2016 Nov 27^th

Castro is dead and Miami is rejoicing. Havana is another story; the older citizens who remember the crimes of Fulgensio Batista are weeping. Castro was certainly a brutal dictator but he didn’t start out that way. He and his entourage visited New York to address the UN in 1960 and brought their chickens with them.  In 1959 Castro addressed the Council on Foreign Affairs. Raoul Castro was with him and signed my wife’s ice skates. She was 14.

Castro tolerated no dissent, but most dictators tolerate no dissent. The previous Cuban dictator Fulgensio Batista began as a benign president supporting democratic ideals, later after a few years out of power, he pre-empted the scheduled election, got the support of wealthy landowners and ruled absolutely. He claimed those who opposed him were communists. That was enough for the US government to provide him with military, financial and logistical support.

Batista made Cuba a criminal’s paradise. Everyone from Meyer Lansky to very minor hoods loved the place. Gambling thrived, there were an estimated 15 thousand prostitutes roaming the streets of Havana. Batista and his relatives took payoffs from all operations.

Here is a quote from President John F. Kennedy, “At the beginning of 1959 United States companies owned about 40 percent of the Cuban sugar lands—almost all the cattle ranches—90 percent of the mines and mineral concessions—80 percent of the utilities—practically all the oil industry—and supplied two-thirds of Cuba's imports.”

Batista left Cuba in 1959 just ahead of Castro. He went to Rafael Trujillo’s Dominican Republic, another brutal dictator, but an anti-communist and so naturally supported by this country. From there Batista immigrated to Spain where he died in 1973 just ahead of a Cuban assassination squad sent to kill him.

Does the government of the United States have any responsibility for the rise of Castro? Should we be surprised at Castro’s continuing hostility toward the United States? Why should we be happy to encouraged the hostility of a government just 90 miles off our coast.?

Now we have a new problem: anyone who wants to can emigrate from Cuba to the United States. Any Cuban can get a green card, and the tap into our generous social programs. Last year there was a six-fold jump in Cubans arriving here.

The National Review, hardly a liberal rag, wants something done to stop this handout.  Marco Rubio is in agreement and even he is sponsoring legislation to stop the free rides.

Things do get complicated!