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Ziva, GREAT POST!

It's about time that someone starts applying the 'heat' to the ENABLERS/SUPPORTERS of the criminals, as well as the criminals themselves!

Ziva, GREAT POST!

It's about time that someone starts applying the 'heat' to the ENABLERS/SUPPORTERS of the criminals, as well as TO the criminals themselves!

Congradulations Ziva! Another piece that hits the nail square on the head! The most important sentence in your post is:

"The Spanish people have free multi-party elections; therefore the government of Spain is your representative on the world stage."

And how true this is! This is what others don't understand about Cuba and it drives me crazy! fidel castro--may here be dead as we speak and rotting in hell--speaks in the royal "we" as if he talks for the Cuban people. And the world, especially the MSM accept this nonsense! Castro speaks no more for the Cuban people than I speak for Eskimos. Spain on the other hand--as you point out-- does have a government that speaks for its people. Unfortunately, Spaniards seem to have an obsession with Cuba. About 2 years ago, I was at Rome International Airport waiting for my flight back to the USA when I met a Spanish woman who was waiting for a flight back to Spain. I told her that I am Cuban and of course, she instantly started telling me how much she wanted to go to Cuba for a vacation. This has happened to me more than once. Spaniards have an obsession with Cuba, but they don't distinquish between castro--who is our plight-- and the Island and her people.

It is a very sad disconnect that has caused us great pain since we are linked by blood ties to our mother country.

Bravo Ziva. Perhaps those upset in the Spanish community with the BUCL campaign should read your comments. Perhaps they will finally understand.
BTW it was a pleasure to meet you at the convention.

Spaniards have a skewed perspective on Cuba because of their innate anti-Americanism. This is a result of their ignominious defeat during the Spanish-Cuban-American War. After decades of abusing and massacring the Cuban population, American volunteers with little military experience destroyed their empire in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines in a mere three months in 1898. Resentful Spaniards have never gotten over this. On the centenary of the war in 1898, there was an outpouring of frustration in the Spanish newspapers of how they could and should have won the war. It reminded me of some U.S. Southerners who are still fighting the American Civil War on paper.
Fascist dictator Francisco Franco promoted the concept of Hispanidad in the 1940s, exalting Spain's moral and spiritual values and rejecting American liberal democracy, materialism, and cultural domination. Most Spaniards still believe this today. This is the same ideology they share with Fidel Castro. That's why Franco, in spite of his professed anti-Communism, was Fidel Castro's ally and the Cuban merchant marine fleet was built in Spain under Franco. The Spaniards still have not apologized for the Cuban Holocaust of their Reconcentrado policy, which caused the death of 170,000 Cubans during the War of Independence. Don't expect those who are ideologically in tune with Castro on Hispanidad and anti-Americanism to denounce their hero.

I essentially agree with everything stated in the Delacova comment above. When it comes to Cuba, the Spanish simply don't have a leg to stand on, which makes any defensiveness on their part a case of adding insult to injury. Spain has historically screwed Cuba up, down and sideways, and that's been going on WAY before Zapatero and company. I don't have the slightest sympathy for their "hurt feelings" or whatever they call it. That just makes me more angry because it's just plain denial (if not worse).

I've totally had it with sentimental arguments and the "mother country" business. If a mother acts like an unfeeling, selfish, spiteful bitch to her children, she's no less a bitch for being a mother--just the opposite. Spain is so deep in the hole of shame and dishonor regarding Cuba that the mind boggles. If it can't or won't face that, I'm not willing to cut it any more slack.

Cubans already did that, BIG time, after the War of Independence, despite the horrors of Weyler's concentration camps, despite the fact that Cuba was laid waste, and despite all the other suffering and deaths that need not have happened. And how did Spain repay such tolerance, generosity and forbearance? By doing business with Castro and enabling his regime from the beginning, starting with Franco, Mr. Ultra Right Wing himself. Again, this is NOT just a Zapatero/Socialist issue. It's much deeper and more twisted than that.

Spain has dug itself into a VERY deep hole. If it ever wants to climb out of it, denial is NOT the way to go. In other words, Spain needs to wake up and GROW THE HELL UP.

Ziva,

I want to know what you would say to Spaniards who feel their government has no right in telling other governements how to run their country. I completely disagree with the notion that Spain is doing the right thing here. Yet at the same time I am not ignorant to the fact that there are many in Spain who do agree with their governement's actions.

In a post-modern world it is generally viewed as wrong, or even evil, if you enforce your own values on another. In the eyes of many they are not supporting a tyrannical regime, but rather agreeing to Cuba's terms and doing what is in the best interest of their own people. Spaniards profit a great deal from their relations with Cuba. We would be extremely naive if we expected the moral value of an embargo to be enough for Spain to forfeit all those pesos earned (i.e. exploited).

Ultimately, I agree with everything you wrote, and appluad the articulate way in which your point is made. Yet I would be doing you a disfavor if I didn't beg you to put yourself in the shoes of the Spaniard. In my eyes that is the only hope you have of resonating with the voting public in that country.

Asombra:
I suggest that after the demise of the Castro dictatorship, a new Cuban Congress should pass into law the renewal of the five original stanzas of the Cuban National Anthem, not just the first two we have now, so we can loudly sing the one that states:
No temais los feroces iberos
son cobardes como todo tirano
no resisten el brazo cubano
su imperio para siempre cayó

El Todopoderoso, there is no denying what you say. There is only the 'debate' as to who's side one wants to be on. The Cuban dictatorship regime and their elites, or the oppressed Cuban people.

-"I want to know what you would say to Spaniards who feel their government has no right in telling other governements how to run their country. "

A country can exercise their right to act in their own interest (Spain) over the interests of another country's citizens (Cubans). However, in view of the 'historical relationship' between these two countries and the role that the country of SPAIN played with the country of Cuba over the course of history, I believe that it is the Spaniards who are sitting in the role of OWING MUCH to the Cuban people! Not the other way around.

I welcome all Spaniards who express and show 'solidarity' with the REAL CUBA!

Anyone who has any problem with what Franco was or what he did, and yet in any way supports or enables the far more destructive Castro regime, is at very best a hypocrite. Sadly, Spain seems to have quite a number of such people. There is no legitimate argument for such double standard. NONE.

Even if Spain were to feel or claim it was "improper" to criticize the Castro dictatorship, does that mean it believes it was wrong for other countries to criticize Franco's while it existed? Of course NOT. One can't have it both ways. Even if Spain claims it's improper to "interfere," does that make it OK to do major business with the Cuban dictatorship at what is clearly the expense of ordinary Cubans, and thus just as clearly enable a totalitarian system? Of course NOT.

This is not rocket science. It's more like a no-brainer. There is NO valid excuse for Spanish behavior. NONE.

So the Spaniards are complaining? Good! BUCL is just getting started. You guys remember that song..."You aint seen nothing yet...bababababy you just aint seen nothing yet."
There's a Sol Melia on South Beach. Too close for comfort.

Gallegos (the Franco and the Castro families included) are internationally regarded as louts, even in Spain, and are the butt of all jokes.
Enjoy a good laugh here at their own expense
http://bepop.com.ar/humor/Gallegos.html

El Todopoderoso-What would I say to Spaniards who feel their government has no right in telling other governements how to run their country? I would say that appeasing a dictator who is a sponsor of terrrorism is not in Spains national interests or in compliance with NATO of which it is a member. Surely the Spanish people can run a profitable business without resorting to the use of slave labor. Their choice.

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