Diaz-Canel Stays Firm in New York

Stresses Friends, Not Foes!

  The photo above shows Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel joyfully addressing the friendly audience at Harlem's famed Riverside Church in New York City yesterday -- Sept. 27th, 2018. The three topics that garnered him the biggest applause were: the Embargo ["Blockade"], Trump, and Imperialism. His closing words were: "Hasta la victoria, siempre. Muchos gracias." ["Until victory, always. Thank you very much."].

     The Miami Herald's key reporter on Cuban issues, Nora Gamez Torres, used President Diaz-Canel's appearance at Riverside Church in Cuba-friendly Harlem to slam Cuba. She stressed that Cuban officials barred or booted out "accredited press from the U. S. and Europe" including journalists from the Miami Herald, el Nuevo Herald, New York Times, EFE, Telemundo, and OnCuba. The surprise appearance of Venezuela's embattled President Nicolas Maduro apparently persuaded both Diaz-Canel and Diaz-Canel's U. S. Secret Service guards to keep antagonistic journalists from inside the church. Prior to Maduro's official appearance, some of those reporters were inside the church but then escorted outside. One female member of Cuba's security team said, "Safety trumps everything else." She then smiled, remembering the verb she had used, and grinned shyly as she said, "No, I was not thinking of the noun Trump! Just the verb."

    Since Sunday, the Cuban plane at John F. Kennedy Airport and President Miguel Diaz-Canel's first trip to U. S. soil in New York City have been safe...and even productive and successful.

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The Biggest Threat to USA?

Bob Dickey, NOT Donald Trump!!

    Yes, President Donald Trump and what he represents to right-wing extremists in the USA is a threat to the United States democracy as we have known it since 1776. But I firmly believe that Bob Dickey and what he represents to the left-wing fringe in the USA is actually a far bigger threat to the USA democracy than Donald Trump and his ilk will ever be. That's because Bob Dickey and left-wing extremists like him have far more wealth and power than the right-wing fringe has. The left-wingers also have a more obscenely funded choir representing about 10% of the U. S. population while the right-wing fringe, which also has about a 10% choir, cannot bellow quite so loudly as the left-wing extremists. Those two very dangerous fringes leave about 80% of the moderate, democracy-loving Americans out in the cold without a legitimate voice. And that's why I believe Bob Dickey represents a far bigger threat to the USA than...Donald Trump, Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, or Global Warming. Now allow me to attempt to prove my point.

     Bob Dickey is the President and CEO of Gannett Corporation, which owns a vast and ungodly array of American newspapers, including the USA's largest -- USA Today. While most Americans want to get rid of the Trump presidency, the 80% of decent Americans want that done via the democratic electoral process, meaning The Vote that might create a qualified electable President in January of 2020. But Bob Dickey's Gannett-USA Today media monopoly is aligned in a vast media coup to dethrone President Trump far outside democracy's cherished electoral process. Aligned solidly with Dickey's Gannett-USA Today coup are other media monopolies owned by multi-billionaire individuals and corporations such as the richest man in the world {left-wing Cuban-American Jeff Bezos} and many of the richest corporations in the world {such as Disney, Comcast, etc.}. Thus, conspiring with Bob Dickey's Gannett-USA Today dire urgency to dethrone Trump are: The NY Times, Bezos' Washington Post, CNN, NBC, MSNBC, CBS, and ABC.

    So, I'll return to the Gannett-USA Today boss Bob Dickey to make my point. While Dickey's empire is engage is a sustained media coup to eliminate President Trump apart from letting the voters do it, Dickey also epitomizes the fact that the mainstream media in the USA, in addition to forsaking journalistic integrity standards, also lacks guts. Yesterday {Sept. 26-2018}, for example, a lying USA Today headline screamed: "Cuba's New President Sticks to Old Script at United Nations." Quite cowardly, while unabashedly lying to the USA's citizens, that article didn't have either the guts or the integrity to point out that Cuba's new President, Miguel Diaz-Canel, is forced to stick to Cuba's "old script" because the United States since 1959, on behalf of the Counter Revolutionary Cuban extremists, have STUCK to the same SCRIPT for over six decades!! In that regard, as an unimportant and non-extremist member of the voiceless 80% of decent democracy-loving Americans, I would like to ask Bob Dickey two questions:

           {1} "I am aware, sir, that the top Cuban-American newsman in Miami, Emilio Milian, was car-bombed when he denounced such Counter Revolutionary tactics as the airplane-bombing of a child-laden Cuban civilian plane. Are such warnings your excuse for lying and distorting Cuba issues?"

           {2} "Mr. Dickey, Thomas Jefferson was among the Founding Fathers who believed that a free and viable press was even more important to the U. S. democracy than the U. S. government itself. If we discount your 10% left-wing fringe and the 10% right-wing fringe, most of us in the 80% moderate majority seem to wholeheartedly agree that the mainstream media in the USA today, like your USA Today, is nothing more and nothing less than a huge propaganda machine dictating the views of the left-wing and right-wing extremists while ignoring the 80% that can be considered democracy-lovers. If that is not so, Mr. Dickey, why is your media empire engaged in a vast media coup to overturn the 2016 presidential election...and why does your media empire not have either the guts or the integrity to report fairly on Cuban issues, a topic that got the USA condemned by both President Obama AND the entire world via the 191-to-0 vote in the UN in 2016?"

Meanwhile:

     This was Cuba's new President, Miguel Diaz-Canel, making an important speech at the United Nations in New York yesterday -- Sept. 26-2018. This was the speech that USA Today and the rest of the mainstream U. S. media typically lied about. But for the record, directly replying to President Trump's earlier Cuban lies at the UN, Diaz-Canel significantly said: "Inequality and poverty around the world are not the result of socialism, as the President of the United States claimed yesterday before this assembly. They are the consequences of capitalism, especially imperialism and neoliberalism." Now on Cubaninsider I am not debating whether Trump or Diaz-Canel is correct regarding whether socialism or capitalism is the primary cause of "inequality and poverty around the world." BUT WHAT I AM DEBATING, with Bob Dickey and the rest of the media elite, is this: There are two sides to the socialism-capitalism debate and two sides to the U.S.-Cuba debate and two sides to the Trump/Diaz-Canel debate. And with that being said, the USA...of all nations...drastically needs a mainstream U. S. media with both the guts and integrity to provide both sides of two-sided issues. Instead, the USA today has a mainstream media that is nothing more and nothing less than a vast propaganda machine. And that, to my mind, makes Bob Dickey and his ilk more of a threat to the U. S. democracy than Donald Trump and his ilk.

    The image above depicts the Cuban channel Dominio Cuba providing live television coverage back to Cuba of this week's United Nations session. Primarily, of course, it focused on President Miguel Diaz-Canel's two prime speeches at the UN but also his meetings with many top U. S. business leaders, such as Eric Schmidt of Google; Cuba-friendly politicians like Congresswoman Kathy Castor from Tampa, European Union leader Federica Mogherini, and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio; and the leaders of many countries even including Argentina's new USA-backed President Mauricio Macri who supposedly will now support the Trump/Rubio-led assaults on Cuba. Well-educated journalists in Cuba, especially now that Diaz-Canel is President, have outlets such as Dominio Cuba, Cubavision International, etc., that are more-and-more provided the wherewithal to make live televised presentations to the Cuban people even from many foreign nations.

    As with the live coverage of President Miguel Diaz-Canel's UN appearances this week being beamed back to Cuba, the island's new leader loves the medium of television. He has told his Ministers: "I want each of you to present yourselves for television news reports in which you tell the people exactly what you are doing to solve their problems, and if you are doing nothing, tell them that too. I want the people to judge if we are dealing with the issues that directly concern them, and television news reports are the means to do that because we are blessed with excellent broadcast journalists."

    The most notable broadcast journalist in Cuba is Cristina Escobar, shown here in a photo this week taken by photo-journalist Roberto Garaycoa Martinez. So how good is Cristina? As a television news anchor and interviewer, either in Spanish or English, Cristina is probably the best all-around broadcast journalist in the Western Hemisphere. At least, that reputation has made Cristina a regular source of information on U.S.-Cuban relations to media giants like the BBC and has earned Cristina speaking engagements at U. S. universities on the topics of Cuba and journalism. AND OH YES!! Cristina is the only Cuban journalist to ever ask questions at a White House news conference...so she made history on U. S. soil.

     Andrea Mitchell, the long-time top Foreign Correspondent at NBC, as well as former President Barack Obama are among the Americans who admire Cristina Escobar's skills as a broadcaster. That's why she was invited to ask questions at a White House news conference, as shown above. She thoroughly dominated the session, asking four questions plus two follow-ups. One of her questions revealed that President Obama intended to become the first sitting U. S. President since 1928 to visit Cuba.

    The White House news conference resulted in Cristina Escobar being interviewed by U. S. journalists. From those interviews came two pertinent quotations from Cristina that, perhaps, Americans should ponder from a Cuban broadcaster that is a star in Cuba and, if she chose, could be a star in America. She said: {1} "Cuba's fate should be decided by Cubans on the island, not Cubans in Miami or in the U. S. Congress;" and {2} "Cuban journalists have more freedom to tell the truth about the U. S. than U. S. journalists have to tell the truth about Cuba."

      I am not suggesting that Americans should agree totally with the above two quotations made on U. S. soil by Cuba's brilliant broadcast journalist Cristina Escobar. But what I am suggesting is this: {1} She believes what she said and she knows enough about Cuba and the U. S. to have formed those opinions; and {2} I believe Americans owe it to America to show some open-minded guts and patriotism when it comes to U.S.-Cuban issues, as opposed to being like clapping trained seals who accept and applaud everything Counter Revolutionaries and the U. S. media say about the topic, Cuba, that probably demeans the U. S. more than any other topic.

For example:

     While being interviewed live from Havana on an international TV hook-up, Cristina Escobar wondered out loud: "Why is it...you tell me...that Americans are not embarrassed when a UN vote of the world's nations condemns America's Cuban policy by a 191-to-0 vote, and President Obama agreed with that unanimous condemnation?" And to be perfectly honest, as a democracy-loving American, I have wondered the very same thing. Indeed, do the last couple of generations of Americans lack the intelligence, the courage and the patriotism to be "embarrassed" about that vote and about the sheer fact that a small cabal of right-wing thugs have dictated America's Cuban policies since 1952 -- first from Havana and then, since 1959, from Little Havana in Miami and in Republican-controlled Congresses and White Houses? Cristina Escobar, Cuba's well-versed journalist, has the courage to express opinions about the subject, something Americans seem incapable of doing.

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Cuba's New Secret Weapon

A Smart & Powerful First Lady

     Cuba has a new First Lady, Lis Cuesta, and a new President, Miguel Diaz-Canel. While her husband projects as a strong leader, she is considered by Cuban insiders to be just as forceful and perhaps just as powerful. Although she leaves all of the upfront business to him, she is his rock and she powerfully influences any major thing he does. On his high-profile UN visit to New York City this week, he has the spotlight but she is his choreographer...and that's precisely how he wants it to be.

     When Cuba's President and First Lady are out in public on the island, Lis Cuesta usually walks in front of Miguel Diaz-Canel.

    Both First Lady Lis Cuesta and President Miguel Diaz-Canel are people friendly and mingle easily in crowds of everyday Cubans. His presidency has popular support.

    Like her husband Miguel who was Cuba's former Education Minister, Lis Cuesta is obsessed with maintaining the island's high-priority educational system. In this photo, Lis proudly watches as a student explains her school's daily routine to visiting foreign observers. Notice Lis's flag-accentuated clothing.

     And, oh yes...Cuba's First Lady Lis Cuesta is very active on social media. Her latest Twitter post says: "Cuba is ready to promote an improvement in bilateral relations with the United States and take advantage of the possibilities of cooperation between the two countries, based on equality and mutual respect." And today when First Lady Lis Cuesta makes such a statement, it is every bit as significant as it would be if President Diaz-Canel had made it. Lis is Cuba's new Secret Weapon.

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U.S. Businesses Court Diaz-Canel

Led by Google in New York!!

     The photo above -- taken yesterday, Sept. 25-2018 in New York City -- illustrates how badly the highest echelon of U. S. business executives want to do business with Cuba. Cuba's new President, Miguel Diaz-Canel, is shown being wooed by Google's top executive Eric Schmidt and Google's Brett Perlmutter, who already heads a Google office in Havana. Schmidt, in fact, also arranged for other top U. S. business leaders to join Diaz-Canel at the meeting held at Google's New York headquarters. The company execs on hand, led by the Google leaders, included...Twitter, Microsoft, Vagner Media, Connectify, Virgin Group, Mapbox, Airbnb, Revolution, Udacity, Bloomberg, etc., etc. All those companies were taking advantage of President Miguel Diaz-Canel's whirlwind trip to the United Nations in New York this week. The Miami Herald reported that Diaz-Canel told the business executives: "The principal obstacle to your involvement in Cuba is not Cuba. It is the blockade that you call the embargo that has been in existence since 1962."

     Of course, anything -- such as Diaz-Canel's meeting at the Google offices in New York yesterday -- that even hints at cooperation between the U. S. and Cuba causes the Counter Revolutionary extremists in Miami and in the U. S. Congress to go ballistic. The Miami Herald reports that, in reaction to Cuban President Diaz-Canel being on U. S. soil this week, four Cuban-Americans fired off a blistering letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The four members of Congress who signed the hastily composed letter were: Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Carlos Curbelo, Mario Diaz-Balart, and Albio Sires. The photo above shows four Cuba-American members of the U. S. Congress from Miami. At the podium is Havana-born Ileana Ros-Lehtinen who has been entrenched in Congress since 1989 when the self-serving Jeb Bush was her Campaign Manager; at Ros-Lehtinen's right shoulder is Carlos Curbelo; on the left is Havana-born Lincoln Diaz-Balart and on the right is Mario Diaz-Balart. The Diaz-Balart brothers are the sons of Rafael Diaz-Balart, a key Minister in the overthrown Batista dictatorship who then, beginning in 1959, became one of the richest and most powerful Counter Revolutionaries in Miami, followed at his death by his two sons who both have been elected to the U. S. Congress. As indicated this week by the reaction to President Diaz-Canel's visit to New York City, such Counter Revolutionary extremists, since 1959, have been allowed to dictate almost all of the Cuban narratives and almost all of the Cuban laws in the United States. And, of course, from generation to generation, they firmly believe they should be permitted to continue that lucrative endeavor.

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Diaz-Canel's Friend In New York

She's Mostly America's Friend!!

     On this week's visit to the United Nations in New York City, Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel met with Cuba's best friend in the U. S. Congress -- Kathy Castor. Born 52 years ago in Miami, Ms. Castor has represented the Tampa area of Florida for six terms in the U. S. Congress -- since 2007. On her Website, she wrote: "I met with Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel during his visit to the United Nations General Assembly today. During the meeting, I stressed the importance of continued dialogue and engagement between the United States and Cuba to benefit the citizens of both countries." Ms. Castor said she urged Diaz-Canel to carry through on two things he has already strongly supported -- "increasing Internet access on the island and helping the Cuban private sector."

    Miami-born U. S. Congresswoman Kathy Castor is unique as: The only politician Florida has sent to the U. S. Congress since 1959 with the courage and integrity to campaign openly for engagement with Revolutionary Cuba. In her hometown of Miami, the top Cuban-American newsman, Emilio Milian, was car-bombed after he denounced such egregious atrocities as the terrorist bombing of the child-laden Cubana Flight 455 civilian airplane that killed all 73 on board, including two dozen teenage athletes. Yet, Congresswoman Castor's brave message is supported by most Floridians, even at the polls sometimes, because she has the guts and the decency to stress the benefits of U.S.-Cuban engagement to both Cubans on the island and Americans in Florida, including Cuban-Americans.

    When former President Barack Obama very bravely and sanely tried to normalize relations between the USA and Cuba, Congresswoman Castor was often at his side, even on Air Force One, influencing Obama's Cuban directives. But Obama, incredibly, was replaced in the White House by Donald Trump, a Republican...and all six Republican presidents since the 1950s have been tightly aligned, politically and economically, with rich and powerful Counter Revolutionary extremists.

     Thus, a Miami-born U. S. Congresswoman representing Tampa in the past 12 years has displayed more guts than 300+ million cowardly U. S. citizens who have, since the 1950s, not had the courage to object when right-wing thugs sicced the Mafia on Cuba in 1952 to facilitate the rape-and-robbery of the island to benefit a few rich Americans...nor object in 1959 when the leaders of the overthrown Batista-Mafia dictatorship in Cuba quickly and eternally established their new capital of Little Havana in nearby Miami. Since the 1950s, Congresswoman Kathy Castor remains the only prominent Florida politician to advocate for decency and sanity in the USA's relations with Cuba. That is a dire reflection of how drastically the Batista-Mafia adventure in Cuba and in the USA has changed the U. S. democracy.

    And, yes, when Congresswoman Kathy Castor posted the above photo along with her comments about her meeting in New York with Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel, her Website was immediately besieged with blasphemous anti-Castor rhetoric. Meanwhile, neither the U. S. citizens nor the mainstream U. S. media have the courage to comment.

     And meantime, since 1959 a handful of Counter Revolutionary extremists -- with the help of self-serving entities such as the Bush dynasty, the Tea Party, etc. -- have dictated both the Cuban narrative in the U. S. and the Cuban laws designed to enrich & empower themselves while engaging in a six-decades-old effort to regain control of Cuba. Of course, in the meantime Americans are force-fed such "historic logic" as, "The mob did not 'run' pre-Castro Cuba." OF COURSE, NOT!! The Batista-Mafia dictatorship treated the Cuban people just as sweetly as Mother Teresa would have treated them!! Now you understand that, RIGHT? Uh, right...so let's keep it this way for another 6 decades!!

And by the way:

     Above is a hand-written note Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel wrote in New York City today -- 25/9/18.

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President Diaz-Canel Impressive at UN

Strong Peace Speech!!

Photo courtesy: Rosy Amaro Perez

    Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel on Sept. 24th, 2018 made a strong speech at the Peace Summit at the United Nations in New York. In a passionate reminder to the world, Diaz-Canel's words were a powerful denunciation of the U. S. embargo that the world already agrees has greatly harmed the Cuban people since 1962. His statement acknowledged the fact that the U. S. has a veto at the UN and the U. S. is the world's economic and military power. But, stressing humanity, he said:

             "There cannot be development without peace and stability, nor can there be peace or stability without development."

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Cuban President on U. S. Soil

Diaz-Canel Arrived Yesterday!!

    Cuba's new President Miguel Diaz-Canel arrived in the United States yesterday -- Sunday, September 23rd, 2018. His primary mission is to starkly denounce the U. S. embargo against Cuba at the United Nations and in other venues, such as when he meets with New York City mayor Bill de Blasio and when he speaks at the historic Cuban-friendly Riverside Church. In fact, President Diaz-Canel had this bitter statement within minutes after he touched down on U. S. soil Sunday: "We bring the voice of Cuba that above all comes to denounce the abnormal policy of the blockade, a policy that has already failed, that will continue to fail, and that is the longest blockade in the history of humanity."

     This is the Cuban airplane that now sits on United States soil at John F. Kennedy Airport after bringing President Diaz-Canel to New York City.

      The highlight of President Diaz-Canel's first trip to the U. S. will be Wednesday's address at the United Nations when his primary focus will be on denouncing the U. S. embargo that he calls a "blockade." But the AFP photo above heralds the fact that Diaz-Canel not only made an anti-embargo statement when he first stepped on U. S. soil and a bit later when he told journalists, "Havana seeks a civilized relationship with the United States despite our ideological differences." He then added, "Of course, the administration of President Trump is difficult to form a relationship with."

    The photo above courtesy of Dominio Cuba and Rosa Miriam Elizalde shows Cuba's President Miguel Diaz-Canel besieged by journalists upon his arrival in New York City.

  A non-Castro and a non-Revolutionary, Miguel Diaz-Canel took over as Cuba's new President on April 19-2018 and turned 58-years-old the very next day, meaning he was born after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution. But make no mistake, he is a fierce defender of "everything the Revolution stands for -- namely, independence but also dignity for the Cuban people who have ruled their island since 1959 after centuries of rule and exploitation from Spain and the United States." Prior to becoming Cuba's President Diaz-Canel was the island's Education Minister and First Vice President. He has considerable support from Cubans all across the island -- including the well-educated, restive young-adults who bitterly oppose the "blockade" and strongly support Diaz-Canel's "reforma" policies. 

     Tasked with improving Cuba's economy and surviving the historic U. S. economic blockade, first imposed in 1962, President Diaz-Canel is stressing foreign investment, less bureaucratic obstacles to private enterprise, and he has keenly studied the market-fueled socialist economies in Communist China and Communist Vietnam, both of whom have flourished economically thanks to friendly deals with the USA. But, as with the quote above, Diaz-Canel abhors "capitalism" because he says it "shamefully enriches the few on the backs of the many."

    Not only is Miguel Diaz-Canel Cuba's new President but the Cuban Parliament has recently drafted a new "reforma" Constitution that is remarkably different from the current one that has been in effect since 1976. The new constitution, which bears Diaz-Canel's imprint, is currently being publicly debated at 24,000 scheduled meetings all across the island and then will be submitted to a nationwide referendum vote early in 2019.

    Cuba's new leader Diaz-Canel is the first non-Castro to lead the island since 1959. But that salient fact, as Diaz-Canel well knows, means very little to the vast Castro Cottage Industry in the United States that has profited so fantastically from its new capital of Little Havana in Miami since 1959. Diaz-Canel has referred to that industry as "a Golden Goose atop six decades of revenge against the necessary Revolution that has opposed them since the 1950s to this day and beyond."

    While Cuba has a new President and is getting a new Constitution, both strongly supported by Cubans on the island, President Miguel Diaz-Canel is faced with an age-old problem: In all Republican administrations since 1959, America's Cuban policies have been dictated by a fierce minority of Counter Revolutionary Cubans who have never had problems acquiring the necessary amount of self-serving sycophants -- right-wing Congressmen, the Bush dynasty, the Tea Party, etc. And Diaz-Canel's refreshing leadership of Cuba coincides with another Republican U. S. President...Trump...who has reversed former Democratic President Obama's friendly gestures towards Cuba and shamefully returned the U. S. Cuban policies back over to the most greedy and vindictive miscreants in Miami and in Washington. About 90% of the mainstream U. S. media is currently engaged in a fierce media-coup to overthrow Trump, yet that 90% lacks the courage to even criticize Trump's genocidal policies against Cuban children on the island. Diaz-Canel, prior to his arrival in the U. S. Sunday, said, "The U. S. UN veto can dismiss a 191-to-0 vote of the world nations that favor our sustained protection of Cuba's children, and the U.S.'s unique military power can permit it to continue to punish another generation of Cuban children, but neither of those things means might is right. Most of the time might is wrong, unless it is wielded by decent people who respect other people."

     Cuban President Diaz-Canel, after arriving in the U. S. Sunday, will address the UN Wednesday, September 26, 2018. That will be 58 years to the day after Fidel Castro's first UN address.

     Yes, I repeat: Cuba's President Miguel Diaz-Canel's first speech this week at the UN will take place Wednesday, September 26, 2018 -- EXACTLY 58 years to the day after Fidel Castro's historic first UN speech on September 26, 1960.

     The photo above shows Fidel Castro making that speech at the UN on Sept. 26-1960. This was the Fidel who set a lot of all-time records during his 90 years on this earth...and he set a record on Sept. 26-1960 that will never be broken. This speech lasted FOUR HOURS and 29 MINUTES. No one has, or ever will, come close to that record at the UN although Fidel himself topped it multiple times in the open-air hot sun at Revolutionary Sqaure in Havana.

    While in New York to speak at the UN, Fidel laughed at the front-page headline in the New York Journal-American about the latest assassination attempt against him, many of them admittedly by the CIA and also by bragging and well-known Cuban exiles. Credible sources, including the Guinness Book of World Records, confirmed "638" such attempts, a record -- like the 1960 UN speech -- that'll never be broken.

 Fidel died of natural causes at age 90.

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