Cuba Reacts to Trump

With Gazes to Friendlier Nations!

       Back in October-2016, two weeks before he incredibly was elected President of the United States, Donald Trump in the photo above was in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood making a speech with a huge Brigade Assault 2506 banner as the backdrop between smaller U. S. and Cuban flags. Brigade 2506 in mid-April of 1961 led the ground assault in the air-sea-land attack on Cuba known to history as the Bay of Pigs. Brigade 2506, created by the CIA and trained at great expense to U. S. taxpayers, was composed of Cuban exiles from the Batista-Mafia dictatorship overthrown on Jan. 1-1959 by the Cuban Revolution. After numerous assassination attempts against Fidel Castro failed, and after numerous terrorist attacks against Cuba's coastal areas, the highly funded Bay of Pigs attack was expected to recapture Cuba but was emphatically defeated by Cuba rebels long-tired of the centuries-old dominance of the island by imperialist Spain and, starting in 1898, America. Trump's message during the above session was to promise the elderly Miami survivors of the Bay of Pigs attack that he, essentially, would finally avenge their April-1961 defeat if they would help him get elected. Today -- June 16-2017 -- he's back in Miami as President.

       To be properly prepared for the Trump visit to Miami today, Americans should have access to Will Grant's reports from Havana for BBC World News, the incomparable broadcast network based in London. It's Channel 346 on USA Direct Cable. In the hours leading up to Trump's gutless capitulation in Miami, the BBC featured several unbiased and incisive reports from Havana and Miami with titles such as "U.S.-Cuba Rollback" and "Trump and Cuba." Will Grant pointed out that Trump is claiming Cuba's "dismal human rights record" is cause to roll back Obama's positive overtures to the island. But, even dealing with foreign-funded and encouraged dissidents, Cuba has few such encounters and even then prideful regular citizens are often the interveners. Also, the U. S. itself has many well-publicized encounters with often innocent civilians, some fatal resulting in HUGE financial settlements. And Will Grant this morning pointed out that the U. S. readily accepts vast human rights violations in U.S.-friendly countries today and, of course, in U.S.-friendly dictatorships in the distant and recent past. Also, Will Grant named names of such countries and the BBC this morning even had a report of Western nations selling extremely sophisticated surveillance equipment to extremely repressive nations, one of which was named, and the equipment could be "classified as weapons" because they spied on "all the people all the time, even in the bedrooms." But, of course, none of those nations had a successful revolution that chased vile leaders to United States soil. 

     The difference between the BBC's Will Grant reporting on Cuban issues as opposed to necessarily biased and intimidated American journalists is like the difference between daylight and dark. By sunrise in Cuba and the United States today, June 16th, Will Grant had repeatedly informed BBC viewers that Trump's rollback of key aspects of former President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba will defy the wishes of all segments of North American and international populations, including the vast majority of Cuban-Americans in Miami. And Grant debunked the absurd claims by the counter-revolutionary zealots in Miami and in Congress and now in the White House that reversing Obama's policies related to Cuba will bring about a LONG-AWAITED "REGIME-CHANGE" ON THE ISLAND. It was duly reported that instead Trump would just force Cuba, as it prepares for post-Castro leadership, to once again gaze almost exclusively in the directions of friendlier countries, especially mighty Russia and prolific China, both of whom are very eager to fill the U. S. void -- with Chinese financial investments and Russia's vast oil and military "persuaders." The U. S. economy can intimidate all nations, except China; and the U. S. military can intimidate all nations, except Russia. The BBC thus believes the U. S. is "unwise" to push "nearby" Cuba into the arms of its two big competitors -- China and Russia. In fact, a letter this past week signed by 55 of the 100 U. S. Senators pleaded with Trump to consider precisely that point -- to no avail, of course. Trump, like other Republican presidents, is far more concerned with recapturing Cuba for the counter-revolutionary zealots than considering how harmful it would be to the vast majority of Americans, Cubans and Cuban-Americans. Will Grant and the BBC have both the guts and the integrity to air such reality.

        The other London-based media giant, REUTERS, regularly features fair, insightful and unbiased reports directly from Cuba by its superb journalists such as Sarah Marsh, Marc Frank, etc. They teamed for a very informative and unbiased article today about "Trump To Limit Cuba Travel, Restrict Business."

     There are multiple nefarious reasons that a handful of counter-revolutionary Cuban-Americans in Miami and in Congress want to curb or stop the Obama-orchestrated influx of tourists, like the one above, from visiting Cuba. First off, the anti-Cuban zealots want to continue to dictate the Cuban narrative in the U. S. and that's why, since 1962, everyday Americans have been the only people in the world without the freedom to visit Cuba, lest they might form opinions of the island that differ from the Miami-directed propaganda. Also, from 1962 to today, the U. S. embargo against Cuba has existed for the purpose of starving and depriving Cubans on the island to induce them to rise up and overthrow their government. It hasn't worked, like most U. S. hostile action against Cuba hasn't, but it has greatly harmed everyday Cubans, again like most U. S. hostile action against Cuba has. We know about the purpose of the embargo...starve and deprive...because of de-classified documents. Classified documents, of course, are often designed not to protect the nation but to protect individual crooks, as the great Peter Kornbluh at the U. S. National Archives has often pointed out regarding Cuba. So Trump's further tightening the Obama-loosened Congressional "laws" against tourism to Cuba suits only a handful of extremists at the expense of everyone else, similar to the U. S. Cuban policy that so correctly now has a 191-to-0 UN condemnation.

    This Cuban is watching the final touches being put on one of four luxury 5-star hotels opening in Cuba, two managed by the giant U.S.-based Starwood Hotels and Resorts and two by a giant Swiss company. The hotels are created for rich tourists but they also provide work for Cubans like this man. Such step-forwards for Cuba infuriate the powerful handful of counter-revolutionary zealots in Miami and Congress, the vicious minority in this post-Obama era that is determined to regain TOTAL CONTROL of America's Cuban policy, the starve and deprive policy that provokes the embarrassing 191-to-0 denunciation of America in the UN, embarrassing to everyone except, of course, the counter-revolutionary zealots.

The bedroom at a Starwood luxury hotel in Havana.

       This ribbon-cutting ceremony depicts American Airlines opening a plush office in Havana, and this was followed by other major U. S. companies, even including Google, doing the same thing. Such ventures created jobs for Cubans and Americans, but counter-revolutionary zealots couldn't care less about that.

     There are now 12 U. S. airlines and cruise lines taking U. S. tourists to Cuba and, thanks to Obama, this started even before Cuba had the capacity, such as with hotel space, to handle such an influx. Many of these airlines-cruise lines as well the airports and seaports they depart from are owned by or controlled by Cuban-Americans who are among the vast majority of Cuban-Americans who desire normal commerce and social relations with Cuba. The commercial airline and cruise-line trips to Cuba from the U. S. had been barred SINCE 1961, PRIOR TO OBAMA, but all those decades of trying to starve and deprive Cuba didn't work, and so today with gutless stupidity Trump wants to reinstate such insanity to appease zealots.

       Despite being starved & deprived for over half-a-century by its nearby superpower, Revolutionary Cuba -- SOMEHOW -- has managed to provide all its people with totally free and excellent educations and health care. In fact, in open defiance of the U. S. embargo, Americans have been traveling to Cuba to get highly publicized and successful treatment of advanced lung cancers that cancer experts, including those at the famed Roswell Park Institute in Buffalo, NY, say is superior to any known U. S. treatment. Also, Cuba has the world's largest medical school and, SOMEHOW, has provided thousands of totally free scholarships, including room and board, to poor foreign students, including MANY from the U. S. Cuba, even after Trump's Batistiano stance in Miami, is not likely to deny free medical educations for poor Americans nor deny treatment Cuba is currently providing to Americans suffering from ills such as lung cancer.

      While Batistiano-pressured Trump today further tightens restrictions against Americans having the freedom to visit the nearby island, Cuba -- as indicated above -- provides visas to allow even its most famed counter-revolutionary dissident -- ubiquitous blogger Yoani Sanchez -- to fly around the world.

        Of course, on her well-funded 80-day world tour, Yoani Sanchez took time to broadcast her anti-Cuban vitriol over Radio-TV Marti, the colossal anti-Cuban propaganda machine in Miami that has sucked up hundreds of millions of extremely biased U. S. tax dollars for decades, including right up till today.

       And, of course, on her worldwide tour, Yoani Sanchez's most important stop was the U. S. Congress where rich and powerful Cuban-American counter-revolutionaries were loving hosts as well as prime architects of America's Cuban policies. When she arrived back in Havana as Cuba's most famed dissident blogger, she announced she also had enough funds to hire the necessary staff to start her own powerful dissident-digital-dandy newspaper, which she has surely done. While dissidents like Yoani Sanchez in Cuba are wildly heralded and promoted in the U. S...and, many believe, wildly funded...they are a decided minority on the island. And if they weren't, the very omnipotent and unchecked counter-revolutionaries backed by the superpower United States would have been back in control of the island decades ago.

      My friend Rosy Amaro Perez, her husband Gilberto, and their daughter are, I believe, typical Cubans on the island -- non-rich but healthy, well educated and absolutely decent people. AND...THEY LOVE CUBA.

Rosy is a superb Cuban broadcast journalist.

    All of her life, Rosy has been punished by a handful of unscrupulous counter-revolutionary miscreants hiding behind the skirts of the world's superpower. If she doesn't show it here, it's only because she is a very strong woman. All of her much-younger life Rosy's daughter has been punished by the same miscreants, despite the renowned resilience by generations of Cubans to cope and to survive. I believe that dissidents in a foreign superpower who punish Cubans like this mother and daughter year-after-year are wrong, and so are the people who callously and cowardly allow them to do it...YEAR AFTER YEAR!!!

      I have been to Cuba and I remain a patriotic, democracy-loving American. I believe America's asinine Cuban policy is the only topic in this extremely diverse world that could possibly garner a unanimous 191-to-0 condemnation in the UN. I believe the Cuban Revolution and Revolutionary Cuba say a helluva lot more about the superpower United States they they say about the island of Cuba. And knowing Rosy Amaro Perez, I believe she is a far more decent and honorable person than the foreign miscreants who bask in the glory of being her enemies as they dictate Cuban policy to a now apathetic and uncaring America.

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Cuba-Trump, What Now?

Surviving Trump and Rubio?

       Normally the mainstream media in the U. S. takes one of two stances regarding Cuba: {1} Ignore the island as insignificant; or {2} report only what the counter-revolutionary forces in Miami and the U. S. Congress want it to report or perhaps suffer the fates dished out to the two bravest Miami journalists -- Emilio Milian and Jim DeFede. But in recent days the U. S. media has featured countless articles about Cuba leading up to tomorrow's {June 16th} announcement IN MIAMI by President Trump about the latest Republican-Batistiano efforts to overthrow Cuba's revolutionary government, efforts that have failed miserably but have been brutal and continuous since January 1-1959, succeeding primarily in regularly brutalizing totally innocent everyday Cubans as well as projecting America internationally as a colossal imperial bully, a fact currently registered by a 191-to-0 condemnation of the U. S.'s Cuban policy in the UN.

       The plethora of U. S. articles about Cuba prior to Trump's cowardly announcement tomorrow in Miami have followed the U. S. media's pattern of being too afraid to depart from blistering counter-revolutionary/regime-change propaganda. But there are notable exceptions, such as Tracy Wilkinson, the superb Washington correspondent for the Los Angeles Times. Her article this week, in case you're interested, is entitled: "Trump Considers Reversing Historic Obama Opening With Cuba." She had the integrity, courage and insight to make these points:

                      "President Trump is expected to roll back parts of the historic Obama-era with Cuba, siding with hawks who oppose detente and rejecting demands from U. S. businesses for whom the island is a ripe potential market. Lobbying Trump against Cuba ties are two Cuban-American Republican lawmakers from Florida, Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart. The move will be controversial. It will dull a boom in tourism by Americans to Cuba...and it could allow Russia and China to more easily step in to fill the void." 

       For Americans today to sit back and allow self-serving counter-revolutionary Cuban-American zealots from Little Havana in Miami, like Marco Rubio and Mario Diaz-Balart, to dictate America's Cuban policy is equivalent to 1952 when that generation of Americans sat back and permitted Mafia thugs like Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky to align with the U. S. government in supporting the thieving Batista dictatorship. While the U. S. media is generally not permitted to mention it, Mario Diaz-Balart's father Rafael was a key Minister in the Batista dictatorship and, following Batista's overthrow in 1959, was one of the richest and most powerful counter-revolutionary forces in Miami and, in fact, the founder of "The White Rose, the very first of many paramilitary groups in Florida aiming to regain dictatorial control of Cuba.

          As for Marco Rubio, whom the American media portrays as a cute Mother Teresa-like choirboy, President Donald Trump's astounding path to the White House had to include a successful take down of highly financed Republican contender "Little Marco," whom then presidential-candidate Trump labeled as being "For Sale" to the highest bidders -- such as controversial multi-billionaire Sheldon Adelson.

       One of America's most respected investigative journalists is the Washington-savvy Ken Silverstein. He earned that reputation after many years with the Associated Press, Harper's Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, etc. In one of his most deeply researched articles, he called Marco Rubio the most "For Sale" and most "corrupt" politician in Washington. As far as I know, he wasn't sued and the article wasn't refuted.

Graphic for Ken Silverstein's Rubio article.

       And so, you ask, How in the world can President Trump turn America's Cuban policy over to Mario Diaz-Balart and Marco Rubio -- one the son of a former Batista Minister and the other also a visceral counter-revolutionary Cuban-American from Miami? Well, Trump can do it and get away with it the same way vicious right-wing operatives in Washington along with self-serving entities such as the Bush dynasty have gotten away with supporting first Batista in Cuba and then the Batistianos in the U. S. since the 1950s. Also, in recent days even the mainstream U. S. media has indicated that Mario and Marco have nudged Trump towards their vindictive Cuban policies with what some might call BLACKMAIL. It's reported that Mario reminded Trump that he is on the House Appropriations Committee that doles out federal money Trump may need to fund his projects AND Marco has reportedly reminded Trump that he sits on the Senate committee that is INVESTIGATING TRUMP'S ALLEGED IMPEACHMENT-THREATENING TIES TO RUSSIA.

          TWO ongoing and ominously looming factors may well impeach the 71-year-old Trump's presidency, but not before he lowers the boom on Cuba in Miami tomorrow. ONE of those factors is Trump having so many Republican foxes, such as Diaz-Balart and Rubio, in his own Republican hen-house. THE OTHER FACTOR is indicated above by the infamous Tweet from Rachel Maddow, the top anchor on MSNBC, flatly and unequivocally stating that "Donald Trump has to be taken out before he ruins our country." Every single anchor and almost every pundit on both MSNBC and CNN devote almost every second of their airtime towards an electronic coup designed to get Trump impeached. They are joined by every single columnist at the Washington Post and New York Times, and that comprises four entities that might be powerful enough to get the job done, as indicated by extreme left-wing antics that include...the Alexandria, Virginia shooting rampage this week, Madonna calling for the bombing of the Trump White House, Kathy Griffin's shamefully touting the bloody beheaded image of Trump, etc. Left-wing zealots, like right-wing zealots, abound but perhaps the biggest threat to America is not Trump but probably the MSNBC-CNN-NY TIMES-WASHINGTON POST media pretending to be journalists while primarily engaged only in left-wing, anti-Trump propaganda. "Donald Trump has to be taken out before he ruins our country." If a kook says such things in a democracy, it's very bad. But when the so-called mainstream media says it, it's downright scary to democracy-lovers.

       The former head of ExxonMobil and the former or current friend of Russia's Vladimir Putin, Rex Tillerson is now, as Secretary of State, the most powerful member of President Trump's cabinet. He strongly advocates lowering the boom on poor little Cuba but certainly not on big, strong threats like Russia or China. Tillerson told Congress: "We believe it is important that we take steps to restore the purpose of the Helms Burton legislation, which was to pressure the regime to change, and that pressure, in our view, has been largely lifted." The right-wing gutlessness of that anti-Obama, anti-American statement assumes that Americans are too stupid or too unpatriotic to know that the Helms Burton legislation was written by and rammed through Congress by the most vicious counter-revolutionary forces in Miami, such as Jorge Mas Canoso. Decades of uncontested Batistiano-dictated propaganda, of course, dispute that but there is no respectable Cuban expert in America that would dispute it. Helms Burton, pure and simply, was designed to bring about regime-change in Cuba while also enriching and empowering selected Cuban-American zealots and defying the wishes of most Cuban-Americans, even in Miami. I assume Tillerson understood that when he mentioned "Helms Burton" in that exact asinine quote depicted above.

America's greatest Cuban expert IS Julia E. Sweig.

      In her book -- "CUBA: What Everyone Needs To Know" -- Julia E. Sweig expertly explains how Helms Burton, as the dismal congressional linchpin of America's disgraceful and failed Cuban policy, came to shame both America and democracy while also cruelly punishing millions of totally innocent Cubans.

America's 2nd greatest Cuban expert IS Ann Louise Bardach.

       In her truly great book -- "CUBA Confidential: Love And Vengeance In Miami And Havana" -- Ann Louise Bardach expertly explains how Helms Burton, as a cruel linchpin of America's disgraced and failed Cuban policy, came to shame both America and democracy while also cruelly and unjustly punishing millions of totally innocent Cubans, including children in Cuba and children aboard the terrorist-bombed Cubana Flight 455 civilian airplane. Since the 1950s, Americans have loutishly swallowed bucket-loads of Batistiano propaganda while they should have shown more respect for America and for democracy by absorbing truthful Cuban information from unbiased experts like Julia E. Sweig and Ann Louise Bardach.

       Emblematic of a great failure of the U. S. democracy is the fact that truly decent members of Congress, like Senator Patrick Leahy, have not been permitted to have major impacts on America's Batistiano-driven Cuban policy. That is so even though most Americans, most Cuban-Americans, and, yes, that 191-to-0 vote in the UN agree with Mr. Leahy's sane approach to Cuba. On the eve of President Trump's announcement in Miami on June 16th about turning back former President Obama's sane and decent overtures to Cuba, Mr. Leahy wrote an article, which you can go online to read in its entirety, in which he begged President Trump not to do it. He wrote: "It would not only harm U. S. business and the Cuban people, it would leave a gaping vacuum, just over 90 miles offshore, for our adversaries to fill. Russia is eager to regain its diminished sphere of influence over our island neighbor. Recent events indicate the Kremlin may be seeking to return in full force to Cuba. The American people and the Cuban people overwhelmingly want closer relations."

       Prior to the election of Donald Trump, the brave and decent President Obama went to Cuba and, in the emotional and heartfelt speech above carried live on state television, he told the Cuban people: "Cuba does not need to fear a threat from the United States." Unfortunately for both Cuba and America, Mr. Obama's two terms as President are over and now the Miami-based Batistianos are back in charge. President Trump will remind the world of that tomorrow in Miami, reminding Cuba of THE U. S. THREAT.

       The above image of America drastically embarrasses decent Americans like Barack Obama. As President, he tried his best to correct it. But Donald Trump is now President. And Trump is about to allow Marco Rubio and the Diaz-Balarts to resume the Batistiano dictation of America's Cuban policy. Meanwhile, the majority of Americans and Cuban-Americans will not have the guts or the patriotism to intervene.

      Cuba's brilliant Minster of North American Affairs, Josefina Vidal, negotiated every aspect of the island's positive relationship with the Obama administration. She will meticulously defend Cuba {note her quote} but remains very willing to cooperate with the Trump administration. Ms. Vidal is very proud that, thanks to the overtures from Obama, everyday Cubans have markedly benefited, with well over 8,000 private Cuban homes renting out accommodations, via AIRbnb traffic, to the increase in U. S. tourism.

       Note the above Tweet exchange between Josefina Vidal in Havana with Jose Ramon Cabanas, the head of Cuba's Embassy in Washington. It's about the Obama-orchestrated increase in U. S. tourism to Cuba. The counter-revolutionaries in the U. S. don't like it and much prefer an aspect of the embargo, since 1962, that still makes everyday Americans the only people in the world without the freedom to visit Cuba, an anti-democratic law designed, many assume, to just keep Americans from making their own Cuba judgments.

And by the way:

        The two photos below are courtesy of Cuba's superb young broadcast journalist Rosy Amaro Perez. The photos show a 12-year-old girl helping the doctor deliver her baby brother. Was she a bit excited? 

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Cuba Awaits Trump Decision

With No Capitulation Plans!
{Wednesday, June 14th, 2017}

      This photo, courtesy of Rosy Amaro Perez, shows a calm and peaceful Havana Harbor on the eve of U. S. President Donald Trump's pro-Batistiano and anti-Cuba announcements in Miami on Friday, June 16th.

 Superb Cuban broadcast journalist Rosy Amaro Perez.

       Revolutionary Cuba has survived 14 U. S. Presidential administrations, including the two-timers, and it plans to survive the Trump era even with what Cuba expects to be Trump's announcement in Miami of Marco Rubio as the island's next U.S.-backed dictator, the first since Fulgencio Batista back in the 1950s.

Whether the Trump-Rubio plan works, remains to be seen.

        A young generation of Cubans on the island, including Rosy Amaro Perez, is not at all anxious to be ruled by a Marco Rubio from Miami and Washington. So, fresh predictions of the long-awaited apocalyptic nihilism finally about to inundate the always vulnerable but pugnacious island may be premature...again. 

      The Cuban conundrum in June of 2017 pits underdog sovereignty-loving Cubans like Rosy Amaro Perez against the imperial-minded super-colossus just across the turbulent waters of the Florida Straits.

     A laughable but serious Rubio-Trump Cuban coup attempt?

    But Rosy thinks Cuba can ride out the Trump-Rubio era too.

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Cuba: Surrender or Fight?

Trump Leaves Two Choices!!
{Monday, June 12th, 2017}

       The AP photo above was used last weekend by the Voice of America to illustrate its article about President Donald Trump's planned visit to Miami June 16th to announce his plans to reverse much of former President Obama's peaceful gestures regarding Cuba. The photo shows a Cuban watching coverage of the Jan. 20th-2017 inauguration of President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. The VOA mentioned the pressure Trump is receiving from visceral counter-revolutionary Cuban-American members of Congress from Miami, Marco Rubio and Mario Diaz-Balart. But the VOA also hinted that Trump is also getting vast requests from business interests and many other members of Congress to continue the Obama-orchestrated detente with the Caribbean island. The VOA article even hinted that Trump may temper his decision or postpone it while he ponders it some more, although both those prospects are very long-shots.

     This coming Friday -- June 16-2017 -- U. S. President Donald Trump will be in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood to announce his Cuban policy. The fact he will do it in Miami is the tip-off that he will do what decent, democracy-loving Americans feared he would do, which is to essentially turn America's Cuban policy back over to Counter-Revolutionary extremists in Miami and the U. S. Congress. It's a reversal of former President Obama's sane and decent Cuban policies and reverts back to the hateful, cruel, right-wing Cuban policy that currently has the United States condemned by a 191-to-0 vote in the United Nations. The unanimous worldwide denunciation of America's Cuban policy is well-deserved but neither Trump nor the Counter-Revolutionaries nor unpatriotic Americans care. 

       Back on Oct. 25-2016, two weeks before the presidential election, Trump went to Little Havana in Miami and displayed the gutless cowardice and stupidity that has marked his first four tumultuous months as President of the United States. As shown above, standing in front of a huge "Brigade 2506 Assault" banner, Trump promised the few remaining Counter-Revolutionary Cuban exiles who -- backed by the air, land and sea support from the U. S. military -- attacked Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in mid-April of 1961, an attack that was supposed to recapture Cuba from the revolutionary forces that had overthrown the U.S.-backed Batista-Mafia dictatorship on Jan. 1-1959. But Revolutionary Cuba, led by Fidel Castro who raced to the frontlines, emphatically defeated the infamous and cowardly air-land-and-sea attack...and has somehow managed to maintain its independence ever since. But in the above speech, Trump promised, as President, he would reverse Brigade 2506's defeat. The apathetic and propagandized cowardice of this generation of Americans will surely afford Trump and the Miami counter-revolutionaries that opportunity. THUS, AS OF JUNE 16-2017 CUBA WILL BE LEFT WITH TWO CHOICES -- SURRENDER OR FIGHT. And there is no doubt that the island will choose to fight, and by sunset on June 16-2017 its do-or-die battle-plans will be firmed up...as if another Bay of Pigs, this time maybe nuclear-powered, was imminent.

        In Miami's Little Havana after he promised the surviving Brigade 2506 veterans that he would reverse the outcome of the 1961 Bay of Pigs attack against Cuba, Donald Trump was rewarded with the above keepsake -- the Brigade 2506 shield. 

      The most insightful Miami journalist is Marc Caputo. He formerly worked for the Counter-Revolutionary Miami Herald but now works in Miami for the Washington-based political juggernaut Politico. Caputo has Counter-Revolutionary instincts but those views intermingle with the fact that he is a brave and decent journalist even when the topic is CUBA!

       And so, it was Marc Caputo working in Miami for Politico who broke the long-awaited news that President Trump would venture to Miami on June 16th to announce that the U. S. would turn its Cuban policy over to a pair of Counter-Revolutionary/Cuban-American zealots from Miami -- Senator Marco Rubio and Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart. That revelation from Caputo instantly sent the unmistakable ultimatum to Cuba -- SURRENDER OR FIGHT. Caputo buttressed his Politico reporting by using Twitter updates that made it plain that President Trump, and therefore the United States, would -- beginning on June 16-2017 -- have a Cuban policy that bears "the stamp" of Rubio and Diaz-Balart. While Americans are not supposed to care or comprehend that meaning, Cuba does care and comprehends that it means Cuba must surrender to the dictates of Rubio and Diaz-Balart or fight, and to Cuba that is actually no choice at all. It will fight to keep its sovereignty.

      While pusillanimous Americans may well deserve a government or dictatorship ruled by Mario Diaz-Balart and Marco Rubio, there are eleven million innocent Cubans on the island who do not deserve such a dreadful humiliation. Those Cubans remember, or have learned, what it was like from 1952 till 1959 under the thieving, brutal Batista-Mafia dictatorship. It is those memories that will force Cuba to now embark on a do-or-die posture reminiscent of its Revolutionary War and its Bay of Pigs triumphs. Mario Diaz-Balart's father Rafael was a key Minister in the Batista-Mafia dictatorship and, after 1959, was one of the richest and most volatile Counter-Revolutionary operatives in Miami. That Diaz-Balart nexus from the 1950s to today may be far beyond the scope of propagandized Americans but it surely is not lost on the still vivid memories of Cubans residing on the nearby island. Likewise beyond the scope of apathetic Americans is the fact that Cubans on the island view Rubio every bit as nefarious as the four rich and powerful Diaz-Balart brothers who have extended their father's fierce Counter-Revolutionary activities beyond the half-century mark but yet have not recaptured Cuba even as they lucratively hide behind the skirts of the superpower U. S. government AND the super-apathetic American citizens.

      The photo above shows Marco Rubio as a High School student in Miami. As far as the mainstream U. S. media is concerned, Rubio today has the same choirboy traits as he supposedly did back then. Such choirboy lies...coupled with allegedly being a diehard Counter-Revolutionary in Miami...has gotten Rubio elected twice to the U. S. Senate and also made him a serious Republican presidential candidate in 2016 when he and Donald Trump called each other vile names. While the mainstream American media delights in projecting Rubio as a choirboy, one of America's most respected investigative journalists -- Ken Silverstein in a long, famous, and easily Googled article -- depicts Rubio as being both the most "for sale" and the most "corrupt" politician in America. Also, many democracy-loving Americans are ashamed that Miami only seems to send a steady stream of Counter-Revolutionary Cuban-Americans to the United States Congress EVEN THOUGH MOST CUBAN-AMERICANS EVEN IN MIAMI FAVOR NORMALIZING RELATIONS WITH CUBA.     

      Americans who are neither patriotic enough nor brave enough to oppose or even acknowledge the Batistiano-grip on their democracy should read the above notation penned by the aforementioned Miami journalist Marc Caputo. It references the fact that both Diaz-Balart and Rubio have essentially black-mailed President Trump into doing their nefarious bidding regarding Cuba. Rubio reportedly used his position as one of the 10 U. S. Senators charged with investigating Trump's alleged ties with Russia to scare Trump into assaulting Cuba. Diaz-Balart, as reported above by Caputo, used his position on the House Appropriations Committee to remind Trump that the President will need Diaz-Balart's support to get financial backing in Congress for his key programs, such as replacing the Affordable Care Act. To forge a cruel, nefarious Cuban policy for all these decades, the tools include blackmail, payoffs and paybacks, intimidation, and apathy from American citizens. 

       In 1989 Havana-born Ileana Ros-Lehtinen was elected to the U. S. Congress from Miami when the self-serving Jeb Bush was her Campaign Manager. She is still there as a visceral Counter-Revolutionary. And since 1989 a steady stream of Counter-Revolutionary Cuban-Americans in Miami, all powered by the Bush dynasty and by Little Havana's dominance of Miami politics, has reached the U. S. Congress. That, of course, includes prime Trump-"adviser" Rubio as well as Carlos Curbelo -- second from the left above -- as well as the Diaz-Balart Brothers, Havana-born Lincoln on the far left and, of course, Mario on the far right.

      Across the Atlantic Ocean in London, the BBC used the above AFP photo in an article telling the world about President Trump's upcoming trip to Miami on June 16-2017, the city and the date in which Trump will essentially declare war on Cuba to sate the fervent desires of a mere handful of Cuban-Americans.

     The side-by-side U. S. and Cuban flags fronting a street in Havana reflects how the BBC-AFP, as non-American -- thus non-intimidated -- international news organizations told their worldwide audiences how President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with Cuba has massively helped everyday Cubans on the island as well as many Americans and Cuban-Americans via increased business and social interactions.

       While the mainstream U. S. media is too afraid or too politically correct to report fairly about Cuba, there are exceptions in some key non-national newspapers -- such as the Houston Chronicle. The Ramon Espinosa/AP photo above, which shows Cubans at sunset on Havana's famed Malecon seawall, was used by the Chronicle this weekend to illustrate an article entitled: "ENGAGE CUBA: End The Embargo And Press Forward On Improving Relations with the Island Nation." The article stressed how Trump's June 16th-2017 declaration of war against Cuba will harm millions of innocent Cubans, Cuban-Americans and Americans to sate the nefarious appetites of a few Counter-Revolutionaries by reversing Obama's policies that "unwound bits and pieces of the U. S. trade embargo put in place in 1962 to topple Fidel Castro...it failed but remains in place." By remaining it place it has enriched and empowered some Counter-Revolutionaries and rightly resulted in an international 191-to-0 condemnation of the United States in the United Nations. The article also called Trump's upcoming June 16th announcement a "political payoff" to Counter-Revolutionaries, which he can do because he can assume apathetic and unpatriotic Americans will allow him to do it. The Houston Chronicle article this week also states bluntly and factually that "Trump's main goal is to curry favor with the same old Miami crowd that has held U.S.-Cuba policy hostage for years."

        The Cuba-United States conundrum has actually held the U. S. hostage since 1952 when the American people didn't object to right-wing thugs in Washington aligning the U. S. with the Mafia to support the brutal, thieving Batista dictatorship in Cuba. After the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, the American people didn't object to an ongoing, unending and unpunished sequence of terrorist acts against totally innocent Cubans, such as the Oct. 6-1976 bombing of the child-laden civilian Cubana Flight 455 in which the Miami media was joyously used to herald the chant: "It's the biggest blow yet against Castro!!" Was it, or was it one of the many Biggest Blows against the U. S. democracy? In any case, with that backdrop since 1952, don't expect the American people, beginning on June 16th-2017, to give a damn even if Trump would announce plans for a nuclear Bay of Pigs against Cuba. But, for the record, decent Americans should at least be cognizant of that exact sentence in this week's Houston Chronicle:

                 "Trump's main goal is to curry favor with the same old Miami crowd that has held U.S.-Cuba policy hostage for years."

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