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New Ah so...
Personally, I think folks are correct when they say that when Castro is gone it won't take long to normalize relations.

As to some of the other points... one thing I seldom see mentioned is that in the Fifties, there were a lot of people in the United States who didn't particularly care for Fulgencio Bautista and/or the sugar companies. We didn't get a new car in 1958, and my mother was pretty hacked about it; Dad responded to a plea for support instead.

I well remember sitting in front of the TV when the clip was played where Fidel declared that he was a Communist, and had always been a Communist. We were visiting friends in Stephenville, and the look Dad and Jimmy exchanged on hearing that had to be seen to be believed.

That's where Jesse Helms's basic support has always come from: people, mainly in the South, who supported Castro against the vile bastards who were running the country -- and felt flatly betrayed when the Bearded One declared for the Other Side, who were at that time quite truthfully regarded as being Out to Get Us.

Most of those folks are old, now, as Jesse is, and when they're gone, the only support the anti-Castro people will have is from the likes of Bacardi. When Fidel finally dies, too, there'll be no object to focus on. Reasonably normal relations will follow fairly quickly (a couple of years, minimum; definitely not overnight).

From the business point of view, yes, many other countries have nationalized U.S. corporations' assets and not been penalized as Cuba has. OTOH none of them has done so as completely and sweepingly as Cuba did. The United States doesn't automatically compensate companies who've been seized, but the end result is the same as if they had -- U.S. taxpayers wind up paying. I personally have precisely zero sympathy for the sugar companies, who were running their operations with what amounted to slave labor; but there were a number of corporations who were just doing maquiladora-type things, and Bacardi, despite its legal location here, is and has always been and Islands company. They got gutted simply because of a legal fiction about where they were incorporated, and are rightfully sore about it. If Castro had satisfied himself with seizing the sugar companies and the land they owned, and the assets of Bautista and his cronies, and left the rest alone... lots of people, including Dad and his friends, would've snorted and said, "Yay! Go for it!" And that would probably have included Jesse Helms.

There is no way the Cuban Revolution can continue absent Castro. There simply aren't any charismatic people around to take over, and the ones who are publicly known are regarded as precisely what they are -- apparatchiks. Socialism is, in its final analysis, just feudalism with the serial numbers filed off; regardless of official titles, the man is and has always been Fidel I Castro, Prince of Cuba, Scourge of the Windward Passage, and Protector of the Meek. Unfortunately he doesn't have a son to invest with primogeniture, and there isn't any other way for him to pass the power he holds. So when Castro dies, there will be a period of great turbulence. The one thing we here in the U.S. need to do when that happens is to try hard to keep the South Florida Cuban exiles from pulling the same trick the West Germans did when the wall came down. If we get a flood of people heading over to explain to the poor benighted Cubans that they've been doing it wrong for forty years and their betters will be happy to take over and show them the right way... it could get nasty.

And Ashton -- in many ways I share some of your attitudes, but don't let your bitterness get the better of you. Our Good Friends the Canadians, who consider it fun and appropriate to tweak the eagle's tail whenever possible, report to me that the real live Cubans are anxious, even avid, to take up the professions of waiter and the like for the sizeable resorts and playgrounds established by European countries for tourism in Cuba, largely by Our Better Friends the Associates of Michael Merlin. Whether the actual result is pretty or not, people do tend for some reason to gravitate to where they can actually make money, eat, live in reasonable housing, and other unreasonable, resource-confusing things.
Regards,
Ric
New Nice analysis of the earlier hostility..
Pity that young Fedelito lacked the savoire faire to speak the language of the men in white gloves, who dance around, The Green Table, my fav stage show / ballet sans dialogue - about the old men sending the young ones off to die for.. er any momentary unpleasantness at the Table.

He could as well have, pronounced himself a Progressive Laissez-faire Compassionate Capitalist - the kinds of BS meaningless phrases so beloved of Murican politicos (and so effective! as they can mean - like the Red Queen - whatever you Want them to mean, and change each week).

Instead he called that spade a er Spade - yet.. there Really Wasn't a Spade!. Like so many revolutionaries - necessarily young ones - he too missed the Point: You can't Have 'Communism' within a culture besotted with say, acquiring endless amounts of things and.. owning them all personally (!) D'Oh. Especially not when - this affliction is the major source of comfort, prized above all else! in 'life'.

Cubans wanted what Bautista and ilk then had much too much of; not some 'different way of coexisting on an island paradise' - via a different social contract. Too heavy stuff, too early - and for an audience with little opportunity for academic philosophizing. Yet only the most hate-crazed can deny that his aim was for.. somehow preventing the Capitalism run-amok of Murican robber barons - that periodic process we live with while averting our eyes. As for the Miami Cubans... they'll die of apoplexy soon enough.

Guess that C-word really Did piss of Jesse and his folk... (ironic for their love of the N-word) - 'enemy of my enemy' doggerel won. Again, predictably: as with all the other folks we demonized for wanting control by an entity which isn't Corporate. And especially not - Murican Corporate.

Not bitter re Murican fairy tales; just can no longer bear the hyopcritical pretense that they Aren't 'fairy stories'! and we (really!) Are: the One Way towards blissful existence on what remains of the planet.

(Must admit that our antics with Puritanism AND Playboy are always good for comic relief though, except maybe when.. the hate preachers start broadcasting which group is slated for removal this year. Bathos. :(

Maybe none of the more interesting social 'contracts' can occur until all Holy Books\ufffd everywhere are burned, in one majestic ceremony dwarfing, Kristallnacht [?]

People collectively aren't yet mature enough Not-to coopt the more subtle parables of a Jesus or Other, next load on lots of really shitty homo-sap stuff: and mix 'em all up, for power and profit. It's not the Economy, Stupid - it's The Robes!



Cackle,

Ashton
House Murican Activities Committee,
Historian Emeritus
New He does have a younger brother, doesn't he?
I remember an article in which it was said his younger brother (apparently the only person in Cuba Fidel really trusts) being named the heir apparent.

He runs the government security forces - and is not very well liked - but troops can keep him in control for a while, I'd say.
French Zombies are zapping me with lasers!
     Helms to retire from Senate. Elizabeth Dole to replace him? - (Another Scott) - (27)
         uh, who's fault is that? -NT - (boxley)
         Re: Helms to retire from Senate. Elizabeth Dole to replace - (addison) - (25)
             Excuse me, but... - (jb4) - (24)
                 The only reason embargo is in place US Sugar Company - (boxley) - (1)
                     Not only... - (Fearless Freep)
                 You're excused. - (addison) - (21)
                     Those poor companies... - (jb4) - (20)
                         I'm not entirely sure where to start. - (addison) - (19)
                             many other countries in the world - (boxley) - (14)
                                 One other thought... - (inthane-chan)
                                 Re: many other countries in the world - (addison) - (11)
                                     bay of pigs was not American Military Units - (boxley) - (2)
                                         Semantic difference. - (addison) - (1)
                                             waal he is a lifeguard on the beach and is "connected" - (boxley)
                                     Please draw your inferences more carefully. - (Another Scott) - (7)
                                         Re: Please draw your inferences more carefully. - (addison) - (6)
                                             Agree about after Castro - (boxley)
                                             Wrong. - (CRConrad) - (4)
                                                 Re: Wrong. - (a6l6e6x)
                                                 CRC == GWB? - (pwhysall)
                                                 No, CRC. And you even quoted the important disclaimer. - (addison) - (1)
                                                     Umm 'not morally correct' to return kid to father? - (Ashton)
                                 Wrong - (Fearless Freep)
                             Start maybe with.. the US mobster-run whorehouses, - (Ashton) - (3)
                                 Ah so... - (Ric Locke) - (2)
                                     Nice analysis of the earlier hostility.. - (Ashton)
                                     He does have a younger brother, doesn't he? - (wharris2)

I should have blown up.
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