Cuba on alert as Bush calls for democracy on the island (AFP)

[laststeamtrain]

Cuba on alert as Bush calls for democracy on the island

by Patrick Lescot 54 minutes ago

Cuba is on heightened alert, wary of a possible invasion by US-based Cuban exiles, as US President George W. Bush called on islanders to push for democracy with strongman Fidel Castro sidelined by surgery.

<snip>

"I urge the Cuban people to work for democratic change on the island," Bush said in his first statement since Fidel temporarily relinquished power to Raul while he recovers from surgery.

"We will support you in your effort to build a transitional government in Cuba committed to democracy, and we will take note of those, in the current Cuban regime, who obstruct your desire for a free Cuba," Bush said.

<snip>

The director of the Juventud Rebelde (Rebel Youth) newspaper said that Bush had delivered "tin pot rhetoric" and "hollow blathering," while legislator Randy Alonso dismissed Bush's statement as "the epitome of delirium and dry inebriation."

<more>
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060804/ts_alt_afp/cubacastro_060804022050&printer=1;_ylt=AkyXhvIVr6jMk5sWyFb8TTbZa7gF;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-

[GoneOffShore]

1. I love the 'Dry inebriation' line

Nailed the shrub in a single phrase!

[IndianaGreen]

8. They must read DU in Cuba

How else to explain their calling Bush a dry drunk?

[Mika]

12. Some of my friends there do look in now and then.

Its a bitch to do with slow dial-up speeds and high costs.

[Horse with no Name]

2. Yeah we don't have to say we are gonna rape and pillage anymore

We just tell you we are "spreading democracy".
Brings the same fear to your loins, doesn't it?

[rubberducky]

3. Boy, do they have *`s number!!!

:rofl:

[Imagevision]

27. Bush: "We will support you in your effort" you-know, like Iraq

and just look at the democracy and freedom the US. has brought to the Iraqi people.

[nancyr]

4. Oh, goody!

We do so well with the "invasion thing".

[goclark]

5. They must admit him to the Betty Ford Center

before he is tried at the Hague.

[ShockediSay]

6. Didn't they say the same before Palestinian elections

wherein they didn't like the outcome so's to cut off all funding

[longship]

7. If Cuban expatriots try anything funny

And if ChimpCo in any way supports them, the international situation is going to go into a significant tailspin very, very quickly.

Cuba is still heavily in the Russian sphere of influence. Any attempt to subvert the Cuban government by the US would be viewed very, very gravely.

The last time the US tried this was as close to all out nuclear conflict that we've ever been. Things have changed significantly since then, but I wouldn't put it past these knuckleheads to get the US past the tipping point before they come to what little sense they have.

[Show_Me _The_Truth]

39. Not quite correct

Any attempt to subvert the Cuban government by the US would be viewed very, very gravely.

The last time the US tried this was as close to all out nuclear conflict that we've ever been.

The reason we came close to conflict with the Soviets was b/c of the Soviets placing nuclear tipped missles in Cuba which was a DIRECT threat to US Soil. The Kennedy Administration could not accept the Soviets to have nuclear weapons in the Western Hemisphere.

This was completely separate from the Bay of Pigs, but could be viewed as a response to rhetoric from the US and Cuban exiles by Cuba and the Soviets using the discord to set up a forward nuclear base.

Nowadays, I doubt Russia would rush to Cuba's aid with nuclear attack. This would be the only opion they had as Russia would have a tough time projecting power this far from home. Their navy is not (and never really was) what it use to be.

By the way, it is tough to argue that confronting the Soviets over this placement was a bad thing. At that time, the Soviets were an expansionist power and could not be allowed to get a nuclear foothold in the Western Hemisphere. There was nothing else the US cold do but resist the placement of missles in Cuba. Of course, the Soviets also got the US to take missles out of Turkey in kind. Of course, this is all IMHO.

[Joe Bacon]

9. Chucklenuts wants to invade...WITH WHAT

Hey Chucklenuts, What IS that percentage of National Guard units UNREADY FOR COMBAT SERVICE??????

What are you going to invade Cuba with? Tossing them a bunch of bibles a la a Stryper concert??????????

[Vidar]

11. The Cuban exile inner tube flotilla.

[ellie]

21. Ah yes! The old C.E.I.T.F. hahahahahahaha

[madrchsod]

10. you do know that bush has" lost " the monroe doctrine

china is the main player in cuba now and will be in the future.

[BrotherBuzz]

15. And China wields all that influence with the help of our debt...

Ironic, no?

[Say_What]

20. Something of interest re Cuba, China, Venezuela

Cuba Comes in from the Cold
Bolstered by New Investments and Beneficial Trade Agreements, the Island’s Economy Surges while Washington Grumbles over Havana’s Possible Big Oil Surprise

Cuban society reaps benefits from new investments and from major equity transfers coming from China and Venezuela

New economic arrangements and wider political ties have led Havana out of its U.S.-consigned international purdah

Regional political shift blows apart Washington’s already failed policy of attempting to isolate Cuba

Bush Administration commits its latest blunder in announcing another scorched

http://www.coha.org/2006/07/31/cuba-comes-in-from-the-cold/

[Judi Lynn]

44. Wonderful image of the little emperor and his bomber. n/t

[Mika]

13. HEADLINE ANALOGY: US on alert as Bin Laden calls for democracy in America.

n/t

[ellie]

22. Thats Abbie Hoffman funny.

[Vidar]

30. Saw a great biopic on Hoffman: "Steal this Movie" starring

Vincent d'Onofrio.

[Vidar]

31. tres drole.

[Matariki]

14. any "call for democracy" from the US should scare the bejeezus

out of sovereign nations.

sad really.

[MrCoffee]

40. My thoughts exactly

who can blame them? I'd encourage them to go on alert if Shrub is looking their way.

[Matilda]

16. Why does Bush take it for granted that Cuba will fall

when Castro dies?

Does he really imagine that Castro hasn't made plans? Raoul stepped in without fuss when Fidel
had surgery.

Why will Fidel's demise change anything?

[Judi Lynn]

17. If Bush is so fascinated by "democracy" for Cuba, why doesn't it appear

he thinks it's right for the United States?

He cheated and bullied and stole his way into the White House, and THAT'S not democracy. He lied BIG TIME about his and his friends' war in Iraq, and THAT'S not democracy, either. He has lied about everything he has done while infesting the White House, and he has drug our country down. THAT'S not democracy.

What he means is he's interested in destroying the hard work done by some very dedicated people all over the island to bring about a higher standard of living in time, far higher than anything they could have had under the brutal, corrupt system which was supported by the U.S. and overthrown by patriots.

[ConcernedCanuk]

18. "Democracy" is over-rated

.
.
.

If the masses are ignorant, mal-informed, misinformed or tempted to vote for reasons that are not in the best interests of the nation

Then you end up with a government that doesn't really represent the real wishes of the masses.

Under Saddam, regardless of his faults, Iraq was stable.

Now it is a hotbed of violence, inflated fuel prices, polluted water, inefficient sewage systems, increased unemployment, shortage of hospitals, food, electricity . .

The list is endless

So

Wherein lies this so called "blessing" of a "democracy" ?

OH

I forgot

Now the USA controls Iraq, and their oil

Silly me . . .

(sigh)

[Say_What]

19. Especially the USSA version....

http://www.krysstal.com/democracy_whyusa01.html

[Judi Lynn]

24. This is a wonderful site. There's so much to study. I see that photo

is one taken of one of the stadiums used to house the suspected "leftists" they tortured, often murdering, downstairs, in the rooms and chambers there.

Did you ever hear one of the men who was tortured beyond description there was finally turned loose, made his way to the States, was in education, went to a conference here, and suddenly found he was looking directly into the face of a professor who used to be the man who tortured him senseless in one of those soccer stadiums?

I read it too long ago to remember more. I'm quite sure he took him to court.

[Judi Lynn]

23. Cuba Says Raul Castro Is in Firm Control

Associated Press
Cuba Says Raul Castro Is in Firm Control
By ANITA SNOW , 08.04.2006, 04:19 PM

The Communist leadership assured Cubans on Friday that Raul Castro was in firm control as acting president, and the health minister said Fidel Castro was "recovering satisfactorily" from intestinal surgery.

The government also issued its first decree since Fidel temporarily stepped down Monday for the first tim1102e in 47 years: The Foreign Ministry condemned Israel's bombing of the Lebanese village of Qana, calling it "cowardly, vile and criminal" and urging the world to force an immediate cease-fire.

The statement came as the government insisted it was operating normally, even though the island's longtime leader has temporarily ceded power to his younger brother Raul, the defense minister.

Some Cuban exiles, seizing on the unprecedented transfer of power, called for the U.S. government to do more to encourage a democratic transition on the island. But Cuba's government appeared undaunted.
(snip/...)

http://www.forbes.com/entrepreneurs/entremgmt/feeds/ap/2006/08/04/ap2928722.html

[Judi Lynn]

25. From today's Miami Herald: Cuban media blasts exiles in S. Florida

Posted on Fri, Aug. 04, 2006
CUBAN MEDIA
Cuban media blasts exiles in S. Florida
As uncertainty swirled among Cubans, the government-run media attacked exiles in Miami for celebrating Fidel Castro's illness.
Miami Herald Staff Report

HAVANA - Under a string of sweltering thunderstorms that soaked this city, some Cubans on Thursday expressed uncertainty about Fidel Castro's future while the government media blasted Miami Cubans who celebrated his health crisis.
(snip)

The nightly Mesa Redonda (Round Table) TV news program Thursday evening was dedicated to blasting Miami's ''terrorist mafia'' -- in particular its representatives in Congress.

''These people live off the anti-Cuba industry,'' said news presenter Reinaldo Taladrid, who added that Cubans on the island are ready for any hostile act from Washington.

Apparently responding to a Cuban American National Foundation call for military brass in Cuba to take action during this apparent power vacuum, news presenter Arleen Rodríguez was adamant: ``We'll be waiting for them, arms in hand. Every Cuban is a warrior.''
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15194228.htm

[tinfoilinfor2005]

26. Gee, I wonder if his speech had anything to do with the oil they recently

discovered in Cuba?

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/html/20060728T200000-0500_110018_OBS_WILL_CUBA_S_OFFSHORE_OIL_DISCOVERY_FINALLY_BREAK_THE_US_TRADE_EMBARGO_.asp :evilgrin:

[IndianaGreen]

28. Fidel's father was Captain Piccard of Star Trek

Doesn't he look like an older Patrick Stewart?


Castro's father was a
wealthy sugar planter

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/5234790.stm

:puffpiece:

[laststeamtrain]

29. Yeah, he does.

I saw a pic of Fidel the other day and the man to play him in the biopic is Richard Schiff, Toby on West Wing.

[Judi Lynn]

32. You got it. He's Jean Luc Picard, only much sterner.

Came to Cuba from Galicia, Spain. His plantation covered 23,000 acres. It was the first property given to the new Cuban revolutionary government. Cuban tourists and others go there to look through it still.

I just found a site with photos from his life. Here's one of his parents when they were young! Then one with a brother and sister in their home town, Birán. Then his mother.



Eleven years old. 17 yrs. old. Some railroad car on his dad's property. Fidel on the right, Raul sitting.



More photos. These are very interesting.
http://www.fidel80aniversario.org/fidel/pages/3_galeria_1.html



Family house, Birán.
.

[Say_What]

35. Here's another...

[Say_What]

36. More favorites...

like the one of a beardless Fidel and Che in Mexico City, a very young Fidel in Bogata 1948 shortly before his marriage to Mirta Diaz-Balart and a couple taken while in prison (and his release from Isle of Pines prison in 1955:

[Say_What]

41. Judi , for years I've taken note of this huge black man in nearly all the

photos and videos of Fidel. I always assumed he was security. Was I wrong!! Just found out this week who he is: Esteban Lazo Hernandez, Cuba's most powerful black leader. Here's a bit of info about him and a couple of photos. Check out Elian and Juan Miguel in the last photo in front of Lazo.

...Castro also handed some duties to three old-time Communist leaders relatively unknown outside Cuba: Health Minister Jose Ramon Balaguer and Vice President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura - representing the revolution's oldest surviving leaders - and Vice President Esteban Lazo Hernandez, Cuba's most powerful black leader.

Their inclusion shows Castro wants to ensure the leadership does not stray from communist principles in his absence.

Like Lage, all three are Politburo members, and two - Machado and Lazo - are also on the party's newly resurrected secretariat, which aims to revive communist ideology in daily government. Castro charged Balaguer with overseeing Cuba's health programs and Machado and Lazo with looking after the country's education programs.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/15190901.htm

[Judi Lynn]

45. Wonderful photos! That man is a giant. He must be 6'7" or more.

Goes to show you how little gets out about Cuba, and that's because very light gets past our propaganda curtain! There are far more people involved in running things there than we are encouraged to believe in our corporate media.

Looks as if Miguel, Elián, and the paternal grandmother are wearing shirts to commemorate the men who went to Miami to gather information on the Cuban "exile" terrorists, which they gave to the FBI, only to find themselves thrown in jail here, for decades to come, even though another court has called for a mistrial.

They are heroes, and I can see why. That must be a meeting in their honor.

The kid is really growing fast! Did you hear him on "60 Minutes" in the last year? He said he wouldn't mind meeting the Miami distant relatives again, because they are his family, still.

[Say_What]

46. The Cuban 5

The Five won the right to a new trial last August 9 by a unanimous and sweeping decision of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals three-judge panel. The Aug. 9, 2005 decision overturned all their convictions.

But the Bush administration has refused to free them because of the U.S. government’s relentless hostility against the Cuban revolution. U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales appealed the Five’s resounding court victory to the full 12-judge panel of the Appeals Court. Surprisingly, the Court set aside the Five’s legal victory and ordered a new appeal.

Now the Five—and their millions of supporters—are awaiting the decision of the full 11th Circuit on their second round of appeals.

http://www.freethefive.org/

[Say_What]

34. He came from Spain to fight against the US in the Spanish-American

war. Here's some background from a poorly translated history:

...They, equally, say that as any other Galician he was grumbling, generous, giving and humanitarian. From the book “ Fidel and Religion” by Frey Betto: In 1895, when the last War of Independence was taking place in Cuba, my father was sent to fight as a Spanish soldier. My father was very young and he was recruited by the Spanish Army as one of its soldiers. At the end of the XIX century, Galicia was one of the poorest and underdeveloped regions of the Spanish Crown. To recruit young men for the army was not a difficult task and even less when it was promised to pay them only a few coins. (They would become into the “ fifths” that would travel to the colonies to defend the king’s properties) “After the was my father was taken back to Spain. It seems that he liked Cuba and, once among so many immigrants, he headed for Cuba in the first years of this century, and without a cent he started to work.” (Fidel in an interview with Frey Betto).

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/fidel/angel-castro.htm

[Judi Lynn]

33. Kicking for the very old photos of Fidel Castro as a boy.

:kick: :kick: :kick:

[Say_What]

47. Some Roberto Salas photos for the mix... Fidel in New York in 1959, more..

I have Salas's book Fidel's Cuba with these and many more photos. His work, like Korda's, is superb.


CASTRO IN NEW YORK, APRIL 1959
Fidel stayed at the Statler Hilton, the old Hotel Pennsylvania, right across from Penn Station. He went out onto a balcony to wave to the cheering Cuban-American crowd assembled below. That balcony is still there and the flagpole is still there. He was 31, and he looks so young and enthusiastic. It makes you think how differently things might have turned out.



MOUNT VERNON, APRIL 1959
We came to the United States with an entourage of about 50 people. Fidel saw Vice President Richard Nixon and, before taking the train from Washington to New York, we went to Mount Vernon. He started looking at the books - he was interested in everything about United States history. This is a vintage print, the only one I have. The negative doesn't exist any more.


CHE GUEVARA AND FIDEL CASTRO, JANUARY 1959
This is very dear to me because it's the first picture I took of Che. It was at the Palace of the Revolution in Havana, about the second week. The picture has a strange atmosphere because it's a time exposure, two or three seconds. The whole illumination is from the match when Fidel lit the cigar.
- Comments by Roberto Salas

On edit. Added photo of Korda, Salas (left and center), and Raul Corrales

[Judi Lynn]

48. Just bookmarked this page because I want to keep the photos you've

posted. These are amazing.

Who would have ever expected to see the greated Cuban photographers in the same picture?

People who don't know about Roberto Salas might be interested in knowing he and his dad had a photography salon in New York before the Cuban Revolution, and when activity starting increasing in Cuba around the time of the revolution Roberto Salas went to Cuba to help document it, knowing it was going to be a very important event.

That cigar photo is one of a kind, just like Korda's world-famous Che photo, for which he never accepted money.

I think possibly my favorite is this one, "El Quijote de la Farola," which has a young guy who climbed a lightpole to get a better look at the event when the rebels came into Havana.



That Mt. Vernon travel book photo is great. Didn't know he got to go there.

Here's one up in the Sierra Maestra during the rebel days, trying to catch up on some reading:

[Say_What]

37. MiamiGUSANO Terrorist Organization CANF calling of a coup on the island

This may have been posted a few days ago. Been too busy to look in but here's the article:

Cuban American National Foundation Calls For Coup

<clips>

..."If today the power rests with Raul Castro, it should not rest with Raul Castro. We are asking those in the military in Cuba to take hold of their own future, to establish a provisional authority with the civil and military members of Cuba who do not want this succession of power. It is to exclude Raul Castro from power in Cuba, and that is what we're calling for today, and expressing our support for those who will take these actions in Havana," Mas Santos said.

http://www.nbc6.net/news/9618783/detail.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
and from the same website:

Fidel Castro Repeatedly Defies Death

<clips>

HAVANA -- When Fidel Castro was 10, he nearly died of appendicitis. Since then, he has survived military assaults and even poisoned cigars and milkshakes. Now, two weeks shy of his 80th birthday, surgery has sidelined the leader of Cuba's revolution.

After a life filled with near-death experiences, the intestinal bleeding that forced Castro to hand over power and undergo "a complicated surgical operation" may be one of the closest calls yet for the true survivor.

A statement attributed to Castro on Tuesday said he was in good spirits but made clear his condition was touch and go. "I cannot make up positive news," he was quoted as saying.

The current crisis follows a lifetime of close shaves.

In April 1948, Castro joined throngs in Bogota, Colombia, to protest creation of the Organization of American States. The rioting spun out of control, and the 21-year-old Castro took refuge in the Cuban Embassy as the army began hunting down leftists.

http://www.nbc6.net/news/9617209/detail.html

[Robbien]

38. How delusional

Why would the military stage a coup? Their government doesn't put them in harm's way for needless wars. They are integral to the country in helping out in natural disasters. They are paid well, get healthcare and free education.

What does Miami have to offer that is any better than what they have?

[Say_What]

42. Intellect and rational thinking never was CANF's long suit.

;-)

[Judi Lynn]

43. Ha ha ha. Isn't THAT the truth.

Their histry of violence goes back so far, even further than their founding father's (Jorge Mas Canosa) trip to Cuba in the Bay of Pigs, in which he STAYED IN THE BOAT.

They are really big, however, on hiring people to do their bombing for them, not to mention small invasions, and "drive by" machine gunnings from the water at Cubans on the beach and around hotels.