New Year's Eve 2006

Here we are on yet another New Year's Eve, this one on the heals of the execution of a brutal dictator, and Cuba has yet to find reason to celebrate. For all intents and purposes, and much to our chagrin, fidel castro is still in power, ruling with an iron fist 48 years after the supposed "victory" for the Cuban people.

Sure, there are the rumors of the demise of the Caribbean dictator and recently released photographs and videos of fidel castro give us a ray of hope that his life, his reign will soon be over. But realistically speaking, there will be no major changes to the political structure in Cuba after the death of fidel castro. Raul and his minions are still there to see to it that they remain in power for as long as possible and by any means possible.

The Cuban people still live in squallor. The Cuban people are still slaves in their own land. The Cuban people remain second class citizens in their own country. The Cuban people are kept in the dark as to the world around them. The Cuban people are still suspended in time, in limbo, without futures or hopes for one. The Cuban people are treated like cattle by their own government.

For as long as I can remember, every New Year has been greeted and toasted with "El año que viene en Cuba." Next year in Cuba. In all honesty, I have never recited that particular phrase. Maybe it's the realist in me or my pragmatism and frankly I dont know if that hope is any closer or farther away this year than ever before.

But as God is my witness, tonight, at the stroke of midnight, after Ive eaten my twelve grapes, after Ive kissed my wife and congratulated all friends gathered around, after Ive called my parents over the phone and thanked them for this beautiful life theyve given me and all the sacrifices they made so that I may live the life of a free human being, I will, most assuredly through teary eyes, raise in toast to Cuba's freedom and cry "El año que viene en Cuba!" at the top of my lungs.

And hopefully tonight will be the night that we put that phrase to rest, never to be needed again. Hopefully this year will be the year that we are able to take it and bury it forever along with the nightmare that bore it.

Happy Jihad New Year!

From Jihad Watch, without commentary:

U.S. agencies missing links between illegal immigration and jihad terrorism

Another story highlighting the howling need for immigration reform, and underscoring its status as a national security issue. As the embattled Congressman Goode said, illegal immigration must be stopped, and legal immigration drastically curtailed -- with an eye toward keeping jihadists from entering the country. "Of special interest: U.S. agencies missing links between illegal immigration and terrorism," by Sara A. Carter in the San Bernardino County Sun, with thanks to Doc Washburn:

COLUMBUS, N.M. - On Sept. 5, a man calling himself Miguel Alfonso Salinas was apprehended off a deserted highway near the U.S.-Mexico border.

The tinted windows on Alfonso Salinas' vehicle aroused the suspicion of Border Patrol agents patrolling a dark and desolate stretch of Highway 9, which runs parallel to the border and is the site of large numbers of illegal crossings.

The agents discovered three Mexican migrants in the vehicle with Alfonso Salinas.

But what they discovered several days later made a far greater impression.

Alfonso Salinas was not who he seemed, according to U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security documents. He lied to the agents about who he was, where he came from and what he was doing.

It would take nearly a week of interviews with federal agents before Alfonso Salinas would give his real name: Ayman Sulmane Kamal, a Muslim born in Egypt - a country designated as "special-interest" by the United States for sponsoring terrorism.

Kamal's case is not an isolated one.

Evidence of "special-interest aliens" using the Mexican border to gain entry to the United States has been kept secret from the American public, according to federal law-enforcement agents, terrorism experts and critics of U.S. foreign policy with Mexico.

In 2005, the Border Patrol apprehended approximately 1.2million people illegally in the U.S. Of those, 165,000 were from countries other than Mexico, and roughly 650 were, like Kamal, from special-interest countries, according to the Border Patrol.

Those interviewed by the Sun's sister newspaper, the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin of Ontario, say agencies including the FBI and CIA are not using information from Border Patrol and Drug Enforcement Administration agents to make connections between the drug trade, illegal immigration and terrorist organizations.

"For us to believe that Mexican smugglers will not assist, knowingly or unknowingly, foreign terrorists trying to enter the United States is incomprehensible," said Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, who, along with other representatives, has pushed for stricter border security policies.

Read it all.

Sic semper tyrannis

BAGHDAD, Dec 30 (Reuters) - U.S.-backed Iraqi television station Al Hurra said Saddam Hussein had been executed by hanging shortly before 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) on Saturday.

BAGHDAD, Dec 30 (BBC) - Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has been executed by hanging at an unspecified location, reports say. Iraqi TV said the execution took place just before 0600 local time (0300GMT). It was witnessed by a doctor, lawyer and officials. It was also filmed. US troops and Iraqi security forces are on high alert for any violent backlash. Saddam Hussein was sentenced to death by an Iraqi court on 5 November after a year-long trial over the 1982 killings of 148 Shias in the town Dujail.

Good riddance. If only the castro brothers were next on the gallows... (See below.)

Why the castro brothers should hang

Pondering the beginning of another year without freedom for Cuba, I once again felt compelled to re-read press reports from the early days of the castro regime. Todays read was Time Magazines’ January 26, 1959 account of events taking place in Cuba. No matter how many times I read about the bloodletting orgy that took place during the early days of the “revolution” I am left weeping and filled with visceral anguish and anger. Anger not just at fidel, raul, and their volunteer firing squads; but also at the world body for turning their back on the atrocities committed by the longest reigning tyrants of the past century.

A few excerpts:

The executioner's rifle cracked across Cuba last week, and around the world voices hopefully cheering for a new democracy fell still. The men who had just won a popular revolution for old ideals -- for democracy, justice and honest government -- themselves picked up the arrogant tools of dictatorship. As its public urged them on, the Cuban rebel army shot more than 200 men, summarily convicted in drumhead courts, as torturers and mass murderers for the fallen Batista dictatorship. The constitution, a humanitarian document forbidding capital punishment, was overridden.

The only man who could have silenced the firing squads was Fidel Castro Ruz, the 32-year-old lawyer, fighter and visionary who led the rebellion. And Castro was in no mood for mercy. "They are criminals," he said. "Everybody knows that. We give them a fair trial. Mothers come in and say, 'This man killed my son.'" To demonstrate, Castro offered to stage the courts-martial in Havana's Central Park -- an unlikely spot for cool justice but perfect for a modern-day Madame Defarge.

In the trials rebels acted as prosecutor, defender and judge. Verdicts, quickly reached, were as quickly carried out. In Santiago the show was under the personal command of Fidel's brother Raul, 28, a slit-eyed man who had already executed 30 "informers" during two years of guerrilla war. Raul's firing squads worked in relays, and they worked hour after hour. Said Raul: "There's always a priest on hand to hear the last confession."

The world looked on, tried to understand the provocation, boggled at the bloodshed. Uruguay's U.N. delegate, Argentina's Cuban ambassador, liberal U.S. Senator Wayne Morse, all protested. Puerto Rico's Governor Luis Munoz Marin was "perturbed." Castro's answer: "We have given orders to shoot every last one of those murderers, and if we have to oppose world opinion to carry out justice, we are ready to do it." He added a few irresponsible crowd pleasers: "If the Americans do not like what is happening, they can send in the Marines; then there will be 200,000 gringos dead. We will make trenches in the streets." Although the U.S. had done nothing more than recognize his regime swiftly, he denounced "cannon diplomacy" and called for a rally of 500,000 this week in Havana.

As he walked with his entourage through the lobby of the Havana Hilton last week, Castro stopped to talk with two old women, who blubbered a request that their murdered sons be avenged. "It is because of people like you," said Castro, hugging the pair, "that I am determined to show no mercy." All over Cuba, the justly aggrieved, the crackpot patriots and anyone who just wanted to square a minor account filled their black notebooks with the names of new candidates for rebel justice. Fidel Castro estimated that fewer than 450 would be shot; Raul Castro bragged that "a thousand may die."

In a Mass Grave. The biggest bloodletting took place one morning at Santiago's Campo de Tiro firing range, in sight of the San Juan Hill, where Teddy Roosevelt charged. A bulldozer ripped out a trench 40 ft. long, 10 ft. wide and 10 ft. deep. At nearby Boniato prison, six priests heard last confessions. Before dawn buses rolled out to the range and the condemned men dismounted, their hands tied, their faces drawn. Some pleaded that they had been rebel sympathizers all along; some wept; most stood silent. One broke for the woods, was caught and dragged back. Half got blindfolds.

A priest led two of the prisoners through the glare of truck headlights to the edge of the trench and then stepped back. Six rebel executioners fired, and the bodies jackknifed into the grave. Two more prisoners stepped forward, then two more and two more—and the grave slowly filled....

This was less than a month into castro's forty-eight years of terror. The fact that fidel and raul have reached old age with international MSM support is a criminal injustice and an act of violence against every Cuban. There is nothing; nothing that can rectify this cruel history.

One less dictator, a better world.

Looks like Saddam Hussein will be hanging his sneakers before years end and I hope he takes his Cuban counterpart along with him if bearded bastard isnt already holding the door to hell open for his Iraqi comrade in oppression.

Apparently, good friend Bill Ardolino, who is as we speak on his way to Baghdad to later embed with US Marines, will be arriving just in time for the dead dictator festivities. Perhaps what he'll be reporting in the next few days may have some similarities to what we'll experience in Miami and Cuba once fidel "Adidas" castro is maggot food.

Bill A's not only a good friend but a fine writer and astute dude. He's filed his first report from Kuwait, with pictures, which you can read here.

Keep an eye on INDC Journal for the next few weeks as Guillermo will certainly be in the thick of things and will undoubtedly be publishing some excellent reportage from Iraq.

And, if you wish to help Billermo out with a small donation to help defray the costs of his expedition, you can do so here.

Friday Open Thread

Ive got a few things to do today that will probably keep me away from the keyboard most of the day, so please feel free to use this post as the final open thread of 2006.

It has been one heckova year with some major ups and downs, hasnt it?

I've been asked to write an editorial for a major internet portal on the different rumors we've heard this past year - and before- on the death of fidel castro, so please gimme a hand and chime in with your favorite chismes on the matter.

The British Bullshit Bash

Looks like Londoners are gonna throw themselves to the streets in celebration, not unlike we extremist Cuban Miami Mafia exiles, the difference being of course, that our British revelling counterparts will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution:

Ken Livingstone is planning a "massive festival" across London to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Fidel Castro's Cuban revolution.

The event, to be staged in 2009, will involve street parties, sports venues and some of London's leading museums as well as the closure of Trafalgar Square.

Unbelievable.

Donnah has the greatest of suggestions at Florida Cracker:

They should hold mock summary executions. What a thrill for the tourists that would be.

Tom Clancy Eat Your Heart Out

You really couldnt spin a better espionage web ala Tom Clancy than the following piece (in Spanish although the Altavista translation's title is quite interesting) from Total News Agency, from Argentina, I believe, with another fidel castro is dead rumor.

This one's complete with covert CIA ops with tons of undercover agents and forensic evidence detailing ala CSI Miami.

Apparently the old goat's been dead since before Christmas and has been frozen while the Cuban government has been waiting for the opportune moment to disclose the...um...news.

I dont get it. Communist regimes never hide the deaths of their leaders.

Dr. Samartino to be deported to Cuba...

...but he's not headed to Havana.

Instead, the Bolivian regime that wants him out is asking that he be deported to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, home of the U.S. naval base.

Gitmo!

Evo Morales just saved his rotten face and his $130 million in aid from the U.S. that props up his odious regime by asking for the U.S. to take in Dr. Samartino instead of hurling him back to castro. And Dr. Samartino, who has helped countless Cuban doctors marooned in Bolivia to reach freedom's shores in Brazil and the U.S., now himself is coming to the land of the free! Welcome, Dr. Samartino!!!!

Dr. Samartino of Bolivia, who helped countless Cuban doctors there defect to freedom Source: El Deber, Santa Cruz, Bolivia

This is a big victory!!!! And it's the result of U.S. pressure, driven by the determined voice of the Cuban American community on blogs such as Babalu, The Real Cuba, Blog for Cuba. As Amy eloquently says: "Go us!"

El Deber of Santa Cruz, Bolivia, has the story, in Spanish, here. The Real Cuba has a good translation of all the pertinent facts from it if you click and scroll down just a little here.

UPDATE: Ziva was way ahead of me on this so I moved my post down here. See what she has here.

The Official Health Update - UPDATED

Notice the capitalization in this sentence, folks. I am recuperating use of the fingers. Swelling has gone down considerably and I can now almost flip the bird again with my left hand. Index finger and thumb are still swollen and a source of pain, but it looks like the meds are working perfectly.

Im gonna try to lay off the pain pills today as those are the ones that zonk me out and put me in orbit. Im very backed up on reading emails and news and the last thing I need to is to try to read through the meds fog.

I had a specialist doctor fly in directly from Spain to verify my condition and he will be holding a press conference today at noon and announcing, officially, that I do not have colon cancer.

Update: Since rumors are starting to abound as to the actual state of my health, we are hereby issuing the following photo as official proof to dispel same:

On the radio tonight (Updated)

Professor Tony de la Cova, our historian-in-residence, will be on WQBA's "Simplemente Alina" show from 6:30 P.M. to 7 P.M.

Dr. Amauris Sanmartino Update

Here's a quick update on the cuban dissident being repatriated Cuba by the Bolivian Goveremnet, making him Bolivian President Evo Morales's first political prisoner of his tenure, via the International Herald Tribune:

Bolivian court backs expulsion

LA PAZ, Bolivia: A Cuban dissident who has publicly criticized President Evo Morales' close ties to Havana said Wednesday that he fears for his life if he is deported home after a Bolivian court declined to block the move.

Dr. Amauris Sanmartino holds permanent residence status in Bolivia but was arrested this past weekend in the city of Santa Cruz, 540 kilometers (340 miles) east of La Paz, under a law forbidding immigrants to be involved in Bolivian politics.

Sanmartino's lawyers argued that the government did not properly notify Sanmartino of their intent to deport him, but a La Paz district court on Wednesday ruled that was not enough to halt his deportation, which has not yet been scheduled.

At the hearing, Sanmartino accused the Cuban government of working through their Bolivian allies to target him for criticizing Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

"Before they said it was the Americans, but now it's the Cubans who run things here," Sanmartino said. "They're sending me to certain death."

Apart from contacting USAID as Ziva suggested in a previous post, you can now contact incoming Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who will be leading a bipartisan delegation to Bolivia in the next fews days.

Reid's contact form is here.

Also attending will be New Hampshire's Judd Gregg, and he can be contacted here.

Updated - Keep up the pressure

AP reports that Bolivias' planned deportation of Cuban dissident Amauris Sanmartino has caught the attention of U.S. officials.

LA PAZ, Bolivia - A government human rights monitor on Tuesday called for the government to halt the deportation of a Cuban dissident critical of President Evo Morales' ties to Havana, saying the move could hurt Bolivia's image abroad.

Dr. Amauris Sanmartino, a Cuban who holds permanent residence status in Bolivia, was arrested Saturday in the eastern lowland city of Santa Cruz under a 1996 law forbidding immigrants to be involved in Bolivian politics.

''This case could affect the image of Bolivia,'' said Public Defender Walter Albarracín, whose office has sought to block Sanmartino's deportation to Cuba. ``Beyond whether someone thinks one way or another, here in Bolivia we live in a state of law, and we must be very careful with that state of law.''

Albarracín confirmed that Sanmartino had fled from Cuba to Bolivia in 2000 with the help of the United States. But the Morales administration says that Sanmartino does not hold refugee status.

U.S. officials are keeping a close eye on the case, which has caught the attention of the Cuban exile community thousands of miles north in Miami.

''We are aware of Mr. Sanmartino's case and we are in contact with the Bolivian government about it,'' read a brief statement released Tuesday by the U.S. Embassy in La Paz. ``In addition to local law, we believe that this case involves international conventions and agreements to which Bolivia is a signatory.''

Yesterdays hearing ended when Sanmartino required treatment for heart problems. So far, I haven't found notice when the hearing will continue.

As Mora reported yesterday, Bolivia is the recipient of $120 million in U.S. aid. If you have not already done so please contact USAID and ask them to insist that Bolivia obey international law and release Dr. Sanmarino.

Read the AP article at the Miami Herald and George has more at therealcuba.

Update: Bad news, from Yahoonews:

LA PAZ (Reuters) - A Bolivian court ruled on Wednesday that a Cuban dissident who criticized improved relations between Bolivia and Cuba should be deported to the communist country.

"This is a death sentence. Cuba is a country where people who have different points of view, like me, don't have rights," Amauris Samartino told reporters after hearing the verdict.

Update 2: El Nuevo Herald reports that Sanmarino attorney will appeal, also legally he could be sent back to Guantanamo. A su vez, el dirigente y vocero de Podemos Jose Arquipa dijo a la AP que "Sanmartino es el primer preso político de (Evo) Morales".

Change Policies Punishing Refugees Fleeing Persecution

From Human Rights First:

Thousands of vulnerable refugees have been prevented from receiving asylum or resettlement in the United States under sweeping immigration law definitions that end up punishing the victims of persecution.

These refugees include:

- women who were raped and enslaved by armed militias in Liberia;
- victims of extortion forced to pay violent militants in Colombia to protect their lives and their children;
- and Cubans who supported a group that took up arms against fidel castro in the 1960s.

Many of these refugees are actually the victims of violence and extortion in places like Colombia, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Others have provided support to pro-democracy groups with armed wings that have resisted repressive regimes in places like Burma and Cuba, while some supported groups that fought alongside U.S. forces during the war in Vietnam. The U.S. government does not consider these groups to be “terrorist organizations” in any other context, but because these groups have used arms, they are categorized as “terrorist organizations” under these immigration law provisions.

The material support bar has crippled the U.S. resettlement program, a critical life-line through which local communities and church groups across the country assist in welcoming refugees to safety in this country. Thousands of refugees have been prevented from resettling in the United States because of these overly broad immigration definitions.

Be a voice for the persecuted. Please take a moment to write to President Bush.

Click here for the Human Rights First Report and the letter to President Bush.

Gerald Ford, R.I.P.

A transitional figure, Gerald R. Ford was obviously a nice man, but fatally flawed. He was a member of The Warren Commission, arguably the greatest cover-up in American history. His pardon of RIchard Nixon before any charges were proferred against him was, in my opinion, a grave error that has led to much acrimony between the two major political parties still with us to this day. His two years in the White House, and the lackluster campaign in 1976, full of gaffes and missteps, led directly to Jimmy Carter's victory and the subsequent disastrous four years of his Presidency. Carter was so inept and so vile in his politics, that Gerald Ford is veritably Churchillian when compared to him.

Rest well, Mr. President. I wish you hadn't taken so many secrets to the grave.

one hand typing

i am typing this with one hand so please read it slowly. it seems noche buena and my hands have a bit of a feud going on. this is the second christmas i spend in the emergency room. a few years back i had both hands bitten by a dog and ended up not only in severe pain while waiting at the er chistma day, but needed months of physical therapy to recover use of my left hand.

right now i look like a one handed mickey mouse with a skinny arm and an oversized - and i mean oversized - hand. i can only move my pinky and ring finger with some minor movement of my thumb. doctor said i have a pretty bad staph infection and am on a variety of meds: anti-biotics, steriod for inflamation and pain meds. my hand is killing me and my stomach is screwed from all the meds.

you never know how much a hand is needed until you have one you cant use. plus, every little thing seems to hit my finger. if a kid three blocks away throws a rock, chances are that it will most certainly hit me point blank on my left index finger.

there's lots of stuff going on in the news today and i wish id be able to post on much of it, but it's damned hard typing wit one hand and the pain meds just put me to sleep. please bear with me and worry not, our talented crew of contributors will be here for your cuba and other news fixes.

thanks for all your get well emails and wishes. hopefully the treatment will begin to take effect today and ill be back on my hand on no time. in the meantime, dont throw any rocks please.

Spaniards enraged over castro's special treatment

Who is this pretty lady here?

Her name is Esperanza Aguirre and she is the one who first spoke out against the disgusting spectacle of Spain providing castro with a special level of health treatment after his long history as a dictator, and more horribly still, after castro's atrocious health care treatment of ordinary Cubans. She spotted the hypocrisy and she's giving castro's enablers over in Madrid hell.

The Miami Herald reports:

''What happens with the rest of the citizens on the island and especially the political prisoners?'' asked Esperanza Aguirre, president of Madrid's regional ...

The Real Cuba has some unsourced material well worth looking at here, among them this key notation that shows she's clearly someone who gets it, and EFE has the full story here:

The president of the Community of Madrid also said that all of this was happening "while the Cuban dictatorship is claiming to have an extraordinary health service, which practically justified having such dictatorship, and the lack of the most elemental human rights." "I hope that Cubans can regain as soon as possible their freedom and democracy that they have been unable to enjoy for so many years," she said.

This lady spoke out.

Nightmare in Bolivia

Ever since Evo Morales was elected president in December 2005, all of Bolivia under its new castroite regime is a nightmare, but one individual nightmare in particular really disturbs me.

Dr. Amauris Samartino is a Cuban doctor who fled castro's communist Cuba for ... Bolivia, years ago. Think about that. Who in hell flees TO Bolivia, South America's poorest and most backward state - unless the place they are fleeing from is infinitely worse? Only if you live in Cuba could you consider Bolivia a promised land and move to it and consider it a step upward. Not even Bolivians do, they have one of the region's highest illegal emigration rates.

Dr. Samartino lives in Santa Cruz, the one area of Bolivia where Bolivians create wealth and welcome immigrants. That's the area that's bearing the hardest lash from Morales and all his castroite communism. That area has seen land confiscations, broken property rights, Cuban security agents and violence. Huge protests have broken out, as happened in Venezuela before them. The local Crucenos hate Morales so bad they actually send each other text-message photos of a dead Morales, acting in the Bolivian spirit of taking out the trash, as they did with che.

Dr. Samartino is a legal resident. He's spoken out against the cubanization of his new country, and more daring still, has helped other Cuban doctors sent to Bolivia to defect, sending them to reach freedom's shores in Brazil and the U.S.

The castroites running Bolivia decided he needed to be stopped. So for criticizing Morales and more significantly, for helping castro's doctors flee to freedom, he's been arrested. And he is about to be deported.

Back to castro's Cuba.

I can't think of anything more terrifying than this. For helping others reach freedom, he is about to lose his own, and be taken back to the very hellhole he fled for his life from.

This is an outrageous human rights violation by any standard and something that ought to get more attention. I am going to do my part. No one should ever be shipped back to castro's Cuba against his will, to what surely will be an ignominous and terrifying fate. Just for speaking out.

The U.S. gives Bolivia $120 million in annual aid. castro, by contrast, just gives Cuban doctors, and Venezuela's castroite Hugo Chavez, by contrast, gives only $7 million in aid. The Morales regime is held together by U.S. aid, which amounts to about 10% of the national budget. This U.S. taxpayer aid to this brutal leftist tyrant has got to stop.

One potential course of action is to contact the U.S. Aid office and them that no aid should be given to a regime that would force a Cuban back to tyranny's prison on our dime. Either bring that Cuban doctor here, or Bolivia must never see another penny of U.S. Aid.

This is going entirely too far now.

To tell the truth...

"Castro recovering, could govern again, doctor says."

If he's in such great shape, why fly an oncologist in from Spain? This is just more of the second biggest export from Cuba: disinformation and lies.

A Pan con Lechon Christmas

Just a quick note to wish our Babalú family a wonderful, beautiful and happy Christmas. We had a great Noche Buena last night here at the Prieto household. Having four generations of your family together in one place really touches the heart. I dont think I could have asked for a better Christmas present.

The Mrs and I have already picked up tyhe house and yard, Ive cleaned the tartaras, put away the tent, chairs and tables. Ive already had my Christmas morning pan con lechon. Ordinarily, now we would stuff the car with presents and head out to do the rounds. Los suegros, los viejos, las sobrinas, los hermanos and friends homes. But our Christmas will be a bit different today.

The Mrs and I are headed out to the emergency room of the local hospital to see what they can do about the mojo I accidentally injected into my hand while I was prepping the pig. Using a horse needle.

Fret not though, folks. Ive still got half a keg of beer at ManCamp.

Best wishes for a wonderful day from our family to yours. And thanks for making this little slice of internet such a great home.

Felicidades!

Merry Christmas

Why hasn't he been busted?

I was just checking up on Tom Hayden, the creepy Santa Monica Svengali who MADE Jane Fonda into a cannon-humpin', Viet-Cong lovin' raddled whore of the global far left. A congential useful idiot, Jane owes all she ever became to rat-faced Hayden.

What was fringe-left Hayden up to these days? Well, in late August, he wrote about his May 21 trip to Cuba, where he went to just hang around with his good friend Ricardo Alarcon, the impotent little sycophant of the castroite cabal.

Unlike you and me, who must obey laws, Tom seems to think he's above the law and can just jet over to Cuba any time he likes - defying an embargo that was put into place because of all the dead bodies the castro regime has managed to pile up.

For normal people, the travel embargo's understandable because killing people is an outrage. Not so for Tom Hayden, who's a fan of big piles of dead bodies. He defies the embargo not to go Varadero Beach like the eurotrash, but to kiss up to Ricardo Alarcon, a slimey castroite operative, who, for all we know, might've had something to do with the castroite torture of U.S. prisoners in Vietcong and North Vietnamese communist dungeons.

In his crummy article published on some blog called 'Truthdig' and on his self-titled Web site, Hayden conveyed Alarcon's "deep" thoughts about the future of Cuba. The late lead time between his kissing session with Ricardo and the August publication of his rubbish makes me wonder if he's just gotten a sudden note from the Treasury Department about his trip and quick, suddenly, had to justify it all by claiming he was, all along, a journalist. I don't buy it and neither should the Treasury Department.

Tom Hayden travelled to Cuba as an honored guest of the Marxist regime there, got the full wonder treatment from the castroites, and then shamelessly jetted back to the states as if nothing ever happened. The real reason Hayden went to see the castroites is because that's where his friends are.

Why hasn't this bastard been busted? Where is the Treasury Department? Why isn't he paying fines or doing some jail time? None of this has gotten a scintilla of scrutiny. Hayden needs a good busting.

castro can run but he can't hide from the truth

Astute Babalu readers bring up several points in response to my post earlier today about a Spanish surgeon being rushed to Cuba presumably to treat the decrepit tyrant.

Reader "class factotum" says:

"The plane carried medical equipment not available in Cuba"

But what about the free health care available to everyone in Cuba because of the superiority of the communist system? Isn't it as good as the health care everywhere else in the world? Perhaps better? I'm so confused.

And reader Melek adds:

What's interesting is that the article neglects to mention that Dr. Garcia Sabrido is an Oncology Surgeon, who seems to specialize in Colorectal Cancer. Moreover it seems that the surgeon was in Cuba early last month, as a "guest speaker" at the IX Cuban Congress of Surgery (November 7, 2006).

But... I thought Cuba insists that castro does not have cancer:

... I'm so confused ... did he have cancer before he did not have cancer?

The smartest, best-informed readers are right here at Babalu.

BREAKING - Spanish Doctor rushed to Cuba

Reuters story:

Renowned surgeon rushed to treat Castro

A RENOWNED Spanish surgeon has been rushed to Cuba to treat ailing leader Fidel Castro, a Spanish newspaper reported today.

Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido, an intestinal specialist, travelled to the Caribbean island on Thursday aboard an aircraft chartered by the Cuban government, according to Spain's left-leaning El Periodico de Catalunya newspaper.

The plane carried medical equipment not available in Cuba in case the leader needs further surgery due to his progressively failing health, the newspaper reported.

Garcia Sabrido will carry out tests on Castro to see if he needs another operation after undergoing emergency surgery for intestinal bleeding in July, the newspaper said.

Officials at the Madrid hospital where Garcia Sabrido works declined to comment on the report. Cuban embassy officials were not immediately available for comment.

Cuban officials say Castro is not dying and will return to public life. His absence from the public eye has fanned speculation he is too ill to govern the country he has run since toppling dictator Fulgencio Batista in a 1959 revolution.

Hat tip to Cigar Mike.

Herald Acknowledges Babalú

As Professor De La Cova mentioned in the comment thread here, the Miami Herald mentions this blog in it's story about Target pulling the Che CD cases off the shelves.

Before Target's about-face, some local Christmas shoppers boycotted the chain because of its apparent fondness for Che. Postings on the Miami-based Babalú Blog showed Target's removal of the CD case went a long way toward getting those customers back.

The article also quotes this comment left by reader Amy to the first post Thursday announcing Target's decision:

YAAAAAAYYYYY!!! I'm so happy we can shop at Target again! Especially because they did the right thing. Go us!

Go us indeed!

Al Qaeda talks to its American allies

Without commentary:

ABC News - The Blotter

Al Qaeda Sends a Message to Democrats
December 22, 2006 2:28 PM

Brian Ross and Hoda Osman Report:

Al Qaeda has sent a message to leaders of the Democratic party that credit for the defeat of congressional Republicans belongs to the terrorists.

In a portion of the tape from al Qaeda No. 2 man, Ayman al Zawahri, made available only today, Zawahri says he has two messages for American Democrats.

"The first is that you aren't the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen -- the Muslim Ummah's vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq -- are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost," Zawahri said, according to a full transcript obtained by ABC News.

"And if you don't refrain from the foolish American policy of backing Israel, occupying the lands of Islam and stealing the treasures of the Muslims, then await the same fate," he said.

WSJ on Target and Che - UPDATED

Mary Anastasia O'Grady has a column in today's Wall Street Journal about the Che Guevara CD case that Target was selling and that Babalu has been documenting since it came to our attention.

UPDATE: It's a good column but I would be remiss if I didn't mention that it was the Wall Street Journal's competitor, Investor's Business Daily, that broke the story on the Che CD cases and that it was Babalu's own Mora that brought the whole thing to our attention more than a week ago. So while I agree with Ms. O'Grady's sentiments I want to point out that she can't take credit, as she seems to, for bringing this to Target's attention. Anyway here's the WSJ piece.

Americas: Che, Cuba and Christmas
Mary Anastasia O'Grady.

Until yesterday Christmas shoppers at Target department stores could purchase a 24-CD carrying case decorated with the image of Che Guevara. When I heard about it, I wondered why the retailer would want to promote the memory of a mass murderer. What's next, I asked, when I spoke with a representative of the company on Wednesday, Pol Pot pajamas?

Late Wednesday evening Target sent me this statement: "It is never our intent to offend any of our guests through the merchandise we carry. We have made the decision to remove this item from our shelves and we sincerely apologize for any discomfort this situation may have caused our guests."

The fact that it took only a day for Target to make that admirable decision suggests that at least someone at the company knows who Guevara was and what Cuba is today thanks in part to him. The misstep, though, probably occurred because others at the company allowed Target to become a target itself of the Che myth.

Guevara is not just a dead white guy from a well-to-do family who terrorized a racially mixed nation and executed hundreds of innocents in the late 1950s and 1960s. He is also a symbol of the totalitarian regime that persists in Cuba, which still practices his ideology of intolerance, hatred and repression. It is not the torture and killing alone that make the tragedy. That only describes the methodology. Guevara's wider goal -- to forcibly strip a population of its soul and spirit -- is what is truly frightening and deplorable. Christians, who celebrate the birth of their Savior on Monday, have particularly suffered under Guevara's dream of revolution, which has lasted since 1959.

The fear under which Cubans have lived for 48 years was fathered by the merciless Che Guevara. The unhappy Argentine Marxist met Fidel Castro in Mexico in 1955 and later became a rebel commander. "The Black Book of Communism," published in 1999 by Harvard University Press, notes that early in his career Guevara earned a "reputation for ruthlessness; a child in his guerrilla unit who had stolen a little food was immediately shot without trial." In his will, the book says, "this graduate of the school of terror praised the 'extremely useful hatred that turns men into effective, violent, merciless and cold killing machines.'"

Peruvian-born Alvaro Vargas Llosa penned his own book this year titled "The Che Guevara Myth." Mr. Vargas Llosa documents a twisted life, such as when Che shot a comrade and made the following entry in his diary: "I ended the problem with a .32 caliber pistol, in the right side of his brain. . . . His belongings were now mine." After that, Mr. Vargas Llosa says, Guevara shot "a peasant who expressed the desire to leave whenever the rebels moved on." Guevara also liked to simulate executions, as a form of torture. "At every stage of his adult life, his megalomania manifested itself in the predatory urge to take over other people's lives and property, and to abolish their free will."

Guevara was an architect of Cuba's forced labor camps, which by 1965 were transformed into concentration camps for dissidents, homosexuals, people with AIDS, Catholics, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Cubans of other religious sects.

All independent thought that refused to worship the communist state was an affront to Guevara. Christians were an especially difficult lot. From the earliest days after Castro took power, Che sent hundreds of men to face firing squads at the Havana prison known as La Cabana. His victims could be heard at dawn loudly crying "Long live Christ the King, down with communism," just before the rifle shots rang out.

Thousands of Cubans have perished in daring attempts to get off the island because they preferred the risks of flight to a life in which Christianity has been forbidden, children are the property of the state, thought is policed and spying on your neighbor is one of the few ways to earn a living. During the Mariel boat lift in 1980, witnesses told of families arriving at the pier together only to be separated by Cuban guards who enjoyed watching their misery. Weeping mothers faced the point of a gun while their distraught sons and daughters were forced to board ships. This Christmas thousands of Cuban-Americans will remember their loved ones who didn't make it out or died trying.

Defenders of Guevara can't even claim that his cruelty brought about equality. Today state policy makes it a crime for the raggedly dressed, malnourished and mostly black Cuban people to visit the beaches, museums and amply stocked stores of their own country, while well-fed tourists in fashionable cruise-wear go where they like. This amounts to de facto apartheid.

Amazingly, hope is still alive in Cuba. One reason is because although Guevara was able to kill a lot of Christians, neither he nor his successors succeeded in wiping out Christianity. The struggling Christian community, which takes seriously the religious teaching to reject fear in the face of evil, is playing a key role in the island's dissident movement.

An icon of the Christian resistance is Oscar Elias Biscet, a black physician who is serving a 25-year sentence for his peaceful activism against the regime. He has been arrested more than 26 times since he began to express his dissent; he has been beaten, tortured and locked in tiny windowless cells for days on end. Hundreds of other prisoners of conscience are in jail, under atrocious conditions; many are also devout Christians.

The Christian faith has survived Che and Fidel and decades of brainwashing. It is battered but has not been defeated. Raul Castro fears it -- which is why he takes Bibles away from his unbreakable prisoners. The moral of the story seems to be that even the all- powerful regime cannot stop Christmas from coming to Cuba.

Hat tip to: PEP

Arguing For The Embargo

Yesterday's post by Conductor got me to think about past posts and columns which clearly and intelligently express the reasons why the embargo should remain in place, if not strengthened even more.

Just after posting this I saw Conductor's Part 2, therefore I have moved this to the top for better continuity of thought.

We all know that this topic comes up quite frequently here and in other Cuba-related blogs. But after reading Conductor's linked articles regurgitating the same old and tired anti-embargo arguments along the lines of: "After 40+ years it's time for change", "If the U.S. can trade with China and Vietnam then why not Cuba?", and "Cuba policy is being held hostage by a small group of influential exiles in Florida", I figured it's once again a good time to present our side of the argument.

I'll start off with this column by El Nuevo Herald columnist Vicente Echerri published in today's Miami Herald and which provides a bit of a unique perspective to the pro-embargo argument:

The error perhaps is the failure of the international community in seeing and appraising Castro's rule in a holistic or comprehensive way. It is easier, I can understand, to judge the commission of particular crimes, the violations of the human rights of specific individuals, than to address the entire nature of a perverse system and, consequently, to find a consensus to deal with it or the instruments for its punishment or dismissal.

The demonization of Castroism was and has been in my opinion -- and in that of most of my fellow Cuban exiles -- the right response of the American government to that challenge; and the embargo, extended for more than four decades, its coherent implementation.

Read the entire column here.

Also, make sure to check out these earlier pieces by Conductor:

- Kitchen Sink Arguments
- Ask A Cuban-American About The Embargo

Think of this as a resource and research tool for the next time this discussion pops up.

The publicity offensive, part 2

Yesterday I posted about how castro's agents of influence and the useful idiots were ramping up their last ditch effort to have the remains of the embargo lifted in an effort to breathe oxygen into the regime which is in its violent death throes.

Well here's some more rubbish from just today. You can expect mountains of this trash to be published as we near the end.

Our view: Opening Cuba

Cuba Policy

Restraint, not force, will bring change to Cuba

Trading with Cuba

Target Pulls che guevara CD Case from Stores

A few readers have sent the following response from Target regarding the che CD case:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and feelings about the Che Guevara CD case. We have made the decision to remove this item from our shelves.

It is never our intent to offend any of our guests through the merchandise we carry and we sincerely apologize for any discomfort this situation may have caused our guests. We appreciate the time you’ve taken to write us and will pass your comments along to our buyers.

We always welcome your feedback, so if there’s ever any question you have about our products or service, please call our Target Guest Relations team at 800-440-0680. We also invite you to share your comments whenever you visit a Target store or on the Internet at www.Target.com.

I hope we’ll see you again soon at Target.

Sincerely,

Jennifer Hanson

Target Executive Offices

Thanks to all who wrote Target with their thoughts.

The publicity offensive is on!

On the heels of the American congressional delegation traveling to Cuba to discuss a possible "dialogue" between the two countries, the Cuban publicity machine has predictably cranked up. Objective: sway people into opposing the embargo so as to give the crumbling dictatorship another lifeline.

Time is running out for the dictorship, as evidenced by things such as the recent announcement, first by Swiss banks followed by others that Cuba's accounts were to be closed. The castroite insiders know this. The closer the regime gets to the brink of collapse the more we can expect to see letters to editors, columns and articles like these taken from just the last few days.

It's high time U.S. talked to Cuba

Normalize relations between U.S., Cuba

US Urged to End Cuba Embargo as Castro Ails

Hints of rethinking the Cuba embargo

Ladrillos

I was picking up bricks. There was a huge pile of rubble at my feet and I was picking up bricks. Sifting through the pile with my bare hands, scraping away with my fingers, leaving little traces of blood on each brick I managed to salvage. I sifted through rocks and pieces of shattered concrete. Dust rose from the heap with each touch of my hand. Large chunks and small pebbles I pushed to the side. I was only interested in the bricks. The ones without chips or cracks or pieces missing. Whole, heavy, concrete bricks.

Some of them, the bricks, turned to dust in my hands. Leaving their dry particles, grainy and rough on my calloused hands.

It was unbearably hot, so humid it was hard to breath with the thick dust wafting from below. Drops of sweat clung hopelessly to my forehead, my nose, my chin until they felt they lost their battle with gravity and commited suicide, releasing their grip on my skin and plunging to their deaths on the detritus below. I followed their voyage to its end: dark, round stains meeting arid stone. Disappearing almost as quickly as they came to life. I'd never met a sun so unforgiving, so heartless.

The pile in front of me was relentless. Brick after brick, rock after rock, pebble after pebble. No matter how many bricks I lifted, no matter how much gravel I brushed aside, the pile, the rubble remained. Dauntless, stoic. As if it were mocking me, for each brick I lifted, saved from its fate, two more appeared.

My clothes clung to my body, glued with sweat. My back screamed with pain with each hunch down to the rubble altar. My fingers bled from the feelingless tips. Nicks and cuts and bruises graffittied my legs. And that sun. Oh that shameless sun beat down upon me, pounding incessantly upon my back, setting my neck afire, sucking my strength out through my pores. I could feel the grit on my face, my forehead, around my eyes, my lips. Deposited there each time I swiped the debilitating sweat from my brows.

But the bricks. The bricks needed saving and I could not stop. Brick by brick. Stone by stone. Breath by breath. One after another I bent, I grabbed, I lifted, I dusted, then turned and lay each neatly, away from the rubble. Lined and rowed like cement soldiers.

I heard the constant shuffling of footsteps behind me. People speaking a language foreign to me. Saying things I should not understand but that I knew nonetheless.

"What is he doing?"

"He's crazy."

"In this heat?"

"Who does he think he is?"

I did not know who I was. All I knew were the bricks. And the bricks had to be salvaged else it would all be a waste. So I continued. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align.

"Why is he doing that?"

"What's he trying to accomplish?"

"Those arent even his bricks."

They werent really my bricks. I just needed to get them out of the rubble. They've been ignored too long, those bricks. Crushed under the weight of ruins. Inert. Helpless.

I found them beautiful, those bricks. All they needed was some breathing room. All they needed was to be pulled out from under the pile. Their dust carressed away. Set next to their fellow bricks. A single, clean, dusted beautiful brick will have some use, but altogether they can build a wall. Ten walls. A hundred walls. Millions of walls made of millions of once discarded bricks.

Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align. Bend, grab, lift, dust, align.

"Hey, you there!' I felt something other than the sun tapping my back. "What are you doing with those bricks? Those are not your bricks. THOSE ARE NOT YOUR BRICKS!"

I stopped for a second and stared into a face I could not see. "No." I said. "They are your bricks."

"THAT'S RIGHT. THEY ARE MY BRICKS. Why are you touching my bricks?"

"Because theyre crushed under their own weight. Crushed under all this rock. Under all this gravel and dust."

"But tthey arent your bricks so why dont you just leave them alone?"

"They dont want to be left alone. They want to be bricks."

"They are bricks."

"No. Bricks in a pile of rubble are nothing but square rocks."

"Bricks are just square rocks."

"No. Bricks are useful. Rocks are just rocks."

"But those are my bricks and I will use them as I see fit. Even as rocks."

"These bricks just want to be bricks. The want the fate of bricks."

"The fate of these bricks is to be whatever I make them be, even my rocks."

"They dont want to be rocks, yours or anyone elses. They just want to be bricks."

"But these arent your bricks."

"Theyre only bricks when they are out of the rubble. Right now theyre just rocks. You can help me make them bricks again."

Bend, grab, lift, pass.

Grab, dust, align.

Bend, grab, lift, pass.

Grab, dust, align.

Bend, grab, lift, pass.

Grab, dust, align.

Bend, grab, lift, pass.

Grab, dust, align.

***

I woke up, took a shower, got dressed and came to work.

Cuba Blog Tour

Let's take a quick tour of the anti-castro Cuba blogosphere:

- Enrique hosts Abajo Fidel - "Free Cuba" Blog Talk Radio.

- Robert says there's something still rotten in Denmark, vis-a-vis Ileana Ros-Lehtinens "castro assasination" quote on video.

- YucaBaby on Christmas presents: wrapped or unwrapped?

- Meet Omar Pernet Hernandez, Uncommon Sense's Cuban political prisoner of the week.

- The result, via new photographs, of fidel castro's revolution at the Real Cuba.

- Payo Libre's got the latest news, en Español.

- El Gusano takes on Flake, etal.

- El Mizzoubanazo tells us about another "humanitarian" mission to Cuba.

- Henry has a great link proving that we darned Cubans are everywhere.

- Luis: Is raul aping Mao?

- Ziva knows which way the rafts go.

- Mama Hen: Esperando que cuelguen los tenis, guinden los piojos y que canten el manicero y el gallo.

- Orlando asks: What's up with the mexicans?

- Alfredo has some heartfelt dibujos.

- Just in time for Noche Buena, Marta has a very special Crema de Vie recipe.

- And speaking of Noche Buena, Alberto has the must read.

Fun Exercise 2 !!

Two former Latin American heads of State have been much in the news lately. One titled himself Chief of State, Head of Government, Prime Minister, First Secretary of the Communist Party, and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. along with "Maximum Leader," which perfectly mimicks Fuhrer, from whom he lifted what became the title of his most famous oration and book. His “constitution” mandated several years in prison for anyone overheard cracking a joke about him. He held absolute power longer than Mao and Hitler combined.

The other summoned free-market consultants from the University of Chicago to advise his administration on the best ways to diminish or completely abrogate government power over the lives of his nation’s citizens. He promised elections and held them, winning an overwhelming mandate to continue in power in one plebecite and losing in a second eight years, whereupon he voluntarily relinquished power as he had promised. Interestingly, though he considered the 2nd plebescite a loss, his tally of supporting votes though not quite a majority, was still much higher than had been the tally that “elected” the Marxist president he helped overthrow. He held office only slightly longer than Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

You will never, ever in a million, gazillion years guess which one the media is reviling as "Dictator" and which they refer to a as "President"!

It gets even better here from today's Newsmax.

Humberto

Noche Buena panic mode

Sorry about the light posting today folks. Not only do I need to finish a bunch of crap at the office, but we are now officially on Nochebuena panic mode. Not only are we behind schedule on getting the house and everythinig else ready, including the stuffed lechon cooking whatchamacallit, but local weather this morning said there's some rain-a-comin' on Sunday.

So not only do we have to finish the original plans for the party, now we have the extra added "setting up tents and shit" in the back yard.

It's a good thing I have next week off. Im gonna need it.

Please bear with me and feel free to use this as an open thread.

Green eggs, no ham

I do not like fidel the ham
I do not like him
Val I am

I do not like him here or there
I do not like him anywhere
I do not like him in a boat
unless of course it doesnt float

I hope that he is rife with pain
or at least squashed under a train
I might just like him in a box
under a heavy pile of rocks

I do not like him in a house
I would not, could not, he's a louse
I do not like fidel the ham
I do not like him
Val, I am

My, how things change...

I was stopped at a traffic light on my way home from work yesterday. In front of me I had one of those big SUV's - an Expedition or one of the other big American SUV's. Through the rear window I could see the kids in the back seat were watching a movie - Shrek I believe it was - on the screen that pops down from the roof of the vehicle.

All I could think was how great these kids have it nowadays. When I was a kid, all we had was AM radio with only a handful of stations , and we never, ever, ever, got to choose which one we'd listen to.

Lucky brats.

A picture worth a million words.

We have all commented on last week's visit to Cuba by 10 US Congressmen hoping to ease sanctions against the Communist nation. Yet, I can present no commentary to describe these US representatives, their mission and what they came back with that's better than the photo found in this post at El Confeti.

Rumors, rumors and more rumors.

Since everything seems to be about rumors lately regarding fidel castro and his cadaveresque health, I felt it appropriate to report on something that I've heard from a very reliable source but have been unable to confirm:

Barbara Walters might score a bedside interview with fidel castro.

Working on getting confirmation at the moment. Will post an update as soon as I have further news.

Resist, Rob and Row.

I Just had to post the following put together by El Gusano, regarding the real Survivor's island:

I'd like to see Survivor producers put a group of Cubans on the show next season. I'd give them a week before not only would they have some kind of makeshift power plant and a bunch of makeshift convenience appliances connected to it, but they'd be receiving weekly "Survivor Bucks" from relatives in Hialeah..

El que tiene hijas, cena en Navidad.

My first thought that morning wasnt the usual "What time is it?" Perhaps subconsciously I remembered I had the day off. Maybe when I went to bed the night before, knowing tomorrow was Thanksgiving Day, caused me to dream about turkey and fixin's and family and the day off from work. But still, my first thought Thanksgiving morning wasnt about turkey or stuffing or famliy or all the stuff we had to do to mark the celebration. First thing I remember thinking that morning was "What the hell is that smell?"

The moment I'd open my eyes I'd gotten a brief whiff of something. Something sweet. Something I'd smelled before. Something I knew, but couldnt quite make out. The aroma had been quite fleeting.

First thing I did that morning, after running the hot water in the shower, was walk over to the laundry room and make sure the pilot was still lit on the water heater. It was. I sniffed around the gas lines, picked up a bottle of Windex and sprayed the fittings and connections and made sure no bubbles appeared. There was no gas leak and what I had smelled as I awoke was definitely not gas.

I jumped in the shower and tried to put together some kind of a schedule in my mind of all the things I had to do that day. We were having Thanksgiving at my mom's this year and my wife and I were in charge of the meal and preparations. Pots and pans had to be loaded, tons of groceries, the turkey, cooking utensils, plates and napkins, vegetables and pies, the little Pligrim salt and pepper shakers. Quite a bit of work lay ahead of us that day.

Then, as I pulled the shower curtain open came another faint and fleeting hint of the very same aroma. "Man," I said to myself, "What is that?"I knew it wasnt the scent of any shampoo or conditioner or soap in the bathroom, but I checked the bottles just the same. Opened the bottle caps, put my nose to them and inhaled deeply. Cupped the bars soaps in my hand and did the same. Nada. The smell, even though I recogized it somehow, wasnt the same as anything found in our bathroom.

It's a funny thing, the olfactory sense. Sometimes you get a slight sniff of some aroma or another and immediately not only do you know what it is, but it congers up memories of precisely when and where you took in that particular smell in the first place. And sometimes, you get the same slight sniff and you know you know it, but you just cant place it.

I threw on a pair of shorts and a tshirt, grabbed a pair of socks from the sock drawer and sat in front of the computer. I'd wanted to post a nice, heartwarming Thanksgiving post that day, but the words just didnt come. Nor did I have the time to wait for them. Too many things to do.

So I wrote up a quick Happy Thanksgiving entry, wishing everyone enjoy their their holiday with family and friends and published it.

And then, as I spun my chair around to the side and bent over to pull on my socks, the smell, that sweet aroma that had visited me twice that morning came back. This time it lingered for a bit. I took deep breaths as I finished putting on my socks. I got up and walked around the room sniffing here and there. I nosed around the closet, drew in around my clothes. The aroma was still there, but I just couldnt discern where it was coming from.

"Enough with this smell crap," I said to myself. "I've got way too many things to do today to be chasing some aroma around the house." So I grabbed a pair of shoes from the closet and stuck my feet in them, tied the laces and off I went.

I went back out to the kitchen and the smell tagged along. I couldnt get rid of the damned thing. The unknown smell, apparently, was with me to stay.

After a few hours of running around, getting things ready, loading up the car and helping the Mrs - all the while the smell competing with the aromas emanating from the kitchen, I stop for a moment and thank my wife for all she's done to have Thanksgiving at my mom's house this year.

"I know it's a lot of hard work," I say. "But man, I love Thanksgiving."

"Me, too," she responds.

"It's not just the food that I love," I say. "It's the whole getting together with family thing. You know, Thanksgiving and Noche Buena were my grandfather's..."

And then it hit me like an olfactory slap to the noggin'. English Leather.

English Leather was the scent that had been hammering me all morning. The all too familiar aroma that had been following me around the house and yard all day and driving me crazy. Making me sniff almost everything in every room looking for it.

I hadnt smelled that particular cologne in years. Almost twenty years to be exact. On my Abuelo's neck. It was his favorite and he never, ever, used it sparingly. I remember hugging him and having the English Leather stay with all day sometimes.

Knowing me, just imagine how I felt right then and there, thinking about my grandfather on Thanksgiving, his second favorite holiday of the year, smelling his cologne all day. I couldnt stop the tears from flowing.

Later that day I stood at the head of the dining room table and gave thanks for everything we have; for our family and our health and everything else we have to be thankful for. And then, just as I was about to close our Thanksgiving prayer my mother, through teary eyes, chimed in:

"And let's give thanks for having as part of our lives those who are no longer with us."

That night, after a full day of preprations and celebration, with turkey and stuffing and yams stuffed in our bellies, around midnight and on our way home, the Mrs and I took a few detours to a couple of 24 hour Walgreens.

See, the smell that had accompanied me all day was gone and I wanted it back. I wanted my English Leather. I wanted my grandfather to stay just a little longer.

We never did find the English Leather that night, but we did find Old Spice, my grandfather's second favorite cologne. So I bought it, opened it and splashed it on, right there in the parking lot at Walgreen's, close to midnight on Thanksgiving. It's appropriate, I suppose, as Thanksgiving was, indeed, my grandfather's second favorite holiday.

His favorite, of course, was Noche Buena. It's only a few days away and I've already got my English Leather.

"El que tiene hija, cena en Navidad."

Communism Sucks

Millions of people killed, wholesale violation of basic, civil and human rights, the degradation of the individual. I find it astonishing that there are still communists in this world.

Apparently, it is only those that have lived under the communist jackboot that recognize its affront on nature and humanity:

President of Romania denounces Soviet era

By Craig S. Smith
Published: 2006-12-18 15:09:16

PARIS: President Traian Basescu of Romania on Monday formally condemned the Communist dictatorship that ruled his country for more than four decades, the first time a Romanian head of state had officially denounced the Soviet-era system.

"The regime exterminated people by assassination and deportation of hundreds of thousands of people," Basescu told his country's Parliament. He based his assessment on a 660-page report compiled by a presidential commission charged with analyzing the country's Communist past.

And here's the money quote, true of each and every communist regime:

"The Communist regime was illegitimate and criminal," Basescu said. "It treated an entire population as a group of guinea pigs for an experiment."

Read the whole thing.

From the "No shit, Sherlock" Department

From the Chicago Tribune:

Bipartisan pitch can't sway Cuba on rights issues

10 U.S. lawmakers hoped to ease embargo

By Gary Marx
Tribune foreign correspondent
Published December 18, 2006

HAVANA -- The largest U.S. congressional delegation in years ended talks here Sunday without a commitment from Cuban authorities to release political prisoners or make other concessions that could bolster those seeking to ease U.S. sanctions against Cuba.

Cuban officials were amenable to discussing with the U.S. such issues as immigration and anti-narcotics cooperation, but they refused to concede any changes in internal policy a