock in two other ports in the cities of Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba before returning to Miami. You can note the capital of Havana on the western end, Cienfuegos on the southern coast and the former capital of Santiago de Cuba on the far southeastern tip.

         Philip Hammond is also in Havana this week. That, too, is really big news! Mr. Hammond is the first British Foreign Minister to visit Cuba since 1959, the year the Cuban Revolution stunned the world by overthrowing the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. He said, "As Cuba enters a period of significant social and economic change, I am looking forward to demonstrating to the Cuban government and people that the UK is keen to forge new links across the Atlantic." The UK is currently Cuba's 11th largest trade partner. In the 28-nation EU, Spain and the Netherlands are by far the top two Cuban trade partners. In Havana Mr. Hammond was forced to admit that the UK "fears" the gutless U. S. embargo against Cuba. It has been in effect since 1962 and Mr. Hammond says it will continue to scare off British companies seeking to do business in Cuba. He pointed out that this year a British architectural firm -- Wimberly Allison Tong & Goo -- was fined $284,000 by the United States for doing some minor work in Cuba while other companies have been fined hundreds of millions of dollars for doing the same, money supposedly used to enrich and empower hard-line Cuban exiles in Miami, New Jersey and the U. S. Congress to continue their assaults on the Cuban people by still enforcing an embargo inflicted on Cuba in 1962 for the stated purpose of starving and depriving Cubans on the island for the purpose of enticing them to overthrow their revolutionary government so the U.S.-based Batistianos could march back across the Florida Straits. The embargo hasn't starved Cubans on the island but it has severely deprived them; one company in Jamaica was fined for sending a box of baby aspirin to Cuba and the American people were supposed to meekly mumble, "God! If baby aspirin gets to Cuba, it will only benefit Castro and insult those nice Miami Cubans!" WOW!! Wow.

        While President Obama has done all he can to combat the gutless U.S. Congress-sanctioned embargo, it remains in place because two successive generations of Americans are simply too gutless or too ignorant or too unpatriotic to demand its removal. All nations of the world, including America's best friends such as the UK, are appalled that the U. S. democracy is not strong enough to follow Mr. Obama's lead in trying to rein in a second generation of a handful of rich and powerful Batistianos-Mafiosi using a bought-and-paid-for and dysfunctional U. S. Congress to continually punish not only innocent Cubans but America's best friends around the world, infringing on their sovereign rights to trade with Cuba. Meanwhile, the U. S. taxpayers and voters are too scared or too stupid to object even as, each October, the 191-to-2 UN vote denouncing the embargo is headlined around the world, with only Israel -- the yearly recipient of billions of easy dollars in U. S. aid -- joining the U. S. in supporting the insidious embargo.

        Cuba has no enemies in the Caribbean or in Latin America or around the world, except for its massive northern neighbor, the United States. For decades, Americans have been told...warned, actually...not to question America's Batistiano-driven Cuban policy. They have meekly heeded that advice, or warning.

Cuba, the Pearl of the Caribbean!

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A Batistiano White House?

Not Now, Maybe Later

       Cuba's revolutionary heroine Celia Sanchez first coined the term "Batistiano" on April 27th, 1959. That was the day she and Fidel Castro returned to the island after a 12-day visit to the United States barely three months after their Cuban Revolution had stunned the world by overthrowing the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship. Celia had arranged the trip with the American Society of Newspaper Editors. A pragmatist as Revolutionary Cuba's prime decision-maker, with Fidel's full concurrence, Celia had many benevolent plans for post-Batista Cuba; she knew, to bring those grandiose aspirations to fruition, little Cuba required friendly relations with the United States, the neighbor that happened to be the world's economic and military superpower. Her quick priority regarding the trip garnered ecstatic optimism when the U. S. State Department assured her that Fidel Castro, then considered both a Cuban and American hero, could meet with President Eisenhower to tell him that Cuba planned a democratic election that fall and the U. S. could closely monitor it to assure its honesty. But the State Department lied to Celia and the American Society of Newspaper Editors. President Eisenhower left Washington to play golf and the devious Vice President Richard Nixon met with Fidel. Nixon, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and CIA Director Allen Dulles all had financial and political reasons to return the Batistianos to power in Cuba and, in fact, by April of 1959 the most fanatic anti-Castro Cuban-exiles, including the infamous Luis Posada Carriles, were already being trained as Brigade 2506 at Fort Benning's then secretive Army of the Americas to spearhead the recapture of Cuba, which became the Bay Of Pigs attack in April of 1961. Tightly aligned with the Dulles brothers and separated from the old and malleable President Eisenhower, Nixon personally told Fidel that the U. S. and the Cuban exiles would regain control of Cuba "within a few months." Shortly after returning to Cuba on April 27, 1959, a double-crossed and furious Celia fired off this sentence in a conversation with Fidel and famed Cuban journalist/author Carlos Franqui: "The Batistianos will never regain control of Cuba as long as I live or as long as Fidel lives." It was the first of at least three times Celia made that statement in the presence of journalists. Her definition of Batistianos was/is unmistakable: A Batistiano was/is anyone who fled Cuba for the U. S. after being an official or a supporter of the Batista-Mafia dictatorship that was overturned by the Cuban Revolution.

        Celia Sanchez was the most important player in the Cuban Revolution and in Revolutionary Cuba. One of the most significant nuances of U.S.-Cuban relations since the 1950s is the sheer fact that Americans to this day are not supposed to know that basic fact. The reason, however, is simple: With collusion from the U. S. government and the U. S. media, the Cuban narrative in the U. S. since 1959 has been dictated by the remnants of the ousted Batista-Mafia dictatorship. But all the most knowledgeable insiders understood the leading role played by Celia Sanchez and that includes Carlos Franqui, Pedro Alvarez Tabio, Marta Rojas, Roberto Salas, Georgie Anne Geyer, Fidel Castro, etc. For example, Salas -- the famed photographer who worked closely with both Celia and Fidel -- said in his book: "Celia made all the decisions for Cuba, the big ones and the small ones. When she died of cancer in 1980, we all knew no one could ever replace her." Geyer, America's top Castro biographer, wrote that Celia "over-ruled" Fidel whenever and wherever she chose. Therefore, Celia's most striking quotation is both historic and amazingly prophetic: "The Batistianos will never regain control of Cuba as long as I live or as long as Fidel lives." Fidel, nearing his 90th birthday, is still alive and the Batistianos -- despite amazing support from the U. S. Congress, the CIA, and the U. S. Treasury -- have still not regained control of Cuba. 

Photographer Roberto Salas traveled with Fidel & Celia.

        Like his famous father Osvaldo, Roberto Salas took thousands of photos of Fidel Castro in Cuba and on foreign trips. Roberto took this one of Fidel in New York City in April of 1959. No one in Cuba questioned Salas when he stated in his book -- A Pictorial History of the Cuban Revolution -- that "Celia made all the decisions for Cuba, the big ones and the small ones." The macho-minded Batistianos, however, realized early-on that vilification of Fidel was a lot easier than vilifying the petite child-loving doctor's daughter.

        While I believe Celia Sanchez's greatest quotation was the one about the Batistianos never recapturing Cuba, TheWomanProject.org favors this Celia gem: "We Rebels get far too much credit for winning the Revolution. Our enemies deserve most of the credit, for being greedy cowards and idiots." 

     Georgie Anne Geyer -- the nationally syndicated conservative columnist -- is America's best Castro biographer. In "Guerrilla Prince" Ms. Geyer correctly pointed out that Celia Sanchez "over-ruled" Fidel with his unending support.

      In "Guerrilla Prince" Georgie Anne Geyer's favorite Celia Sanchez quotation occurred soon after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution when Celia and Fidel were reminiscing about the revolutionary war with a group of journalists that included Carlos Franqui. Fidel had mentioned a very tough 10-day battle that the rebels won against a large Batista army. That's when, according to both Franqui and Geyer, Celia spoke up and, with deep emotion and sincerity, said these remarkable words: "Oh, but those were the very best and happiest times, weren't they? We were all so very happy then! We'll never be that happy again, will we? Never!" A petite, well-to-do doctor's daughter fighting and winning bloody battles against overwhelming forces were the best and happiest times of her life? Yes, she thought Cuba was well worth the effort and the risks.

       This is the great Cuban historian Pedro Alvarez Tabio. He wrote this unequivocal and pertinent observation of the Cuban Revolution: "If Batista had managed to kill Celia Sanchez anytime between 1953 and 1957, there would have been no viable Cuban Revolution, and no revolution for Fidel and Che to join."

      Pedro Alvarez Tabio edited this early Fidel bio and got Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Colombian-born all-time greatest Latin-American author, to write the introductory essay. It's still available at Abe Books.

  Yes, although to this day the Batistianos don't allow Americans to judge her correctly, Celia Sanchez was the most important player in the Cuban Revolution and in Revolutionary Cuba that has, against great odds, survived for almost six decades...and counting. Celia -- long before macho males like Fidel, Che, and Camilo joined her war against Batista -- was the catalyst as a guerrilla fighter and the prime recruiter of rebels and supplies that launched and sustained the war. Fidel's worship of her began while he was helpless in a Batista prison and even today he understands why Tabio, Cuba's top historian, wrote: "If Batista had managed to kill Celia Sanchez anytime between 1953 and 1957, there would have been no viable Cuban Revolution, and no revolution for Fidel and Che to join." So, the Celia Sanchez who coined the term "Batistiano" is also the person most responsible for beating them and for keeping them from regaining control of her beloved island. In Cuba today -- in the spring of 2016 -- famed revolutionary heroines and Celia contemporaries such as Tete Puebla and Marta Rojas still live. But a younger generation of Cuban heroines -- led by Josefina Vidal and Cristina Escobar -- are currently the key Celia Sanchez disciples determined to make sure that the Batistianos don't "regain control of Cuba." In that regard, Vidal and Escobar have each made resounding statements/quotations that, I believe, Celia would wholeheartedly sanction.

          Josefina Vidal, Cuba's Minister of North American Affairs, is the main reason Cuba survived the Batistiano-aligned George W. Bush presidency from 2000 till 2009. Since then she has been Cuba's prime negotiator with the Barack Obama administration in attaching some sanity to U.S.-Cuban relations. But, as always, Vidal keeps a wary eye on the U. S. Congress where a handful of anti-Castro zealots aligned with a handful of right-wing sycophants have dictated America's Cuban-related laws for five disastrous decades. Also, Vidal keeps a keen perception on the ongoing presidential election process in the U. S., realizing that a Republican in the White House beginning in January of 2017 would align with Congress to wage either a cold or hot war against her island. In particular, Vidal has noticed that two Cuban-American first-term Senators who are vehement anti-revolutionary zealots -- Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz -- have been prime Republican presidential candidates, at least till Rubio dropped out after being swamped by Donald Trump in his home-state of Florida in a primary election. Unlike television pundits who actually are propagandists for their favorite candidate, Vidal's perceptions are vital to Cuba's survival as a sovereign nation. In that capacity, she has produced probably the most accurate and salient quotation regarding the U. S. presidential race, noting that the two Cuban-American hardliners -- Rubio and Cruz -- have had the backing of the Bush dynasty {to kick off their political careers}, the Tea Party, and a bevy of right-wing, Jewish, and conservative billionaires. Vidal, in the mold of Celia Sanchez, made this astute deduction: "It seems the Batistianos have a new plan. They now plan to capture the White House first and THEN recapture Cuba." Vidal didn't intend that comment as a pun or a joke. When it comes to the Batistianos, she is totally serious.

     At age 28, Cristina Escobar is Cuba's and the region's superstar newscaster. She is also highly regarded by the island's young-adult generation that plans to make sure that they, and not Miami and Washington, set the course for Cuba's future. Her most salient comment this year, made in a video-taped interview with respected American journalist and Cuban expert Tracey Eaton, was: "I don't want the U. S. to bring me democracy. That is a project for Cubans on the island." Like Celia Sanchez and Josefina Vidal, Cristina Escobar is the embodiment of brilliant and powerful Cuban women who cherish the island's hard-earned sovereignty and she doesn't want to trust it to foreigners. "In the 1950s," Escobar says, "the U. S. sicced Batista and the Mafia on my island and called it democracy. Americans still accept that and justify it. But enough Cubans didn't. I believe enough in my generation now will stay on the island and defend the sovereignty that so many great Cubans fought so hard for. Even if the odds are against us, we will fight." 

       From their vantage point in Cuba, Josefina Vidal and Cristina Escobar closely monitor news coverage of U. S. politics. Actually Vidal made her comment about the shifting Batistiano "plans" to recapture Cuba by first capturing the White House when she feared the Republican nomination would fall to Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz. Truth be known, Vidal would have preferred the extremist Cuban-Americans Rubio or Cruz to Jeb Bush. After the highly financed Jeb and Rubio both succumbed to the surprising Donald Trump tsunami, Vidal recently told the AP in Havana, "I honestly don't know what's going on in the U. S. election at this point. I really don't." And Americans are as flabbergasted as Cuban sage Josefina Vidal.

        Like Rubio and Bush, Ted Cruz has also been wiped out by the Trump tsunami, at least in this presidential cycle. But the dangerously ambitious and far-right winger Cruz is not ready to admit it. Yesterday he named former Republican contender Carly Fiorina as his "Vice President," something no one has ever done before actually getting the nomination. Confused Americans, not to mention acute observers Vidal and Escobar in Cuba, are left to ponder the latest craziness in the all-out Batistiano quest to capture the White House BEFORE they recapture Cuba, as the keen observer, Ms. Vidal, opined.

       Television pundits, such as Ms. Cupp, are perhaps as big a threat to the American democracy as the billionaires who now seemingly have a clear path toward purchasing it for their personal use. While, for sure, there remains some decent print journalism, the pundit-driven television "news" coverage in the U. S. is an insult to both viewers and democracy. The days of great broadcast journalists like Ted Turner, Walter Cronkite, and Kate O'Brien -- who actually believed in covering the news -- are long gone. And the biggest casualty is democracy, which from its inception in 1776 depended on a vibrant and competent news media as an essential component. But the Founding Fathers never envisioned television pundits or visual propaganda machines. And in Cuba, Vidal and Escobar seem to be sympathizing with the plight of American voters even as they keep keenly abreast of United States efforts to "return democracy to Cuba."

        Great television newscasters like Walter Cronkite once actually told Americans "the way it is." Since then, the pundit-driver television news networks have evolved into visual propaganda machines.

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