Yoani Sánchez Comes to Washington, DC

Yoani Sanchez 2

Yoani Sánchez finally came to the CATO Institute in Washington, DC, on March 19, 2013.

 
I had the option of watching her speech from my office computer through a live feed, or attending in person. Convenience versus walking approximately seven blocks. Decisions, decisions, decisions!

I opted to see her in person. It did help that it was a lovely spring day today. I wanted to see her body language, her facial expressions, how she looked from up close.

I was ambivalent about what she stood for. I had heard some of my Cuban-American friends criticize her postures harshly, while others praised her as a true Cuban patriot. I was confused, and I wanted to find out for myself. This was the first time that the Cuban Government allowed Yoani to travel to the United States, and this could be the last time that she’d be allowed to exit her homeland. I’ve been around long enough to realize that when an opportunity presents itself, you must seize it. So, I did!

First, a sample of those in attendance. Arturo López-Levy from the University of Denver. Wayne Smith, second Chief of Mission of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana from 1979-1982 under President Jimmy Carter. Writer/Film Maker Agustin Blazquez. Dr. Enrique Pumar, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology at the Catholic University of America. Alicia Diaz, Director, Legislative Policy & Government Relations, Washington, DC Office of the Cuban American National Council.

And, then, it was time for Yoani to address the crowd. Her demeanor was unassuming. Her humbleness covered up a steel personality that had stood up to power in the past and paid a stiff price for doing so. Her speaking voice was well modulated. Her vocabulary, precise. Her eye contact with the audience was great. She spoke extemporaneously, without relying on any notes.
Yoani indicated that there is a mainly youth movement in Cuba lately that relies on online technology to circumvent the Cuban Government monopoly over information flow. Cubans can puncture holes in the wall of censorship by relying on mobile phones, blogs, and twitter accounts. If American songwriter and performer Sam Cooke were around today, he would be singing “A Change Is Gonna Come” to Cuba soon.

Yoani acknowledged that she was not under any illusions that reliance on online technology was sufficient to topple the Cuban totalitarian regime. But she was certain that it played an important role in the democratization of her homeland. The use of non-violence and civil disobedience was foreign to a government that had relied on repudiation brigades to instill fear on its citizens. This explains why the Raul Castro Government had sparked a vicious response to this new movement.

But, wait a second! While Yoani’s remarks were highly informational and enlightening, she failed to address the topic that I was most interested in. It is a controversial topic, but one that I thought that she had to address. What is it? But, of course, the keeping or lifting of the embargo that the United States has maintained over Cuba for over fifty years.

So, considering that I had used the 6-P’s Philosophy (Proper Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance) by sitting on the first row, I got a chance to ask the first question. I opted to ask my question first in English, but I translated it into Spanish because I wanted to communicate directly “de cubano a cubana.” I started by pointing out that prominent Cuban dissidents like Dr. Oscar Biscet, Berta Soler (current leader of the Ladies in White), Dr. Guillermo Fariñas, and Jose Daniel Ferrer had lobbied for the maintenance of the U.S. embargo against Cuba. They argued that lifting the embargo would give more oxygen to the repressive apparatus. I mentioned that I had read recently that Yoani favored the lifting of the U.S. embargo, but I realized that media outlets often took one’s comments out of context. Therefore, I asked Yoani to set the record straight on this matter.

She responded that the Cuban dissident movement was not monolithic in its viewpoints. While they all shared the common goal of restoring democracy to Cuba, they had diverse views on issues like the U.S. embargo. She favored the lifting of the embargo because the Cuban Government had used it as an excuse for the manifest failures of its oppressive communist system.

Another attendee asked what else was needed to bring about a democratic transition to Cuba. Yoani responded that the main ingredient would have to be for Cubans to lose their fear. As long as the great majority of Cubans embraced a “what’s in it for me” mindset, Cuba would not be free.

When asked how would the death of Hugo Chavez impact the Cuban society, she indicated that most Cuban feared a return to the special period when Cuba plunged into a severe recession after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990’s.

Yoani expects more harassment when she returns to Cuba, but she thinks that this trip will serve as a shield because of the notoriety that she’s gained overseas. She would like to devote her life to making others uncomfortable as a journalist in today’s Cuba and in a future Cuba. Upon her return to Cuba, she would like to set up an independent digital newspaper.

She concluded her remarks by mentioning that during the last five years, she had applied twenty times to travel outside Cuba, and her requests had been denied twenty times. Only after the 2013 immigration policies was she allowed to travel overseas. But she explained that the new immigration policies were not what the Cubans had hoped for because they excluded political prisoners from the 2003 Black Spring Crackdown who opted to remain in Cuba – like Dr. Oscar Biscet. Yoani speculated that the Cuban authorities had granted her a passport to travel abroad because they hoped that she would not go back. And even if she went back, they hoped that she would be intimidated by subjecting her to violent repudiation rallies by pro-government mobs. But she said that she would not be intimidated, she would not be silenced, and she vowed to continue exposing the abuses of the Cuban Government through the online media outlets.

At the end of the day, I learned to agree to disagree with Yoani regarding the U.S. embargo. I did not convince her, and she did not convince me on this matter. However, I appreciate all that Yoani has done to expose the repression that the Cuban Government has subjected the Cuban population for the last fifty-four years.

I agree that it is impossible to bring about uniformity of thought in a coalition to topple the Cuban totalitarian regime. As long as we share one goal in common – to restore democracy to Cuba – we can become brothers and sisters in a fight for a just cause.

Blockade, Schmockade… psst… we can buy anything we want and sell it to you for a much higher price

drugs

Cuba is Venezuela’s main drug supplier

Whoa… wait a minute.

No, not illegal drugs, but pharmaceutical products.

Question: how does Castrogonia become a major drug exporter when it has a tiny and grossly inefficient pharmaceutical industry and its natives are sorely lacking in access to the simplest drugs?  And what about the fact that the leaders of the Castro Kingdom constantly claim that the “blockade” prevents the delivery of much-needed drugs to its subjects?

Hah!  Gotcha, Castronoids!  You are very bad liars.  You can get any drugs you want on the world market and resell them to Venezuela at inflated prices, all because the late Hugo Chavez set up this scam, probably with some personal profit in mind.   You’ve got to hand it to the cretins: they sure do have a way of fooling everyone and growing filthy rich at the same time.

In the meantime, non-elite Cubans on the island go begging for the drugs they need, and many suffer greatly or die because the Castro regime chooses not to buy these drugs for its own slaves or to dispense them through its much-praised  free health care system.

Read it and seethe:

Venezuela imported USD 323 million in pharmaceutical products from Cuba in 2012

ROBERTO DENIZ | EL UNIVERSAL
Tuesday March 19, 2013 11:19 AM

Venezuela’s US dollar sale to the health sector dropped 13.5% in 2012, according to information compiled by the Foreign Administration Commission (Cadivi). However, such fall did not prevent Venezuela from importing pharmaceutical products from Cuba.

The National Statistics Institute (INE) records on imports in 2012 confirm that Cuba has become Venezuela’s main supplier of pharmaceutical products. Estimations show that Venezuelan imports from Cuba amounted to some USD 323 million last year, 10.6% above the figure recorded in 2011.

Cuba’s exports to Venezuela exceed those of the US (USD 303 million), Germany (USD 251 million) and Brazil (USD 230 million).

In recent years, Cuba has played an increasingly significant role in the supply of drugs and pharmaceutical products to Venezuela. Based on INE’s data, exports reported a 2.906% hike in 2006-2012, climbing from nearly USD 10 million to USD 323 million.

Sources linked to the industry and labs stated that Venezuela-Cuba operations have been conducted in the public sector. “They are government purchases; private firms do not buy products from Cuba.”

The sources added that such products are re-exported by Cuba, as the island does not manufacture many drugs or high-tech equipment. “Cuba does not have a big pharmaceutical industry,” the source explained.

Raving hard-line MANIAC(!) insults Canadians and Canadian Gov.–while on a top-rated Canadian TV network!

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* “The Canadian Gov. KNOWS GOOD AND WELL what’s going on with this sex tourism!”

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* “Canadian tourists provide THE LIFELINE to Cuba’s Stalinist regime!”

* “The Cuban regime is enjoying RECORD tourism revenue while the Cuban people are suffering RECORD (recent) repression!– PLEASE remember that Canadians!!!”

* “Canada’s Foreign minister Baird was recently in Cuba CHUMMING IT UP with Stalinist dictator Raul Castro!”

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Entire interview here, folks. As usual, our friend Ezra Levant is at the forefront of denouncing Castroite swinishness and repression. We could sure use many more like Ezra in the media of these free and independent states!

(Pero fijense que tipo mas malagradecido este Fontova! Lo invitan, le hacen un “plug” enorme para su libro– y lo unico que hace este Fontova es INSULTAR el gobierno y el pais de la estacion que lo invito!–y que se han portado tan requete-bien con el!…Pero que tipo mas malagradecido y PICU’O, este Fontova!)

A small but important victory

Chalk this one up as a WIN for our side. However, just because we won this skirmish does not mean the other side will desist from wanting to disarm us. 

An assault weapons ban won’t be in the gun-control legislation that Democrats bring to the Senate floor next month, a decision that means the ban’s chances of survival now are all but hopeless.

The ban is the most controversial firearms restriction that President Barack Obama and other Democrats have pressed for since an assault-type weapon was used in the December massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn. Rejection by Congress would be a major victory for the National Rifle Association and its supporters and a setback for Obama and the provision’s sponsor, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

In a tactical decision, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., concluded that including the prohibition in the gun bill would jeopardize the chances for passage of any firearms legislation at all, taking away votes that would be needed to overcome Republican attempts to block the Senate from even taking up the issue. […]

Semper vigilans!

An Open Letter to Pope Francis I – By Zoé Valdés

By Zoé Valdés – translation to English forthcoming:

Carta abierta al Papa Francisco.

sonia garro

Su Santidad Francisco

Ciudad del Vaticano

Roma

Primero le deseo mis congratulaciones por su designación de Sumo Pontífice de la Iglesia Católica.

Desde hace más de medio siglo, 54 años, mi país, Cuba, sufre una de las más crueles tiranías comunistas bajo el mando de la familia Castro. Ni un solo día desde el año 1959 hasta la fecha ha habido libertad en la isla, las cárceles llenas, represión tortura, asesinatos políticos, falta de libertades, persecución de religiosos, fueron y son el pan de cada día en la isla.

El 22 de julio del 2012 fallecieron en un raro accidente automovilístico el líder del Movimiento Cristiano Liberación Oswaldo Payá y el joven Harold Cepero, iban perseguidos, como era ya habitual, por la policía política. Hace dos semanas un miembro del Movimiento Cristiano Liberación también fue muerto en otro accidente de automóvil, junto a él iba dos sacerdotes, que quedaron mal heridos. Antonio Rodríguez Vázquez fue sepultado en Cienfuegos hace un mes, las honras fúnebres se realizaron en la parroquia Monserrat de esa ciudad. El accidente ocurrió cuando Rodríguez Vázquez junto a los sacerdotes jesuitas Ramón Rivas e Ignacio Cruz Magariño viajaban  a la capital.

Rosa María Payá, hija de Oswaldo Payá y líder del Movimiento Cristiano Liberación, clama por una investigación a profundidad con la que se esclarezca la verdad sobre la muerte de su padre y de Harold.

El problema racial en Cuba se acrecentó con la llegada de los Castro al poder. En mi país golpean salvajemente a las mujeres y hombres, cualquiera que sea el color de su piel, a diario. Pero el odio del régimen se descarga con mayor encono en contra de las mujeres de piel negra. Como ha ocurrido en días recientes contra la opositora Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera.

El 21 de marzo próximo hará un año que la opositora Sonia Garro Alfonso y su esposo Ramón Alejandro Muñoz fueron encarcelados en unas de las peores cárceles de la isla, sin juicio y sin sentencia, por el sencillo hecho de querer ser oida como Dama de Blanco por Benedicto XVI durante su visita en marzo del 2012 a Cuba. Ella padece de un quiste en el riñón y está gravemente enferma, él de una úlcera, no les permiten los medicamentos ni los alimentos que sus familiares les llevan a la cárcel. Su hija, menor de edad, se encuentra al cuidado de una tía, que también tiene tres hijos, y a los que han reprimido sin piedad las autoridades castristas.

En Cuba encarcelaron al Dr. Oscar Elías Biscet, así como a Jorge Luis Pérez García, conocido como Antúnez, por anhelar la libertad y la democracia para su país. Ángel Moya es un preso de la Primavera Negra. A ninguno de los tres les permiten viajar fuera de Cuba para dar sus mensajes de paz, de amor por Cuba y por la vida, de democracia y de libertad, al mundo. Un mensaje bien distinto del que ha dado el régimen de los Castro al mundo durante más de medio siglo.

Al ex preso político de la Primavera Negra, el escritor Regis Iglesias, portavoz en el exilio del Movimiento Cristiano Liberación, que fue desterrado hacia España bajo licencia extra penal junto a otros muchos presos, las autoridades cubanas le niegan la entrada en su país, como a muchos otros exiliados.

Los cubanos necesitamos que la iglesia se una al pueblo cubano y no a la dictadura, que la iglesia apoye con sus palabras y con sus actos a estas personas.

Continue reading HERE.

An interview with Cuban punk rocker Gorki Aguila

Pedazos de la Isla interviews Cuban punk rocker Gorki Aguila:

Gorki Aguila talks independent art, new album and his most recent arrest

Gorki Aguila, lead singer of the punk-rock band ‘Porno para Ricardo’ (censored in Cuba, although with lots of fans in the “underground”), chats with this blog about the release of their new album, “El Maleconazo”, and other topics.

Pedazos de la Isla: Gorki, first of all, tell us about your more recent arrest at the hands of the political police this past Saturday 9th of March. When did it happen and why?

Gorki: The arrest took place in the morning when I was leaving my daughter’s house. The police had been surrounding the house since 6 AM to try and impede the presentation of the album which was going to take place in my house, along with an exposition by the graffiti artist Danilo Maldonado (“El Sexto”). State Security was very interested in keeping that event from happening, not only because the nature of the CD and the exposition, but also because of the recent announcement of the death of Hugo Chavez. Then, they carried out a really exaggerated police operation against me. I was physically assaulted, they used violence against me despite that I didn’t even resist the arrest. They shoved me into the police vehicle and took me to a police unit on Infanta and Manglar. We’ve been there a couple of times before.

PDLI: What happened inside that police unit?

Gorki: These people from State Security interrogated me. Like I said, one of their main interests was for the album launch not to go through. It was that kind of ridiculous dialogue, always asking the same questions and telling us the same threats. The arrest was violent. I still feel pain on my neck, my chest and parts of my back because of how the police treated me…they threw me against the car and shoved my face against the car seat. I couldn’t see where I was being taken.

PDLI: What does this say of the system?

Gorki: When you see that a government does not tolerate an exposition or a simple CD presentation, then I think that’s a very fearful government, a government which fears simple things, like these, cultural and artistic activities.

I was chatting the other day with Reinaldo Escobar, the husband of blogger Yoani Sanchez, and he was joking around telling me that the G2 (State Security) have indirectly become the main promoters of our projects, in this case of our most recent album. Each time they carry out a big show like this, they further promote our CD or our activities, because then more people end up finding out about it.

Continue reading HERE.

Fun and Games from the Vatican

popepizza

Time for a Contest!

Over thirty years ago Father Guido Sarducci introduced a new game on Saturday Night Live: the Find the Popes in the Pizza Contest.

Well, here it is, 2013, and the Vatican is still providing  the world with games and contests that challenge the faithful and the not-so-faithful.

This contest has no prize to offer other than the satisfaction of proving to yourself that you are extraordinarily perceptive.

A divertirse, damas y caballeros !

Here is the first contest:  Find the Communist Dictator-Loving Cardinal from the Caribbean in the Procession:

cardinals

 

And here is the second contest:  Find the Irritated Communist Female Tyrant-in-the-Making Who Also Happens to be From the Same Country as the Pope:

cardinals 2

 

And here is the third contest: Find the Ever-So-Clever Allusion to the Years 711-1492 in Iberian History.  

cardinals 3

 

Erwin Harris: The man who chased down deadbeat Fidel Castro

Via The New York Times:

Erwin Harris, Ad Executive Who Seized Cuban Assets, Dies at 91

Erwin Harris left behind a respectable record of achievement as an advertising executive, an estimable collection of Chinese antiquities (his lifelong hobby), a loving family and a remarkable if little-remembered role in the tortured history of diplomatic relations between the United States and Cuba in the early 1960s.

Mr. Harris, a Yonkers-born World War II veteran who died in Miami on March 9 at 91, probably did not tip the scales of history. But from 1960 to 1961, armed with nothing more than a court order from a Florida judge and accompanied by local sheriff’s deputies, he scoured the East Coast confiscating Cuban government property — including the state airplane Fidel Castro parked in New York while on a visit.

It was a dogged mission in pursuit of compensation for what he said Mr. Castro owed him: $429,000 in unpaid bills stemming from an advertising campaign promoting Cuban tourism.

At different times, Mr. Harris seized two Cubana Airlines passenger planes, five cargo planes, a Cuban Navy vessel and a boatload of 1.2 million Cuban cigars arriving in Tampa, Fla. In Key West, he appropriated train cars carrying 3.5 million pounds of cooking lard bound for Havana. Temporary lard rationing in Cuba ensued.

In September 1960, he took control of Mr. Castro’s personal government plane while Mr. Castro was in New York for a 10-day official visit, and began arranging to have it auctioned. (“Cuban Airliner Seized Here,” trumpeted the front page of The Daily News.)

The Soviet leader, Nikita S. Khrushchev, stepped in to replace the plane Mr. Harris had snatched, and on Sept. 28, a reporter watching Mr. Castro board the Soviet aircraft at Idlewild Airport (now Kennedy International) described him as smiling “almost defiantly.”

By then, Mr. Castro had added airplane stealing to the litany of abuses he said were being perpetrated against his country by the American government. In a fiery four-hour speech to the United Nations, he said the purpose of the abuse was to restore Cuba to its prerevolutionary status as “a colony” of the United States and American monopolies.

Despite heated phone calls between United Nations officials and the State Department, half the members of the Cuban delegation were still scrambling for flights home and the rest were returning on the Soviet aircraft.

Philip Brenner, a professor of international relations at American University in Washington, said a tense and hectic atmosphere that week probably helped Mr. Harris carry out his seizures, especially of Mr. Castro’s turboprop plane. Debates had erupted over United Nations membership for the People’s Republic of China, Soviet and American officials were jockeying over proposed disarmament talks, and the first presidential debate between Senator John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard M. Nixon was broadcast that week.

“Everything was so wild, I’d guess the authorities were just blindsided by this guy,” Dr. Brenner said.

Many of Mr. Harris’s seizures were contested, and some properties, including Mr. Castro’s plane, were returned. Mr. Harris recovered part of his money, though not all, selling confiscated property at auction far below its value.

His wife, Theresa, who confirmed his death, said he was eventually forced to file for bankruptcy.

Mrs. Harris said her husband was motivated by simple indignation and a wish to be paid. As far as she knew, she said, he never received help from intelligence agencies in locating Cuban assets, though he had served in an Army counterintelligence unit during World War II.

Continue reading HERE.

Cuban political prisoners and torture victims humbly invite Yoani Sanchez for a chat

aa4aaaaa6mujer-presaaaa3

Daily–indeed, almost hourly lately–we’re assured by all the properly anointed media parties that no one has done more to alert the world to the “horrors” of Castro’s rule than Yoani Sanchez.

On this side of Alice’s Looking Glass, these Castroite horrors might include murdering more political prisoners in his first three years in power than Hitler murdered in his first six, along with jailing and torturing political prisoners at a higher rate than Stalin during the Great Terror–all these horrors in the process of converting a nation with a higher standard of living than half of Europe and deluged with immigrants into one that repels Haitians.

But on the other side of Alice’s Looking Glass these horrors seem to consist of shortages of computer memory sticks and of properly palatable foodstuffs.

This incongruence in reported horrors has caught the eye of some of the aforementioned Castro prisoners and torture victims–i.e. the longest suffering political prisoners in the modern history of the human race. These were all born in the same country as Yoani Sanchez and suffered their horrors at the hands of the same regime she denounces (Lite.)

When she visits Miami next month some of these folks would like to expand the frontiers of Yoani Sanchez’ knowledge concerning Castroite horrors. Here’s a letter from Luis G.Infante (16 years in Castro’s prisons and torture chambers) and Orlando L. Periu on behalf of Organizacion Presidio Politico Historico Cubano:

To answer the often expressed question regarding the position of Historic Cuban Political Prisoners to Yoani Sanchez visit to Miami, we declare:

For over half a century the Castroite tyranny has managed to erase all memory of Cuban life prior to their usurpation of power. As well, they’ve erased the memory of the repressions that drove so many Cubans to rebel against their totalitarian rule.

We realize that generations born since 1959 have been victims of Communist indoctrination. We’re familiar with practically all the declarations and statements by our compatriot Yoani Sanchez. So we notice there’s a large portion of Cuban history, prior to her birth, that she’s unfamiliar with. She now has a chance, if she wishes, to learn of this history.

Yoani, along with those new (Cuban) voices that travel the world should have an opportunity to learn about this part of Cuban history of which they are uninformed. We suggest that they take a few minutes to meet with the men and women of the generation that preceded them and fought against a regime responsible for the very repressions and miseries they now travel the world denouncing.

We suggest that during her visit to Miami, a good place for her to learn of these would be during a visit, however brief, to La Casa de Los Presos. Here are on display many proofs of that long and bloody struggle. The gallery of martyrs displayed on our wall alone provides the best proof of this struggle. And here a small number of ex-political prisoners, male and female, would be delighted to meet with her and help her learn about this vital chapter of Cuban history.

If she agrees to visit us, we assure that the meeting will be low-key without much media fanfare. The point would be for her to learn about us. We would not be interviewing her. Instead, hopefully, she would be learning from us so that in her role as investigative journalist with a large international audience she might help educate others.

If her assistants or handlers find merit in this suggestion we would be happy to host her.

Luis G. Infante PP#34028- Pte. PPHC.; Orlando L. Periú PP#31211- Sec. PPHC.

Your humble servant has both translated and taken the liberty to paraphrase from the original which is here in Spanish.

On this side of Alice’s Looking Glass an invitation by the (miraculously still living) Cubans who sacrificed most for Cuba’s freedom to host the most internationally celebrated Cuban dissident in recent history in the capitol of Cuban exile would seem a newsworthy issue. But we search the mainstream media in utter vain for any mention of it.
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(Luis G. Infante and the good folks at Casa Del Preso, btw, provided the pictures that make up the famous YAF Che poster)

Bill Maher says his taxes are too high?

Welcome to the party, pal! Choke on it.

“You know what? Rich people – I’m sure you’d agree with this – actually do pay the freight in this country.  I just saw these statistics,” he continued, “I mean, something like 70 percent. And here in California, I just want to say liberals – you could actually lose me. It’s outrageous what we’re paying – over 50 percent. I’m willing to pay my share, but yeah, it’s ridiculous.”