Babalu Blog: Bitchslapping Ana Menendez

February 28, 2007

Bitchslapping Ana Menendez - UPDATED

Robert takes Ana Menendez out behind the woodshed and gives her a well deserved sopapo or two:

Harmless Spies
It's been a while since I've fisked an Ana Menendez column, so when I read her column this morning, whistles and bells went off.

It's time to dust off the fisking machine.

Ana's reaction to the sentencing of Cuban spies Carlos and Elsa Alvarez is the subject of her column this morning. Apparently, she thinks the Alvarezes were victims of "misguided pride" who were trying to "persuade Cuba and the United States to make nice". The fact that she even tries to justify and/or downplay their acts is shameful, IMHO.

Contained in the dry court documents are all the personal betrayals and self-important skullduggeries that through coups, revolution and exile have remained a constant feature of Cuban political life.
In that context, Carlos' biggest sin was not ''spying'' but pride. Pride that he could game Cuban intelligence. Pride that he could be the agent of change by betraying friends. And pride that his academically informed ''conflict resolution'' skills could penetrate the miasma of cynicism and calculation that has crippled U.S.-Cuba relations this last half-century.

Here's some of the "harmless" personal information the Alvarezes had on their computer and which they shared with a foreign country, an enemy regime:

• FIU president Modesto Maidique's personal finances and private business ventures.

• A ''redacted'' U.S. government study on the "status of telecommunications in Cuba.''

• Brothers to the Rescue leader José Basulto, including that ''an investigation should continue'' into "the ties he has to the CIA, the Cuban American [National] Foundation and financial interests such as Bacardi.''

• A personal contact who had met with Richard Nuccio, then-President Bill Clinton's special advisor for Cuba, who ''was very depressed'' by Cuba's shootdown of two Brothers to the Rescue planes killing three Cuban-American men and a Cuban exile and the subsequent Helms Burton law toughening the U.S. embargo against Cuba.

• Lula Rodriguez, a Miami-Dade Democrat who later became personal assistant to then-Attorney General Janet Reno and eventually deputy assistant secretary of state for public affairs in the Clinton administration.

Here's Ana's justification of these actions:

Whatever combination of personal ambition and hopeless naiveté first led Carlos to open up to Cuban intelligence and then to the FBI, we can never really know. Neither can we know who ultimately served him up to U.S. prosecutors; that information is secret.
But the picture that emerges of Carlos and Elsa is less one of hardened spies than of two highly educated and religious people who assumed everyone shared their lofty ideals. A member of an underground anti-Castro student movement, Carlos eventually fled to America and grew to believe he could persuade Cuba and the United States to make nice.
...
This is not intelligence to make or break a country. This is theater of the cliché. By the time Carlos received a commendation from Cuba in 1991, he should have known he was being played in a game he'd long since lost control of.

Is Ana that naive to think that Cuba would have just stopped at gathering personal information on influential exiles? What do we wait for, leaked information on our ports and nuclear facilities? Do we wait for another Ana Belen Montes to show up?

I know. Ridiculous. But it gets better. Ana saves the best for last.

And then the judge sentenced him to hard time. Carlos thought he could be a one-man foreign policy machine and ended up betraying friends and trusting scumbags. The over-the-top hysteria and paranoia surrounding his slight story now must be giving Fidel sweet solace in his last days.
In the end, Carlos Alvarez's biggest victim was Carlos Alvarez. The bigger tragedy would be if the cause of moderate Cubans goes down with him. One suspects that, for the Cubans at least, that was the goal all along.

It's those insufferable hard-liners once again, causing a ruckus with their "paranoia" about those harmless spies. Of course, Ana asserts that the biggest tragedy isn't the fact that personal information was given to the castros, but that the "cause of moderate Cubans" is going down with the Alvarezes.

Un. Believeable.

Here's a man who was commended by the Cuban regime in 1991 for his invaluable work. If Alvarez is indeed a representation of the moderate Cubans, then we're really in bad shape.

Or Ana Menendez's vision of reality is totally warped. My bet in on the latter. And that's the best I can say about Ana.

UPDATE FROM HENRY:

I just wanted to add to Robert's excellent points. What Ms. Menendez conveniently fails to mention is that the nature of the actual information they gave Cuban intelligence is under seal. The prosecutor's sentencing memorandum only refers superficially to some of the content but for reasons of privacy (of the victims) does not give much more detail. The judge did have access to that information though, and I'm sure that influenced his decision.

Also, keep in mind that the info that got them 6 and 3 years respectively is merely what the FBI was able to recover from the computer after it had been erased. Alvarez was spying for 30 years and his wife was assisting him for at least 25. Who knows what else they did during that time?

And lastly, let's not forget the access these people had to psychological profiles of law enforcement officials in South Florida. Having private information about one's psychological make-up and any pecadillos the person may have committed is an incredible tool for blackmail and for "turning" a person into a compromised person.

If they weren't guilty of a serious crime, why did they plead guilty? If the evidence is on their side they should have fought to clear their name. Nobody elected Carlos Alvarez to be "a one-man foreign policy machine". We have elections to pick the people that represent us and conduct our foreign policy. Whatever his motivations, Alvarez' actions undermined that policy.

Posted by Val Prieto at February 28, 2007 09:39 AM

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Comments

I can think of a third possibility...

Posted by: Eleggua at February 28, 2007 08:57 AM

On castro's daughter's radio show they were bothered that the judge gave them such a "harsh" sentence! I wish the judge would have given them a much harsher sentence! The US knows of plenty of other spies it could prosecute any time it chooses to!

Posted by: Jose Aguirre at February 28, 2007 09:07 AM

I think Ana is part of the battle of ideas and is on the payroll of the castro regime. Her bias is just to obvious, her article could be printed in Granma without censorship.

Tango

Posted by: Tango_1250 at February 28, 2007 09:13 AM

I'm of the opinion that if you even give scum like Adolf and Fidel the correct time of day you're a collaborator!

Posted by: Tomas Estrada-Palma at February 28, 2007 09:57 AM

Lets not forget that K. Michael Moore, who handed down the sentences, reviewed ALL the evidence. He didn't relly on incomplete (and perhaps inaccurate) newspaper reports about these defendants' activities.

Judge Moore is a Federal Judge, not subject to popular election and therefor insulated from popular sentiment. He is not, as far as I know, of Cuban descent. Any argument that this is an example of intransigent Cuban exile hysteria is baseless.

Ms. Menendez' attempt to down play the importance of these long time spies/moles/agents (whatever) is not grounded in fact and is puzzling.

Posted by: LittleGator at February 28, 2007 10:50 AM

LG,

Puzzling? Its not puzzling. It's called an agenda.

Posted by: Val Prieto at February 28, 2007 10:56 AM

I feel that you are too kind to Ana Menendez say that she needs a SOPAPO. What she really needs is una pata por C**o. Maybe she should asked the parents and siblings of dead Cuban-Americans and Cubans about "misplaced Pride" that got them murdered by Castros spys.

Posted by: Henry Agueros at February 28, 2007 12:03 PM

Too "harsh" a punishment? Five years for him and three years for her? Which means that he'll be out in three years and she in one? Not quite what that other famous spying couple the Rosenbergs got. Not even what Jonathan Pollard got. What did they expect the government to give them? Time served? A slap on the hand? The Presidential Medal of Freedom?

Posted by: Manuel A. Tellechea at February 28, 2007 01:23 PM

One thing you can be sure of. When the professorial spies are released, there will no shortage of job offers. Every liberal university in the country will be vying for the services of these triple traitors — to Cuba, the U.S. and their friends; the perfect prototypes of Castro's "New Man" and "New Woman." I pity their poor 12-year old daughter raised in this country. She was the most betrayed of all.

Posted by: Manuel A. Tellechea at February 28, 2007 01:29 PM

The Cuban regime's international campaign to free THE FIVE spies convicted in the U.S. should now be modified to THE SEVEN.

Posted by: delacova at February 28, 2007 02:13 PM

The sentence should have been longer. What ticks me off is that not only were they spies but they were university professors and they probably did have a subversive influence on many students here at FIU. Man, the liberals here really fill my cup, the English department here makes you throw up.
Manuel is right, these liberal universities will probably open their arms to the spies.

And Ana Menendez can speak for her own wretched self, because calling spies moderate is like calling a dictator misunderstood. Perhaps she gave herself away because if her definition of a spy is a "moderate" then since she considers herself a "moderate" wouldn't she be calling herself a spy as well.

Posted by: qbanartemisa at March 1, 2007 10:50 AM

"Wrap her up in a package of lies
Send her off to a coconut island
I am not worried - I am not overly concerned
. . .
And Anna begins to toss and turn
And every word is nonsense but I understand it and
Oh, Lord. I'm not ready for this sort of thing."
Anna Begins--Counting Crows

"So, Annie Are You Ok
Are You Ok Annie
Annie Are You Ok
So, Annie Are You Ok
Are You Ok Annie
You've Been Hit By
You've Been Hit By-
A Smooth Blogger."
Smooth Blogger--Alien Ant Farm

Posted by: mrcs_Concepcion at March 2, 2007 11:44 PM

February 28, 2007

Bitchslapping Ana Menendez - UPDATED

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