Cuba's Legendary Resilience

Faces Looming Challenges 

       This photo shows Cuba's Minister in charge of U. S. Affairs, Josefina Vidal, holding a news conference in Havana following President Obama's announcement that he was ending the infamous Wet Foot-Dry Foot U. S. law that has long favored Cuban migrants while grossly discriminating against all others.

        As this photo reveals, Josefina Vidal had trouble leaving the news conference even after she had shouldered her purse and explained that she had "other things" to do, "uh, really folks." 

     This apparently is Ms. Vidal's favorite photo of her favorite American President. At least...she Tweeted the above photo and thanked Mr. Obama "for showing true American respect for the Cuban people." By Vidal's account, she has now been able to negotiate "17" substantially positive changes in U.S.-Cuban relations with President Barack Obama's administration. 

       At her "Wet Foot-Dry Foot" news conference, Vidal's only dour mood occurred when she was asked, "How many of your 17 successful agreements with Obama will Trump soon wipe out." She replied somberly, "We'll wait and see. Maybe all of them. We'll see." Later, back in her office, Vidal's optimism resurfaced as she Tweeted and Retweeted some of the still-standing Obama-Vidal positives related to American-Cuban rapprochement.

      Vidal Tweeted the above photo that shows the head of the United States Chamber of Commerce, Tom Donahue, on his latest visit to Cuba to assure President Raul Castro that, regardless of the impending Donald Trump presidency, America's business community "like the rest of the world" strongly favors an end to the U. S. embargo "that hurts Americans and Cubans." Below are two Vidal Re-Tweets reflecting her optimism:

 Josefina Vidal Retweeted

Engage Cuba ‏@Engage_Cuba  Jan 12 U.S. House Reps introduce bipartisan bill to lift #Cuban embargo. Thx @RepTomEmmer, @USRepKCastor for ur leadership.

Rep. Barbara Lee ‏@RepBarbaraLee  Jan 13Decision to end ‘wet foot, dry foot’ policy is a step forward for our relationship w/ #Cuba. Now we must lift the embargo & end travel ban! Josefina Vidal Retweeted

        The two retweeted Tweets above were by Josefina Vidal, Cuba's Minister regarding all of the island's U. S. relations. In the first one she thanked two members of the U. S. Congress -- Tom Emmer of Minnesota and Kathy Castor of Florida -- for introducing a bill to lift the Cuban embargo. The Emmer-Castor bill is entitled ""The Cuba Trade Act" and is co-signed by seven other members of Congress. In the second Tweet, Vidal retweeted a Tweet by Congresswoman Barbara Lee regarding Ms. Lee's sane comments about lifting the embargo and about President Obama's decision to end the "Wet Foot-Dry Foot" U. S. law. The embargo and "Wet Foot..." were/are laws embedded by Congress and crafted by the most hardline Cuban-American counter-revolutionary hardliners in Miami.

     The photo above shows a news conference in Miami on Nov. 26-2016 celebrating the death of Cuba's Fidel Castro at age 90. Left to right: former Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart; Congressman Carlos Curbelo; Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen; and Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart. If you go back and check the CBS-5 video of this news conference, you will note that, at one point, the Havana-born Ros-Lehtinen turned to the Havana-born Lincoln Diaz-Balart and congratulated him on "writing" some of the Congressional laws regarding Cuba that currently get a unanimous 191-to-0 denunciation in the UN. Americans who pusillanimously have allowed such laws to exist for decades are not supposed to consider that the father of the Diaz-Balart brothers, Rafael Diaz-Balart, was a key Minister in the Batista dictatorship and then, after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution on Jan. 1-1959, created the first counter-revolutionary paramilitary unit on U. S. soil. The Diaz-Balart brothers, Ros-Lehtinen and Curbelo represent, along with Senator Marco Rubio, Miami's current counter-revolutionaries almost six decades after the overthrow of Cuba's vile Batista-Mafia dictatorship. 

        Vidal Tweeted this photo of U. S. Senator Dick Durbin "honoring Cuba" by leading a contingent of American health officials, including Dr. Robert Barish of the University of Illinois Health Center, on a visit to Cuba.

      The updated photo above reflects one way Revolutionary Cuba, famed for its mere survival and pugnacious resilience since 1959, plans in 2017 to survive what appears to be the convergence of The Perfect Storm that many prognosticators predict will finally doom the enigmatic Cuban Revolution. This Friday -- January 20th -- the anti-Cuban Trump presidency replaces the Cuba-friendly Obama administration; Cuba's most important friend, Venezuela, is in an economic and political free-fall; and Cuba's second most important friend, Brazil, has gone from the fiercely pro-Cuban democratically elected presidency of Dilma Rousseff to a coup-like and fiercely anti-Cuban unelected president. So resilient Cuba now has to look beyond the United States and even beyond Venezuela and Brazil if it is to survive The Perfect Storm that so powerfully favors the U.S.-based Batistianos who have been chomping at the bit for almost six decades to regain control of Cuba. The photo above shows Cuba's most important and most promising oil well. Aided by China's Gran Muralla company, this oil well -- known as "Varadero Aeste 1008" -- is being hastily developed to counter Cuba's dwindling source of oil from Venezuela. It is on the edge of the city of Matanzas and faces out toward the sea, including a horizontal path to the ocean. Cuban and Chinese engineers believe it will very substantially increase Cuba's quest for oil.

       Speaking of oil, the Russian newspaper Sputnik is reporting that Russian President Vladimir Putin is offering Cuban President Raul Castro low-cost oil to compensate for the island's dwindling supply from Venezuela. Sputnik said: "The Russian Ministry of Energy states that Rosneft and Lukoil companies have the reserves and the technical conditions to increase the volume of shipments to Cuba and is preparing the correspondent contracts." The newspaper Sputnik said that Russia sold Cuba $11.3 million worth of oil products from 2010 till 2015 and sold Cuba $740,000 in oil products in 2016.

      The French perfume giant Guerlain is opening a store in a rejuvenated National Heritage building at 157 Paseo del Prado in Havana. Guerlain sells cosmetic powders, soap and the most famous perfume brands -- Givenchy, Hermes, Versace, etc. Guerlain products are sold in America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East...and soon in Cuba.

      Saint Remy Trading Ltd. will be the distributor of the Guerlain products in Cuba. Susel Ferran is the Brand Manager at Saint Remy and she is very bullish on Cuba. She said, "Cuba has the spirit we are looking for. This is the first Saint Remy franchise outside of Europe. Now we have an extensive commercial space in Havana to sell our brands. Cuba restored the woodwork and the original floors at the National Heritage building and we are excited about our presence on this magnificent island." Cuba needs post-Obama support from people like France's Susel Ferran.

      The emergence of the anti-Cuban Trump phenomenon in the United States coincides with the recent death of Cuba's revolutionary sovereignty-protector Fidel Castro at age 90 as well as the ominous anti-Cuban signals from Venezuela and Brazil. It collectively brings to mind Fidel Castro's famous revolutionary definition: "Revolution is a struggle between the future and the past." He knew that the struggles of a revolution, even a successful one, are unending and, in turn, will inevitably spawn counter-revolutions. So juggling the past with the future is always paramount. Fidel's delicate juggling acts, such as with the U. S. and USSR, kept Cuba afloat in the turbulent Caribbean sea for over half-a-century. Cuban resilience, rolling with an incessant preponderance of powerful faints and actual punches, will still depend on resilience and necessary augmentations from the Cubans on the island, such as accentuating friends like China, France, and even Russia while deemphasizing dire threats and adverse entanglements, such as with the largely unencumbered, nearby United States-based Batistianos.

       Foreign investments, even from the United States, are vital for Cuba such as {above} with the Sheraton hotel behemoth.

      While Cuba can't afford the construction of ultra-modern 5-star hotels, such as its spanking-new Hotel Manzana, there are a lot of foreign companies and nations willing to make such investments in Cuba, a gorgeous island where the long-embargoed decay doesn't totally mask its vast but untapped potential. It is the largest and arguably the most beautiful island in the Caribbean, and still the enchanting Pearl of the Antilles. 

        A young-adult generation of Cubans on the island is stressing the "Cuba es Neustra" {"Cuba is Ours"} theme and demanding, as their T-shirts illustrate, the end of the U. S. embargo of their island. Jennifer Bello Rodriguez, the student leader at the University of Havana, says, "We need friendship with the United States but if we don't get it, and soon, we must look at other options. Unlike our parents, we will not grow old with the status quo. The blockade is a major problem and there are others, like Guantanamo Bay. To accept such things would be to forever surrender our sovereignty, and that we won't do."   

Jennifer Bello Martinez

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Weak Media Hurts America

Meaning It's Also A World Problem! 

Especially for Cuba!!

      When posters like the one above first began to appear, no one gave Donald Trump a chance to be elected President of the United States. But this week -- on Friday, Jan. 20th, 2017 -- he indeed will be inaugurated as the 45th U. S. President. But it seems there are always exceptions to the rule, in this case a person who knew things most of us did't know. A Bronx-born Canadian writer named Jim Moriorty seemed to know something early-on. He wrote: "In this election the egregious machinations by the disgusting alliance of the media, the DNC and Wall Street has demonstrated for all to see how deeply corrupt and entitled the ruling classes are. The swamp needs draining." Indeed, the disgusting alliances Moriorty mentioned elevated Trump above 16 Republican challengers and then the world watched in awe on Nov. 8-2016 as he beat the well-heeled, well-established Clinton dynasty to attain the most coveted and most powerful office in the world. Of course, in the closing hours of the campaign, Hillary Clinton tilted the final edges to Trump; she hobnobbed with ultra-celebs such as Beyonce, Jay-Z and Bruce Springsteen while Trump wisely ignored celebs, New York and California and stumped solely in the smaller, more American Rust Belt states. Then Mrs. Clinton sealed his and her deals when she declared that the Trump supporters were "a basket of deplorables." They weren't; for the most part they were Americans trying desperately to reclaim their democracy. Trump quickly, once elected, betrayed that trust when his transition team became over-loaded with long-ago remnants of the Bush dynasty, including seven vicious anti-Cuban propagandists and lobbyists, which is not exactly draining the swamp in Washington but, instead, the first signs of an imminent Cold or Hot War across the Florida Straits. But Moriarty's hint that a terribly biased mainstream U. S. media, Wall Street and the out-of-touch elite class could put Trump in the White House was insightful...wasn't it? And I like insights.   

      Remember in the not-too-distant past when truly great broadcast journalists like Walter Cronkite were America's primary source for news? Mr. Cronkite and his contemporaries would actually not only cover the news but also actually tell us "the way it is," or "was." Well, it's not like that anymore, is it? In one generation, great broadcast journalism on three competitive over-the-air networks -- CBS, NBC and ABC -- has evolved into a totally non-competitive mish-mash of cable network propaganda machines -- nothing more and nothing less. That undeniable fact might not be a major come-down in a dictatorship or Banana Republic but rest assured it is gigantically deleterious in the world's greatest and most influential international democracy.

       The image above reflects the sharp departure from the halcyon days of the Walter Cronkite-era to the utter pits for "broadcast journalism" today, with CNN the biggest disappointment for reasons that date back almost four decades. In 1980 the visionary Ted Turner founded CNN as the first cable news network. His intention was to hire and train the best broadcast journalists and cover the news fairly wherever it might occur. It worked magnificently for a time, till Turner sold out to billionaires at AOL. But Turner's brainchild soon evolved into other cable news outfits -- most notably Fox and MSNBC -- owned by other billionaires interested in only making more billions. Later, all three major cable "news" outlets realized their virtual monopolies allowed them to become propaganda machines with supposedly captive audiences. So today Fox is a right-wing propaganda machine, MSNBC is a left-wing propaganda machine, and CNN is a politically and socially correct propaganda machine now leaning sharply leftward. Thus, no longer do they even make a pretense of hiring broadcast journalists; instead, they only hire propagandists known as pundits. Therefore, instead of even making a pretense of covering the news, all you get today from broadcast journalism are, yes, a fake anchor and his/her pundits as indicated above. So, hour-after-inane-hour Americans are supposed to so addicted or so stupid as to listen to inane questions like, "But should he not hit back if someone attacks him, or if he thinks something is inappropriate? Why shouldn't he hit back?" And then hour-after-inane-hour an endless array of propaganda pundits provide their propaganda, self-serving answers...pundits who appear not as intelligent and surely not as fair as most Americans. Meanwhile, out in the real world, news is actually happening...news that Americans need, and badly want, to know about.

Ted Turner's visions for CNN were bold and worthwhile.

        On CNN and the other cable "news" networks "BREAKING NEWS" is NOW A JOKE with prime-time saturated only with professional propaganda pundits. The typical punditry above insults broadcasting.

        To be sure, CNN in the honorable tradition of its long-gone visionary founder Ted Turner has some superb talent in its international section -- such as the truly brilliant broadcast journalist Clarissa Ward who was hired in September of 2015. But she and CNN's other best talent -- such as Christiane Amanpour, Arwa Damon, Oren Lieberman, Becky Anderson, Atika Shubert, Nina dos Santos, Jim Bittermann, Phil Black, etc. -- are all mostly wasted and seen, with extremely rare exceptions, only in early A. M. pre-dawn hours. Prime Time, with few exceptions, is reserved solely for pundit-introducing teleprompter-reading anchors such as Erin Burnett, Anderson Cooper and Don Lemon. Wasting a really true broadcast journalist like Clarissa Ward in favor of professional propaganda pundits shames broadcast journalism, America and democracy.

       The mainstream U. S. media coverage of Cuba-related news, of course, is extremely and even laughably biased with apparently both written and unwritten rules that mandate and dictate that only vicious counter-revolutionary zealots are allowed to report on Cuban issues. CNN's Miami-based correspondent and Cuban-American counter-revolutionary Boris Sanchez is {above} merely an example. It appears that the last Cuban-American broadcast journalist to report fairly about Cuba in Miami...or elsewhere...was Emilio Milian, and he was car-bombed in 1976 for such bravery and audacity. As far as I know, since then neither Miami nor America as a whole has had a broadcast journalist reporting fairly on Cuban topics. And that apparent fact, I believe, is far more injurious and insulting to the United States and democracy than it is to Cuba and...IN FACT...probably helps account for the unanimous 191-to-0 worldwide denunciation of America's Cuban policy in the UN. When CNN allows a Boris Sanchez to report on Cuban topics without disclosing his anti-Cuban bias it is knowingly perpetrating the industry's propaganda tilt.  

  But, like a vaccine that cures an illness, great Editorial Cartoonists like Dana Summers at Tribune Content Agency largely make up for the depths to which the mainstream United States propaganda media has sunk in both its broadcast and print forms. I'll give you some Dana Summers examples to illustrate my point.

      With this gem Dana Summers is telling us that voters actually had no chance of sanely making a choice or having a choice in the almost interminable two-year, two-billion-dollar presidential election process. The length and money is clearly unique to the U. S. and obviously designed to enrich the candidates, the networks, the ad agencies, the pundits, and the lobbyists while ravaging the voters, most of whom didn't vote and most of those who did admitted they had to choose between "the lesser of two evils." As Mr. Summers opines, that is not exactly what the Founding Fathers had in mind in 1776 when they crafted the world's best form of government, which they knew depended on an honestly informed U. S citizenry.

       Across the Atlantic pond in England, Dana Summers reminds us that the British democracy also has its problems with entrenched politicians and media. In the UK, as in the US, politicians preach about working together for "the good of the country." On both sides of the Atlantic, the people now laugh at such absurd propaganda, so maybe the U. S. inherited such ridiculousness from its Mother country.

      With this classic, Dana Summers is telling us that neither the UK nor the US democracies should be saddled with dynasties or the evils of nepotism. In the U. S. the recent Clinton and Bush dynasties have established wide ranges of repetitious political losers -- both elected and appointed -- that prevented fresher and better candidates to emerge. In other words, candidates get elected by selling their souls and votes to the highest bidders and, once in office, that's how they remain incumbents. In the U. S. in recent years hundreds of similarly elected incumbents have often left office only to work as high-paid lobbyists for the same donors who elected them and kept them in office in the first place. The recent presidential election proved that U. S. voters, bless their ever-loving hearts, tried desperately but in vain to save their democracy from such an entrenched, established and money-crazed cancer...but instead of reelecting another Bush or Clinton the maze elected the unpopular and unqualified Donald Trump as President.

          This is one of Dana Summers' all-time gems. It shows the joyous reunion in heaven of Margaret Thatcher, the former conservative British Prime Minister, with Ronald Reagan, America's former conservative President. When they were the world's two most important leaders on earth, Ronnie and Margaret were the best of friends and, uh...colluders...on conservative issues that greatly affected the world, for better or worse and, of course, in Cuba and Latin America it was for the worse because it spurred brutal right-wing dictators. {The same, of course, could be said for former President George W. Bush and his former old conservative cronies -- such as Tony Blair, Alvaro Uribe and Vincente Fox. None of them are in heaven yet but, mostly out of the spotlight, their anti-Cuban vendettas continue to have gross effects}.

      This is an absolute Dana Summers classic. One thing the much-harangued American voters managed to accomplish in the recent money-crazed, media-mauled presidential quagmire was to stop or at least put a snag in the Bush political dynasty. Despite backed by the requisite billion-plus-dollars, Jeb Bush's "I'm my own man" was quashed quickly and as easily as smashing an egg. Even with the limitless Bush money-machine and age-old advisers behind him, Jeb was one of the first of the 17 Republican candidates to be sent unceremoniously packing. That was the best thing to happen in the campaign for innocent Cuban children on the island, at least till President-elect Donald Trump's transition team quickly included seven key advisors regarding Cuba AND ALL SEVEN are counter-revolutionary zealots from the Bush dynasty.

       But Dana Summers penned the very best narrative -- utilizing just five words -- to explain the difference between the outgoing Cuba-friendly Obama presidency and the incoming Trump presidency. Study his Editorial Cartoon above. For Cuba and perhaps the world it is a difference that well might be equal to the chasm between sanity and insanity or war and peace, especially where Cuba is concerned. Trump, even prior to assuming office on January 20th, declared war on Cuba in a speech in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood in front of a huge Brigade 2506 banner, with that being the still very viable unit that attacked Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in April of 1961. While the mainstream U. S. media has neither the guts nor the integrity to say so, Trump's Little Havana speech declared war on Cuba on behalf of the long-ousted {1959} Batistianos who quickly got reconstituted on U. S. soil two unfortunate generations ago. Dana Summers in the above classic shows the divergence and soon-to-be collision of the Obama-Trump policies regarding Cuba. Obama has done a yeoman job trying to normalize relations with Cuba for the benefit of Americans, Cubans, Cuban-Americans and the world, a world that supports Obama's decent Cuban policies by a resounding 191-to-0 margin in the United Nations. Trump, meanwhile, has already bowed to the greed and revenge of a handful of Miami and Congressional anti-Cuban zealots. As Dana Summers points out above, President Obama is using even his final few days in office to try to prevent President-elect Trump from declaring either a Cold War or a Hot War on innocent Cubans, especially their precious children.

I'll end with the ominous color photo below:

       This photo is courtesy of Pavel Golovkin/Associated Press. It shows a beautiful Russian journalist proudly holding up a portrait-montage depicting -- left to right -- Russian leader Vladimir Putin, France's right-wing leader Marine Le Pen and America's soon-to-be leader Donald Trump. The photo got omnipotent international exposure not just because of the pretty Russian but because it was taken when Putin held his annual year-end news conference back in December. The Russian journalist in the red outfit is bragging about what she apparently feels IS the new World Order led by three prime, or perceived, right-wing leaders. Russia, the U. S. and France -- she reminds us -- happen to be the three world-leaders in nuclear warheads with about 7,300 for Russia, about 6,970 for the U. S. and a much smaller but significant 300+ for France, and all have sophisticated air, land and sea delivery systems. Also, these are the three biggest sellers of weapons in the world, led by the U. S. at about $40 billion last year with France next at about $15 billion and Russia in that neighborhood as a weapons seller and supplier. The Russian female journalist above is typical of the Russian people who strongly support their controversial leader, Mr. Putin, with an approval rating hovering around 85%. Russia is not only a nuclear superpower but its landmass is still huge and the Russian people, as would-be conquerors like Napoleon and Hitler discovered to their chagrin, will fight to the death to defend Mother Russia. After the collapse of the Soviet Union to start the decade of the 1990s, Russians credit Putin with putting their country back at or near the top of the international power spectrum. Before making war on little harmless Cuba, the unpredictable Trump might want to start by asking that beautiful Russian journalist why she is so fond of Putin, Le Pen AND HIM. Hey! I'd like to hear her answer too...and her shiny vision of a new World Order.

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OBAMA ATTACKS WET FOOT/DRY FOOT

AS UNDEMOCRATIC!!

       Before dawn on the Caribbean morning of Friday, January 13th, 2017 Josefina Vidal was awakened in Havana and informed of the latest gigantic assault by President Obama on America's Batistiano-driven Cuban policy. Though still tired and sleepy, Vidal appeared on Cuban and other television networks to herald President Obama's newest pro-democracy decision regarding Cuba, "Which is all I've ever asked for," said Vidal. She is the Cuban Minister on all things related to the United States.

        The BREAKING NEWS that awoke Josefina Vidal Friday morning in Havana was President Obama's decision to erase one of the long-standing and most undemocratic U. S. laws, the one known as "WET FOOT/DRY FOOT. Since 1966, in order to hurt Cuba and to appease the most hardline Cuban-Americans in Miami and Congress, the law has provided special and very discriminatory incentives for Cubans to defect to the U. S. and be lushly rewarded beginning the second their foot touches U. S. soil. The law grossly discriminates against all non-Cubans and grossly sates the appetites of counter-revolutionary forces in the U. S., one of the reasons the nations of the world vote 191-to-0 against America's undemocratic, discriminatory Cuban policy. President Obama's official statement Friday morning said:

                  "Effective immediately, Cuban nationals who attempt to enter the United States illegally and do not qualify for humanitarian relief will be subject to removal, consistent with United States laws and enforcement priorities. By taking this step, we are treating Cuba migrants the same way we treat migrants from other countries." 

          This is the latest in an amazing sequence of brave and pro-American executive orders that President Obama has enacted regarding Cuba in defiance of Cuban-exile dictums that no previous U. S. president since 1959 has dared to attempt. The hardline anti-Cuban forces in Miami and in Congress fully expect incoming President Donald Trump to begin dismantling Obama's sanity and decency regarding Cuba but to do so he will also be defying the wishes of most Americans, most Cuban-Americans and all the nations of the world, especially the ones who love democracy and respect the United States of America the most.

       In her televised statement before dawn Friday morning, Josefina Vidal praised Obama's "courage and decency" regarding Wet Foot/Dry Foot but she also said "the total elimination of the 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act that spawned it must also be removed, for democracy's sake in America as well as for the sake of innocent Cubans." Vidal, an absolutely brilliant diplomat, has engineered all of the Obama-orchestrated advances in U.S.-Cuban relations, starting with her "line in the sand," which was her insistence that Cuba be removed from the U. S. Sponsors of Terrorism list before she would discuss such things as the reopening of embassies in Havana and Washington for the first time since 1961. While much has been done with Obama, she realizes much can be undone with Trump. "But at least with Obama," she says, "we have illustrated where we stand. As he leaves office on January 20th, much will be left before any normalization of relations can be achieved, but we will take those developments as they evolve." In addition to wanting the entire 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act ended and not just reworked, Vidal insists on an end to the embargo and a return of Guantanamo Bay to Cuba, all items considered impossible within the realm of a disjointed and dysfunctional Congress but also items that democracy-lovers the world over strongly support her on. Without those things, the sovereignty-loving Josefina Vidal is willing to forego normal Cuban relations with the U. S.

        Obama in March of 2016 not only became the first sitting U. S. President to visit Cuba since 1928, during his 8 years as America's two-term President, he has been the first American leader to have both the courage and decency to apply democratic principles to U.S.-Cuban relations. With a Batistiano-fueled Congress soon joined by a Batistiano-fueled Trump presidency, Mr. Obama's herculean efforts on behalf of democracy and innocent Cubans may well be unraveled. But his efforts alone should crown him at the very top echelon of America's 45 Presidents. No democracy-lover in the world could defend the plethora of anti-democratic Batistiano Cuban laws easily rammed through Congress and supported by right-wing Republican administrations, laws such as Wet Foot-Dry Foot. No matter what happens after January 20th, Mr. Obama tried his best to correct Cuban policies that daily shame America and democracy in the eyes of the world. And just trying in the manner he did should stand as an unforgettable legacy for a great man.

A favorite photo of my favorite President. 
{I now rate FDR #2 and Lincoln #3} 

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Cuba Aims to Survive Trump

Minus A Military Intervention!
{This post updated for Friday, January 13th, 2017}

      This week -- Jan. 10th-2017 -- a great American, Barack Obama, flew to his home turf in Chicago to make his FAREWELL SPEECH as America's greatest and bravest two-term President {FDR served 4 terms}. The speech was brilliant and important.

      The speech President Obama delivered in Chicago was magnificently crafted, heartfelt, and emotional...and one he wrote himself. When listing his achievements, he made it a point to include "opening up a new chapter with the Cuban people." By doing that, President Obama displayed more guts, more intelligence and more patriotism than any U. S. president since the 1950s. And by doing it, he had to confront a dangerous and deeply-embedded-in-the-U. S. Congress Castro Cottage Industry that for going on six decades has enriched and empowered a handful of greedy and revengeful miscreants who have primarily punished two generations of children on the island of Cuba while also direly harming the images of America and democracy worldwide, a fact evidenced by the current 191-to-0 vote in the UN denouncing America's vile Cuban policy.

       President Obama's 8 years in the Oval Office as U. S. President have been tough, really tough. A small but powerful right-wing cabal in the opposition Republican party has, as expected, dogged every sane and decent policy that Mr. Obama has attempted to execute, primarily using his Executive Powers to circumvent a dysfunctional, right-wing and mostly bought-and-paid-for Congress. {Disclosure: I was a lifelong conservative Republican until I became aware of the systemic harm the Bush dynasty was inflicting, in my opinion, on America and on democracy dating all the way back to the 1950s and even to the 1930s and 1940s with Prescott Bush}. Amazingly for a two-term President, Mr. Obama will leave office with an approval rating well above 50%. His extraordinary efforts to normalize relations with Cuba are supported by most Americans, most Cuban-Americans and, in unanimity, by all the nations in the world. He faced a Cuban-policy dictated for decades by a handful of right-wing extremists who can easily dictate to the 535-member U. S. Congress and to every Republican president. Unfortunately, the decent Mr. Obama will be replaced in the Oval Office by a Republican president in just a few days -- on Jan. 20th, 2017.

      Also this week -- on the morning of January 11th-2017, a few hours after President Obama's Farewell Speech in Chicago -- Rex Tillerson faced the U. S. Senate regarding his nomination to be President-elect Trump's Secretary of State. Even in his written opening remarks, prior to the grilling from Senators, Mr. Tillerson -- the head man at oil-giant Exxon-Mobil -- grossly assailed President Obama's sanity and decency regarding innocent Cubans on the island. Rex Tillerson's exact words were: "Their leaders have received a lot, while the people have received little. This does not serve the interests of Cubans or U.S. citizens." That, of course, is a lie. All unbiased sources agree that President Obama has paved the way for thousands of everyday Cubans to become entrepreneurs and for hundreds of American workers and businesses to already begin profiting from Obama's Cuban openings. Mr. Tillerson's disgraceful and cowardly comment merely reflects the fact that President-elect Trump's upcoming Cuban policy will totally march in tune with the vile goals of a few right-wing Republicans who have saddled America and democracy with a 191-to-zero disapproval rating worldwide for punishing innocent Cuban children, not the Castro-ruled government, decade after decade after decade.

       As expected, Rex Tillerson was grilled longest and hardest at his Senate hearing because of his close ties with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, a man who has more nuclear warheads, about 7200 to 6800, than the U. S. has and a man not exactly fond of either the United States of America or democracy.

       In the 100-member United States Senate, Republicans hold only a margin of one over the Democrats but most observers believe all of President-elect Trump's anti-Cuban zealots will get confirmed, including Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State to replace President Obama's John Kerry, a long-time advocate of a sane Cuban policy. In fact, all of Trump's appointments- nominations are anti-Cuban zealots designed to replace Obama's far more pro-democracy advocates -- such as Nikki Haley replacing Samantha Power as the U. S. Representative at the United Nations; Mauricio Claver-Carone replacing Ben Rhodes and Susan Rice as key advisors regarding Cuba, etc. But the most dangerous Trump clump is Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State to replace the very decent John Kerry. So the cruel, dangerous and perhaps bloody dismantling of President Obama's sane and decent Cuban openings will begin on January 20th, 2017 even as more high-profile relations -- such as with Russia, China, Iran and North Korea -- will grab most of the big headlines.

      This updated photo taken by Casey Strong reminds me of why a Republican Congress and a Republican White House, so easily dictated to by a handful of Cuban-American extremists, are consistently injurious to America's and democracy's worldwide reputations, as confirmed by that 191-to-zero UN vote. This photo shows a young Cuban mother feeding pigeons while her precious little girl, neatly attired in an orange outfit, poses beautifully and happily for Casey Strong's camera. All her life that mother has been punished by Fat Cats in a foreign country, the U. S., in the guise of "hurting Castro." And all her life that little girl is scheduled to be punished by Fat Cats in a foreign country, the U. S., in the guise of "hurting Castro." In reality, as Mr. Obama realizes, such greed and cruelty has helped sustain the Castros for over half a century even as the two oldest Castro brothers -- Ramon and Fidel -- died in 2016 in their 90s and the remaining brother, Raul, is an old and very tired 85.

       This photo reveals how typically Cuba's majority peasant children were treated in Batista's Cuba in the 1950s -- no education, no health care, etc.

      This typical photo shows Cuban mothers marching to protest the murders of their children in Batista's Cuba, "asesinatos" apparently designed to quell dissent. Instead, brave mothers like these spawned the revolution that, in 1959, defeated Batista but, in essence, created a revengeful Cuban government-in-exile with Miami's Little Havana as its capital from 1959 till the present day.

      This updated photo shows the drastic difference in how children in Revolutionary Cuba are treated today as compared to the children in Batista's Cuba in the 1950s. For all its faults, Revolutionary Cuba has lived up to its promise to prioritize mothers and children, and has done so even in spite of the U. S. economic embargo that is the longest and cruelest ever imposed by a powerful nation against a weak nation. Batistiano-dictated U. S. laws and the Batistiano controlled Cuban narrative in the U. S. would have you believe that the schoolgirls depicted above are being forced to become world-class actors to look so happy and well-cared-for in Cuba. The Batistiano-fueled Congressional law that for decades has ruled that everyday Americans are the only people in the world without the freedom to visit Cuba is designed to perpetuate such lies because, after all, judging Cuba for oneself would not compute with the very effective and usually unchallenged Batistiano propaganda. Children like these in Revolutionary Cuba are guaranteed free and excellent health care for life, free and excellent educations through college, etc., and FOUR keen international observers -- UNESCO, the World Health Organization, the Pan Am Health Organization and the World Bank -- have all either praised Revolutionary Cuba for its prioritizing children or singled out Cuba as a "role model" in its treatment of mother-child preventative health issues, such as praising Cuba for its extremely low infant mortality rate, for Cuba being "the first nation" to totally eradicate the transmission of AIDs from mother to child, etc. Those who profit from denying the color photo above and the two black-and-white photos that preceded it are, in my opinion, why the nations of the world vote 191-to-zero against America's Cuban policy THAT THE DECENT PRESIDENT OBAMA HAS TRIED SO VERY HARD TO CORRECT.    

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           Cuba's reluctant President Raul Castro turns 86 in June. He is tired. A year from now he plans to turn the leadership of Cuba over to a non-Castro, 56-year-old Miguel Diaz-Canel. This month of January-2017 marks the first year of his life that Raul must live without his more famous brother Fidel who died at age 90 back on November 25th. Aware that Cubans are concerned about the imminent departure of America's Cuba-friendly President Barack Obama, Raul Castro "fully expects" incoming U. S. President Donald Trump to be like "the Bush presidents," which to him means "war-like." The above photo taken by Yamil Lage shows one of the newly posted billboards in which Raul Castro tries to assure the Cuban people that the island's sovereignty will survive Trump. Above his name are his own words: "We must look at the socialist and prosperous future of the country." After Raul's imminent departure, left to their own devices, it is likely that Cuba's well-educated and impatient young-adult generation -- led by two brilliant Cuba-loving women in their twenties, Cristina Escobar and Jennifer Bello Martinez -- will chart the island's future. Ever mindful of what the U. S. sicced on Cuba in 1952 -- Batista and the Mafia -- both Cristina and Jennifer have profoundly stated: "We don't want the U. S. to bring us democracy. That is a project for Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami and Washington."  Both Cristina and Jennifer are true, sovereignty-loving Cubans.

     Cristina Escobar above & Jennifer Bello Martinez below, a rather formidable modern-day Cuban duo.

           Cristina Escobar & Jennifer Bello Martinez remind some of Cuba's two greatest and most determined anti-Batista guerrilla fighters -- the legendary Celia Sanchez & Haydee Santamaria.

     This week Alaska Airlines made more history as a part of outgoing President Obama's herculean efforts to normalize relations with Cuba before incoming President Trump takes over the White House on January 20th. An Alaska Airlines flight originated in Seattle, had a stopover in Los Angeles and then continued on its pleasant journey to Havana. It marked the first time since 1961 that a commercial U. S. flight from the West Coast had been allowed to fly to Cuba. Alaska Airlines said the advance bookings for such flights "are strong but not sold out," pointing out that the Congress-mandated embargo against Cuba still prevents most Americans from having the freedom to visit Cuba, making Americans since 1962 the only people in the world without that freedom, a fact that pusillanimous Americans accept because, apparently, they fear the power and threats from America's vast and lucrative Castro Cottage Industry, which -- as expected -- has even out-lived Fidel Castro. Eight other major U. S. airlines from cities east of the Mississippi River already had permission to fly to Cuba, so competition for the Cuban business plus the embargo are factors.

      Cuba has decided to take incoming U. S. President Donald Trump's dire threats at face value after minutely studying Trump's condescending promises made to Brigade 2506 veterans in the above speech in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood. Brigade 2506 is the unit that attacked Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in April of 1961, a drastic U. S. failure that mightily strengthened Fidel Castro's power in Cuba and around the world. A distinct offshoot of the Bay of Pigs was a new tactic in 1962 -- the embargo designed to starve & deprive Cubans on the island to induce them to rise up and overthrow Castro. The starve & deprive aspect of the embargo continues and, of course, has been augmented by such things as the infamous Cuban Adjustment Act and such discriminatory laws as Wet Foot/Dry Foot designed to favor, enrich and empower Cubans whose feet HAVE OR WILL touch U. S. soil, privileges not available to any non-Cubans. To at last add democratic aspects to America's Cuban policy, outgoing U. S. President Obama has very bravely and decently used Executive Powers in a valiant attempt to normalize relations with Cuba, infuriating the benefactors of America's vast and lucrative Castro Cottage Industry that easily dictates to the U. S. Congress and to Republican presidents. So, Cuba expects the erratic Trump and the refurbished Brigade 2506 to reverse Obama's sane Cuban advances as well as reverse the Batistiano and American disaster at the Bay of Pigs in April of 1961. Moreover, Cuba fully realizes that Trump, using Executive Powers as the President and military powers as Commander-in-Chief, will soon have the capacity to assault Cuba.

       Eric Schmidt, the Chairman and CEO of internet Super-Giant Google, flew to Havana to sign an important intercommunication deal with Cuba. It was in keeping with President Obama's plans, during his final days in office, to make his Cuban policies as irreversible as possible for the Trump administration.

       Scott Gilbert, American lawyer and entrepreneur, a few days ago signed another historic deal, this time to export Cuban charcoal to the U. S. with the first 40 metric tons arriving on January 18th, two days before Trump replaces Obama in the White House. The embargo for decades prevented such deals.

        Cuba hails its sweet-smelling, long-burning charcoal as the world's best. It is made from the invasive and woody Marabu weeds that have long plagued Cuban farmers, at least till the charcoal became a saleable product for the farmers to cultivate as they clear their land. While Cuba wants input from U. S. companies like airlines, cruise ships and Google, and wants to sell items like charcoal to the U. S. market, because of Trump Cuba is shifting to non-American options AND BACK TO A COLD WAR-TYPE POSTURE.

And did you know?

       The smallest bird in the world is the Bee Hummingbird and it is only found in Cuba, and birdwatchers know where to look. On my first day in Cuba, I mentioned to Vivian, the manager of the Victoria Hotel, "This is not why I'm here but where do I go to see the Bee Hummingbird and the Cuban Tody." She reached under the desk and fetched me a plainly marked map, adding, "The Bee is mainly in the area marked in yellow and the Tody is almost exclusively in the area marked in red. At both places there are bird experts to help you."  

       Scientists have minutely studied Cuba's Bee Hummingbird. Totally unique, it a friendly and beautiful little bird. For their nectar meals, they only visit ten flowers and nine of those flowers are unique to Cuba.

The actual size of Cuba's Bee Hummingbird.

The also tiny Cuban Tody is Cuba's national bird.

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