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(Excerpt)--CHILDREN'S CODE
At the heart of the issue is Cuba's steadfast portrayal of itself as a society in which ''normality" for its 11 million people, especially children, means support for Castro's ruling Communist Party.
Article 3 of the legal Children's Code, calls on ''society and the state [to] work for the efficient protection of youth against all influences contrary to their communist formation."
That means, according to Marta Molina, a Cuban psychiatrist who went into exile last year, that children who don't follow the party line not only run into trouble with authorities but get no help from psychiatrists.
All Cuban psychiatrists are under government orders to defend communism in such cases, Molina said, and ''because of the lack of adequate independent counseling, the children frequently became depressed."
She treated more than 500 children in Cuba who had ''serious psychological problems as a result of their own disagreement with the communist ideology or their parents' refusal to indoctrinate them," Molina said in a sworn affidavit given to the lawyers for Elian's Miami relatives.
Based on the government's view of normality, Cuban officials have impugned the sanity of persistent Castro critics, arguing in effect that opposition to the regime is so abnormal that dissidents must be mentally ill.
''Such a conceptualization has enabled the Cuban government to redefine some ecidivist' political activity as a form of mental illness," wrote two veteran Cuba analysts, Charles J. Brown and Armando Lago, in the 1991 book The Politics of Psychiatry in Revolutionary Cuba, published by Freedom House.
The book details the cases of 27 dissidents diagnosed since 1963 as suffering from mental ailments, mostly depression. Many received electroshocks, more as torture than treatment, the authors alleged. (Excerpted from CUBA'S ABUSES OF PSYCHIATRY)
Contact Fidel Castro at: f_castro@cubagov.cu
Sorry -- but not surprised -- that so many are so ignorant----Charley Reese ---Orlando Sentinel, July 6, 2000 ---[Excerpt]---- If you think Cuban-Americans have lost their political clout, then alienate them, and see if you can win a statewide election or an election in Miami-Dade County. The only clout they've ever had is that they are intelligent and hard-working, and they're willing to put their money where their mouths are and vote.
In other words, unlike so many of their critics, they do their duty as American citizens. They do know history, and they do not have defective memories.
They do all of this, by the way, because, unlike so many of their critics, Cuban-Americans do indeed dearly love this country, and they've proved it in every way a human being can. The only thing they wanted for Elian was the liberty his mother died trying to give him.[End excerpt]
Thomas Sowell: Why There's No Freedom for Elian--(via NewsMax.com--[Excerpt]-- The one thing that is clear already is that this case was not about parental rights, which do not exist in Cuba, nor about "the rule of law," which does not exist in the Clinton administration. Judging by the polls, the American people do not understand that.
Part of the problem is that most Americans have no conception of a totalitarian dictatorship or the ruthlessness with which they use family members as hostages. This is nothing new, but our schools and colleges teach so little history that the public can hardly be expected to understand what an old and widespread pattern this is, among dictatorships of the left or right.[End excerpt]
There Stood Patriots---Luis Gonzalez's 4th of July essay---[Excerpt]--- I feel wounded, and I don't think the wound will heal, I don't think I want it to. I will not
seek internal peace by resigning myself to Elian's fate. But as much as I care about his Freedom, about his right to a better tomorrow than the one which surely
awaits him now, I need to look closer to home, to my future and that of my boys.
It's no longer what happened, is how it happened. And while I can do nothing about the what, I have to do something about the how. It's the how that threatens this soil, this dream of Freedom, these United States. It's the realization that within this Country, my Country, our Country, grows a malignancy deeper than I had believed possible, a tumor eating away at our foundations. [End excerpt]
Derbyshire: ELIAN NATION--National Review
--(Excerpt)--Once in a while, some issue in our public life - not necessarily an issue of great intrinsic importance - acts like a flare sent up over a nighttime battlefield, throwing all
the contours into sharp relief and shedding light on dark places. The Clarence Thomas hearings were such an issue; the impeachment was of course another.
The affair of Elian Gonzalez has also been a flare, revealing much about our political landscape. It has, for example, shown that reflective thought and intellectual complexity are not almost exclusive to the Right, while the Left is more monolithic and thinking impaired than ever. As a conservative journalist expressed it to a colleague: "I'm torn on Elian, really torn. But what burns me is that the liberals are not torn. They are bright and breezy; they know exactly what they think." It is not so much a case of Yeats - "The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity" - as of Tolstoy: Happy liberals are all alike, while each conservative is distraught in his own way.-(End Excerpt)
Don't subsidize a tyrant --Miami Herald--(Excerpt) --
While the embargo restricts most U.S.-Cuba trade, it does not impose a humanitarian burden. Cuba frequently has bought wheat from Canada,
rice from Vietnam, and medicine from Europe, Asia and Latin America. Donations of food and clothing and the licensed sale of U.S. medical
products are permitted.
The real cause of Cuba's hardship is not the embargo but the state's Soviet-style economy. Traditional exports such as sugar cost the regime more to produce than they sell for on the global market. Tourism brings in hard currency but not nearly enough to provide for Cuba's needs. Debt payments are so uncertain that major trade partners often must extend new loans.--(End Excerpt)
Friends of Fidel--Washington Times--(Excerpt) Louisiana rice and Illinois wheat producers should not assume that selling to Havana is synonymous with getting paid. U.S taxpayers should be wary. Mr. Castro desperately needs credits and subsidies, and Washington is being pressured to provide them.
If the United States begins to subsidize trade with Cuba estimated at $100 million a year five years from now, U.S. taxpayers could be holding, or paying off, a $500 million tab. That´s real money.
Before extending Mr. Castro credit, grain growers should visit any street corner in Manhattan and observe a game played there. Called three-card monte, it consists of convincing the player that he knows exactly where the card carrying his money is. Until it disappears. In this game, the gambler takes his own chances. Where trade with Mr. Castro is concerned, the U.S. taxpayer will be left holding the losing card. --(End Excerpt)
Play a Dirge For Liberty: On Elian Gonzalez and The Fugitive Slave Law-- The Claremont Institute --(Excerpt)-- Juan Miguel Gonzalez may be Elian's biological father, but a decade ago, Fidel Castro gave a famous speech in which he said he was the real "daddy" of all Cubans. This is confirmed by the fact that the Cuban constitution declares that parents' rights exist "only as long as their influence does not go against the political objectives of the State." And in a rare moment of candor, Luis Fernandez, the chief of the Cuban diplomatic mission in Washington declared that Elian is "a possession of the Cuban government." And just like an antebellum slave owner, Fidel wants "his" property back.
This sort of reasoning is at odds with the principles of American republicanism. After all, a republic is based on the idea that no one can rule over another without the latter's consent. But Cuba is no republic. As recently as April 18, the United Nations Human Rights Commission condemned Cuba for its continued violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms. This is a state that kills people, including children, who try to leave. In the summer of 1994, Castro's political police gunned down 10 children and 22 adults as they tried to escape to Florida aboard a leaky tugboat, then prohibited the families from burying the bodies when they washed up on shore.
The real question here is this: is America obligated to return someone like Elian Gonzalez to a place like Cuba? The best analysis of this question that I have seen comes from John Eastman, a California attorney (and a brilliant student in a class on Law and Economics that I once taught many years ago). As Mr. Eastman observes, the common law and English statutory law, from which much of American law emerged, held that a slave, whether an adult or child, escaping to free territory from the jurisdiction of his or her enslavement was deemed to be free.-(End Excerpt)
Chinese President Jiang Zemin (L) waves to the press after he
was met at Havana's Jose Marti Airport by Cuban leader Fidel
Castro April 12, 2001. Jiang Zemina arrived to begin a three day
state visit to Cuba. China yesterday released the 24 U.S. crew
members of a surveillance plane which was forced to land on
Chinese soil after a mid-air collision with a Chinese fighter.
REUTERS/Andrew Winning
Holding an AK-47 rifle at a huge rally in Havana April 16, 2001 to mark 40 years
since his proclamation of socialism in Cuba, President Fidel Castro (L) urges Latin
American nations to stop the U.S. "shark" destroying them with a free trade pact.
Castro and the 100,000-strong crowd reaffirmed their commitment to socialism in
the same words used by the Cuban leader 40 years ago in a speech at the same
Havana street-corner on the eve of the Bay of Pigs invasion. REUTERS/Rafael
Perez
Chinese President Jiang Zemin, left, and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez
exchange signed agreements at the theater Teresa Carreno in Caracas, Venezuela,
Tuesday, April 17, 2001. Jiang and Chavez signed accords on agriculture, taxation
and energy, agreeing to build a fuel plant here for export to China. China also
extended a credit line to support Venezuelan exports to China. (AP Photo/Fernando
LLano)
China President Arrives in Venezuela--(Excerpt)-- ``Venezuela is certain that if there is any country that has advanced in human rights, it's China,'' said Juan Jose Montilla, Venezuela's ambassador to China.
Asked if Venezuela would vote against the resolution, he said: ``That question belongs to the foreign minister, but I would guess that Venezuela is not going to support any condemnation of China in regards to human rights.''
………
There also was some speculation of a Venezuela-China arms deal after (President Hugo) Chavez recently took a 10-minute flight in a Chinese trainer. Officials say a deal was yet to be worked out, but the two leaders are expected to sign other economic accords. (End Excerpt)
(President Hugo) Chávez's school plans ignite furor in Venezuela --(Excerpt) Parents and teachers' unions complain that Chávez is not merely fixing problems, but rather trying to establish a Cuba-like system of political indoctrination for young minds. Among the controversial actions:
A new constitution written by Chávez supporters requires all schools to teach ``Bolivarian principles'' ---- a code phrase for Chávez's brand of leftist populism ----
and the pro-Chávez majority in the legislative National Assembly is preparing a bill laying out the exact curriculum. (End Excerpt)
It's a time to remember and reflect on Elian's abduction and forcible return to Castro's island of terror. I'm posting these links to educate and give a glimpse of what Elian's future is under communism. Returning Elian to the very place his mother died getting him away from is a black mark on our history.
It's important for Americans to understand the danger of associating with a dictator and to know that by doing business with Fidel Castro we give legitimacy to his brutal enslavement of generations of Cubans and his communist regime that's destroyed a country and the lives of its people.
Even if you're someone who believes Elian belonged in Cuba and under Castro's control, I hope you will take the time to educate yourself and your children about communism and understand that to maintain the obsolute order necessary to exist, communist states must oppress, brutalize and enslave their citizens.
Do we want the United States to roll out the red carpet and salute a victorious Fidel Castro? Our children need to know communism is evil, Fidel Castro is a murdering dictator and that our Republic will confront him, communism and human rights offenses.
Extended Elian thread. (Links to other Elian stories and editorials which link to more information.)
Bump for later. Thanks for posting.
Beware there has been a revival of reno-clinton-castro apologist sympathizers on the FR attacking Cuban-Americans and American family relatives and friends of Elian. The formula---mo is some humanistic--legal Godless blatherings about supreme statist ends to determine family values void of moral-civilized efforts and results!
Don't be surprised or shocked like I have been!!
The affair of Elian Gonzalez has also been a flare, revealing much about our political landscape. It has, for example, shown that reflective thought and intellectual complexity are not almost exclusive to the Right, while the Left is more monolithic and thinking impaired than ever. As a conservative journalist expressed it to a colleague:
Correction: It has, for example, shown that reflective thought and intellectual complexity are now almost exclusive to the Right,...
Don't be surprised
Hi F.C. I'm not. It's the communist way to infiltrate in a helping-hand way, spewing their lies and indoctrination before the inevitable locking of the shackels.
children who don't follow the party line not only run into trouble with authorities but get no help from psychiatrists.
If Cuba uses psychiatry the way the Communist regimes typically do, I'd say this is a blessing.
bttt
African teachers target Hamlet--Cuban teachers sent to Africa.
Cuban-Mexico relations strained
American Socialists and the Allure of Castro
Group Wants End to Cuban Embargo (president of Youth for Understanding-remember their Elian role?)
"I am a Maoist"--Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez Attacks Elitism-- Mr. Chávez has described the subsequent purge of Ms. Imber and others as the start of a "Bolivarian cultural revolution," a reference to Venezuela's national hero, Simón Bolívar. But that term has generated apprehension here, especially in view of Mr. Chávez's declaration "I am a Maoist," made during the visit this month of President Jiang Zemin (news - web sites) of China, and the agreements he has signed to bring Cuban advisers and exchange programs to Venezuela.
Derbyshire: SORRY STATE (Communist, Nationalist, and Dangerous)-- This psychopathological aspect of Chinese nationalism was on display in the Hainan affair. Chinese e-mail forums buzzed with demands for the captured U.S. servicemen to be beaten, or sentenced to life imprisonment. Years of relentless propaganda about historical grievances, real and imagined, and the need to restore ancient glories, have created a febrile atmosphere of hyperpatriotic agitation to which it is hard to think of any Western parallel other than the banal and obvious ones of early-20th century fascism.
This is a going to be a keeper. The work you put into this post is wonderful and alarming at the same time. I am going to have my teenagers read it-by way of an assignment, including the links-of course. I hope I can meet you someday. I grow more and more impressed with your intelligence and depth of reasoning, your dedication and your understanding of exactly what a Democratic Republic represents. Are you a lawyer, Cincinatus'Wife, by any chance? For sure-if a memorial to the tragic events that led to Elian's crushing return to the vile arms of Castro is ever built in Miami-I want you to go with me for the unveiling. I will never forget your work on behalf of Elian, just like I will never forget many here who shed so many tears and hours working on Elian's behalf. And I will never forget Elian, ever. If anything, my ferver grows. Sorry to get so personal-but sometimes ya gotta air it all out there. LOL
Impressive, no? I don't know how we missed this fabulous post. And I mean intelligent, together, cohesive, critically relevant, and on the mark. IMHO, this should be in every textbook in America (including the links, printed and incorporated). This FReeper, Cincinatus' Wife, understands the broad perspective and gets it down.
Impressive read. Enjoy.
Thought you guys might like to review this post. And McGruff-I loved the pic you posted of Elian-it was deeply spiritual-just like FREEDOM.
BUMP
Cordially
--Anybody that resist communism and the state must be crazy.-- Straight form the Soviet Union. I think that philosophy is taking root here. Government schools have been getting a headstart for years. Only it goes like that anybody isn't politicaly correct will be indoctrinated. There are exceptions. We just had a predident that treated woman like sex objects, but that was OK, he had the right kind of political values. To many he is a liberating hero. In fact women voted for him by the millions and they would have voted him a third time if the could have. Consistancy isn't a value of the left. Rant/off.
Thanks for this post.
Thanks for the flag.
Thanks for the flag and I couldn't agree more.
Shame on those at this forum who defend Castro/Reno/Clinton.
Just a bump for a worthy post!
Republic, thanks. Seems like this will never be over for freedom lovers. Elian will forever be the little boy torn from a nation that has always stood for freedom. A nation that has graveyards full of brave men and women who gave everything to make a better world. Pray for all the people around the world that do not have the freedoms that clinton/reno took so lightly.I pray that Elian will someday be free again and his beautiful smile will once again shine.
Me, too, Sam I am.
Signed: Sad I am :^(
CW has always been incredible in her efforts, and one day they will come to fruition. Thanks for the flag.
BTW, the best part of the whole article is Fidel's e-mail address.........f_castro...........I say that all the time.
Thanx, first I've heard Cuba is a communist country and did this to people. We should get all those kids out of there.
BTW How many kids in the US are on meds because of pressure to succeed in our schools and at home?
BTW How many kids in the US are on meds because of pressure to succeed in our schools and at home?
An alarming number are on meds and still in public schools.
You may already be familar with this thread Free Republic links to education but if not check it out.
I think the idea of medication is to make them more managable. Indoctrination doesn't need a curious mind.
Your words are very kind Republic. I believe your posts, especially those on Elian,
are some of the most spontanious and heart-felt I've ever read.
I'm just an American mother who is outraged by what happened.
The point is we should clean our own closet.
Thanks for the flag, Republic.
Great thread!
John, FYI something odd with Self-Search. I happened to run across this thread and saw Republic's flag. However, her flag did not appear on my Self-search.
She spelled my name correctly; it should have been in between these posts:
Just letting you know for future reference.
Thanks for the flag, Republic.
Excellent article CW, thank you.
Boy-It is an excellent thread, I agree, Victoria. Bumping for posterity.
Bump!
The point is we should clean our own closet.
Putin Receives Venezuelan President-- ``We're called people of democracy, with our own vision of democracy.''
We better be cleaning more than our own closet or Putin, Chavez, Castro, Jiang Zemin, et all will be cleaning our clock.
Russia, Venezuela push for oil-price fixing: --Chavez, an admirer of Cuban communist President Fidel Castro, also praised Moscow's global role. Russia, according to Chavez, will "play an important role in building new international relations," and declared Russia's "rebirth" is of "great global significance."
Cuba receives substantial support from Russia and Venezuela. In December 2000, Putin visited Cuba and substantially increased Cuban-Russian commercial and economic relations. During the visit, Putin declared that Russia and the communist government of Cuba, "hold similar views on key international issues."
Chavez to Promote Third World Unity … Chavez scheduled a last-minute trip to Beijing to consolidate economic relations and cement his budding friendship with Chinese President Jiang Zemin (news - web sites), who visited Caracas last month……Chavez said he would use his three-week trip abroad to ``seriously'' consider declaring a state of emergency, a move that would allow him to rule by decree.
BTTT
Arrested Cuban Dissidents Feel Betrayed by CNN.--- The oppositionists are desperate for their activities, and their very existence, to be known. They are certainly unafraid to challenge the regime; but they would naturally like some reward for their courage.
There is no doubt that CNN filmed the protest; a network spokeswoman confirms as much. But, for reasons unknown, the network chose not to air the film, or to report on the matter at all. There was, however, a report from Cuba on CNN that day: It was about the return of Elian Gonzalez to Cuban society, where "he is a typical, happy-go-lucky schoolboy."
Many of the Cubans who participated in the November 23 protest were later rounded up at a religious gathering. They were beaten and jailed.
………………
Addressed to ``The People of Venezuela and the International Community'', the notice condemned the Chavez administration for ''manifest incapacity, intolerance, demagoguery, deceit, arrogance, abuse of power, unfulfilled promises (and) constant violation of the constitution.''
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Ambassador denounces anti-Cuba campaign in Venezuela-- ``Revolutions cannot be exported or imported like merchandise. They are born from the stomach of each country,'' he said in a Friday interview with Caracas daily El Universal. He said the campaign is funded by Miami-based anti-Castro groups.
An energy pact signed last year allows Cuba to pay for some of its Venezuelan oil imports with goods and services. The communist island has sent 178 doctors and 323 sports trainers to Venezuela under the pact, and Chavez has sent more than 500 Venezuelans to Cuba for free medical treatment.
Fidel, Saddam and Hugo --An improbable but growing friendship of three military revolutionaries
Democrat National Socialists in the U.S. Congress now the same but just renamed, Progressive Caucus
'You don't have to worry about China'-- "I respect the Communist Party," said Anita Zou, a young office assistant. "I don't want to see anything affect stability. It will lead us to a better life."
Tom DeLay: Communist Chinese need to understand we will no longer kowtow
Jay Nordlinger: Who Cares About Cuba?-- And what he did he want from Americans, I asked, beyond specific help for his son? "I would like them to remember their principles: their sense of unity, justice, and liberty, maintained over so many years." Last, he wished to say, "Human rights cannot exist without God."
Elián's family can sue the U.S.(June 8, 2001)
Chavez Thanks Communist Party-- ``We count on you comrades,'' Chavez told communist supporters. ``The goal is clear: smash the conspiracy and promote the revolution.''
Citgo -- a U.S. refining and marketing company, based in Tulsa, Oklahoma -- is owned by Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA. Under Chavez's control
Chavez Threatens to Expel Foreigners from Venezuela He was speaking during a forum organized by state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA, the newspaper reported. (PDVSA)
Fervor Fading Over Venezuela's Chavez--trucking in "supporters" giving marathon speeches--"CHAVEZ IS NO LONGER CHAVEZ. CHAVEZ IS THE PEOPLE.''
Venezuela's Chavez Declares Revolutionary Campaign ("anti-imperialist revolution")-- During his fiery speech, Chavez announced ``revolutionary laws'' were being prepared, praised Russia, China and Cuba.
(June 15, 2001) --Sino-Russian summit targets twin evils (guess who's one)-- SHANGHAI, China -- Chinese President Jiang Zemin met his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, here Thursday to forge a stronger alliance against what they view as twin evils: Islamic militancy in Central Asia and American dominance around the world.
The vehicle for this ambitious agenda is the so-called Shanghai Five, a Central Asian organization formed five years ago to reduce tensions along the former Sino-Russian border. But as China emerges as a political and economic powerhouse, the group's mandate is taking on a regional dimension, highlighting Beijing's aspirations for greater influence in Asia.
To that end, the group is changing its name to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. On Thursday, it added Uzbekistan to the original five-country collective, which includes the former Soviet states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. More nations, such as Pakistan, India and Mongolia, could join later.
Cuban Opponent Sentenced to 2 Years (wrote about woman beaten to death by husband)
How to Make Castro Smirk (Useful Idiots attack Helms-Burton Act)
Who The Real Ogres Are --( UNDER THE GUISE OF RELIGION, NCC, UMC, PASTORS FOR PEACE)
Media Research Center's in depth study using the media's own words:Back to the "Peaceable" Paradise: Media Soldiers for the Seizure of Elian
U.S. Media are Castro's Biggest Ally, Exiles say
Miami Dad may seek Cuban girl---``She doesn't know that her mother died,'' said Tania Cordova, 30, the sister of Dr. Leonel Cordova. ``And she asks for her father.''
The chubby little girl with long hair and brown eyes sat quietly on her aunt's lap Wednesday afternoon. Tania Cordova said her brother ``adores'' his daughter and wants her to live with him in the United States.
Dade men imprisoned after foray into Cuba--- ``These men went there not to get publicity or anything for themselves, but because they were convinced they could do something for Cuba,'' he said. ``This is a very hard thing to understand: People will ask, `How can three people try to get into Cuba to fight an army the size of Castro's?' But on other occasions, one or two have infiltrated and stayed many months in Cuba to do sabotage and then returned.
``This struggle is a struggle of small groups. If they had luck and had been able to establish themselves in the mountains, they would have been able to reunite with our people there and done some sabotage,'' Nazario said. ``There is a lot of merit when three men go alone to fight against the army of a communists regime like Cuba's.''
Common Dreams--Breaking News and Views of the Progressive Community.
A real "who's who" of the radical left.
Jeff Jacoby: Cuban Liberty a Test for Bush --Linked to other articles about Helm-Burton.
Justice asks Reno, Holder, Meissner be dropped from Elian raid suit
LINKS to Elian-Reno-Media bias-Miami raid.
Florida editors honor Herald's Elián stories-(publisher in on two hour debriefing with Reno)
[Linked to the above story of the Herald getting the Pulitzer, etc. for their Elian raid coverage, is an April 26, 2000 Herald story reporting that immediately after the raid, Miami Herald Publisher Alberto Ibargüen offered his offices to the people negotiating for Elian's family in Miami to get the "chronology of the negotiations while their recollections were fresh" and while they were there Janet Reno just happens to call and they all have a two hour chat.]
In the Cauldron (journalistic omphaloskepsis)---- ESPINOSA SAYS REPORTERS told him there was a lot of tension in some newsrooms as the drama unfolded, particularly because Cuban American journalists believed that news agencies committed "errors of omission" in covering the Elián story.
Fabiola Santiago, a senior writer at the Herald, says she shared that concern. A Cuban American with 20 years of journalism experience, she says she didn't think some stories that she had suggested to colleagues were getting done. For instance, she accused reporters of doing a poor job of explaining exactly how Cuban children were oppressed by Castro's regime.
Santiago and Espinosa say that the Elián case could have allowed journalists to explore the situation in Cuba and educate people outside South Florida about the Castro regime.
It is not so much a case of Yeats - "The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity" - as of Tolstoy: Happy liberals are all alike, while each conservative is distraught in his own way.-(End Excerpt)
ping for the quote...
(June 26, 2001) Bank account in Miami led to Montesinos-Venezuela obstacle throughout the eight-month search-- In capturing Montesinos, Peruvian and U.S. law enforcement agencies and diplomats worked closely to bypass the Venezuelan government, which officials said they believed had been protecting Montesinos all along.
Thus, the capture of Montesinos has global repercussions -- for Venezuela and for Japan. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez must answer how his police forces were unable to capture the high-profile fugitive for months.
Japan, on the other hand, will be under intense pressure to extradite Monestinos' boss, former President Alberto Fujimori, who fled to Japan last year to escape corruption charges at home.
………..
In announcing the arrest at the close of a summit conference of leaders of Andean countries Sunday, Chavez suggested that Venezuelan intelligence agents had managed the operation for days. But the account provided by U.S. officials, supported by Peruvian Defense Ministry documents, suggested Venezuela was a last-minute partner in the operation and an obstacle throughout the eight-month search.
(Union-Leader)--Anti-Castro Cuban-American targeted for defeat in Senate by foreign powers-- George W. Bush may be underestimated again, this time by his own conservative base. Naming Otto Reich to head Latin American policy was an act of solidarity with Reaganism. That Fidel Castro has targeted Reich validates the choice.
WHY THE DOUBLE STANDARD FOR CASTRO?--Psychologists may be better able than political scientists to explain why many American liberals idealize foreign dictatorships with institutions or values that they find horrifying in milder forms in the United States. For some reason, many American leftists who loathe the military are not troubled by the fact that Castro appears in public only in a military uniform. American liberals somehow manage to support gay rights in the United States while ignoring Castro's vicious campaigns against homosexuality, which he has defined as a "bourgeois perversion" American liberals fret about the FBI and Internet censorship, while calling for the United States to befriend a regime where culture and religion are rigidly controlled by the secret police.
Excerpted from Hillary Clinton and the Racial Left…… Ever since abandoning the utopian illusions of the progressive cause, I have been struck by how little the world outside the left seems to actually understand it. How little those who have not inhabited the progressive mind are able to grasp the ruthless cynicism behind its idealistic mask or the fervent malice that drives its hypocritical passion for "social justice."
No matter how great the crimes progressives commit, no matter how terrible the future they labor to create, no matter how devastating the catastrophes they leave behind, the world outside the faith seems ever ready to forgive them their "mistakes" and to grant them the grace of "good intentions."
It would be difficult to recall, for example, the number of times I have been introduced on conservative platforms as "a former civil rights worker and peace activist in the 1960s." I have been described this way despite having written a detailed autobiography that exposes these self-glorifying images of the left as so many political lies.
Like many New Left leaders whom the young Mrs. Clinton once followed (and who are her comrades today), I regarded myself in the 1960s as a socialist and a revolutionary. No matter what slogans we chanted, or ideals we proclaimed our agendas always extended beyond (and well beyond) the immediate issues of "civil rights" and "peace."
New Left progressives-including Hillary Clinton and her comrade, Acting Deputy Attorney General Bill Lann Lee-were involved in supporting, or protecting or making excuses for violent anti-American radicals abroad like the Vietcong and anti-American criminals at home like the Black Panthers.* We did this then-just as progressives still do now-in the name of "social justice" and a dialectical world-view that made this deception appear ethical and the fantasy seem possible.
As a student of the left, Jamie Glazov, has observed in an article about the middle-class defenders of recently captured Seventies terrorist Kathy Soliah: "if you can successfully camouflage your own pathology and hatred with a concern for the 'poor' and the 'downtrodden,' then there will always be a 'progressive' milieu to support and defend you."* Huey Newton, George Jackson, Bernadine Dohrn, Sylvia Baraldini, Rubin Carter, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Rigoberta Menchu and innumerable others have all discovered this principle in the course of their criminal careers.
There is a superficial sense, of course, in which we were civil rights and peace activists-and that is certainly the way I would have described myself at the time, particularly if I were speaking to a non-left audience. It is certainly the way Mrs. Clinton and my former comrades in the left refer to themselves and their pasts in similar contexts today.
But they are lying. (And when they defend racial preferences now-a principle they denounced as "racist" then-even they must know it).
The first truth about leftist missionaries, about believing progressives, is that they are liars. But they are not liars in the ordinary way, which is to say by choice. They are liars by necessity-often without even realizing that they are. Because they also lie to themselves. It is the political lie that gives their cause its life.
Why, for example, if you were one of them, would you tell the truth? If you were serious about your role in humanity's vanguard, if you had the knowledge (which others did not), that you were certain would lead them to a better world, why would you tell them a truth that they could not "understand" and that would hold them back?
If others could understand your truth, you would not think of yourself as a "vanguard." You would no longer inhabit the morally charmed world of an elite, whose members alone can see the light and whose mission is to lead the unenlightened towards it. If everybody could see the promised horizon and knew the path to reach it, the future would already have happened and there would be no need for the vanguard of the saints.
That is both the ethical core and psychological heart of what it means to be a part of the left. That is where the gratification comes from. To see yourself as a social redeemer. To feel anointed. In other words: To be progressive is itself the most satisfying narcissism.
That is why it is of little concern to them that their socialist schemes have run aground, burying millions of human beings in their wake. That is why they don't care that their panaceas have caused more human suffering than all the injustices they have ever challenged. That is why they never learn from their "mistakes." That is why the continuance of Them is more important than any truth.
If you were active in the so-called "peace" movement or in the radical wing of the civil rights causes, why would you tell the truth? Why would you tell people that no, you weren't really a "peace activist," except in the sense that you were against America's war. Why would you draw attention to the fact that while you called yourselves "peace activists," you didn't oppose the Communists' war, and were gratified when America's enemies won?
What you were really against was not war at all, but American "imperialism" and American capitalism. What you truly hated was America's democracy, which you knew to be a "sham" because it was controlled by money in the end. That's why you wanted to "Bring the Troops Home," as your slogan said. Because if America's troops came home, America would lose and the Communists would win. And the progressive future would be one step closer.
But you never had the honesty-then or now-to admit that. You told the lie then to maintain your influence and increase your power to do good (as only the Chosen can). And you keep on telling the lie for the same reason.
Why would you admit that, despite your tactical support for civil rights, you weren't really committed to civil rights as Americans understand rights? What you really wanted was to overthrow the very Constitution that guaranteed those rights, based as it is on private property and the individual-both of which you despise.
It is because America is a democracy and the people endorse it, that the left's anti-American, but "progressive" agendas can only be achieved by deceiving the people. This is the cross the left has to bear: The better world is only achievable by lying to the very people they propose to redeem.[End Excerpt]------ Author: David Horowitz
Cuba's Castro Brands Milosevic Detention 'Illegal'-- Castro himself is also termed a ``dictator'' by his foes, particularly in the fiercely anti-communist Cuban American community in Florida where there have been moves to indict him for alleged ``genocide'' and rights' abuses on the island.
U.S. Backed Peru's Decision on Spy -- In Lima, however, Peruvian Interior Minister Antonio Ketin Vidal said Friday he was detained by heavily armed security forces for three hours while on an authorized trip to Venezuela in April to hunt for Montesinos. He questioned Venezuela's ``systematic and categorical'' denials of Montesinos' presence in Venezuela.
Peru and Venezuela recall ambassadors in fray over Montesinos's capture-- Officials in Lima said they will study all options before deciding how best to respond to Venezuela. But in public opinion, the reaction was swift and certain.
A leading newspaper published a photo of Chavez with a large headline: CLOWN!
MANY STORIES and LINKS-- Chavez's threat to expel critical foreigners unsettling
That means, according to Marta Molina, a Cuban psychiatrist who went into exile last year, that children who don't follow the party line not only run into trouble with authorities but get no help from psychiatrists.
Same thing is happening here with several issues one of them being homosexuality. You think homosexuality is wrong? Then the teacher says you need "sensitivity" training or "diversity" training. A student expresses the opinion that he thinks homosexuality is wrong he is charged with harassment.
Then the teacher says you need .....
Don't listen to these idiots about anything.
An Anti-Castro Fourth---"Ladran seńal de que cavalgamos."--[Excerpt]-- Castro is an enemy of the United States. Because of him, Cuba is an outlaw nation, an exporter of terrorism. It's on the State Department terrorist list ranking behind others like Iran and Iraq, which are more prolific exporters of violence only because they have more money to work with.
Taking on Fidel is the right thing for Dubya to do. More than that, it's good politics both here and abroad.
Politics has always been rough on the Cuban-American community. Congress finds them an embarrassment for speaking out when Fidel's appeasers take the field. The media are always picking on them because they are not a normal "deprived" minority. They came here, like so many immigrants, without a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out of. But, on the whole, they have succeeded.
Media abuse of Cuban Americans in Miami fueled one of Janet Reno's two big triumphs. I'll never forget Elian Gonzalez. The picture of General Reno's assault troop reaching over his MP-5 to grab the screaming kid out of the arms of a friend made me ashamed of my government as I had never been before. Never mind that the guy had his trigger finger safely outside the trigger guard. His hand is reaching for the screaming child, and the subgun is pointed just to the side of the kid's gut. [End Excerpt]
Cuban Doctor, Children Reunited in U.S.-- Giselle Cordova jumped into the arms of her father, Dr. Leonel Cordova, knocking him to the floor. He gathered up Giselle and her half-brother Yusniel Hernandez in his arms, hugging them and crying. He wiped tears from Giselle's face. It had been more than a year since Cordova slipped away from a medical mission in Zimbabwe and defected.
Chavez, who won the Venezuelan presidency last December through the ballot-box after his military coup failed in 1994, noted that he had already attended six international summits since taking power in February.
Excusing himself as a "novice" and a dreamer, Chavez also presented to his fellow leaders a vision of a future, united continent with full political integration and "a vast Congress of the Americas" based in Panama.
``I have confidence in you,'' Castro told Chavez. ``At this moment, in this country, you have no substitute.''…….. Castro has said he sees Chavez as a
possible successor to his role as a Latin America's most visible leftist.
"I am a Maoist"--Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez has described the subsequent purge of Ms. Imber and others as the start of a "Bolivarian cultural revolution," a reference to Venezuela's national hero, Simón Bolívar. But that term has generated apprehension here, especially in view of Mr. Chávez's declaration "I am a Maoist," made during the visit this month of President Jiang Zemin (news - web sites) of China, and the agreements he has signed to bring Cuban advisers and exchange programs to Venezuela.
"The Chinese are betting on Venezuela" said President Hugo Chavez, following a 4-day visit by Chinese officials, reports Caracas El Universal. "We are not just speaking empty words, but we are dealing with specific issues," Chavez exclaimed. Since Chavez's visit to Beijing in October 1999, "No less than five high-level government and private business commissions have visited [Venezuela], as well as commissions comprising local governments." Chavez said bilateral agreements were reviewed in such areas as gas and oil, as well as agriculture and mining, plus the national railroad plan.
The 14-member Chinese delegation was led by Li Ruihuan, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. After meeting with the delegation, Venezuelan National Legislative Commission president Luis Miqilena said his country, "has much to learn and receive from China. We have not only opened our heart, but also all sectors of our economy, all possibilities for hyper-development between the two countries . . ."
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Delighting in the Dictator--- In the late 1970s the American writer Sally Quinn returned from Cuba having found it an Isle of Eros. Said she of the country that then housed thousands of political prisoners in dirty cells and torture chambers, "an attitude of sexuality is as pervasive in Cuba as the presence of Fidel Castro. You can feel sex in the atmosphere." Former Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern bounced around the Cuban countryside with Fidel in a jeep and survived to tell of it. Said he of a man who even then was sending arms and soldiers around the world to support Communist terror and oppose American policy, Fidel is "soft-spoken, shy, sensitive, sometimes witty….I frankly, liked him." And Senator Lowell Weicker, the Republican ever on the prowl for a presidential nomination, launched this line certain to illuminate his presidential qualifications. "Castro's been known to snow people but he didn't snow me," Weicker asseverated. He spoke of Fidel's "enormous intellect and idealism" -- yes, idealism! He questioned why the United States did not take Fidel's side, the side of progress.
Russia: Canadian oil company siezed at gunpoint
China's Venezuelan 'partnership': Jiang hails 'strategic' relationship with Latin American nation-- By Toby Westerman © 2001 WorldNetDaily.com (April 18, 2001)
China exerts influence in Latin America: Jiang Zemin's tour goes to communist-soul mate Cuba-By Toby Westerman -2001 WorldNetDaily.com (April 14, 2001)
U.S. Embargo-Busters Aim to Import Cuba Rat Poison---Pastors for Peace getting funding from Smith Bagley (DNC-elian fundraising fame and Arca Foundation head).
Why was Elian less worthy than Giselle-- Writing last year to an online journal, another writer defended Elian's seizure and vowed: "If the situation were reversed, and Cuba was holding a small child whose American father wanted him back, why, all hell would break loose."
All hell did not break loose over Elian in reverse -- neither on the editorial pages of The New York Times nor among the send-Elian-back mob. That's because Giselle, like Elian, is an individual -- not a collective like Vietnam's Boat People, Cuba's Mariel flotilla, or generations of Mexicans, groups for which America made exceptions to its arbitrary immigration laws.
Very worthwhile post CW, thank you ... it's a keeper!
Thank you 2Trievers.
Kiss From Castro for Elian at Rare Cuba Appearance-- Seven-year-old Elian and his father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, were in the front row with Castro and other senior leaders for a gala event at Havana's ``anti-imperialist'' square to wind up this week's congress of the children's pioneers movement.
At the end of the event, Castro, who launched the biggest political campaign of his 42-year rule to bring Elian back to Cuba, exchanged a kiss on the cheeks with the boy, before giving him a paternal pat on the shoulder and chatting briefly.
Leaders dust off a Post-Castro Plan-- Contingency plans -- crafted after so many rumors of Castro's ``impending death'' and the hopes that were buoyed by the fall of European communism -- again have been dusted off in South Florida after Castro's near collapse on a Havana stage last month.
A glimpse: The Coast Guard intends to dispatch cutters to stop would-be immigrants from reaching the United States -- and South Floridians from trying to pick them up. The U.S. Navy has contemplated a blockade, according to one congresswoman from South Florida. Tourism boosters in the Florida Keys have even considered how to handle an influx of 1950s vintage automobiles they expect to come to Key West by ferry.
Big Red Lies: In communist China, it's still 1984.-- All of which leads me to the suggestion that the West might find itself less frequently frustrated and surprised by China if we took a hint from Mr. Waldron and tried describing the doings there not as habit dictates, but as truth deserves.
Bush picks Reagan-era figure as chief diplomat to Americas-- WASHINGTON -- President Bush sent the Senate on Thursday the long-awaited nomination of Otto Reich, a Cuban-born conservative, as his top diplomat to Latin America while the White House prepared to follow a Clinton administration policy long unpopular with many Cuban exiles.
Congressional sources say Bush appears nearly certain to continue barring U.S. citizens from suing individuals or companies benefiting from property seized by Cuba following the 1959 revolution. That policy was followed by the Clinton administration, which Bush had generally criticized over its handling of Cuba.
The president's decision must come by next Tuesday. In the interim, the White House is acting to reward Cuban-American voters for their significant support in the presidential election last fall.
Today, the White House is expected to announce a series of measures to increase pressure on Cuba -- steps that may include stricter enforcement of the U.S. embargo and plans to overcome Cuban jamming of Radio and TV Martí.
Other measures may include a White House statement of increased support for the internal opponents of President Fidel Castro of Cuba, congressional sources said Thursday.
Cuba Wages Offensive on 'Over-Sized' Houses -- ``The day money is the factor behind distribution of the nation's properties is the day we will be divided into social classes. We will not allow that,'' said Juan Contino, who heads the movement of Cuba's state-affiliated neighborhood groups, the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR).
Christopher Ruddy: Newsmax.com-- Loony Congress Helps Madman Castro--We knew Congress was loony - but how loony became apparent yesterday when legislators voted to life the ban on travel for U.S citizens wishing to go to Castro's Cuba.
Castro sympathizers are jumping for joy that the Republican-controlled House voted by a wide margin to lift the travel ban to Cuba. No doubt they see this as the first step to an outright lifting of the embargo against this anachronistic communist regime.
There are several reasons why lifting the travel ban - and the trade embargo - are a bad idea. In fact, lifting these bans won't work and will be a more dangerous solution than the current status quo standoff with Castro.
Bush likely to veto Cuba travel-- The White House said yesterday that President Bush does not support lifting travel restrictions to Cuba, even as travel agents prepared for a potential gold rush of tourists.
"The president thinks it's important to send a strong message of standing strong against oppression in Cuba," White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said.
The House voted 240-186 Wednesday to pass a measure that would allow Americans to travel to Cuba. The Senate is working on several similar bills.
Delirious Democrats--I can't help suspecting that Foxman's laughable critique is linked to the Democrats' efforts to slime Otto Reich and John Negroponte, nominated for top diplomatic jobs. Both men were exceedingly effective at advancing President Reagan's Central American policy. Negroponte was American ambassador in Honduras, and Reich ran a tiny public outreach office in State that greatly annoyed the Left, because he was very good at it. He was later a first-class ambassador to Venezuela.
These terrific men are under attack precisely because they performed extraordinarily well under exceedingly difficult circumstances at the great turning point in the second half of the 20th century. The defeat of Communism in Central America was deadly to the messianic vision of the men in the Kremlin, and to their many supporters and fellow travelers around the world, because it demonstrated that history was NOT on their side. The tide of events was running in favor of the democratic revolution, and Otto Reich and John Negroponte were among its most effective advocates.
Amid chaos, a hero's struggle-- Mario González treaded water in a churning sea, clutching his son's body for as long as four hours. He wanted to ensure a Christian burial.
As waves crashed, Leonides Consuegra emerged as a hero, helping others by organizing a human chain. But the last link was a 3-year-old girl, torn from her mother's arms by a violent wave.
And alone in darkness, 23-year-old Ricardo Pérez swam for 12 hours, holding a laminated picture of the Virgin Mary.
A week after one of South Florida's deadliest refugee smuggling missions, 20 somber and dazed survivors were bused from the Krome Detention Center to a Little Havana health clinic, where they were greeted by a crowd of relieved relatives.
It's Cool Again to Be Communist-- "Many of the international communist-front organizations are continuing to operate, but they now are hiding behind one level of cover - groups that are in the antiglobalism coalition," a veteran U.S. intelligence officer explains. "A lot of funding has come from the Communist Party of India. The North Korean Communist Party has taken over some coordination in recent years." Some analysts hypothesize that the People's Republic of China might be trying to jump-start the machinery of the old Soviet front groups, using North Korea as a "funding cutout." But the fronts have changed their terminology: Marxist-Leninist rhetoric is gone, replaced by antiglobalism themes. "It doesn't arouse the concern of Western governments or get stereotyped as being antidemocratic," says a longtime observer. "Though there is a considerable organizational structure behind the antiglobalist movement, it isn't totally coordinated. Much is spontaneous." Spaulding notes, "These rallies have been organized by a combination of Marxists, anarchists, ecologists, feminists and gay-rights activists. And nobody has been able to get control."
Castro continues to stumble on feeding, housing Cubans "Anti-capitalism" economy, deep seated resentment about being sent to fight in Angola, lack of food, etc.
Campus Marxists are a funny bunch--until they end up running your country--Both of my grandfathers were exterminated by Stalinist terror. My father and mother both barely escaped the Gulag. But here I am, with PhD students, being treated to a one-hour discussion about "homophobia" on campus. My colleagues are agonizing about how "Homophobia-Free Zone" pink stickers must be put on every door in the university. "But what if a professor or a teaching assistant refuses to have one put on his door?" one of them asks indignantly. After a few seconds of silence, another answers, "Well, then a committee might just have to be set up where these people will be taken to account." Serious head-nods follow.
United Students against sweatshops on 150 campuses-AFL-CIO support [ Excerpt]-- U.S. unions, which have been losing members and influence as American plants have moved abroad, see the student group as a way to tap the pool of anti-globalization activists who demonstrated during international financial meetings in Seattle and Washington.
"Every big international union has called us to be involved in some way because they want to get in on the student stuff," said Carrie Brunk, a United Student organizer in Washington.
But the students are getting more than just phone calls. Major U.S. unions partially finance the group's activities and the AFL-CIO provides logistical support and money to the activists in Atlixco, the group's members say. [End Excerpt]
Some Urge Restraint, Introspection (GAG ALERT)--People who don't sound like Americans,
respond to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the United States.
LONE VOICE FOR RESTRAINT: Rep. Barbara Lee
(D) of California
was the only member of Congress
Friday to vote against war-power authority for
Bush.
Her constituents respect her beliefs, but
disagree.
ADAM TRAUM/SAN FRANCISCO
CHRONICLE/AP/FILE
Check out the Progressive Challenge. Read the "Fairness" Agenda of the CONGRESSIONAL PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS
Member/Position/District-- Address-- Phone-- Website (linked at site)
Dennis Kucinich (Chairman)
(CHAIR, OHIO-10)
1730 LHOB
225-5871
WEBSITE
Barbara Lee (Vice Chair)
(OFFICER, CALIFORNIA-09)
426 CHOB
225-2661
WEBSITE
Cynthia McKinney
(OFFICER, GEORGIA-04)
124 CHOB
225-1605
WEBSITE
Major Owens
(OFFICER, NEW YORK-11)
2309 RHOB
225-6231
WEBSITE
Bernie Sanders
(OFFICER, VERMONT)
2135 RHOB
225-4115
WEBSITE
Paul Wellstone
(OFFICER, MINNESOTA)
136 HSOB
224-5641
Neil Abercrombie
(MEMBER, HAWAII-01)
1502 LHOB
225-2726
WEBSITE
Tammy Baldwin
(MEMBER, WISCONSIN-02)
1022 LHOB
225-2906
WEBSITE
Xavier Becerra
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-30)
1119 LHOB
225-6235
WEBSITE
David Bonior
(MEMBER, MICHIGAN-10)
2207 RHOB
225-2106
WEBSITE
Corrine Brown
(MEMBER, FLORIDA-03)
2444 RHOB
225-0123
WEBSITE
Sherrod Brown
(MEMBER, OHIO-13)
2438 CHOB
225-3401
WEBSITE
Michael Capuano
(MEMBER, MASSACHUSETTS-08)
1232 LHOB
225-5111
WEBSITE
Julia Carson
(MEMBER, INDIANA-10)
1339 LHOB
225-4011
WEBSITE
William "Lacy" Clay
(MEMBER, MISSOURI-01)
415 CHOB
225-2406
WEBSITE
John Conyers
(MEMBER, MICHIGAN-14)
2426 RHOB
225-5126
WEBSITE
Danny Davis
(MEMBER, ILLINOIS-07)
1222 LHOB
225-5006
WEBSITE
Peter DeFazio
(MEMBER, OREGON-04)
2134 RHOB
225-6416
WEBSITE
Rosa DeLauro
(MEMBER, CONNECTICUT-03)
2262 CHOB
225-3661
WEBSITE
Lane Evans
(MEMBER, ILLINOIS-17)
2211 RHOB
225-5905
WEBSITE
Eni Faleomavaega
(MEMBER, AMERICAN SAMOA)
2422 RHOB
225-8577
WEBSITE
Sam Farr
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-17)
1221 LHOB
225-2861
WEBSITE
Chaka Fattah
(MEMBER, PENNSYLVANIA-02)
1205 LHOB
225-4001
WEBSITE
Bob Filner
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-50)
2463 RHOB
225-8045
WEBSITE
Barney Frank
(MEMBER, MASSACHUSETTS-04)
2252 RHOB
225-5931
WEBSITE
Luis Gutierrez
(MEMBER, ILLINOIS-04)
2452 RHOB
225-8203
WEBSITE
Earl Hilliard
(MEMBER, ALABAMA-07)
1314 LHOB
225-2665
WEBSITE
Maurice Hinchey
(MEMBER, NEW YORK-26)
2431 RHOB
225-6335
WEBSITE
Jesse Jackson, Jr
(MEMBER, ILLINOIS-02)
313 CHOB
225-0773
Sheila Jackson-Lee
(MEMBER, TEXAS-18)
403 CHOB
225-3816
WEBSITE
Stephanie Tubbs Jones
(MEMBER, OHIO-11)
1516 LHOB
225-7032
WEBSITE
Marcy Kaptur
(MEMBER, OHIO-09)
2366 RHOB
225-4146
WEBSITE
Tom Lantos
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-12)
2217 RHOB
225-3531
WEBSITE
John Lewis
(MEMBER, GEORGIA-05)
343 CHOB
225-3801
WEBSITE
Jim McDermott
(MEMBER, WASHINGTON-07)
1035 LHOB
225-3106
WEBSITE
James P. McGovern
(MEMBER, MASSACHUSETTS-03)
430 CHOB
225-6101
WEBSITE
Carrie Meek
(MEMBER, FLORIDA-17)
2433 CHOB
225-4506
WEBSITE
George Miller
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-07)
2205 RHOB
225-2095
WEBSITE
Patsy Mink
(MEMBER, HAWAII-02)
2210 RHOB
225-4906
WEBSITE
Jerry Nadler
(MEMBER, NEW YORK-08)
2334 RHOB
225-5635
WEBSITE
Eleanor Holmes Norton
(MEMBER, D.C.)
2136 LHOB
225-8050
WEBSITE
John Olver
(MEMBER, MASSACHUSETTS-01)
1027 LHOB
225-5335
WEBSITE
Ed Pastor
(MEMBER, ARIZONA-02)
2465 RHOB
225-4065
WEBSITE
Donald Payne
(MEMBER, NEW JERSEY-10)
2209 RHOB
225-3436
WEBSITE
Nancy Pelosi
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-08)
2457 RHOB
225-4965
WEBSITE
Jan Schakowsky
(MEMBER, ILLINOIS-09)
515 CHOB
225-2111
WEBSITE
Jose Serrano
(MEMBER, NEW YORK-16)
2342 RHOB
225-4361
WEBSITE
Hilda Solis
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-31)
1641 LHOB
225-5464
WEBSITE
Pete Stark
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-13)
239 CHOB
225-5065
WEBSITE
Bennie Thompson
(MEMBER, MISSISSIPPI-02)
2432 LHOB
225-5876
WEBSITE
John Tierney
(MEMBER, MASSACHUSETTS-06)
120 CHOB
225-8020
WEBSITE
Tom Udall
(MEMBER, NEW MEXICO-03)
502 CHOB
225-6190
WEBSITE
Nydia Velazquez
(MEMBER, NEW YORK-12)
2241 RHOB
225-2361
WEBSITE
Maxine Waters
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-35)
2344 RHOB
225-2201
WEBSITE
Mel Watt
(MEMBER, NORTH CAROLINA-12)
2236 LHOB
225-1510
WEBSITE
Henry Waxman
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-29)
2204 RHOB
225-3976
WEBSITE
Lynn Woolsey
(MEMBER, CALIFORNIA-06)
2263 RHOB
225-5161
WEBSITE
WASHINGTON -- A few days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, Ana Belen Montes, a top Defense Department intelligence analyst, sent an e-mail note to an old friend saying she was all right and had not known anyone who died at the Pentagon.
"I could see the Pentagon burning from my office," she wrote. "Nonetheless, it pales next to the World Trade Center. Dark days ahead. So much hate and self-righteousness."
The days darkened especially quickly for Montes. A week after she signed off, sending love to her friend's family, federal agents surprised her at work and charged her with spying for Cuba. She is the highest-ranking official ever accused of espionage at the Defense Intelligence Agency, which, as a sister agency to the CIA, handles analysis for the Pentagon.
The arrest, on Sept. 21, left her friends and colleagues at a loss to explain what might have motivated her to risk everything, should the charges prove true. Friends described Montes, who is 44 and single, as a loyal companion, doting aunt, and an avid traveler. She had no evident money problems, and was apparently content dating a man who either was in the military or did business at the Pentagon, they said.
She was warm and funny, friends said, and seemed apolitical, even back in college. Her remark about "self-righteousness" was as ideologically pointed as she had ever been, said Lisa Huber, who had attended the University of Virginia with Montes and received the e-mail message.
"I can't picture her being involved in something like this," said Huber, a Louisville, Ky., resident who has seen Montes at least twice a year since their college days. "It goes against everything I know about her. She has a lot of integrity."
Montes, who had been the DIA's top intelligence analyst for Cuba since 1992, left a different impression among colleagues. She came off as rather severe, they said; at meetings, she sat rigidly in her chair and rarely spoke. Some associates viewed her as struggling to advance in a culture dominated by men.
"She was a very strange person, very standoffish, extraordinarily shy," said a U.S. diplomat.
But professionally, Montes seemed above reproach. She spoke fluent Spanish because of her Puerto Rican heritage, and in 1990 she was tapped to brief Nicaragua's new president, Violeta Chamorro, about the Cuban-backed Sandinista military.
In 1992 or 1993, she pulled off what seemed to be an intelligence coup. She traveled to Cuba and interviewed Cuban generals about economic reforms on the island. In 1998, she played an important role in drafting a widely cited analysis that found that Cuba's much diminished military posed no strategic threat to the United States. As recently as the week before last, she briefed top Pentagon policy-makers on Cuba.
According to the FBI affidavit, Montes, who had a high-level security clearance, spied for Cuba for at least five years, and possibly longer. She identified at least one U.S. undercover agent to the Cubans, disclosed a top-secret intelligence-gathering program and reported on U.S. training in the Caribbean, the FBI said.
Current and former U.S. officials say she was in a position to tell have told Havana virtually everything the intelligence community knew about Cuba's military and might even have disclosed U.S. contingency plans for taking the island by force.
"I would think, if damage was done, it would be about what she learned about the U.S., how it was militarily prepared vis-a-vis Cuba," said Richard Nuccio, who was President Bill Clinton's special adviser on Cuba.
92 Posted on 09/30/2001 03:23:06 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
93 Posted on 10/01/2001 13:14:57 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
94 Posted on 10/01/2001 13:20:48 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[Unfortunately, the American left has still not forgiven the Reagan administration for destroying the Soviet Empire, and the Senate Leftists are going all-out to make Reich and Negroponte pay for their brave virtue. Having lost the ideological battle, the Left has only one weapon: The politics of personal destruction, and the lame suggestions of the likes of Foxman and Daschle that our leaders should not try to advance our interests, but surrender to the baseless demands of political correctness.]…. Michael Ledeen.
95 Posted on 10/03/2001 03:32:22 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
96 Posted on 10/04/2001 02:05:54 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
97 Posted on 10/05/2001 13:02:03 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
98 Posted on 10/05/2001 13:55:08 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
99 Posted on 10/10/2001 11:37:52 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Among Castro's contributions, according to the UM report: support for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the Basque separatist movement from Spain known as ETA, the Irish Republican Army and several 1960s- and 1970s-era American radical groups accused of killing police officers and bombing public buildings.
``Cuba's geographical location, Castro's continuous connections with these groups and states and the harboring of terrorists in Havana creates a dynamic that requires vigilance and alertness,'' writes Jaime Suchlicki, director of the institute.
Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., during a recent visit with The Herald's editorial board, said Cuba ``clearly has the capability of producing chemical and biological ingredients that could become weapons of mass destruction.''
But whether Cuban scientists are in fact facilitating such efforts, Graham said, is unknown in part because the international inspection agencies have not been given access to facilities. [End Excerpt]
100 Posted on 10/11/2001 01:58:31 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Otto Reich was nominated on July 12 to be assistant secretary of state for Western Hemispheric Affairs. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has not even bothered to schedule Fa confirmation hearing for Reich, and has no plans to do so. The reasons have nothing to do with Reich's competence or qualifications, and everything to do with Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd's affinity for Cuba's Fidel Castro and the communist Sandanista regime in Nicaragua.
101 Posted on 10/12/2001 01:35:43 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Troubling, too, are the regime's 40-year ties with the Middle East that include relations with fellow members of the terror blacklist: Libya, Iraq, Iran, Syria and Sudan. The friendships are no accident. As recently as this year, Fidel Castro saw fit to renew those relationships personally in a Mideast tour.
The importance of those relations was reflected in the rushed arrest of Ana Belén Montes, the Defense Intelligence Agency analyst accused of passing classified information to the communist country. The concern was that secrets passed to Cuba would be shared with unfriendly Mideast states, compromising U.S. anti-terror efforts.
102 Posted on 10/12/2001 02:50:16 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
103 Posted on 10/18/2001 03:08:03 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
104 Posted on 10/19/2001 05:21:53 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Perhaps the most astonishing development in the past three years is the growth of Chinese investments and involvement with the Castro regime. The Chinese have built a variety of factories in the island and invested in Cuba's biotechnology industry. More important, a close military relationship is developing between China's Peoples Liberation Army and Castro's Revolutionary Armed Forces.
Of significant concern to the United States is the Chinese establishment of an eavesdropping station in Cuba and of equipment to interfere with Radio Marti as well as to monitor U.S. military and commercial transmissions……. ](March 17, 2000)WHAT'S CASTRO UP TO?
105 Posted on 10/20/2001 01:19:29 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Five chemical- and biological-weapons plants operate throughout the island, according to documents smuggled out of Cuba and made available to Insight by Alvaro Prendes, a former Cuban air force colonel who now is the Miami-based spokesman for the Union of Liberated Soldiers and Officers, a clandestine pro-democracy movement within Cuba's security services.
The credibility of the smuggled documents is enhanced by a recent classified Pentagon analysis. Also, these facilities have not been on the itinerary of such visiting dignitaries as retired Marine Gen. John Sheehan, the recently passed-over candidate for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who enthusiastically embraced normalizing relations with Havana following a recent round of junketing with Castro.
Pentagon, State Department and congressional sources also point to continuing Cuban support for international terrorism and drug trafficking. They tell Insight that, according to the CIA, Russian specialists still operate the electronic listening station at Lourdes on the northeast tip of the island which taps into U.S. communications. During the Persian Gulf War, this station forwarded strategic information to Iraq.
Reports smuggled out this year by dissident Cuban military officers and scientists are believed to be among the factors prompting Defense Secretary William Cohen to revise a Pentagon report sent to Congress last April which decertified Cuba as a threat to U.S. national security……………] (April 29, 2000)--Fidel Castro's Deadly Secret - Five BioChem Warfare Labs
[Thirty Cuban doctors also arrived in Caracas Wednesday to serve the needy in rural Venezuelan provinces. It's part of a deal in which Venezuela sells Cuba oil at preferential rates in exchange for Cuban expertise in tourism, sugar, medicines and other areas. Venezuela provides Cuba 53,000 barrels of oil a day - by some estimates worth $500 million a year. Cuban ambassador German Sanchez Otero said Cuban trainers work at schools and with athletes in 20 of Venezuela's 24 states. He stressed a ``synergy'' between Fidel Castro communist Cuba and Venezuela's leftist government.]-- Venezuela barters oil for Cuban doctors
106 Posted on 10/20/2001 01:44:05 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
107 Posted on 10/20/2001 06:50:01 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
108 Posted on 10/20/2001 08:00:02 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
109 Posted on 10/20/2001 08:13:16 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
110 Posted on 10/20/2001 08:24:02 PDT by backhoe
Officials based at the Cuban Interests Section will have to give the government 72 hours' notice if they want to travel outside a 273-square-mile area around Washington, deputy spokesman Philip Reeker said.
Previously the travel limit was 1,961 square miles.
The changes were made to conform with travel restrictions that U.S. diplomats have faced in Havana, Reeker said. They took effect Tuesday.
There was no explanation for the timing of the changes. The Bush administration has advocated a tougher line with Fidel Castro's communist government than the Clinton administration had.
The new restrictions will limit the free movement of Cuban diplomats generally to the area inside the Capital Beltway, the highway that surrounds Washington. That's roughly a 10-mile radius from the White House and includes areas of Virginia and Maryland. The Cubans also will be allowed to travel outside the Beltway to Dulles International Airport in Virginia.
Those wishing to travel outside the restricted area may do so by giving 72 hours' notice. They can travel if the government does not object.
There was no immediate comment from the Cuban Foreign Ministry in Havana or the Cuban Interests Section.
Cuba and the United States do not have diplomatic relations, so the interests sections serve as the equivalent of embassies. The State Department said Cuba has 25 diplomats in Washington, and the United States has 52 in Havana. --- U.S. Tightens Travel Restrictions for Cuban diplomats in D.C.
111 Posted on 10/20/2001 14:51:26 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
112 Posted on 10/22/2001 01:20:28 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Sidestepping a fight with the White House, negotiators from the House and the Senate agreed to omit language from a spending bill that would have blocked the Treasury Department from spending to enforce restrictions on U.S. citizens wanting to travel to Cuba.
113 Posted on 10/27/2001 03:20:47 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The last three paragraphs of Miller's article:
Then there's the bizarre case of Mohammed Raza Hassani, Nez Nezar Nezary, and Ali Sha Yusufi-three Afghan men recently detained in the Cayman Islands. They carried fake Pakistani passports and claimed to have gotten off a boat bound for Canada from Turkey. The police commissioner, however, determined that they actually had arrived by plane from Cuba. They were still in the Caymans on August 29 when a local radio station received an anonymous note saying that they share an association with Osama bin Laden. "The three agents are here organizing a major terrorist act against the U.S. via an airline or airlines," said the letter. The station gave it to the authorities. Soon after September 11, they tracked down its author, Byron Barnett, a local building contractor, who says his note was "pure speculation" and based on "a premonition." This incident has received scant attention from the media.
It's a startling story, perhaps even revelatory; then again, maybe there's nothing to it apart from amazing coincidence. But what is beyond doubt is that even though the Wasp Network has been busted and Ana Belen Montes is under arrest, those Cuban numbers stations continue to broadcast their coded messages several times each day.
Who is listening to them? [End Excerpt]
114 Posted on 10/27/2001 15:37:17 PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
115 Posted on 11/01/2001 09:55:19 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
116 Posted on 11/08/2001 10:59:43 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
While there has been a tendency to play down Castro's capabilities to engage the United States in asymmetrical warfare, "they are getting renewed attention in the light of recent events," according to a Pentagon source. The source tells Insight that only a highly sophisticated espionage network, such as the one operating from Cuba, could have cracked the code of Air Force One in an apparent breach of security that caused U.S. Secret Service officials to whisk the president out of sight on the morning of Sept. 11.
Snip
There are signs that Castro's new alignment with fundamentalist Islam could go beyond crowd-pleasing declarations. U.S. law-enforcement agencies have indications that Cuba may have assisted the logistics and planning for the latest wave of terrorist attacks. Insight has learned that al-Qaeda ringleader Mohammed Atta, who organized the Sept. 11 attacks and crashed a hijacked airliner into one of the twin towers of the World Trade Center, may have met secretly with Cuban undercover agents shortly after his arrival in the United States last year. The Czech government has confirmed that Atta similarly had met with Iraqi intelligence officers in Prague.
Federal investigators believe that Castro had been exploiting the international controversy unleashed by the Elian Gonzalez case to flood the United States with intelligence agents - including high-level officials of Cuba's biological-warfare program who allegedly spoke with Atta at a Miami motel. Federal investigators suspect that Atta's Cuban contact was a top defense-ministry officer with personal ties to Castro who entered the United States under cover of assignment to a Cuban-government delegation escorting Elian's two grandmothers, who supposedly were coming to mediate the custody battle. [End Excerpt] ----Much more in article.
117 Posted on 11/10/2001 02:10:11 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
118 Posted on 11/11/2001 06:10:44 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Hays, a former State Department Cuban affairs expert who served as ambassador to Suriname, said Rusk's goals were to reduce Cuban President Fidel Castro's ability to export subversion, to make clear that communism had no future in the Western Hemisphere and to serve as a drain on the Soviet Union.
Sally Grooms Cowal, who housed Elian Gonzalez in Washington D.C. and whose foundation ( Cuba Policy Foundation) got started with funding from HUGE DNC fund raiser, Smith Bagley and his ARCA Foundation, tries to paint herself as a centrist interested in trade with Fidel Castro.
119 Posted on 11/15/2001 05:11:39 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
He still keeps an apartment in Germany with his wife but has been living mainly in Cuba for the last three years. Because of a housing shortage, he sleeps in his office.
The Cuban government requires him to have state-operated Cubatur as a partner. Through Cubatour he pays his 13 employees a total of about $3,000 a month.
He says he has yet to turn a profit. Things were looking hopeful, ``but then Sept. 11 happened,'' he said. ``This year we've arranged trips for 400 people to Cuba this year, most of whom were Americans. We were on our way to having 600.'' [End Excerpt]
120 Posted on 11/18/2001 15:50:11 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Castro, the Caribbean, and Terrorism MEGA-LINK thread
121 Posted on 11/21/2001 04:52:26 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
This man and his lackeys have a lot of blood on their hands, not only in Cuba, but among the many nations they tried to export their cheap-jack "revolution" to.
122 Posted on 11/21/2001 11:50:14 PST by backhoe
123 Posted on 11/21/2001 12:03:42 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Maritza's is not an isolated case. About a million people have gone through Castro's gulag and those who survive tell stories that are much the same. But after 42 years the world still is not listening, especially the American people, just 90 miles away from the most brutal and repressive regime in the history of the Americas. It is a frustrating shame that because the U.S. media, which has failed to report the facts to the American people, must take much of the blame for Castro being and staying in power.
124 Posted on 11/22/2001 03:11:21 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"Our principal weapon is our right to demonstrate against this pitiful situation which is dragging Venezuela through the dirt, humiliated and discredited not only at home but abroad as well," said Democratic Action politician Henry Ramos.
The march quickly deteriorated into chaos as supporters of Chavez's Fifth Republic Movement or MVR tried to block its passage toward Congress. Stores closed as tear gas filled the streets, and the metropolitan police, controlled by opposition Mayor Alfredo Pena, fired on the government loyalists.
(November 23, 2001)-Most Latins disapprove of Castro, survey says--The finding comes days before this weekend's Ibero-American Summit in Peru, a forum where Castro has often attracted the lion's share of the attention from the media -- and from other participants, in some cases -- in spite of representing a country at variance with the prevailing democratic currents in the region. Saladrigas said he hoped that knowledge of the poll would prod Latin American leaders to take a more outspoken position against Castro and the Cuban government.
125 Posted on 11/23/2001 01:48:29 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
126 Posted on 11/23/2001 02:08:45 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
127 Posted on 11/23/2001 15:09:21 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Panamanian authorities Monday denied reports that 30 Cubans missing 10 days at sea had been rescued by a Panama-registered vessel. The 30 Cubans set off from the Cuban coast, near Bahía Honda, on Nov. 17, with Florida as their destination. But the migrants, the Miami man who allegedly smuggled them, and the dozen children they brought along never arrived. A capsized 30-foot boat with no registration numbers was found three days later 40 miles south of Key West. [End Excerpt]
128 Posted on 11/27/2001 03:36:31 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
129 Posted on 11/27/2001 12:14:35 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
130 Posted on 11/29/2001 07:42:25 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"That nomination's not going anywhere. That's the end of it," Dodd recently snapped. He has hurled at Reich a number of easily refuted ethical charges pertaining to his 1980s service as director of State's Office of Public Diplomacy and as Ambassador to Venezuela. However Dodd will not let his subcommittee hear Reich defend himself. Perhaps Dodd fears looking foolish once Reich demonstrates his innocence.[End Excerpt]
131 Posted on 11/29/2001 12:50:33 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
132 Posted on 11/30/2001 01:35:16 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
133 Posted on 12/01/2001 02:08:03 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
There are also 39,000 reservists and a militia of at least 1 million trained to take up arms against any U.S. invasion - a lingering fear despite the Cold War's end.
Hardware and tactics were emphasized during last week's media visits to the academy, a tank division and a military high school.
But military men now wear business suits as easily as olive green uniforms, operating hotels and a domestic airline as well as the FAR's own construction company, which builds tourist facilities in joint ventures with foreign companies.
Its Youth Labor Army annually produces tons of crops to feed a nation dependent on imported food a decade ago.
``It sounds like they are taking a page out of China's book,'' said Philip Mitchell, an analyst at the London-based institute. ``The Chinese military in the past has been heavily involved in industry and farming.'' [End Excerpt]
134 Posted on 12/02/2001 05:05:50 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Stop Otto Reich web site set up.
135 Posted on 12/03/2001 13:51:18 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
``The United States has not changed any rules . . . or moved in any way to encourage these sales,'' Gutierrez said.
Gutierrez's statements were part of a Bush administration effort to dispel speculation that the food shipments scheduled to begin arriving in Havana this month could lead to more permanent trade relations between the two nations. [End Excerpt]
136 Posted on 12/09/2001 02:33:01 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Cuban Exile Group Demands More Scrutiny Of Castro-Terrorism Link
Presidents Fidel Castro (L) and Hugo Chavez board a military ship in Margarita, Venezuela, December 11, 2001. Venezuelan business and labor leaders said in the wake of a 12-hour nationwide strike, they planned a wave of further protests if President Chavez continued with his authoritarian and statist rule. REUTERS/Miraflores-Handout
137 Posted on 12/11/2001 12:45:00 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
[Excerpt] "In our efforts to isolate the Castro regime, we've built walls that are hampering our goal of bringing democracy to the Cuban people," said Dodd, who has just assumed the Chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs, the Subcommittee with jurisdiction over Cuba legislation in the Senate. "As a measure that tears down those walls and replaces them with bridges, this legislation is a good starting point for a serious debate about how we can change U.S. policy in order to foster a peaceful transition to democracy on the island of Cuba while alleviating the hardship that our current policy has caused for the 11 million people who reside there. I hope to hold hearings in the near future and will be discussing with the committee leadership dates for the markup of this important legislation."
"While we cannot ignore the unfortunate political situation in Cuba, the United States should not enact laws that exacerbate the suffering of the Cuban people," Chafee said. "We must recognize that the thirty-seven year embargo against Cuba has failed to acheive its aims, while inadvertantly increasing the hardships endured by average Cubans. I believe that it is time to formulate a new approach to Cuba in which the United States reaches out directly to the Cuban people, while being careful not to reward the Cuban govenment for policies with which we strongly disagree."
"Cuba is no longer a national security threat to the United States," Roberts said. "Continuing our current policy only benefits our trade competitors at the expense of the American farmer and businessman. I believe that trade, travel, and cultural exchange between Cuba and the United States will benefit both Americans and Cubans. I am hopeful that this legislation can move forward to bring positive engagement between our two countries." [End Excerpt]
_____________________________________________
Senator Dodd is not astute, he isn't a statesman, he isn't even right. His position is asinine.
The U.S. hasn't built walls, Castro has and he's built torture chambers too.
I wouldn't call Castro's bloody communism regime an "unfortunate political situation," it is a living hell.
And as for Cuba (Castro) "no longer being a national security threat to the U.S.," I guess that would depend on who you want to prevail.
In this case, I say Senator Dodd's calls for the appeasement of Castro and his "unfortunate form of government,"
and the misery of the Cuban people so acerbated and put upon by the mean old wall-building U.S.,
shows Dodd's stripes and they aren't red, white and blue. And BTW, I'd like to know how propping up a communist country
with subsidized trade helps us or how cultural exchanges with communists helps Americans. (I know U.S. educators like Casto's politics.)
A majority of Latin American leaders don't like Castro or his regime and the European Union doesn't like Castro.
They've all been burned by their associations with him. Why in the world would we throw Castro a lifeline?
The only people who like communists are the LIBERAL media, progressives and other communists, but then I repeat myself.
138 Posted on 12/12/2001 02:15:10 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Following a long conversation, the abbess said Castro asked her: "Mother, how many months will the works take?"
"Eleven months," she replied.
"Oh, no, we must do it before. The works must be completed, at the latest, in five months," Castro retorted.
"I want this center to be finished has soon as possible, so that here, in Havana, we will have another religious community with the charism of ecumenical work, because many different religions are present here," he concluded. [End Excerpt]
__________________________________________________________
Look at the involvement of religious organizations in the environment, social justice, voting, etc. I'm afraid the churches and synagogues have (as has the education system) become enamored by the socialist movement. When you hear environmental movement, think communist (don't laugh, check it out).
Web of Creation: Resources on Ecology and Faith
Transforming Faith-Based Communities for a Sustainable World
Social Development and World Peace(U.S. Catholic Conference)
139 Posted on 12/14/2001 01:25:18 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
140 Posted on 12/14/2001 02:08:08 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
141 Posted on 12/14/2001 02:20:41 PST by cdwright
The sales, the first under last year's revisions to the four-decade-old embargo, have re-ignited the farm lobby's efforts to make it easier to sell food to Cuba. But it remains doubtful that policies will change because President Bush is an embargo supporter. Today's shipment includes 22,000 tons of corn for animal feed and 4,000 tons for human consumption.
Under last year's law, Cuba can buy food and medicine as long as it pays cash without public or private U.S. financing. But the administration remains adamant that it will not ease the embargo unless Cuba holds free elections, releases political prisoners and takes other steps toward democracy.
Earlier this month, the administration sent Lino Gutierrez, acting assistant secretary of state, to Miami to reassure Cuban exiles -- whose votes Bush will need in 2004 -- that his hard line toward the island has not changed.
The Cuban government said the financing restrictions are insulting and until they are lifted, there will be no more food purchases.
Joe Garcia of the Cuban American National Foundation said his organization does not oppose this sale as long as the cash-only rules apply.
"It's $30 million that they're not going to be able to spend on repression," he said.[End Excerpt]
142 Posted on 12/14/2001 06:01:00 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
143 Posted on 12/15/2001 01:57:27 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
That's old Dan "the news man" Rather. Is he a communist or is he brain dead?
144 Posted on 12/15/2001 02:11:32 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
cubaicei.org-- The site was launched on Dec. 7 by Roque's Cuban Institute of Independent Economists and includes one of the most extensive lists available of local dissident organizations, including 132 groups numbering around 21,000 activists.
145 Posted on 12/15/2001 02:13:17 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
I'll bet you're being redundant for emphasis!
146 Posted on 12/15/2001 03:03:23 PST by cdwright
You are a brave soul to venture into this endless thread. Thanks for the comments.
147 Posted on 12/15/2001 03:08:54 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The trip is planned to commemorate Cuban solidarity during the celebrated 1981 IRA hunger strike at the Maze prison. Ten strikers died in what became a major embarrassment for the British government over demands that IRA prisoners be given political status.
As well as meeting Castro, the Sinn Fein delegation will unveil a monument in memory of the hunger strikers.
Analysts say the visit is part of an attempt to improve Adams' international standing while peace talks drag on with the British government. The IRA has lately come under increased international pressure for dragging its feet over decommissioning its weapons, a key element of the peace process.
In October Adams made a similar visit to South Africa, where he met with former President Nelson Mandela. During that visit he also unveiled a sculpture on Robben Island to commemorate those who have died on hunger strikes in Northern Ireland and South Africa.
Analysts, however, say the merits of visiting Cuba are harder to see.
The trip will only serve to refocus debate over Sinn Fein's alleged involvement with left-wing Colombian guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, often known by its Spanish abbreviation, FARC. One of the three IRA suspects jailed in Colombia was Sinn Fein's unofficial representative in Havana, Niall Connolly. [End Excerpt]
148 Posted on 12/16/2001 03:04:06 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The U.S. government cautioned in September that an Adams trip to Cuba would raise "troubling questions" if it turned out the IRA had links to the FARC guerrillas.
An anti-Castro newspaper in the United States, the Miami- based El Nuevo Herald, ran a headline Sunday saying "Leader of Irish terrorist group goes to Havana."
Sinn Fein has been striving to build up its political standing in the United States, where it draws considerable financial support from Irish-Americans who back its opposition to British rule in Northern Ireland. [End Excerpt]
149 Posted on 12/17/2001 01:38:59 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Adams's kind of country (SINN FEIN / IRA LAVISHES PRAISE ON CUBA)
Hialeah couple found slain in Cuba (5 dead)
Cuba's bishops lament divisions in families, call for unity--…..human sensitivity and Christian values have not been lost.''
150 Posted on 12/18/2001 03:25:52 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The homes of opposition leaders Gerard Pierre-Charles and Victor Benoit were burned down.
Aristide supporters also set ablaze the home of opposition leader Luc Mesadieu in the northern city of Gonaives. Two men were killed there by the mob and their bodies were burned, independent Haiti Inter radio reported.
``I don't know what happened at the National Palace, but it has become a pretext to massacre the opposition,'' said opposition leader Gerard Gourgue, who went into hiding in fear of his life.[End Excerpt]
151 Posted on 12/18/2001 03:59:07 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
152 Posted on 12/18/2001 10:46:26 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
153 Posted on 12/19/2001 01:57:49 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Although President Bush has authorized military tribunals to try terrorist suspects from other countries, Rumsfeld said the military has made no plans to hold such tribunals at Guantanamo. Defense officials said Thursday that Rumsfeld has not decided how, where or even if those tribunals would take place. But officials already were considering how such tribunals would be conducted. A draft of proposed Bush administration rules for the tribunals states that a unanimous vote of a tribunal's military officers would be required to impose a death sentence on a foreign terror suspect, The Washington Post and The New York Times reported in Friday's editions.
The draft rules also would allow conviction by a two-thirds vote of the panel, the newspapers said. In addition, the draft regulations stipulate that a defendant is presumed innocent and that the panel may find guilt only after presentation of proof beyond reasonable doubt. That is the same test applied in U.S. civilian courts. The newspapers said the proposed rules also would allow some type of appeals process, an apparent concession to concerns voiced by civil rights groups and some members of Congress about the fairness and openness of the tribunal process.
Asked about the newspaper reports, Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke called any draft irrelevant without Rumsfeld's approval, which she said no current draft has. The Guantanamo base, which the United States has held since 1903, is near the U.S. mainland and highly secure. The Cuban military prohibits access to areas around the base, and the U.S. military patrols its side from behind tall fences topped with razor wire.
Guantanamo Bay has drawbacks, too, including its location, surrounded on three sides by an island governed by Fidel Castro, an anti-American communist who has criticized the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan. But ``we don't anticipate any trouble with Mr. Castro in that regard,'' Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference. Rumsfeld said it will take weeks to get the Guantanamo Bay base ready to house the detainees. Although the base has been used in the past to hold Cuban and Haitian refugees, its main purpose in recent years has been to refuel and maintain Navy vessels in the Caribbean. Chief Petty Officer Richard Evans, a base spokesman, said it now has space for about 100 prisoners.
Rumsfeld said, ``I would characterize Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as the least worst place we could have selected.'' The United States is holding 45 prisoners in and near Afghanistan, interrogating them about terrorist leader Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s whereabouts and trying to determine which ones should be brought to trial. [End Excerpt]
154 Posted on 01/01/2002 06:29:30 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
``Just as the head of state names or replaces a minister, so he can name and replace any head of a section of the armed forces,'' Rangel said after the handover ceremony in which Cruz ceded command to his replacement, General Efrain Vasquez. Reporters were barred from attending the handover ceremony. Cruz, who was known to be one of a group of senior officers loyal to Chavez in the Venezuelan military, had become the target of public allegations of corruption made by leading journalists and opposition politicians. The allegations included accusations of negligence, misuse of public funds and making irregular bank deposits.
FREE TO SPECULATE
Asked by reporters whether these were what had motivated the replacement of Cruz, Rangel replied: ``You are free to interpret. Whatever I tell you, you will still go on speculating and that's normal, absolutely normal.'' Cruz had been commander of the army, currently the strongest branch of the armed forces, since July. He had occupied a number of senior positions since the president, an outspoken, left-leaning populist, won a landslide election three years ago with a pledge to eliminate poverty and unemployment and end rampant corruption.
FLAGSHIP SOCIAL PROGRAM INVESTIGATED
Cruz had headed a flagship social program introduced by Chavez, the Plan Bolivar 2000, in which members of the armed forces worked alongside civilians to build schools and hospitals and also assisted the population with food and regional infrastructure projects. The program was a key plank of the tough-talking president's self-proclaimed ``revolution'' aimed at closing the gap between the wealthy minority and poor majority in Venezuela, which is the world's No. 4 oil exporter. Following allegations of widespread corruption and misuse of state funds in the Plan Bolivar 2000 program under Cruz, the country's Comptroller-General opened an official investigation, which failed to produce any concrete results. But the allegations were embarrassing for the president, who defended the innocence of officers facing the allegations.
CONFRONTING A CHALLENGE
Chavez, who has insisted the country's armed forces remain loyal to him, is currently confronting a determined challenge from business and labor opponents who are trying to block disputed government reform laws covering everything from land and oil to fisheries and finance.
The president's opponents staged a widely-supported national protest strike against the laws Dec. 10 and are also challenging the contested legislation in the Supreme Court and parliament. Chavez has bluntly refused to suspend or revise the reforms, which include a law to redistribute unproductive private rural estates to poor peasants and another to assert state control over the strategic oil industry. His opponents say the laws are inspired by Fidel Castro's communist Cuba and will destroy jobs and investment by increasing state interference in the economy.
Although Chavez has expressed confidence in the loyalty of the armed forces, he has denounced what he says are plots and conspiracies by opponents to stir up trouble in the barracks. Critics of the tough-talking president say conservative members of the armed forces, many of whom were trained in the United States, are unhappy about his left-wing policies and over his friendly ties with communist Cuba and China.
155 Posted on 01/01/2002 06:30:42 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
[Excerpt]--Latin America: Consensus has it that we only need to worry about Argentina and Brazil. Meanwhile, Venezuela appears to be sliding toward civil war, with nationwide business and worker strikes vehemently opposing President Hugo Chavez's recent antidemocratic, anticapitalist decrees restricting business and investment. Venezuela supplies a great deal of U.S. oil, and any disruption in that flow could potentially affect energy prices and the economic recovery in America. Chavez seems strong today, and he rules the country much like his hero, Fidel Castro of Cuba. So it would be a surprise if the country's military ousted him in a coup and installed a new leader whose interests were better aligned with those of the U.S. and the rest of the developed world. A more U.S.-friendly Venezuela would potentially be a damper on oil prices, because it would be less likely to go along with OPEC price hikes or restrictions during a Middle East conflict. [End Excerpt]
156 Posted on 01/01/2002 06:34:55 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
157 Posted on 01/02/2002 03:11:13 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
158 Posted on 01/04/2002 02:16:21 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
159 Posted on 01/04/2002 02:37:26 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
160 Posted on 01/06/2002 04:39:13 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
161 Posted on 01/08/2002 03:09:31 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
162 Posted on 01/08/2002 05:53:55 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
An Illinois-based nonprofit agribusiness group, the Farm Foundation, gathered about 100 people, including two former agriculture secretaries, in hopes of going to the island last week on a fact-finding mission.
But the Treasury Department rejected the trip.
``The whole thing is entirely arbitrary,'' said Wayne Smith, a former U.S. diplomat who says Americans should be allowed to travel wherever they choose. Smith served as a consultant in preparations for the trip.
The administration normally approves trips to the island that predominantly involve contacts with ordinary Cubans as opposed to government or Communist Party officials.
An administration official, asking not to be identified, said one of the reasons the proposal was rejected was that the arrangements were largely handled by Cuba's diplomatic mission in Washington.
163 Posted on 01/10/2002 02:47:52 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Lt.-Gen. Viktor Denisov, commander of the operation, told the Interfax-Military News Agency that the departure of the three cargo planes to pick up equipment from the listening post in Lourdes, Cuba, had been delayed because the military didn't receive the money to pay for the flights on time. [End]
164 Posted on 01/10/2002 02:49:57 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Lt.-Gen. Viktor Denisov, commander of the operation, told the Interfax-Military News Agency that the departure of the three cargo planes to pick up equipment from the listening post in Lourdes, Cuba, had been delayed because the military didn't receive the money to pay for the flights on time. [End]
165 Posted on 01/10/2002 02:55:49 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Prominent Castro foe welcomed at MIA--Maritza Lugo Fernández, a Cuban dissident and former political prisoner, walked through the gates with her 11-year-old daughter wearing matching straw hats and broad grins. ``This is a woman who fights,'' said Omar Lopéz Montenegro, director of human rights for the Cuban American National Foundation. ``She has become one of the most important emblems, a nucleus, for opposition in Cuba.'' It was a bittersweet reunion for Lugo, who left behind her husband, Rafael Ibarra Roque, who is serving a 20-year sentence in a Cuban prison for opposing the Castro regime.
166 Posted on 01/12/2002 13:17:02 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
167 Posted on 01/14/2002 02:06:03 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
168 Posted on 01/15/2002 02:18:43 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The present state of Latin America is hardly as bright, nor does its future look as promising. The fire this time is not in the small countries of the Caribbean basin; it is centered in the large, resource-rich nations of South America, including Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela and Peru. [End Excerpt]
Soft stance strengthens Castro--Allowing Castro access to hard currency will not only strengthen his hold on the Cuban people, but also allow him to build up his military and continue his support of anti-American terrorist groups in Latin America and elsewhere. When Castro sees U.S. policy as weak and has cash in his pocket, he eagerly supports turmoil abroad. Nicaragua, Angola and Colombia are prime examples.
169 Posted on 01/15/2002 04:19:58 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
170 Posted on 01/18/2002 05:02:58 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Cuban torture suspect's citizenship targeted With LINKS to reports of abuse of Cubans
Group studying U.S. policy toward Cuba ends visit to island nation With LINKS about pro-Castro groups.
An Agenda for The Americas: Otto Reich Takes the Reins of U. S. Policy With LINKS to President Bush's remarks on Western Hemisphere policy.
171 Posted on 01/21/2002 05:02:54 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
172 Posted on 01/22/2002 03:22:48 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Food, drug industries size up Cuba market-- While hopes for a trade thaw are high among Cuban officials and U.S. firms, one expert warned against excessive optimism. Most U.S.-Cuba trade is barred by the embargo, and it was only after a November hurricane that Cuba got to buy its first U.S. food since the embargo began.
173 Posted on 01/25/2002 06:00:44 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
174 Posted on 01/26/2002 03:25:33 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Friends praised Gonzalez as a soldier-intellectual with extensive knowledge of the region under his supervision and a good sense of the tortured U.S.-Cuba relations that have existed since Fidel Castro seized power in 1959.
``Emilio is a very intelligent and patriotic military officer, up to speed on issues of the Western Hemisphere and national security,'' said Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, a Miami Republican. ``Ambassador Maisto made a wise choice.''
Jaime Suchlicki, the University of Miami professor who supervised Gonzalez's doctoral thesis, called him ``a very, very bright, very disciplined, very organized guy.''
175 Posted on 01/26/2002 04:28:07 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
``I'm sure Castro, knowing him, might be peeking out to the north, probably being very sorry that he is unable to match us or to sink us,'' Sánchez said. ``We are establishing a bridge of communication with the Cuban people through light.'' [End Excerpt]
[Excerpt] Strikers Rey Angel Martinez, 20, and Alberto Delgado, 22, told El Nuevo Herald, the Miami Herald's Spanish edition newspaper, on Thursday that they want to stay in the United States permanently and play for Major League Soccer.
The players' defections come at a tough time for the Institute of Cuban Sports because six members of the male volleyball team defected in Belgium in December. The volleyball players are now in Italy where they have obtained temporary residence. ``That news fell on Havana like an atomic bomb,'' Martinez told El Nuevo.
Both players told the paper they planned to travel in coming days to Miami, where Martinez has relatives.[End Excerpt]
Cuba closes Russian spy base-- When Moscow announced its withdrawal from Lourdes, Bush called the intelligence centre a Cold War relic whose demise would help cooperation between the United States and Russia. But Cuba's ruling Communist Party said the financial saving for Russia, cited as its main motive, was negligible and the closure would pose a security risk. "From the Lourdes center, Russia was receiving 75 percent of the strategic information it needed to prevent an aggression and it has been the principal tool for controlling the fulfillment of the (nuclear) disarmament agreements with the United States," a government statement said soon after the announcement.
176 Posted on 01/27/2002 02:42:23 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
177 Posted on 01/28/2002 02:13:50 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
178 Posted on 01/28/2002 12:21:43 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
These women should have stayed right here in the United States and talked to some of the "happy people" who escaped Castro's regime. They should have lunched with Eugenio de Sosa Chabau, who fled Cuba after two decades as a political prisoner. He could have told them about his 52-page complaint against Castro for crimes against humanity, which he filed with a group of nine Cuban exiles last fall under a Belgian war crimes law. He could have told them about his torture at the hands of Castro's Cuban Security Services in a Havana psychiatric hospital. He could have told them how he was hooked up to wet electrical prods and "treated" with 14 sessions of shock therapy delivered to his temples and testicles. [End Excerpt]
_____________________________________________________________
Insight Magazine details Castro's intelligence work in the U.S. and terrorist support around the globe: Alive and Kicking --[Excerpt] Argentina's economy has collapsed, potentially spreading anti-U.S. populism like a cloud of billowing debris. Colombia, twice the size of France and straddling the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea, risks becoming a narcostate like Afghanistan as drug-trafficking guerrillas fight to seize power. Mexico, beset with its own internal guerrilla problems, is on the verge of an historic anticorruption effort that actually could make a dent in the institutionalized kleptocracy. Venezuela, the largest supplier of U.S. oil, now shows resistance to the Qaddafi-style dictatorship of left-wing strongman Hugo Chavez.
Against this backdrop in nearby Cuba, the 43-year-old Communist regime of Fidel Castro looks more and more ripe for its much-delayed, post-Soviet transition. Unless, that is, the United States tries to rescue it in the name of stability. [End Excerpt]
179 Posted on 01/28/2002 23:33:22 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
This is another Ellen Ratner brother. The other one is the RATner associated with the discredited doctored N.Y. fireman raising flag statue.
180 Posted on 01/31/2002 02:23:43 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
There is nothing further from the truth than this malicious slur. For years I wanted to write about it, but it was not until I met former political prisoner Luis Grave de Peralta Morell and read his recently released book The Mafia of Havana that I was compelled to do so. Grave de Peralta is a physicist who was a professor at Oriente University in the eastern part of Cuba. The Cuban government expelled him from his job and prohibited him from getting another, simply because he resigned his membership in the Communist Party of Cuba. Thus he had the time to research and bring together portions of Castro's speeches made over the years - and his distinct contradictions. [End Excerpt]
Mexico's president walks tightrope on first visit to Cuba over meeting dissidents-- MEXICO CITY - President Vicente Fox is walking a tightrope over whether he will meet with dissidents on his first official visit to Cuba and members of his own party are publicly urging him to do so.
The issue goes to the core of Fox's most valuable asset; his pro-democracy credentials as the first opposition candidate ever to win Mexico's presidency; and his fondest goal, that of improving relations with the United States.
Cuba Says No More U.S. Imports Until Embargo Eased (He can hold his breath)-- He said Cuba would see as positive any new measures easing the ban on U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba or allowing U.S. firms or banks to offer Cuba credit for its imports because Cuba currently has to pay for any imports in cash or win credit from a third country.
181 Posted on 02/01/2002 13:50:58 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
182 Posted on 02/02/2002 03:31:47 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The patterns among welfare states, past and present, dictator or no, are clear. Even in hopping European cities, one need only wander beyond the city limits to find people living along undeveloped countryside, drinking their wine alone. Some of Canada's largest cities, Edmonton and Calgary among them, give a pervasive sense of drabness. In Israel, the rich are very rich and very few, while in any given year those in the upper middle class live paycheck to paycheck and with huge debt. Especially in South America, where the mass depression among the populace is palpable, one can look to Argentina for a case in point: Social welfare mandates, murky property rights, high taxes and burdensome regulations are what led to its economic meltdown.
So yes they're partying in Europe and Latin America. They spend their money today, because there's no chance of saving for tomorrow. Friends, music and dancing. Wine and sex. What else is there? Not work. Not a future. So why not party now? [End Excerpt]
183 Posted on 02/08/2002 01:27:57 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"The human rights activists represent those people who would like to be part of the world," Huddleston said. "The independent journalists represent all the people who want to speak out."
Seven dissidents met briefly with Mexican President Vicente Fox during his visit to Cuba Monday.
The meeting, Huddleston said, was "very, very important" because it provided the dissidents with recognition.
"Those dissidents represent the Cuban people and their hopes," she said. [End Excerpt]...Vicki Huddleston, chief of the U.S. Interests Section.
184 Posted on 02/08/2002 02:35:16 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
A long-running stalemate between Aristide and the Haitian opposition, fueled by episodes of corruption and political violence, makes it impossible for international donors to deliver contributions to Haiti with confidence, Powell said. He rejected a call from Caribbean governments to help free the $200 million, programmed by the Inter-American Development Bank but held up along with other aid funds from Europe and elsewhere until the political crisis is resolved.
"In the absence of a solid political system, there is good reason to have a lack of confidence," Powell said after a quick series of meetings here with members of the Caribbean Community, or Caricom. He noted that the United States nevertheless will provide $55 million in humanitarian aid to the impoverished country this year, working through nongovernmental agencies. [End Excerpt]
185 Posted on 02/08/2002 03:19:23 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Other independent library heads say they have been jailed briefly or had security agents search their collections. ……
…. That's not to say that at least some of the same things aren't available at Cuba's expansive network of state libraries. The National Library in Havana has 4 million titles, and while most are dated--one of the "International Who's Who" copies is from 1995--the big wooden card catalog is full of authors considered controversial in Cuba, from Mario Vargas Llosa to George Orwell.
Critics point out that such books are not available to all patrons, whose type of library card depends on their jobs or other affiliations, and that most Cubans would hesitate to go on record asking for controversial titles.
Most of the library's books are in closed stacks. Patrons must ask for them by filling out a form with their own name and the title, which is then handed over to librarians. [End Excerpt]
186 Posted on 02/11/2002 02:45:58 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Although President Bush has authorized military tribunals to try terrorist suspects from other countries, Rumsfeld said the military has made no plans to hold such tribunals at Guantanamo. Defense officials said Thursday that Rumsfeld has not decided how, where or even if those tribunals would take place. But officials already were considering how such tribunals would be conducted. A draft of proposed Bush administration rules for the tribunals states that a unanimous vote of a tribunal's military officers would be required to impose a death sentence on a foreign terror suspect, The Washington Post and The New York Times reported in Friday's editions.
The draft rules also would allow conviction by a two-thirds vote of the panel, the newspapers said. In addition, the draft regulations stipulate that a defendant is presumed innocent and that the panel may find guilt only after presentation of proof beyond reasonable doubt. That is the same test applied in U.S. civilian courts. The newspapers said the proposed rules also would allow some type of appeals process, an apparent concession to concerns voiced by civil rights groups and some members of Congress about the fairness and openness of the tribunal process.
Asked about the newspaper reports, Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke called any draft irrelevant without Rumsfeld's approval, which she said no current draft has. The Guantanamo base, which the United States has held since 1903, is near the U.S. mainland and highly secure. The Cuban military prohibits access to areas around the base, and the U.S. military patrols its side from behind tall fences topped with razor wire.
Guantanamo Bay has drawbacks, too, including its location, surrounded on three sides by an island governed by Fidel Castro, an anti-American communist who has criticized the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan. But ``we don't anticipate any trouble with Mr. Castro in that regard,'' Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference. Rumsfeld said it will take weeks to get the Guantanamo Bay base ready to house the detainees. Although the base has been used in the past to hold Cuban and Haitian refugees, its main purpose in recent years has been to refuel and maintain Navy vessels in the Caribbean. Chief Petty Officer Richard Evans, a base spokesman, said it now has space for about 100 prisoners.
Rumsfeld said, ``I would characterize Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as the least worst place we could have selected.'' The United States is holding 45 prisoners in and near Afghanistan, interrogating them about terrorist leader Osama bin Laden whereabouts and trying to determine which ones should be brought to trial. [End Excerpt]
187 Posted on 02/11/2002 13:56:49 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
188 Posted on 02/12/2002 04:53:53 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
[Full Text] HAVANA - Oliver Stone is in Cuba to research a possible documentary about the island, a producer with the project said.
The 55-year-old director arrived in Havana on Wednesday night and planned to stay for a week, producer Fernando Sulichin told The Associated Press. He offered no additional details.
Stone, who won Academy Awards for "Platoon" and "Born on the Fourth of July," met President Fidel Castro during a 1987 visit here for the screening of one of his earlier films, "Salvador." Stone's other credits include "JFK," "Nixon," "The Doors, "Natural Born Killers" and "Wall Street." [End]
189 Posted on 02/16/2002 03:45:29 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
190 Posted on 02/17/2002 04:07:09 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
191 Posted on 02/19/2002 02:50:54 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
192 Posted on 02/19/2002 12:49:40 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
193 Posted on 02/22/2002 01:40:13 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Capitalism is alive and not-so-well here. It's simply upside-down, inside-out. It's wrapped in the rhetorical language of communist jargon that seeks to explain the inexplicable in terms that meet the revolution's socialist goals. In those terms, everybody's in the same boat: struggling in an economy that guarantees every good citizen a job that pays too little to live on and promises too much to hope for.
194 Posted on 02/24/2002 04:25:01 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"I say to our people, I say it here, we have suffered dozens of biological attacks," Castro said in a television address on Cuba's massive campaign to eradicate a recent outbreak of the potentially fatal dengue fever.
Castro did not blame Washington for the current dengue problem, which has killed two and stricken hundreds but is now receding. But he said U.S. authorities were responsible for past attacks against Cuban tobacco, sugar and pigs.
Last year, Havana also blamed the United States for a disease that has destroyed 16,000 beehives, causing an estimated $2 million in lost honey output, since 1996. [End Excerpt]
195 Posted on 02/26/2002 01:57:25 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The American President's outburst sets right some misconceptions in Havana, at the U.S. State Department and on Capitol Hill. The word has been spread that under Secretary of State Colin Powell's tutelage, Bush was going to seek normalization with Castro's dictatorial regime. While the trade embargo may be modified, it will continue and will no longer be the only instrument deployed by Washington to democratize Cuba. What's more, Powell is fully on board with an expanded anti-Castro strategy. [End Excerpt]
196 Posted on 02/26/2002 12:46:21 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Roads around the building were blocked, while groups of police, plainclothes agents and pro-government Rapid Response Brigades stood by to prevent further incidents at the diplomatic mission in the city's posh Miramar district.
President Fidel Castro's government blamed the break-in on a rumor that Mexico was opening its doors to Cuban asylum-seekers, saying an anti-communist radio station in Florida, Radio Marti, had broadcast "the false and evil" news into the Caribbean island eight times during the day. [End Excerpt]
197 Posted on 02/28/2002 11:32:08 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
King serenaded Castro with "You've Got A Friend" and a new song, "Love Makes the World." King says her songs were a message she wanted to bring there. She says her life and her work are all about communication and she wants to set an example of good will. Carole King is best known for her 1971 album "Tapestry" that had the hit single "It's Too Late." [End Excerpt]
198 Posted on 02/28/2002 15:27:17 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher yesterday succinctly summed up the situation: ``Cubans would not seek entry to foreign embassies if they had an opportunity to choose their own government.'' [End Excerpts]
199 Posted on 03/01/2002 03:22:35 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Eager to leave
Most of those who gathered on the normally busy street said they had family in Miami and yearned to join them.
Daimey, 25, who brought her 3-year-old child, said she had been waiting since morning, hoping to join her father who left during the Mariel boatlift.
"Here, there is no liberty," said Daimey, who declined to give her last name. "There's nothing."
Judelia Torres Sedeno, 38, of Old Havana, said she hurried over to the embassy as soon as she heard the news on Cuban TV. Her two sons didn't know she was there, but she said they would approve. They often told her if she ever got the chance to leave and join her father in Miami, she should.
There was little chance that this would be her day. As the small knot of people grew a little larger, a burly police officer trooped across the street and politely asked the crowd to disperse. Disheartened, Torres said she doubted the Mexican incident would ignite another Mariel.
"This time, they [the government] reacted quickly," she said. "It's just not the same." [End Excerpt]
Youths Evicted From Mexican Embassy Fri Mar 1, 2002 5:10 AM ET
[Full Text] HAVANA (AP) - Acting on Mexico's request, Cuban authorities removed 21 youths occupying the Mexican Embassy in Havana early Friday after they repeatedly refused to leave peacefully on their own, the government said. [End]
200 Posted on 03/01/2002 06:19:39 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The 10-minute operation, accompanied by muffled shouts behind police lines according to Reuters reporters on the scene, ended a two-day standoff at the mission and was carried out at Mexico's request, according to Havana.
``Today, at 4:30 a.m., a specialized and unarmed unit carried out the ejection in a planned manner, in keeping with the request and desire of the Mexican government, without the least incident,'' a government statement said.
The communique added that Mexico's special envoy for the crisis, Gustavo Iruega, the deputy foreign minister for Latin America and the Caribbean, and other Mexican diplomats had repeatedly asked the intruders to leave ``as they had no real reason or right to stay there.'' [End Excerpt]
201 Posted on 03/01/2002 08:03:23 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
……….Castro became personally involved in the incident, which threatened to embarrass Mexican President Vicente Fox following his state visit to Havana in early February. Mexico has maintained diplomatic ties with Cuba throughout Castro's 43 years in power.
Current relations are less cordial than in the past, however, in part because Fox visited with dissidents on the island Feb. 4, but the countries' relationship remains generally friendly.
''[Castro] himself designed . . . this operation,'' the Mexican Embassy's No. 2 official, Andres Ordoñez, who witnessed the events, told Reuters. ``There was no blood . . . the whole thing took six minutes with an impressive neatness and efficiency.''
Much about the episode remained unclear -- including whether the break-in was organized or spontaneous and whether other political motives may have played a role.
Mexico said the young men appeared to be ''led and manipulated'' to force their way into its embassy and noted in a statement that ``none of the intruders sought political asylum or diplomatic asylum, or offered evidence that they were subject to persecution or that their lives were in danger.''
''This is very murky,'' said Odilia Collazo, a well known Cuban dissident reached by telephone in Havana. ``It's all very weird. Why did all these people have criminal records? There wasn't a decent person among them.''
………..Collazo, who is president of a small opposition group, the Pro-Human Rights Party of Cuba, said she believed the episode had been engineered by the Castro government to send Fox a message.
''The main intention was to show the Mexicans that as long as they have relations with dissidents [to Castro], problems will occur for them,'' she said. [End Excerpts]
202 Posted on 03/02/2002 03:01:45 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Cuban rights activists also said they were worried for the 21 men, who were peacefully expelled from the Mexican Embassy by special forces before dawn on Friday to end a 30-hour standoff. Most are thought to be in Havana's Villa Marista jail.
…………….
Elizardo Sanchez, who heads Cuba's Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, said he hoped the men evicted from the Mexican Embassy would be treated fairly and not face reprisals. "We are very concerned," he said.
The men's action threw international attention once again on the frustrated desire of many Cubans to leave the Caribbean island ruled by President Fidel Castro since 1959.
Cuba's ruling Communist Party says they and others wanting to leave by illegal means are criminals incited by Washington and anti-Castro foes in the Cuban American community. But critics say they are simply fed up with harsh economic conditions, emigration restrictions and an authoritarian one-party political system.
…………………
"Since he was a boy, he's thought about leaving. He doesn't like living here. He tried to enter the Spanish Embassy; he took to the sea twice on a raft but they turned him back," she said. "When he has the chance, he'll keep trying to get out."
Sanchez, Cuba's best-known dissident, also expressed concern for those arrested during the melee after the break-in when baton-wielding police charged into a crowd, dragging men into waiting Ladas. Cuba has said there were 150 arrests, but rights groups say there were far more.
"By saying they were 150, they are hiding the magnitude of the affair," Sanchez said, expressing his hope all those arrested outside the embassy would be released in coming days. [End Excerpts]
203 Posted on 03/02/2002 15:49:30 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
[Excerpts] Q: What does the average Cuban on the island think of the Cuban exile community?
A: That's hard for me to answer. It depends on the education level. If they are not very educated, if they live in a rural area, they probably believe what they hear in the state-run media and in the rallies, which is not good. But if they are more sophisticated and listen to Radio Martí, or if you're at the university or work at a hospital, then you're likely not going to believe the negative propaganda. You're probably aware the Cuban American community does not represent a threat to you. But if you're a farmer in a rural area, or a teacher or a guard placed outside my house, you might believe what the Cuban government tells you. There is a billboard in Cuba that says ``There are a million children who will sleep in the street tonight. Not one is Cuban.''
……….. Q: Should Cuba be removed from the list of terrorist states?
A: Cuba knows what it has to do to get off the list of terrorist states, and that is simply not to give safe haven to terrorist groups as it has in the past. We suspect, and in some cases we know, that they have provided safe harbor to members of the ETA [Basque separatists], other leftist movements of Latin America, the macheteros [pro-independence radicals in Puerto Rico] and the 70-some fugitives from the United States [the FBI believes that 77 federal fugitives are in Cuba, including former CIA agent Frank Terpil, a convicted arms trafficker, and Robert Vesco, indicted in a multimilliion dollar fraud]. Those are not terrorists, but they are still fugitives from justice. Cuba is not the player it once was on the world stage. Ten or 15 years ago, Cuba was a major player and Fidel had a large platform. It's much smaller now. . . . I don't see Cuba even as a leader on the Caribbean stage. I see more democratic Caribbean countries taking leadership roles.
………….Q: Should travel restrictions to Cuba be lifted?
A: The problem with the lifting of travel restrictions is that the Cubans control it because they issue the visas. They can put quotas. They can decide to allow only the tourists going to Varadero and Cayo Coco and ensure they have very little contact with the Cuban people. And all that will do, initially, is fill the government coffers and build up the regime. It's ironic because what you need is for the government to respond to the current economic crisis by opening up, by letting Cubans own and operate their own businesses, by letting them invest, letting them stay at hotels. [In Cuba,] the economy is shrinking. It is too dependent on tourism and remittances. Their way of fixing the problem is to fill up the hotels. A far preferable way . . . would be to grow the economy by letting the people invest in their community by starting small businesses -- not just restaurants and taxis and services, but also . . . creating products. You have natural capitalists in Cuba, and the proof of that is in the cars they have and how they take care of them. If allowed to work independently, they would create wealth through their own labor . . .[End Excerpt]
Latin America's other problem: No regional leaders [Excerpts] Needed urgently: A Latin American leader with enough stature to help President Bush deal with the crises in Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela and Cuba, which have led Latin America to one of its most difficult times in recent memory.
The problem is, there don't seem to be any. For the first time in many years, there are very few -- if any -- Latin American presidents who are strong enough at home and command the respect abroad to propose collective efforts to put out fires in the region.
Until recently, whenever there was a major crisis in Latin America, U.S. presidents could count on Brazilian leader Fernando Henrique Cardoso -- perhaps South America's most respected head of state -- to get on the phone with his regional counterparts in search of a political solution. To a lesser extent, Argentina's President Fernando de La Rúa and Colombia's Andrés Pastrana would also play that role.
In Central America, Costa Rican President Miguel Angel Rodríguez was always there to address problems in his neighborhood. In the Caribbean, Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernández used to carry out that task.
But today, Latin America suffers from a serious leadership vacuum. Virtually all the political heavyweights in the region are on their way out or have already finished their terms.
……………One of the few Latin American presidents who could emerge as a big player in regional affairs is Mexico's Vicente Fox, who has just completed the first year of his six-year term and remains relatively popular in the polls. To a lesser extent, Chilean President Ricardo Lagos and Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo could also help fill the void. [End Excerpts]
204 Posted on 03/03/2002 03:53:40 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
George W. Bush is the seventh president to visit China since Richard Nixon opened that door in 1972. But Bush also is keeping the door closed to Cuba.
205 Posted on 03/03/2002 07:28:33 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Here's an essay by Jesus J. Chao, posted by Dqban22.
Mexico and the Cuban Regime Close Ranks [Excerpt] Mexico has lost any moral authority it might have to demand immigration amnesty for those Mexicans living illegally in the U.S. while the Mexican government grossly violated the human rights of the Cubans who sought asylum in its Embassy. "You will be measured with the same rule that you measure others."
"These are young people facing a difficult economic situation, like many in Latin America," said Gloria Abella of Mexico's Foreign Relations Department. This action by the Mexican government opens the doors for the U.S.'s deportation of over 6 million Mexicans living illegally in this country; deportation that is much more than justified since the Mexicans have a free democratic government in their country where human rights are respected, unlike the case of the Cubans.
"The government of Mexico is not going to provide preferential treatment simply because they have invaded the embassy," Mexican Ambassador Ricardo Pascoe Pierce said Friday in an interview with Radio Formato in Mexico City, declaration that puts in a dire situation the millions of Mexicans who have invaded the U.S. crossing its borders illegally.
In a televised interview re-transmitted Friday afternoon by the Spanish National T.V. in Madrid, the Mexican Ambassador in Havana, Mr. Pascoe, shamelessly accused the U.S. government of being behind what happened in his Embassy. This scum of the earth, after betraying those who tried to seek asylum, defamed them by echoing Castro's propaganda and portraying them as common criminals. After delivering them into the hands of their torturers, the Mexican government had the gall to declare that it would not press charges, and "taking into account that the assailants were led and manipulated, the government of Mexico asked Cuban authorities to consider humanitarian factors in the treatment of the cases."
I ask the Mexican government, manipulation by whom? Perhaps, as many Cuban exiles suggest, by the Cuban government in cahoots with the Mexican Ambassador, Pascoe, in order to force the resignation of the Mexican Chancellor, Mr. Castañeda, for his declaration in Miami that displeased Castro so deeply? [End Excerpt]
206 Posted on 03/04/2002 04:30:34 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
207 Posted on 03/05/2002 03:37:09 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
208 Posted on 03/05/2002 03:40:11 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
209 Posted on 03/06/2002 05:00:13 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Some 100 million people worldwide lost their lives to the ideological scourge of communism after 1917. They include the victims of Stalin's terror, mass deportations of entire nations and politically induced great famine; victims of the Chinese Revolution of 1949, and later the Cultural Revolution; victims of the Cambodian genocide; victims of the Latin American and Cuban civil wars; East and Central Europeans dying in the uprisings of 1953, 1956 and 1968 against their communist rulers. The list goes on and on.
But it is not just important to remember the victims. Let us not forget that 1.2 million Chinese still live under the thumb of communist rulers; so do the people of North Korea and of Cuba. Former communists remain in positions of power and influence all over the former East Bloc. And on American university campuses, many of its apologists and fellow-travellers have retained their tenured positions. The foundation's president, Lee Edwards, has recently commissioned a study on the nexus between communism and terrorism. In other words, this cause is not simply talking about exposing the past. [End Excerpt]
210 Posted on 03/06/2002 05:40:47 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
The Cuban leader said in a late-night television appearance carried by newspapers Wednesday that those arrested in the embassy invasion could expect to face charges in Cuba's courts. He also rejected their characterization as "dissidents or prisoners of conscience."
"We will guarantee the security of the embassies," Castro said in the three-hour speech. "Anyone who enters an embassy by force will never, ever leave," he said. "We will not make any concessions."
"Those who did this should know that it carries sanctions," he added. [End Excerpt]
211 Posted on 03/06/2002 12:30:18 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Wilson declined to discuss the matter further in open session, and the administration has not commented publicly on the subject since then. The senior official said Cuba's ability to engage in cyberattacks is part of the policy review. Castro has dismissed Wilson's comments as ``craziness.''
Richard Clarke, the White House technology adviser, said in testimony in February before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee, that the United States could respond militarily against a foreign government in the event of a cyberattack.
``We reserve the right to respond in any way appropriate: through covert action, through military action, any one of the tools available to the president,'' Clarke said.
He said Iran, Iraq, North Korea, China, Russia and other countries already have people trained in Internet warfare. He did not mention Cuba.
Cuba is on the State Department terrorist country list, a designation based on ties Cuba maintains with other countries on the list, including Iraq, and the haven Cuba provides for foreigners linked to alleged terrorist organizations.
As a result of the policy review, the Cuba section of the next State Department terrorism report, due next month, may add to the rationale for keeping Cuba on the list. [End Excerpt]
212 Posted on 03/07/2002 00:58:26 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
He joins other Cuban-Americans in key positions who, like Reich, have viewed Castro as a menace for years.
Shortly after Reich took office, the administration began a policy review of Cuba with a view toward determining Cuba's potential for damaging U.S. interests.
One issue under study, according to a senior official, is the role Washington says Cuba plays in international terrorism. Cuba is on the State Department terrorist country list, a designation based on ties Cuba maintains with other countries on the list, including Iraq, and the haven Cuba provides for foreigners linked to alleged terrorist organizations.[End Excerpt]
213 Posted on 03/07/2002 02:24:56 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"Iran and Cuba, in cooperation with each other, can bring America to its knees. The US regime is very weak, and we are witnessing this weakness from close up," Castro affirmed.
During his trip, the Cuban leader also held meetings with Iran's Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi, parliament speaker Mehdi Karubi, as well as former president Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani.
He also received an honorary doctorate from a Tehran university for his "contributions to justice, humanist ideals and the fight against discrimination."
Castro told journalists before leaving Tehran that he was "totally reassured about Iran. There is great hope for the future of relations between Cuba and Iran. I am leaving with many unforgettable memories." [End Excerpt]
214 Posted on 03/07/2002 10:30:38 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Castro frequently says his one-party communist system is more democratic than the Western model and denies the existence of political prisoners or repression of freedom of expression.
The signatures, gathered by activists across the Caribbean island of 11 million inhabitants over the last year, will be presented to the National Assembly in a few weeks, once all 10,000 signatures have been checked and ratified, Paya said.
"This has never been done before, it has no precedent," he added. "It shows Cubans not only want changes, but also are ready to face the risks to show they want changes." [End Excerpt]
215 Posted on 03/07/2002 11:23:42 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Two other independent Cuban reporters, Lester Tellez Castro and Carlos Brizuela Yera, were attacked and beaten as they sought to visit Castillo in the hospital.
Juan Basulto Morell, a 70-year-old journalist operating on the western part of the island, was struck in the head with a rock by an individual denouncing him as a "counterrevolutionary."
A fifth journalist, Normando Hernandez, escaped an arrest attempt and reported the beatings of Castillo, Tellez Castro, and Yera to Radio Marti, a subsidiary of the Voice of America.
Hernanadez, however, had been beaten earlier, along with Tellez Catro and Yera, while covering the opening of an independent library in the central Cuban town of Florida.
……Ironically, the U.S. press, noted for its vocal defense of its own freedoms, has been all but silent on the Cuban government's actions to independent journalists. Even the assault on the Reuters reporters received scant attention.
In the face of U.S. journalistic silence, the government of Cuban President Fidel Castro has clearly defined expectations for those engaged in journalism. [End Excerpt]
216 Posted on 03/08/2002 02:58:52 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Mexico official fired over rights policy e-mail - Cuba
Says Castro Under Terrorism Microscope-- Cuban President Fidel Castro may soon be facing an indictment.
217 Posted on 03/08/2002 06:38:32 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
But the information proved worthless and the Caribbean island will remain on a U.S. list of states that sponsor terrorism, along with Libya, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan and North Korea, a U.S. official said on Wednesday.
"We were convinced that it was deliberately of no assistance. Given Cuba's history there could have been more information at their disposal to provide us," a State Department official told Reuters.
"There is no inclination in this building or anywhere in the executive branch to consider that Cuba is anywhere near qualified to come off the terrorism list," he said.
….. the information provided by President Fidel Castro's government was of no help at all, leading Washington to suspend its contacts with Havana on intelligence sharing, he said.
"Cuba was quick to condemn terrorism, but has done nothing to assist in the global effort against terrorism," the State Department official said. [End Excerpt]
218 Posted on 03/08/2002 08:50:43 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Cubans Seeking Political Change Sign Petition - Castro's rejection of it virtually certain--[Excerpt] Castro's government has not commented publicly on the effort.
Previous petition efforts have stalled in part because people were afraid to sign, but in the decade since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the government has shown slightly more tolerance for opposition groups.
The project is named for Father Felix Varela, a Roman Catholic priest who fought for the emancipation of slaves on the Caribbean island. The referendum was first mentioned by the Christian Liberation Movement shortly after Pope John Paul II's visit here in January 1998.
The Cuban Commission for Human Rights and Reconciliation and the Democratic Solidarity Party later joined the Christian Liberation Movement in helping coordinate the signature-gathering drive. The groups have been gathering signatures across the island since early last year.
All three groups operate here without the approval of the government, which regularly characterizes its opponents as "counterrevolutionaries" and "mercenaries" for the U.S. government and Cuban exiles. [End Excerpt]
219 Posted on 03/09/2002 02:24:14 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
220 Posted on 03/11/2002 02:23:14 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
221 Posted on 03/11/2002 02:56:09 PST by Cincinatus' Wife
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