Friday’s Granma, Saturday’s Cuba
Who would have thought, just a few years ago, that the austere newspaper Granma would open a section that would become its most read and commented on feature. Under the title, “Letters to the Editor,” every Friday letters sent by readers come to light, addressing the economic and organizational aspects of our society. At first, word spread that the official organ of the Cuban Communist party would sound out a test-tube Glasnost which would later be extended to the rest of the press, but the result has been a limited debate, considering it occurs in a media with a strong reactionary tendency, resistant to change.
The temperature of the criticism has been rising, and in this same newspaper which has never printed a color photo, they appear today to focus on different nuances of old problems. There has even been talk of “privatization” and “the end of subsidies,” all this accompanied by phrases such as “our stagnant mentality” along with exhortations in the style of “we must be realists.” So far, it would seen that the controversy has embedded itself in a publication that has contributed so much, over the decades, to cutting off debate; but let’s not let the excitement run away with us. Now in the heading of the “Letters…” they clarify that it includes “opinions with which one may or may not agree.” All in a show of tolerance that some of us who are discriminated against for our opinions know very well does not reflect anything in real life.
Setting aside the delight, and separating the words that appear from the facts, one can see the true extent and seriousness of this space for discussion. It jumps out at you that there is clearly a limit in terms of topics, because never in all this time have they touched on hot button issues such as the travel restrictions, the lack of freedom of expression, the penalization of those who think differently, the political prisoners, the demand for direct election of the president, or the need for a press less intertwined with the apparatus of governance. Interestingly, the letters appear only to refer to the diversion of resources, production methods, bureaucratic inefficiency, and the requests of many to implement stronger controls. This could be because the opinions are filtered, or because the readers themselves refrain from writing about certain issues that they know will never see the light of day.
On the other hand, Friday’s Granma has created the false impression that criticism is admissible and one can speak with “no holds barred.” But it’s enough to read it at length to confirm that there is a compulsory reverence required to be admitted into the select group of those who can opine. A phrase must be dropped in relative to “keeping our current system,” or a note of exoneration extended to “the historical leaders of the process,” and a sentence added that lays the blame for our national disaster outside our territory. Never – don’t even dream about it – could one read in these pages of ancient design the doubts my compatriots have about the management of Raul Castro and the dysfunction of the state capitalism – or the family clan – under which we live.

The Cuba of Saturday, Tuesday, Sunday – that which overflows with dissatisfaction and anguish – hardly shows in the “Letters to the Editor.” The organ of the only party permitted would never disseminate that to those they don’t consider – even remotely – the vanguard of the nation. To do so would be as if Saturn, having devoured his children, started in on his own heart.
Julio 3rd, 2010 at 09:49
And your tirade about others being “hating animals” illustrate my point to perfection. As do all your posts.
Crap filled with impotent hatred of anything and anyone that does not support you in your self-destructive adrenaline fuelled ire.
Julio 3rd, 2010 at 09:46
Post 65, if you had an education, you would have known that great minds think and act alike. On the other side of the spectrum are the no minds (dumbo cretens like your good self) who may even think alike, but due to difficulties in composing their simple thoughts (the only great thing about you morons - great difficulties), they sound different even when talking about the same thing.
That is how masses come to be. And we know that human masses have very low IQ. Given how low that IQ is in you individual members of the Mass, we can anticipate a violent, stupid and pointless mass on the move.
Luckily, the numbers in that “group” are quite small.
Junio 27th, 2010 at 00:50
64JohnTheOne
Junio 26th, 2010 at 07:15
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here we have another emmigrant hater like damir the retarded….. they both sounds so similars that you will get confused about who is who…..but don’t worry dear readers……. the question is that they both are similar retarded or same “person”…… sorry I ment: same hating animal.
Junio 26th, 2010 at 07:15
albertico, get some perspective. You yourself are one who shoots from the hip when it comes insulting people. That is all you really do here. Nothing else.
I am yet to see a meaningful post, debating issues and facts, from you.
This wannabe “civlized” comment you offer here is poor patronising. You insulted me for perfectly legitimate comments directed at no one, especially not you, yet you called me (inerestingly the same as those fake psychoanalist and other “visitors” use) names for expressing my opinion.
And you are demanding “civlized” behavior from others…?
Clean up your act first before patronising others whose IQ level is by far higher than your own. You are an immigrant in US of A and yet, Damir’s english is by far better than yours.
Whose is greater intellect here?
You lose.
Junio 25th, 2010 at 12:31
@#62
Where is YOUR sense of civility?
Your writen record proves (by your own hand) what an insulting, arrogant bully you are …
Don’t you read what you write?
I think you lead a lonely miserable life …
Junio 24th, 2010 at 05:56
Post 61 is from a mentally deranged iot with no sense of civility. Jusgt a lot of insulting with no substance. Endless stream of hose two same words teh immigrant has managed to identify in his dictionary (monkey, there are FREE translatin pages on the internet) and is relentlessly throwing them at anyone who doesn’t think Yoani is the brod No.1.
Well, retard, you are both mentally challenged. And have no hope in recovery. Your stupidity is already legendary. Everyone knows that you are the same one person behind almost all of the “supporters” nicks.
Your empty skull is not capable of delivering to you any information, let alone to make sense of it.
So your next post will be just another barrage of insults indiscriminately spread over the page wth no regards to the fact that people will always have a different opinion and that it is their right to disagree with you.
And there’s NOTHING you can do about that.
Just like Fidel, you want only to have people think what you think. Anyone thinking for themselves and not accepting your stupidity should be eliminated.
To come to think of it, you are Fidel, aren’t you? After all, that is what HE would do, acording to you too.
Hola Fidel, hijo de mierda.
Junio 23rd, 2010 at 22:28
60Rudy
Junio 23rd, 2010 at 05:07
….. Hopefully with dialogue with the U.S. and without intervention from dissidents and others who want to get their hands in the cookie jar……….
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That’s all concern of the castrofascist elite…… to keep exploiting Cuba’s natural and human resources without competence, in a monopolistic way……. that’s way the spend so much money and man-hours to make propaganda and lure the people of Cuba and americans too if possible……… but they have a handicap…….. they can’t hide they real intentions….. elite member rudy is the best example of this handicap……… sorry rudy…… but the days of your fascist feast are accounted…… cuban people is close to sweep you all and take back what belong to them.
Junio 23rd, 2010 at 05:07
Yoani’s ideas are just as rigid as the ideas of the government she detests and criticizes so often in her blog. I would hate to see her, or anybody like her running Cuba. I hope it is a new, younger crowd of forward thinking Cubans who eventually lead Cuba to a better future. It’s time to stop the “blame game” and move forward with new ideas and new energy to lead the country in a new direction. Hopefully with dialogue with the U.S. and without intervention from dissidents and others who want to get their hands in the cookie jar. Cuba is for Cubans, for those who love the island and its people. Not for those who want to run things and forget about the people just like the current regime has.
Junio 22nd, 2010 at 08:40
That is of course merely your fantasy at work. Your intentions are not to deal with the facts but with propaganda. Your irrationality is measured with decibels of your writting, not with the IQ of your arguments (because there is none).
Again you post nonsense without LINKS, but you are uncivilised enough to insult and demand links from others whenthey post infromation that makes you shine in all your primitive nazist hysteria.
And that is one very ugly sight…
Junio 20th, 2010 at 20:30
But guevara was not only a child killer but a disgusting racist that had a very rascist way to see black people and american natives…… like our racist damir uses to feel about non white people che guevara felt thus:
Whiting for a boat to travel to Pascuas Islands guevara wrote in his dairy book “Travel Notes”: ”Isla de Pascuas… allĂ tener un novio blanco es un honor para ellas.”……… “Pascuas Islands….. for women there to have a white man is like an honor.”
che’s rascism is extremely evident in this “Travel Book” where he wrote: “Los negros, esos magnĂficos ejemplares de la raza africana que han mantenido su pureza racial gracias al poco apego que le tienen al baño, han visto invadidos sus reales por un nuevo ejemplar de esclavo: el portuguĂ©s.”……. “Black people, wanderful samples of african race, they could keep their race so pure thanks their weak love for the bathroom. They have now a new competitor as slaves: portuguese people.”……. of course this uncomfortable paragraph was omited of the film “Motorcycle dairies”
Junio 20th, 2010 at 20:10
56Damir
Junio 18th, 2010 at 18:55
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This episode of the assasin guevara life was written by one of the survivors of the day…. same episode has been related by ex fire squad members in Fort La Cabaña and also related by several eyewittness…… in same way has been related other episodes where che killed children …… because this was not the only child he killed…….. to prove a crime in any justice court is needed photos….. to prove the killing of more than 20 children in tugboat “Mars 13″ sinking is not needed a photo but the testimonies of survivors, including parents of those children that survived the massacre, tens of survivors that has related the crime to international authorities putting in such way the tiranny in a sitiation that denial of the crime is not posible and it only “defense” is to lie trying to justify the act as an act performed by workers of the very tugboat…….. well, relators asked to tiranny, “If it was the workers why no of them is in jail???”…….. they have no answers because it simply was not the workers but regime’s agents who wassacred those children……… same impossibility to justify guevaras children killing is observed by international investigators that listened for survivors testimonies…….. it is a proven crime, this one and another more.
Junio 18th, 2010 at 18:55
A dumbfuck claiming to be a “democrat” writes like this?
“Barbara C please send us your picture so we can “PARTY” with you.”
The true face of the ailing vanishing terrorist squad whose last station before the death is this primitive page.
The same poster claims Che shot a 14 years old boy in he head. As if he was there and saw it.
Show us the photo and three witnesses of the incident.
No evidence, no witnesses? No photos?
Then you ARE a LIAR.
Mentiroso, as they say in Cuba…
(they do say mentiroso in every spanish speaking country too, you know, you ignorant terrorist?)
Junio 18th, 2010 at 18:49
Post 51, another avalanche of shit from a well known nazist. Huffington Post, by the way is well known in the local area as a gossip board. SO to call upon it as a source of serious information is as good as the Miami Herald, or Womans Day, or Sun, while we are at that.
Seriously deranged post by a seriously deranged poster.
It’s like defending mussolini and hitler citing their own press statements.
But of course, just as team Yoani complains about having problems with expressing themselves against tyrants who wouldn’t let them, the poster of 51 is just the same. Anyone can post, as long as it is along MY party lines. Anyone else is NOT ALLOWED and must be insulted heavilly.
Some “democrats”.
Pretenders. Nazists jealous for not being in power. Violent criminals waiting for their turn. Hypocrites bullshitting about “democracy” which doesn’t exist anywhere.
Nothing else here.
Junio 18th, 2010 at 05:32
@#52
Siggy:
you stir memories burned in the soul, pictures in the mind, smells & sounds, fears
untold & unable to share even today …
It was supposed to be a better future, a better life for all but how quickly it changed into a nightmare, how quickly learning how to lie convincingly, how to hide thoughts and how fast slogans were learned all in the name of survival …
After the dust settled, life did not go as before, concerns became worries; a parent’s choice for their children’s future became a game of hide & seek.
Oh for the past that is & the future that we don’t know … hope for an end to the nightmare fear for what might the future bring …
Junio 17th, 2010 at 16:02
Cuba is on the USA terrorist list for various reasons,, ie Cuban embassy in Somalia selling visas so that terrorist can travel to the USA through Cuba and the help of Cuban officials. Children in Cuba today are all told Che was a “GOOD GUY” and that they should be like him. CHE was cold blooded killer and a pig. Cuba should have better role models to follow. The recent news from Cuba (not Granma) real news that is , is all very promising and Cubas new future looks bright. Pa la Calle.
Junio 17th, 2010 at 14:47
Che. The Assassin.
December 1959; in a dark and cold cell 16 political prisoners tried to sleep on the floor, 16 more remain standing to make place so the others could sleep. This exercise of solidarity was in vain anyway because no one could sleep; our only concern at this time was to survive, to survive a day, an hour, a minute.
Suddenly the cell door was open and another person was pushed violently in the cell. Our new cellmate was a child, 12 or 14 years old, no more. After the initial surprise all the men in the cell surrounded the kid and asked him almost in a choir “Why are you here?”…… “What have you done?”
Bleeding profusely out the mouth and head and with black rings around his eyes and ears the boy told us: “I tried to protect my father, I tried to avoid them to kill him but I couldn’t – say the boy while crying – those son-of-a-bitches murdered him.”
We remained in silence looking at each other trying to find words to console the boy but some kind of words doesn’t exist. Our own problems were too hard. Three days has passed without summary executions, with each passed day enhances the hope of this entire nightmare comes to an end. Executions are terrible, it take your life when more you need it for you self and your family; it not takes in account your protests and desires to live.
Our hope lasted not too long. The door was open again and 10 of us were called out, among them the boy.
How was it possible to take the life of a child in such way? Were we wrong maybe and they would put us free?
We climbed up to the window to see if they took the prisoners to the execution squad or not. Near the fire squad walking slowly with the hands on his heaps was the abominable Che Guevara. He gave the order to bring the boy to him. It seemed he found no one with the guts to kill the child and the horrible task would be done by him self. Guevara commanded the child to get on his knees while we and other prisoners in other cells yelled on him not to commit such a crime. Much of the prisoners offered Guevara to take them to the fire squad instead of the boy.
The boy remained standing and said to Guevara: “You want to kill me? Then kill me but I will not get on my knees, I am not a coward”. The infamous Che walked around the boy and once at his back said: “So you are a valiant kid” and taking out his pistol shoot the boy in the neck. The shoot separated the head of the boy of his body and a pond of blood flooded the soil for a moment before the dry terrain sucked it thirty.
All prisoners were furiously yelling: “You assassin, you coward, you miserable and many other offenses I can repeat here. Guevara turned on the windows where we were and discharged the whole magazine of his pistol on us. I don’t know how many people he killed or hurt this day but I met several of us in the Hospital Calixto Garcia where we were sent after the barbaric deed.
Junio 16th, 2010 at 23:40
Barbara Culero said,
Junio 15th, 2010 at 01:00
“The most intelligent thing Yoani has done thus far. Of-course Americans should have their constitutional rights returned to them after 50 years of ridiculous foreign policies on the part of their government!”
HA HA HA! OH CULERO! YOU HAVE YOUR CULERO UP YOUR CULERO TO SAY THAT!!
THE HUFFINGTON POST:World’s Worst Human Rights Violators: Freedom House Report (PHOTOS) - 06- 4-10
A new report by the Washington-based watchdog Freedom House has identified nine countries and one territory as being the world’s worst human rights abusers. According to the 36-page report released Thursday, the citizens in these places live in “extremely oppressive environments, with minimal basic rights and persistent human rights violation.”
Freedom House’s report — entitled “Worst of the Worst 2010: The World’s Most Repressive Societies” — ranks each country and territory on a scale of 1 (most free) to 7 (least free), according to an assessment of its political rights and civil liberties. The 10 worst abusers scored sevens in both categories.
Ranking just below these countries were three of the members of the UN Human Rights Council: Cuba, China and Saudi Arabia. These countries received a 7 for political rights, but a 6 for civil liberties.
“By highlighting these countries, we hope to give advocates a tool they can use to shine a light on these abuses at the world’s only global human rights body,” Paula Schriefer, Freedom House’s director of advocacy, said in a statement.
See the 10 worst abusers, and a few other notable human rights violators, below.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....tml#s96183
Junio 16th, 2010 at 17:04
The Cuban government has always been about LIES or “mentiras” as they are called in Cuba. The new REAL HEROS in Cuba are YOANI SANCHEZ, ORLANDO ZAPATA TAMAYO, COCO FARINAS, LOS ALDEANOS, Ciro Diaz, Gorki, PANFILO ,las Damas de Blanco and Las Damas De Apoyo. They all have the guts to speak up and be heard in an oppressive Government that inhumanly punishes people with torture and injust jail sentances. Its time for the people of Cuba to take to the streets and claim whats theirs. PA LA CALLE,
Barbara C please send us your picture so we can “PARTY” with you. Where the hell is FIDEL?
Junio 16th, 2010 at 16:50
Sig, I too promise to go to that same Plaza, when the people of Cuba are Free, and leave my contribution. I will then enjoy a Cuba Libre en Cuba Libre eat more masitas de puerco and then leave mojon #2 in honor of Barbara C. and all the other REVOLUTIONARY RATS. Soon my people will be free and able to do the same.
Junio 16th, 2010 at 06:11
Crimes against humanity are not just the ones about deaths, there are also by omision or moral weakness … silence in a horrid enviroment is acceptance … but the choices are hard to make specially in a world of fear.
As I said … slogans can be repeated … from the safety of distance in time & space.
Che was no good hero … he was a butcher.
Che was no soldier … he was a terrorist.
Che was not a good military leader, his follower’s body count proves it.
Che was no strategist … the results are to the last a failure.
Che was no economist … his decisions still reflect in the economy of Cuba
Che was no planner … the results are still suffered by the state of the agricuture & industry.
Che was a self deluted individual, arrogant & cruel, in love w/himself.
Che made people believe he knew everything … but when it came to translating words into action … he failed time & time again.
Lastly think about this:
the consecuences of initiating a military operation in a country other than your own.
Che entered the country w/false documentation, under false pretenses & in disguise.
Declaring war w/the purpose of doing away w/the present form of goverment.
What do you think the consecuences of such action would be?
Che was not murdered … he was executed & if you want to believe all the heroic tales … you’ll realize he knew that was the outcome; if the situation was reversed … he would have done the same. (fidel stopped che from doing it at the Bay of Pigs).
Think about this as well … the geographical area in which che operated allowed some of his followers to escape.
fidel chose not to send help or reinforcements via the same routes, fidel chose not to because …?
Think hard about whom you choose to call your heroe …
Junio 15th, 2010 at 16:41
43Barbara Curbelo
Junio 15th, 2010 at 15:18
#42 - I never committed crimes against humanity for which i deserved a death penalty in Cuba, eitther.
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No maybe you don’t but for your tracherous attitude against the cuban people and your support to the criminals that massacres our nation you deserve a place in the “Mierdoleum”…… your name in stainless steel letters will be placed in this toilet shaped monument in the middle of the Revolution Plaza so all cubans can go ther and left over all traitors and criminal’s lovers the only memory you all deserve….. shit!!!!
Junio 15th, 2010 at 16:39
43Barbara Curbelo
Junio 15th, 2010 at 15:18
#42 - I never committed crimes against humanity for which i deserved a death penalty in Cuba, eitther.
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No maybe you don’t but for yourtracherous attitude against the cuban people and your support to the criminals that massacres our nation you deserve a place in the “Mierdoleum”…… your name in stainless steel letters will be placed in this toilet shaped monument in the middle of the Revolution Plaza so all cubans can go ther and left over all traitors and criminal’s lovers the only memory you all deserve….. shit!!!!
Junio 15th, 2010 at 16:00
My father-in-law, a political prisoner for over 20 years was in a prison cell when Barbera Curbelo’s idol che, pulled a 14 year-old boy from an adjacent cell and despite many protestations took great pleasure in shooting the boy in the back of the head. How’s that as an example for the new revolutionary man? The only thing this retched, racist, ego-maniac of a “revolutionary” accomplished was having a great many people executed, many by his own hand. He succeed at nothing, he helped to destroy the cuban banking system and played a part in the ruination of the economy. Other than being an efficient killer for the revolution his only other accomplishment was having a picture taken … a picture that was then used to create a myth. After having worn out his welcome, fidel sent him off to start trouble elsewhere. He died like a coward, begging for his life, asking for the mercy he denied to so many.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 15:39
BC
Were you being sarcastic BC …I’m hurt. Thanks for the parenthetic clue. One never knows with a clueless putz like you. You can stop with the phoney formality and fiegned sensibilities, you’ve been posting your pro-castro tripe long enough on this forum for everyone to see what a useless tool you are. Take a clue from your idol, the foul-smelling, lice-ridden loser che and get lost…
Junio 15th, 2010 at 15:18
#42 - I never committed crimes against humanity for which i deserved a death penalty in Cuba, eitther.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 14:50
You do not talk w/experience about che …
I doubt you have experienced hate & death as he dispensed with others lives.
You repeat slogans, having never experiencing brutality & murder.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 13:19
YUBANO -real class and real intelligence (note: sarcasm intentional)…
Junio 15th, 2010 at 10:23
BC la jinetera finds merit in quoting a psychopath and murderer. BC you are as much a loser as your beloved idol.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 10:04
#36 ALBERTO!!!
La solidaridad internacional es la ternura de los pueblos - Che Guevara
Junio 15th, 2010 at 09:43
Dumir
You and your sad-sack friends are the only name changing degenerates infesting this blog. Dumir/Darko, BC/Juan, one in the same. The foulmouthed lies and mirsrepresentations posted by you and your half-wit buddies are the creations of your masters in cuba and repeated by you like the clueless morons you are. You are an infantile, stateless communist cretan with anti-US obsession and an equally deranged fixation with your mentor the walking colostomy bag fidel. Who’s ass are you kicking with your third grade english and your kindergarden insults?
Junio 15th, 2010 at 08:45
There’s one, under a number of different nick, sour and mentally deranged individual who keeps trying his best to insult me every time I kick his and the buts of his kind.
The world, in the words of Che’s own grandson: “Ya se acabo’.”
To all the netally deranged anti cubans here, read it carefully.
When even christian church leaders, in all their flavours from Benedict to protestants, declare the capitalism dead, it takes a creten, and a creten from Miami, to still believe in that utopia. The evil dream that has destroyed the world promissing the freedom and richness to all.
Only 5% of people in the usa own 95% of all the money in the country.
So much about “it works”.
And now another christian, dr. Schluter, came out to declare the capitalism dead, gone and the evil system that should be burried never to return. If only all the anti cubanitos emigrant nazist(s) posting here, from Miami and neighbouring areas, would follow the capitalism…
http://www.jubilee-centre.org/.....hp?catID=1)
Five moral flaws of Capitalism and their severe social consequences. A radical new economic vision is urgently needed. Only a creten like humboldt/siggie/freeda something still thinks people actually believe his nazist/capitalist diarrhea.\\SO, when nothing works, teh dumbfuck insults, because a primitive animal that he is, it’s the only thing he knows how to use.
Violence is the argument of intellectually unable people.
Stupid, really.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 07:01
-” WE WILL MAKE OUR HEARTS CRUEL, HARD & IMMOVABLE … WE WILL NOT QUIVER AT THE SIGHT OF A SEA OF ENEMY BLOOD. wITHOUT MERCY, WITHOUT SPARING, WE WILL KILL OUR ENEMIES IN SCORES OF THOUSANDS; LET THEM DROWN THEMSELVES IN THEIR OWN BLOOD! lET THERE BE FLOODS OF THE BLOOD OF THE BOURGEOIS … MORE BLOOD, AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE”-
che guevara
Junio 15th, 2010 at 01:00
“Seventy-four Cuban opposition activists — including the island’s best-known blogger and a hunger striker who has garnered worldwide attention — signed a letter Thursday cheering proposed legislation that would lift the U.S. travel ban to their country.”
The most intelligent thing Yoani has done thus far. Of-course Americans should have their constitutional rights returned to them after 50 years of ridiculous foreign policies on the part of their government!
Some of you should be glad, just think, now Americans can see and judge for themselves.
They no longer need to rely on the experts who haven’t set foot on Cuban soil themselves, in 50 years.
#33 - RICK
A person affected with an antisocial disorder would not have had the ability to willingly sacrifice himself so that those less fortunate than him could have a better life, and the opportunity to offer their children a dignified future. It was precisely his immense love for humanity that compelled him to leave all that was dear to him and all that he had attained, only to endure hardships compounded by the fact that he was an asthmatic.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 00:28
#31 - furthermore, why do you think the Cuban 5 deserve to have been killed?
For what crime would you have them killed, for preventing terrorism?
That was their only crime.
While Pres. Bush told the entire world, “You are either with us or against us” in the war on terror, and warned that he would go after any nation harboring terrorists. What he didn’t say, was that terrorists in Miami were exempt, and that anyone uncovering their dastardly deeds would feel the weight of his injustice.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 00:19
Che was a murdering psychopath.
Junio 15th, 2010 at 00:15
Jerry # 31 -
Che is well known, loved and respected on every continent in the world where there are working class people, honest intellectuals, people hopeful for a better world.
He is an international emblem of inspiration, human dignity, and honor. Had he failed at all, that would hardly be the case.
Thanks to his efforts in Bolivia today Evo Morales is the first indigenous president in the hemisphere. In 2006, the Fidel Castro and Evo Morales signed a cooperation agreement, which resulted in a medical facility at the very school in which Che was assassinated in cold blood after his capture.
Thousands have received free eye surgery there, including the now elderly man who claims to have been ordered to pull the trigger on Che. After Cuban doctors successfully operated on him, his son expressed his gratitude to those doctors in the public media, and said that his father was the man that shot Ernesto Guevara.
The doctors were glad Che had won another victory.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 21:30
Barbara, I believe that history records Che’s administration of the National Bank as being less than successful and his adventures in Congo and Bolivia being failures as well. Che well deserved his execution in Bolivia, too bad that the Cuban 5 didn’t receive the same.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 20:23
#25 GUSANITA - Victims of torture, rape, and pillage of Fulgencio Batista, death squads in South and Central America, and other victims of such terror around the world for which Che sacrificed are way to long to fit here.
“EL REAL CHE, que yo conocĂ…. lo conocistes tĂş o alguien te lo dijo?”
You claim to have known him. He would have turned 82 today. Did you know him in Argentina when he was becoming a physician, or when he volunteered at a leper colony, or in Mexico when he met Fidel and the other revolutionaries there, or did you meet him up in the mountains of the Sierra Maestra or Escambray? Did you work with him when he was the head of the National Bank, when he went to the Congo, or when he was in Bolivia? When did you know him?
Junio 14th, 2010 at 19:56
BArbara # 26
KKK maybe? don’t make me laugh…….
and don’t be sorry for me, that was the name my father always called me when I was just a little girl and argued with anyone who wanted to hurt him.
A gift for you my dear Barbara:
LISTA DE CUBANOS ASESINADOS POR EL CHE
*Nota: TODOS ESTOS NOMBRES DE FUSILADOS, OBTENIDOS POR EL DR. ARMANDO LAGO, 305 665 8026 , TIENEN FECHA DE FUSILAMIENTO Y ESTAN CONFIRMADOS POR DOS O MAS FUENTES DE INFORMACION INDEPENDIENTE, LIBROS O PERIODICOS.
PARA MAS INFORMACION CONSULTESE A: CUBA: EL COSTO HUMANO DE LA REVOLUCIONES SOCIALES, 2005 PAG. 348 por Armando M. Lago, PHD.
Son 179 ASESINADOS!
14 FUSILADOS EN LA SIERRA MAESTRA:
ARUSTIDIO
MANUEL CAPITAN
JUAN CHANG
EUTIMIO GUERRA
DIONISIO LEBRIGIO
JUAN LEBRIGIO
EL NEGRO NAPOLES
CHICHO OSORIO
DOS “NO-IDENTIFICADOS” EN EL 04/57
10 FUSILADOS EN SANTA CLARA:
RAMON ALBA
JOSE BARROSO
JOAQUIN CASILLAS
FELIX CRUZ
HECTOR MIRABAL
J. MIRABAL
FELIX MONTANO
CORNELIO ROJAS
ALEJANDRO GARCIA OLAYON
ALEJANDRO ROJAS
VILALLA
155 FUSILADOS EN LA CABAĂ‘A:
VILAU ABREU
HUMBERTO AGUIAR
GERMAN AGUIRRE
PELAYO ALAYON
JOSE LUIS ALFARO
PEDRO ALFARO
MARIANO ALONSO
JOSE ALVARO
ANIELLA
MARIO ARES POLO
JOSE RAMON BACALLAO
CEVERINO BARRIOS
EUGENIO BECKER
FRANCISCO BECKER
RAMON BISCET
ROBERTO CALZADILLA
EUFEMIO CANO
JUAN CAPOTE FIALLO
ANTONIO CARRALERO
GERTRUDIS CASTELLANOS
JOSE CASTAĂ‘O QUEVEDO
RAUL CASTAĂ‘O
EUFEMIO CHALA
JOSE CHAMACE
JOSE CHAMIZO
RAUL CLAUSELL
ANGEL CLAUSELL
DEMETRIO CLAUSELL
JOSE CLAUSELL
ELOY CONTRERAS
ROBERTO CORBO
EMILIO CRUZ
JUAN FELIPE CRUZ
ORESTES CRUZ
HUMBERTO CUEVAS
CUNY
ANTONIO DE BECHE
MATEO DELGADO
ARMANDO DELGADO
RAMON DESPAIGNE
JOSE DIAZ CABEZAS
ANTONIO DUARTE
RAMON FERNANDEZ OJEDA
RUDY FERNANDEZ
FERRAN ALFONSO
SALVADOR FERRERO
VICTOR FIGUEREDO
EDUARDO FORTE
UGARDE GALAN
RAFAEL GARCIA MUĂ‘IZ
ADALBERTO GARCIA
ALBERTO GARCIA
JACINTO GARCIA
EVELIO GASPAR
ARMADA GIL
JOSE GONZALEZ MALAGON
EVARISTO GONZALEZ
EZEQUIEL GONZALEZ
SECUNDINO GONZALEZ
RICARDO GRAO
BONIFACIO GRASSO
RICARDO GRAU
OSCAR GUERRA
JULIAN HERNANDEZ
FRANCISCO HERNANDEZ LEYVA (padre de Pepe Hernandez)
ANTONIO HERNANDEZ
GERARDO HERNANDEZ
OLEGARIO HERNANDEZ
SECUNDINO HERNANDEZ
JESUS INSUA
ENRIQUE IZQUIERDO
OSMIN JORRIN
SILVINO JUNCO
ENRIQUE LAROSA
IGNACIO LAAAPARRA
JESUS LAZO
ARIEL LIMA LAGO
RAUL LOPEZ VIDAL
ARMANDO MAS
ENERLIO MATA
ELPIDIO MEDEROS
JOSE MEDINAS
JOSE MESA
FIDEL MESQUIA
JUAN MILIAN
FRANCISCO MIRABAL
LUIS MIRABAL
ERNESTO MORALES
PEDRO MOREJON
DR. CARLOS MUIĂ‘O
CESAR NECOLARDES ROJAS
VICTOR NECOLARDES ROJAS
JOSE NUĂ‘EZ
VITERBO O’RREILLY
FELIX OVIEDO
MANUEL PANEQUE
PEDRO PEDROSO
RAFAEL PEDROSO
DIEGO PEREZ CUESTA
JUAN PEREZ
DIEGO PEREZ CRELA
JOSE POZO
EMILIO PUEBLA
ALFREDO PUPO
SECUNDINO RAMIREZ
RAMON RAMOS
PABLO RAVELO
RUBEN REY
MARIO RISQUELME
FERNANDO RIVERA
PABLO RIVERA
MANUEL RODRIGUEZ
MARCOS RODRIGUEZ
NEMESIO RODRIGUEZ
PABLO RODRIGUEZ
RICARDO RODRIGUEZ
JOSE SALDARA
PEDRO SANTANA
SERGIO SIERRA
JUAN SILVA
FAUSTO SILVA
ELPIDIO SOLER
JESUS SOSA BLANCO
RENATO SOSA
SERGIO SOSA
PEDRO SOTO
OSCAR SUAREZ
RAFAEL TARRAGO
TEODORO TELLEZ
FRANCISCO TELLEZ
JOSE TIN
FRANCISCO TRAVIESO
LEONARDO TRUJILLO
TRUJILLO
LUPE VALDES
MARCELINO VALDES
ANTONIO VALENTIN
MANUEL VAZQUEZ
VERDECIA
DAMASO ZAYAS
http://www.futurodecuba.org/li.....os_por.htm
Junio 14th, 2010 at 17:48
CUBA ARCHIVE:The Project: Truth and Memory PROJECT
Cuba Archive is developing a comprehensive registry of disappearances and fatalities of a political nature resulting from the Cuban Revolution. This information is gathered and disseminated for educational purposes and to advance human rights. Users of this information should read carefully the Terms of Use section of this website.
“The Numbers”
As of December 31, 2008, around 11,000 case records had been entered into the electronic database (go to Database if you wish to register as a user.) For regular updates on numbers, go to Reports or undertake an Advanced Search of the Database. Please read the Terms of Use section for important information regarding how to interpret this data.
Case records entered into the database provide the basis for ongoing reports on “the numbers.” But, these are only the cases for which information has been obtained; they are considered “documented” for the purposes of this work. Actual deaths resulting from the Cuban Revolution are believed to exceed the deaths documented by this project by many times.
The Work
Data amassed until 2003 by Armando Lago, Ph.D. (1939-2008), derived mostly from bibliographic sources, served as the building block of the electronic database. Subsequently, Cuba Archive has improved and expanded that work, particularly by gathering new information from primary sources and with improved information management thanks to its tailor-made data management system.
This work is ongoing and is partially available to the public in an electronic Database, a cutting-edge tool in the field of human rights reporting. In addition, Cuba Archive undertakes in-depth studies of selected cases, developing profiles of victims and/or using multimedia tools to tell their stories, and engages in diverse efforts to disseminate its work worldwide, raising awareness of the crimes of the Castro regime and the human cost of political violence in Cuba.
Scope
The Archive encompasses events beginning on March 10, 1952, date of General Fulgencio Batista’s coup d’etat and suspension of constitutional democratic rule in Cuba. It incorporates actions taking place inside or outside the island and affecting Cubans and non-Cubans alike. All cases are documented, irrespective of political, ideological, and other attributes or affiliations of the victim. Each case is referenced with all the sources from which the information was obtained. Discrepancies in case details are noted as “conflicts of evidence.” All findings are reported faithfully, honoring a strong commitment to objectivity, transparency, and impartiality.
Timeline
The project involves an ongoing undertaking to identify and investigate previously unreported cases and add or correct information on recorded cases and enter this data into the database. Progress will depend on available staffing and resources.
Cuba Archive hopes to endure as a vehicle of ongoing research, archival collection, dissemination, and capacity-building on the issue of truth, memory, and justice.
Principles guiding this effort
Cuba Archive is an independent initiative by individuals with a shared vision to uphold the intrinsic right of all people to live safely and in freedom. The project is premised on the belief that the benefits of truth recovery outweigh its potential drawbacks and that knowledge and acknowledgement of systemic injustices are vital for the psychological wellbeing of both survivors and society. Constructive remembering is thought to shape a moral ethos that, by fostering a culture of respect for life and the rule of law, promotes societal reconciliation and averts further atrocities.
What Cuba Archive is not
This effort is not a Truth Commission. Such bodies are usually official initiatives of democratic governments that follow violent regimes once they can embark on far-reaching forensic work, gain access to official records, and significantly overcome the danger of reprisal to witnesses. None of these conditions exist in Cuba to date.
This work hopes to serve as a building block for an eventual Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation process when a free and democratic society can prosper under the rule of law. Only when all sectors of Cuban society can participate freely in a public and responsible debate, will it then be able to decide how best to effect a transition from repression.
http://cubaarchive.org/home/in.....;Itemid=94
Junio 14th, 2010 at 17:42
Yoani can dream of Perestroika, Glasnost, Walensa style solidarity movements, and benevolent sugar barons all she wants; but she should thank her lucky stars each time she looks at her little red elementary school scarf , because thanks to the sacrifices of many in Cuba, she had a wonderful childhood, as children in Cuba still do today.
In our world there are 215 million children who have to work in order to survive - none in Cuba.
115 million of them do it under the worst and most degrading conditions of exploitation, that is sure to scar them physically and emotionally for life.
According to Save the Children, 40 million children and adolescents in the world work as domestic servants, nearly 10 million are kept secretly in their employers’ homes. These children, as young as 10 years of age or less, suffer conditions of “authentic slavery“, subjected to endless working hours and abuses
In Sub-Saharan Africa 1 in every 4 children have to work. In the Asian-Pacific region, 1 in every 8 children have to work, and in Latin America and the Caribbean, 1 in every 10.
That is without taking immigrant children, orphans, and victims of child trafficking (especially the girls) into consideration.
This is not the case in Cuba.
In Cuba children are only expected to just be children.
The # 2 Objective of the Millennium in the UN is - making universal primary education a priority- in order to combat child labor and give infancy an opportunity for a future, as well as establishing a policy that will “improve the families economy, so that they will be able to survive without having to send their children to work.”
The National Center for Homeless Families in the US has provided the following data from 2005-06:
1.5 million children in the U.S. are homeless.
42% of them are under 6 years of age.
The figures are more disproportionate among Afro-American and First Nations People in the U.S.
More than 1 in 7 of homeless children have health problems - from moderate to severe, such as asthma.
Approximately 1.16 million homeless children will not graduate from high school in our country.
Yet our government has wasted $70 million on Cuban American organizations in the past 10 years alone, and last week Congress released another $15 million, and probably more to follow.
Since 1959 a superb system of education, including higher education has been made available to all Cubans free of cost.
There are even thousands of scholarships available to students from around the world who mostly come to Cuba to study medicine, at ELAM (Latin American School of Medicine). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELAM_(Latin_American_School_of_Medicine)_Cuba
500 of those scholarships are reserved exclusively for U.S. students. http://www.ifconews.org/node/351
Presently 150 U.S. students of different races and ethnicities, and from different states in the union are becoming doctors there. Those which have already graduated are practicing in the US. Recently, some of them went to Haiti to assist victims of the horrific earthquake alongside Cuban doctors.
All Cuba is looking for are those interested in a medical career they cannot afford here, with a heart for the poor. All is included; tuition, uniforms, room & board, textbooks, recreational activities, and a small monthly stipend in pesos. Students only need to pay for airfare to and from Cuba, and it is approved by our Treasury Department.
Now that is benevolence!
Junio 14th, 2010 at 15:49
GUSANITA - (Creeme, que sin conocerte me da repugnancia llamarte por ese nombre, pero respeto tu decision de usarlo. Creo mereces mucho mas)
For me, Dr. Douglas Young’s website evokes imageries of white hooded members of a certain southern secret society; if you know what I mean?
If Che faced brutal enemies of the poor masses, he didn’t do it by indiscriminately bombing civilian populations, allowing the destruction of museums and libraries preserving some of histories oldest documents, and he didn’t take any spoils of war. He faught with little resources, but a gigantic heart, against armed military oppressive, corrupt and sadistic forces, and put his life on the line for the cuase of the poorest of the poor wherever he went.
If he had the duty to oversee the executions for crimes against humanity after the triunph of the revolution; of all those that weren’t able to accompany Batista and his closest family and friends out of Cuba with over 700 million from the Cuban bank, he was carrying out his duty.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 15:15
BARBIE algo para que veas EL OTRO LADO DE LA MONEDA……..
EL REAL CHE, que yo conocĂ…. lo conocistes tĂş o alguien te lo dijo?
Ernesto “Che” Guevara dreamed of creating the “New Man” at any cost. During the Cuban missile crisis, he was in favor of a nuclear war because he believed that a better world could be built from the ashes, regardless of the cost in millions of lives. By adhering to his anti-American feelings and pro-Soviet stance, he achieved a role in history that stands for one failure after another, both in Cuba, as well as in all the other countries where he went to promote and disseminate Castro’s Revolution.
Ernesto “Che” Guevara had all the characteristics of a ruthless dictator and opponent of freedom. He believed that the end justifies the means, and he fanatically adhered to this gospel. This “idealized icon” is the one who, as a modern day Grand Inquisitor, eliminated many of his foes with a single pistol shot to the back of their heads. And he is also the same one who authored these enhancing words printed in the identity booklets of young Cuban soldiers sent to fight in Angola: “Blind hate against the enemy creates a forceful impulse that cracks the boundaries of natural human limitations, transforming the soldier in an effective, selective and cold killing machine. A people without hate cannot triumph against the adversary
http://www.therealcuba.com/MurderedbyChe.htm
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Junio 14th, 2010 at 13:16
Para Gusanita:
El verdadero CHE!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....eature=fvw
Junio 14th, 2010 at 13:04
20Barbara Curbelo
An essay by Dr. Douglas Young, Professor of Political Science & History at Gainesville State College
February 10, 2009
Hollywood has dutifully churned out yet another cinematic agitprop paean to a leftist “martyr,” this time Ernesto Guevara. So let’s recall the real “Che” and try to discern why many supposedly democratic, civil libertarian liberals still swoon over this Stalinist mass-murderer.
The meticulous myth of Senor Guevara is of a handsome Argentine heroically helping Fidel Castro’s guerrillas liberate Cuba from Fulgencio Batista’s military dictatorship in 1959. Then he became a global revolutionary icon inspiring the downtrodden to rise up everywhere, even personally leading rebel warriors in the Congo before being executed doing the same in Bolivia in 1967. The (communist) party line says Che personifies the selfless humanitarian courageously fighting for “social justice.” He’s the Marxists’ martyred Christ figure replete with pictures of his half-naked corpse riddled with bullet holes. And the classic poster of an angry young Guevara has scarred countless college dorm rooms for over 40 years, putting a face on the eternally young rebel for angry adolescents everywhere.
The real Guevara was a reckless bourgeois adrenaline-junkie seeking a place in history as a liberator of the oppressed. But this fanatic’s vehicle of “liberation” was Stalinism, named for Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, murderer of well over 20 million of his own people. As one of Castro’s top lieutenants, Che helped steer Cuba’s revolutionary regime in a radically repressive direction. Soon after overthrowing Batista, Guevara choreographed the executions of hundreds of Batista officials without any fair trials. He thought nothing of summarily executing even fellow guerrillas suspected of disloyalty and shot one himself with no due process.
Che was a purist political fanatic who saw everything in stark black and white. Therefore he vociferously opposed freedoms of religion, speech, press, assembly, protest, or any other rights not completely consistent with his North Korean-style communism. How many rock music-loving teens sporting Guevara t-shirts today know their hero supported Cuba’s 1960s’ repression of the genre? How many homosexual fans know he had gays jailed?
Did the Obama volunteers in that Texas campaign headquarters with Che’s poster on the wall know that Guevara fervently opposed any free elections? How “progressive” is that?
How socially just was it that Che was enraged when the Russians blinked during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and withdrew their nuclear missiles from the island, thus averting a nuclear war? Guevara was such a zealous ideologue that he relished the specter of millions of Cuban lives sacrificed on the altar of communism, declaring Cuba “a people ready to sacrifice itself to nuclear arms, that its ashes might serve as a basis for new societies.” Some humanitarian.
Che was a narcissist who boasted that “I have no house, wife, children, parents, or brothers; my friends are friends as long as they think like me, politically.” This is a role model for today’s “post-political” voters claiming we should get beyond partisanship?
Adding to the ridiculousness of the Che cult is that he was virtually a complete failure. As a medical doctor, he never even had a practice. When put in charge of the Cuban economy at the start of Castro’s government, his uncompromising communist diktats ran it completely into the ground, from which it never recovered. Humiliated, and also angry that Castro wasn’t fomenting enough revolution abroad, he then tried to lead such quixotic adventures in Argentina, the Congo, and Bolivia, failing miserably everywhere while sacrificing the lives of scores of naïve, idealistic young followers as deluded pawns in the service of his personality cult.
Another reason he fled Cuba in the mid-1960s was the complete mess he made of his private life. Though he preached sexual purity to his colleagues, he was a shameless adulterer who abandoned two wives and many children, some legitimate, others not. As a grandson put it, “he was never home.” The public Che who supposedly had such great love for humanity privately couldn’t stand most folks.
Guevara’s promiscuous communist adventurism was the pattern of a terminal adolescent running away from his problems to get caught up in some heroic crusade against his eternal bete noir, “Yankee imperialism.”
So why do so many well-heeled American libs still admire this thug? Are the young simply ignorant of his execrable record and drawn to the image of the dashing young rebel? Do older progressives feel guilt for their free market prosperity, and showing solidarity with Che absolves them? Do hippies-turned-yuppies get nostalgic for their youthful protests and rationalize that the symbolism of Che as a “social reformer” eclipses his actual horrific human rights record? And are some American Guevaraistas truly dangerous leftists who seek to emulate their icon and destroy our free, democratic, capitalist society? Ask that guy wearing the Che t-shirt.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 12:41
REUTERS AFRICA: Vatican official to visit Cuba amid calls for change-Mon Jun 14, 2010 -By Jeff Franks
* Visit raises hopes for political prisoner releases
* Will meet with Cuban foreign minister
* Cuban cardinal has called for change in Cuba
HAVANA, June 14 (Reuters) - Vatican Foreign Minister Dominque Mamberti will visit Cuba this week at a time when the Catholic church is flexing its political muscle and calling for change on the communist-led island.
His five-day visit, which starts on Tuesday, follows the release of one of Cuba’s estimated 190 political prisoners and the transfer of 12 others to jails closer to their homes in moves requested by church leaders.
The concessions by the Cuban government have raised hopes that more prisoners will be freed in a gesture to Mamberti, who is the third Vatican official to come to Cuba since Raul Castro succeeded older brother Fidel Castro as president in 2008.
Mamberti is scheduled to meet with Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez, as well as take part in a church conference where Cuban intellectuals, including several exiles from the United States, will discuss key issues on the island.
His official reason for coming to Cuba is to mark the 75th anniversary of the start of Vatican-Cuba diplomatic relations.
Relations between the Catholic Church and Cuba’s communist government were highly contentious in the years following the 1959 revolution that put Fidel Castro in power, but have improved since the 1998 visit of Pope John Paul II.
The pope urged Cuba to release its political prisoners, and after he left more than 200 were freed.
The church has moved cautiously over the years, but in recent months Cuban church leader Cardinal Jaime Ortega has become more outspoken.
In a unusually blunt interview with church publication Palabra Nueva (New Word) in April, Ortega said Cubans were fed up with the country’s ongoing economic difficulties and called for the government to “make the necessary changes quickly.”
Ortega, 73, said “the limitations of the type of socialism practiced here” have dragged down the economy, but he also blamed the 48-year-long U.S. trade embargo against Cuba.
CHURCH INTERVENTION
Ortega then intervened in May to stop the government’s heavy-handed attempts to end protest marches held weekly by the dissident “Ladies in White” since their husbands and sons were imprisoned in a 2003 crackdown on government opponents.
That was followed by a May 19 meeting with President Castro in which, Ortega said afterwards, they spoke of releasing political prisoners and of broader problems within Cuba.
The session, he said, was a “magnificent beginning” that showed “the church can play the role of mediator and resolve old conflicts.”
The government published a front page photo of a smiling Raul Castro with Ortega and other officials in the Communist Party newspaper Granma, but said only that they discussed a range of issues.
It has been silent on the movements of the prisoners, whom it considers mercenaries for the United States.
President Barack Obama has made the release of political prisoners a condition for improving relations with Havana, but Castro said there would be no prisoners in Cuba if Washington ended its decades-old attempts to promote political change on the island.
So far the prisoner moves have been small and perhaps only an attempt by the government to improve its image after the Feb. 23 death of jailed dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo from an 85-day hunger strike, Cuba experts said.
Zapata’s death drew international condemnation of human rights on the island and prompted another hunger strike by dissident Guillermo Farinas that is still ongoing.
The decision to move prisoners “shows a willingness to negotiate on the part of the government that did not exist previously,” said Paul Wander at the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington. “Still, the government’s decision to acquiesce to Cardinal Ortega’s request probably has more to do with the death of Zapata than anything else.”
The release on Saturday of political prisoner Ariel Sigler Amaya, 46, may have been a mixed blessing for Cuba.
He emerged from seven years in prison crippled and emaciated, not the poster boy Cuba might have hoped for, to back up its contention that the prisoners are well-treated.
Just last week, the United Nations special investigator on torture, Manfred Nowak, accused Cuba of blocking him from making a fact-finding mission to the island’s prisons.
Cuba denied the accusation, but said the Austrian lawyer’s investigation was not needed.
“Few countries can boast of the results achieved in Cuba in the treatment of people in prison and their full reinsertion into society,” it said in a statement. (Reporting by Jeff Franks, editing by Anthony Boadle)
http://af.reuters.com/article/.....8820100614
Junio 14th, 2010 at 12:20
CHE GUEVARA’S GRANDSON SPEAKS ABOUT GROWING UP WITH THE CHE LEGACY AND WHAT HE THINKS ABOUT HIS FAMOUS GRANDFATHER, FIDEL AND THE REVOLUTION.
EL PERIODICO: Canek Sánchez Guevara: “A mi abuelo el Che le incomodaba el poder; a Fidel le obsesionaba”
SONIA GARCĂŤA GARCĂŤA
BARCELONA
Canek Sánchez Guevara tiene un nombre que proviene de un rey maya, un padre mexicano y un apellido muy famoso, el de su abuelo, el guerrillero Che Guevara. Nació en La Habana (1974). Have dos años, publicó Diario de Bolivia (Linkgua ediciones) y hoy interviene en el coloquio Libertades en Cuba: ¿Para quién? ¿Para qué?.
–LeĂ que está cansado de que le pregunten por el Che Guevara.
–De hecho, yo no le conocĂ. Lo he conocido a travĂ©s de sus textos. CrecĂ en un ambiente de izquierda radical fuera de Cuba, pero Âżpuede alguien olvidar de quiĂ©n es nieto?
–Es curioso que el mito del Che haya crecido al mismo tiempo que el neoliberalismo.
–De hecho, fue a partir de los años 80 cuando se volviĂł un objeto. Es un sino del capitalismo, reciclar la subversiĂłn en forma de mercancĂa y luego venderla. Y un sino de la subversiĂłn: crear hĂ©roes, mártires y mitos. Fue la izquierda la que ha contribuido a crear el mito.
–ÂżTambiĂ©n es su fan?
–No soy guevarista, me parecerĂa de una soberbia terrible. Me fascinĂł que, tras haber llegado al poder, lo abandonara todo para seguir su obsesiĂłn: la revoluciĂłn.
–No le gustaba el poder.
–Se sentĂa incĂłmodo, lo ejerciĂł mal. El poder era una obsesiĂłn de Fidel.
–ÂżQuĂ© futuro le ve a Cuba?
–Vivimos en un mundo en el que todo parece derrumbarse y Cuba no es ajena. Se ha derrumbado, de hecho.
–Fidel, RaĂşl Castro, Âżmejor o peor?
–Son dos caracteres diferentes, pero el proceso de democratizaciĂłn será pos-Castro, ni con Fidel ni con RaĂşl. El sistema polĂtico cubano se ha comportado como una monarquĂa y no sĂ© por quĂ© se le sigue llamando socialismo. RaĂşl es más pragmático. PodrĂa abrir esos espacios para la democracia, pero no lo ha hecho.
–Ha cambiado a los fidelistas.
–Lo que hay es una mayor presencia de las fuerzas armadas en puestos civiles. Administran hoteles y servicios turĂsticos. Son capitalistas de Estado, antiliberales.
–Y los cubanos, ÂżquĂ© piensan?
– La principal obsesiĂłn del cubano de a pie es llevar comida a la mesa.
–El presidente RaĂşl Castro ha prometido mejorar lo inmediato.
–Cualquier cosa que se haga es pura palabrerĂa, porque hablamos de un sistema corrupto que adolece de transparencia.
–Con lo que está pasando en Cuba, ÂżquĂ© dirĂa su abuelo si viviera?
–No puedo atreverme a poner palabras ni ideas de otras personas, sea el Che o cualquier otra persona, porque a pesar del merchandising sigue siendo un desconocido para muchos. Pero lo que sĂ puedo decir es que Ă©l se fue de Cuba.
http://www.elperiodico.com/def.....io_PK=1026
sábado 21 de noviembre de 2009-Habla el nieto del Che Guevara
http://bendeasis.blogspot.com/.....evara.html
Junio 14th, 2010 at 12:11
Che An extraordinary human being
Jayatilleke de Silva
Today marks the 82nd birth anniversary of an extraordinary human being, one whose name will live through centuries and generations. He is none other than Ernesto Che Guevara, the legendary guerilla, statesman, thinker and revolutionary
In the words of his close comrade-in-arms Fidel Castro he was “ a person of total integrity, a person with a supreme sense of honour and absolute sincerity, a person of stoic and Spartan living habits, a person in whose conduct not one stain can be found.”
He was not only a man of action but also a visionary and a person of broad culture, a profound thinker. His great contribution was the building of a new man who would with selfless devotion contribute to the building of a new society in revolutionary Cuba.
In Socialism and Man in Cuba Che spoke of two pillars of the construction of socialism: “the education of the new man and woman and the development of technology.” He always led by example.
Whether it is in the mountains of Sierra Maestra, or in the battle for post-revolutionary construction, he was always in the forefront. In the early days of the Revolution he had many responsibilities - Head of the newly created Industrial Department, Command of a regiment in Oriente, Head of Cuba’s National Bank.
He worked till early hours of the morning. In a letter to his parents he wrote: “We are not men, but working machines, fighting against time in the midst of difficult and luminous circumstances.” As biographer Lee Anderson said he used to grant interviews to foreign diplomats at 3’O clock in the morning.
For fellow men
Che’s life was full of sacrifices, sacrifices for fellow men. He gave up the profession of a doctor and the chance to accrue money and comforts to join Fidel’s group of rebels. In the very first battle as the doctor of the guerillas in which their group was decimated, he chose the rifle over the medicine box and became a guerilla commander. In battle he undertook the most difficult missions never fearing death. As Fidel said, “If, as a guerilla, he had his Achilles’ heel, it was his excessively combative quality, his absolute contempt for danger.”
Born in Congo, leading the revolution in Cuba, fighting in Africa and Latin America with arms in hand against imperialism he faced death in Bolivia at the hands of CIA trained butchers. He died defending the cause of the poor and the humble of the earth. That is why he has become an immortal legend.
Che was convinced that political independence itself wasn’t enough for the former colonies to be free. He understood the need for economic independence if they are to be really free. Participating at the Second Economic Seminar of Afro-Asian Solidarity way back in February 1965 he said: “Each time a country is liberated it is a defeat for the world imperialist system.
But we must agree that the break is not achieved by the mere act of proclaiming independence or winning an armed victory in a revolution. It is achieved when imperialist economic domination over a people is brought to an end.” Experience of the past 45 years has confirmed the truth of this statement.
It is customary to remember and honour Che as a military figure, as a guerilla commander. However, his relevance today is more in the ideas and thoughts he bequeathed to humanity. In the context of neo-liberal globalization accompanied by a media and ideological blitz by monopoly capital and world financial institutions his teachings on independent economic development become very useful. He wrote: The IMF acts as a custodian of the dollar for the capitalist world.
The IBRD is an instrument that is used to penetrate into underdeveloped countries, and the Inter-American development Bank fulfills this sad role in the American continent. The laws and principles that these organizations are governed by appear to be, on the surface, acting in the interests of the people they are supposedly there to help. They are promoted as safeguarding equity and reciprocity within the area of international economic relations. However, in reality they are merely subtle instruments used to perpetuate exploitation and backwardness.”
An inspiration
Most of all Che will be remembered for his internationalism, his lack of parochial interests. Actually he brought internationalism to a new height. He is the most outstanding proletarian internationalist of the 20th Century. At the time of the Vietnam War he wrote: “There are no borders in this struggle to the death. We cannot be indifferent to what happens anywhere in the world, because a victory by any country over imperialism is our victory, just as any country’s defeat is a defeat for all of us.”
He was devoid of ambition and self-interest. He never wanted any privileges for himself or his family. He believed that leaders should have no special privileges over the masses. He led a Spartan life enjoying no privileges that the masses did not have. Soon after the revolution, Che undertook a tour of several African and Asian countries (including Sri Lanka). Fidel had asked him to take his wife also along with him. He flatly refused the privilege offered as an extravagance that the Government could not afford.
In putting an end to his life at a young age imperialism hoped to end his influence over the masses, especially in the Third World. The result, however, was quite the contrary. His thoughts and deeds continue to inspire millions the world over, those in developed countries, to join the struggle for a better world.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 12:11
TORONTO SUN: Israel denounces Castro ’swastika’ remarks-By Robert Evans, Reuters-June 14, 2010
GENEVA - Israel denounced comments on Monday by former Cuban president Fidel Castro, who compared the Israeli treatment of Palestinians to the Nazi extermination of Jews, an example of heated rhetoric at a U.N. body’s debate.
Castro’s remarks were issued by Cuba’s diplomatic mission in Geneva amid debate in the 47-nation United Nations Human Rights Council on Israeli action in the occupied territories.
“The hatred felt by the state of Israel against the Palestinians is such that they would not hesitate to send the one and a half million men, women and children of that country to the crematoria where millions of Jews of all ages were exterminated by the Nazis,” the ex-Cuban leader said.
“It would seem that the Fuehrer’s (Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s) swastika is today Israel’s banner,” the 83-year-old Castro declared in the latest of a series of articles dubbed “reflections””in the communist-ruled island’s media.
His remarks were not cited in the Council itself, but diplomats said Cuba had sent the comment to other foreign missions in Geneva as well as to journalists.
“With these outrageous comments, Fidel Castro shames his old-time companions and the ideals he always pretended to serve. Che Guevara must be spinning in his grave,” Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said in Jerusalem.
Israel has long lamented its treatment by the Human Rights Council, which it believes is biased against it. Cuba is a member of the council’s bloc of developing countries, which shields its members and friends outside the body like Iran and Sri Lanka from criticism, but regularly condemns Israel.
Fidel Castro stepped down in 2008, following a long illness after nearly 50 years as his country’s number one leader and handed over power to his younger brother Raul, now 79. Since then his “reflections””have kept him in the public spotlight.
On June 2 the Geneva-based Council condemned as outrageous Israel’s interception of a ship flotilla taking aid to blockaded Gaza and the death of nine activists on board one vessel, voting to set up an independent fact-finding mission into the affair.
Israel has set up its own probe with foreign experts and rejected a separate U.N. investigation.
http://www.torontosun.com/news.....80851.html
Junio 14th, 2010 at 12:00
Damierda,
I have two cousins that left Cuba through The Dominican Republic, one was able to make it to Miami while the other is still there. Trying to twist the truth again “REVOLUTIONARY RAT”?
Junio 14th, 2010 at 11:15
13Damir
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:11
Post 11 is another illiterate nazist agitator in that drug ring in Florida.
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Why you get mad for your own stupidity????…… my comment 11 only used your comment 9 to demonstrate something real….. I am not responsible of your stupidity….. you are the one that find information to back and support the denounces we does on castrofascism….. thanks again……. if you still feel mad, discharge your wrath on yourself not on me….. go and stand in front a mirror and tell to yourself stupid, retarded, idiot, moron, abnormal, mental handicapped, imbecile……. hahahahahahahahahahaha
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:39
14Damir
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:19
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Poor hater….. your anti cuban spasm are very similar to your anti Indian convulsions…….. poor retarded one finding in hate the only relief to your inferiority!!!!!
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:24
10Damir
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:06
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You maybe are going through one of the scattered lucid period in your stupidity because you are right….. no totalitarian system style former communist countries has fell by violence…… all them fell by the pacific pressure of the people and fell almost suddenly…… Cuba is will not be an exeption…… we all ready are wittnessing the change.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:19
Illiteracy at work for poster under 11:
“Thanks for confirming what we all knew…… that even Dominican Republic is a beeter place lo live than castrofascist Cuba”
And this from a Dominican:
Written by: Ricardolito, 5 Nov 2008 4:42 PM
From: Dominican Republic, Boca de Chavon
Manhattanite, there are definitely bigger problems and i think many people in their own small way try to be a giver here especially to improve the education and living standards of the poor ..corruption is always the main obstacle to progress here and it can only be defeated by good education ..,.how can ministers in this small country be paid more than the US president ?? Electricity , clean water, health care and education should be priorities ahead of underground railways and an oversized army.
Or this one:
Written by: willmo, 5 Nov 2008 5:44 PM
From: Dominican Republic
Why would anyone like to become a Dominican citizen? What is there? Corrupt government, widespread injustices to the poor, high unemployment, corrupt judges, lawless police force, a president that believes that he is a Prince, just traveling for free everywhere, at taxpayer’s expenses? Showing off at any opportunity? Why would I live in a country like this?
One form the usa reader:
Written by: danny00, 5 Nov 2008 6:58 PM
From: United States
come on i live in miami… the only CUBANOS going thier are ex or current DRUG DEALERS…. at least most of them…. i hear them talking about it in miami…. tale this 1st hand…. just what the country NEEDS now… MORE DRUG DEALERS….. why do you think their down their?…. cant show the MONEY in the states…..sure if i have lots of money i would run to live in a country that figure out how to make ELEC…. cant drink the water, ect ect…… give me a break….. oh! they are sure buying up the condos in santo domingo…. their the only ones that have money to buy NOW….
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:11
Post 11 is another illiterate nazist agitator in that drug ring in Florida.
Just a puppet of Mexican narco mafia.
Cannon fodder. Expendable nobody. Someone who thinks “we all know that” but knows nothing really.
Observing his masters eating lobsters doesn’t make him an expert in dinner table manners.
Just an observer.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:08
Cuban drug dealers in DR
http://www.dominicantoday.com/.....itizenship
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:08
9Damir
Junio 14th, 2010 at 08:58
Dominica Republic has admitted accepting citizenship applications from 580 Cubans,
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Thanks for confirming what we all knew…… that even Dominican Republic is a beeter place lo live than castrofascist Cuba.
By the way……. you are having it hard to find some croat speaking translator that helps you with Darko??????
Junio 14th, 2010 at 09:06
Rick, post 6, do you understand the magnitude of the shock a sudden and radical change in a country’s economic and political system have?
Capitalism is falling apart yet no oe is rushing to change the whole system over night. There’s a reason for that. The critical mass has to be reached for a society to make a transition from one state into another. It would be ideal if Cuba could simply wake up tomorrow and declare Castros retired.
But that cannot be done. Cuba, like it or not, is a country with a functioning political system. Any changes have to go through the system, have to find their critical mass of people accepting them and only then the changes can take place peacefully and to the benfit of the people.
Any other way is plain simple stupidity. Self-destructive ideological nonsense that can only lead to decades of destruction, crimes of horrifying magnitude, unnecessary suffering of the innocent.
Anyone who is for such an option is just a common criminal or an ignorant. Either way, one should not be listened to at all.
Violence is not a solution in 21st century.
Intellect is. I hope you do agree with that.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 08:58
Dominica Republic has admitted accepting citizenship applications from 580 Cubans, majority from Miami, of all places, all drug dealers.
Cubans are the major buyers of condos in DR. And major drug dealers too.
That confirms the Miami Cuban-Mexican connection in the drug industry. It would be fair to suspect that many anti-cuban posters here are among those crimsons and are really just peons in the hands of Mexican mafia which is now almost openly controlling the south of the usa through corruption and massive drug trade that nets just for Mexicans over 65 billions of usa dollars every year.
That eliminates any credibility of anyone who is criticising Cuba from his/her Miami, Florida, or any other usa location. Chances are they are among majority of cuban immigrants who are involved in this immoral and illegal industry.
They do not seem to be able to understand that they are but servants to a very poverful criminal organisation that could eat them and teh whole Cuba in a flash.
Hell, they have plans for a military confrontation with the usa army if Cuban current system and government crumble. The island is in too important strategic position for 65 BILLIONS annually to go to waste.
Not a biggie as CIA is the biggest single purchaser of cocaine from the south anyway. Just ask Noriega who got caught selling the drugs OUTSIDE of the usual channels and only for that got the prison terms.
The usanian govt however mitigated his “suffering” by giving him a three bedrom apartment in the prison which is separated from other inmates, he can receive visits any time he wants adn has a 130cm plasma screen in every room…
So, cubanitos (the immigrants) shut the frick up. No one is really asking you servants for your opinion.
Because it doesn’t count. It is worthless.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 08:58
Dominica Republic has admitted accepting citizenship applications from 580 Cubans, majority from Miami, of all places, all drug dealers.
Cubans are the major buyers of condos in DR. And major drug dealers too.
That confirms the Miami Cuban-Mexican connection in the drug industry. It would be fair to suspect that many anti-cuban posters here are among those crimsons and are really just peons in the hands of Mexican mafia which is now almost openly controlling the south of the usa through corruption and massive drug trade that nets just for Mexicans over 65 billions of usa dollars every year.
That eliminates any credibility of anyone who is criticising Cuba from his/her Miami, Florida, or any other usa location. Chances are they are among majority of cuban immigrants who are involved in this immoral and illegal industry.
They do not seem to be able to understand that they are but servants to a very poverful criminal organisation that could eat them and teh whole Cuba in a flash.
Hell, they have plans for a military confrontation with the usa army if Cuban current system and government crumble. The island is in too important strategic position for 65 BILLIONS annually to go to waste.
Not a biggie as CIA is the biggest single purchaser of cocaine from the south anyway. Just ask Noriega who got caught selling the drugs OUTSIDE of the usual channels and only for that got the prison terms.
The usanian govt however mitigated his “suffering” by giving him a three bedrom apartment in the prison which is separated from other inmates, he can receive visits any time he wants adn has a 130cm plasma screen in every room…
So, cubanitos (the immigrants) shut the frick up. No one is really asking you servants for your opinion.
Because it doesn’t count. It is worthless.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 08:46
#4
Dear Friendly Translator, Seems that the comments are flowing again at least from my location near Tampa, Florida.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 08:44
#5
Yes Damir change is coming to Cuba but the turning over of barbershops to their workers is but a ploy to allay the true change necessary for Cuba to emerge from the darkness that has enveloped it for half a century which is for open presidential elections to be held so that the nepotistic rule of the Castro family is ended.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 03:23
Same old crap, same old “I know it better”. Speaking through the back nozzle, accidentally placed on your heads. No wonder it stinks, everything that comes out of your heads.
Speaking about socialism as if you know what you are talking about. What exists in Cuba is NOT socialism.
But how do yu explain that to ignorants who are so stubborn, they even argue with themselves…
Like Yoani, YET AGAIN:
“Friday’s Granma has created the false impression that criticism is admissible and one can speak with “no holds barred.””
So, now even open discussion is just another function of socialism that needs to be suppressed…!!!
But she does even worse:
“But it’s enough to read it at length to confirm that there is a compulsory reverence required to be admitted into the select group of those who can opine.”
It’s ENOUGH to read it AT LENGTH…”
Who on earth speaks like THAT…!!!???
Never satisfied, are we, Yoani?
Lost the puff long time ago and now are doing the Fidel thing. Just speak forever and ever and exost’em until they are catatonic and cannot care any longer even if they wanted at the beginning…
And you have the face to complain about them. Nothing is left in you but a bit of bitter hypocrisy. Would it not be better to embrace the changes, no matter how small they seem now? Because even the voyage of thousand kilometres starts with ONE SMALL STEP.
Read this Yoani, dear, until it sinks. And embrace the changes. After all you asked for them. Now they are happening, try and accept you are still not at the forefront. You never will be. Your modus operandi is wrong.
Junio 14th, 2010 at 02:47
Yes, the ability to leave comments is severely compromised right now…the experts are working on finding the problem.
BTW, no one is “blocked” and there is no spam in the spam queue… the comments never make it into the site.
Patience, dear commenters, and as soon as it’s fixed I’ll post a comment (frankly, I’m surprised this one got through but it’s the middle of the night and I think that helps).
Your Friendly English Translator
Junio 12th, 2010 at 20:28
2Jim Christensen
Junio 12th, 2010 at 20:03
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Dear Jim…… of course, this blog is not published inside Cuba but Germany……. the blogger and 99.99% of cubans has not access to internet, so, cubans inside the island can’t read this blog and the blogger depends of friends outland to publish the blog……. it is a blog for the world and not for cubans because regime want not internet for cubans….. internet is too dangerous for tyrannies
Thanks for commenting…… hope read you often here.
Junio 12th, 2010 at 20:03
Although I don’t have a y in my name, I felt compelled to comment. I am a lawyer in Kansas City Mo. USA and recently heard a talk by a woman judge here who told about how she left Cuba with her parents when she was about five.
I heard about your blog at about the same time, and am very impressed that you have been able to maintain such a blog in the circumstances.
Keep it up. Freedom will arrive.
Junio 12th, 2010 at 17:45
One of the major differences between a Democratic form of government and a Socialistic form is that there is a far greater separation in the former of goverment and economic. Many world-wide Democratic governments have a capitalistic form of economy. Those two factors are separate and distinct items. Within Socialism the economic system is much less separated. Most of the topics that Yoani states are off-limits for discussion pertain more to the governance side and less to the economic. So, it seems the government is not quite so partisan toward the economic factors as to the governing topics. Still, loosening of any items for open discussion seems to be a plus.