"Meet the Cuban Five- at the center of blockbuster announcement on Cuba"

"On Wednesday, Obama administration officials confirmed to The Post that Cuba has freed American citizen Alan Gross. Gross, who was detained in December 2009 while working as a subcontractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development, had been accused of espionage and sentenced to 15 years in prison by Cuba. His imprisonment was a major problem in relations between Washington and Havana.

Gross was not freed by accident. According to ABC News, his release is the culmination of more than a year of "secret back-channel talks at the highest levels of both governments." And, importantly, his release comes at the same time as an agreement by the U.S. government to release three Cuban citizens, part of the "Cuban Five."

Of the 5, two were released after time served for espionage sentenced in 1998, then finally on appeal after appeal convicted (as they stayed in US prisons,fortunately).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Five

The last 3 were released TODAY by our marxist in chief and his asst. holder-- released murderers of the Brothers to the Rescue air flight rescue planes which were shot down over international waters (planes were spotting balseros, rafters escaping the Cuban gulag on the Straits of Florida). Now that the dictator in chief thinks he can write immigration law, then Cuba should be opened up to open immigration-- just like Jimmah Cahtah, whom he has surpassed in liberal treachery and lies.

THIS is who obamaumao is- a marxist in chief, apologizing for the one last safe place for freedom in the world, the USA-- and now does this- on behalf of the falling oil prices and desperate Russian agents and diminishing cash from/to client states of Cuba (who has chinese wells drilled offshore) and Venezuela. To his utter eternal shame- which he will not have. Juxtapose this action with Diane Feinsteins self righteous indignation-- and you will see that Gitmo closing is not far behind. All of the fellow traveller venture socialists are doing their job for their foreign masters. Waited until Congress had recessed. It never stops, him an Val Jarrett.

Thanks to the Canadian nickel mine owners (who pay the castros a "tipping" fee % taken out of the 5 cents an hour labor of Cubans in Cuban nickel mines, btw-- said money going to Castro's private accounts-- Slavery anyone? Protests from NAACP?- doubt it). Thanks Canada-- great work. And a Left wing Pope who is all in favor of communist dictators apparently.

In a "swap" (unequal) for Alan Gross of AID, and an unidentified US intelligence officer who had been 20 years in a Cuban prison (who is a patriot, and whom we should be briefed on to acclaim and take care of - for he/she is surely insane at this point). The 60's generation continues to do the dirty work of Ayers, Dohrn and the Comintern. Deo Vindice. De Oppreso Liber. Molon Labe.

Cluelessness on Cuba (Humberto Fontova)
12,26,2014

Excerpts

http://townhall.com/columnists/humbertofontova/2014/12/26/rand-pauls-cluelessness-on-cuba-n1935926/print

First off, if Castro “secretly favors the embargo,” then why did every one of his secret agents campaign secretly and obsessively against the embargo while working as secret agents? Castro managed the deepest and most damaging penetration of the U.S. Department of Defense in recent U.S. history. The spy’s name is Ana Belen Montes, known as “Castro’s Queen Jewel” in the intelligence community. In 2002 she was convicted of the same crimes as Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and today she serves a 25-year sentence in Federal prison. Only a plea bargain spared her from sizzling in the electric chair like the Rosenberg’s.

In fact, few U.S. foreign policy measures in recent history have been as phenomenally successful as our limited sanctions against the Stalinist Robber-Barons who run Cuba. First off, for three decades the Soviet Union was forced to pump the equivalent of almost ten Marshall Plans into Cuba.

This cannot have helped the Soviet Union’s precarious solvency or lengthened her life span. Secondly, the U.S. taxpayer has been spared the fleecing visited upon many others who reside in nations who eschew “embargoing” Cuba.

Per-capita-wise, Cuba qualifies as the world’s biggest debtor nation with a foreign debt of close to $50 billion, a credit–rating nudging Somalia’s, and an uninterrupted record of defaults.

In 1986 Cuba defaulted on most of her foreign debt to Europe. Seven years ago France’s version of the U.S. government’s Export-Import Bank (named COFACE) cut off Cuba’s credit line. Mexico’s Bancomex quickly followed suit. The Castro regime had stuck it to French taxpayers for $175 million and to Mexican taxpayers for $365 million.

Bancomex was forced to impound Cuban assets in three different countries in an attempt to recoup its losses.
A bit later we heard from another Castro sucker: “The Cuban regime has a long track record of failing to pay back our loans,” lamented South Africa’s Deputy Minister of Trade & Industry, Geordin Hill-Lewis. “In 2010, South Africa had to write off R1.1 billion in bad Cuban debt, and on Friday we wrote off another R250 million in bad debt. The time has come for South Africa to invest in strategic partnerships that deliver prosperity for our people.”

in 1960 stormed into almost 6000 U.S. owned businesses (worth almost $ 2 billion at the time) and stole them all at Soviet gunpoint. A few American business-owners resisted. One of these was Howard Anderson who owned a filling stations and Jeep dealership (not a casino or brothel, which were relatively rare in pre-Castro Cuba, by the way.) I’ll quote from Anderson v. Republic of Cuba, No. 01-28628 (Miami-Dade Circuit Court, April 13, 2003). “In one final session of torture, Castro’s agents drained Howard Anderson’s body of blood before sending him to his death at the firing squad.”

The Inter-American Law Review classifies Castro’s mass burglary of U.S. property as “the largest uncompensated taking of American property by a foreign government in history.” Rubbing his hands and snickering in triumphant glee, Castro boasted at maximum volume to the entire world that he was freeing Cuba from “Yankee economic slavery!” (Che Guevara’s term, actually) and that “he would never repay a penny!”

This is the only promise Fidel Castro has ever kept in his life. Hence the imposition of the Cuba embargo, not that you’d know any of this from the mainstream media.

The burglarized (and often brutalized) American owners filed those property claims against Castro’s regime with the U.S. government. They’re worth $7 billion today—and must be settled before the so called embargo is lifted.

This settlement provision for lifting the embargo was codified into U.S. law in 1996 by the Helms-Burton act, which means only Congress can lift the embargo, obviously after a vote. But the votes are not there.

Shouldn’t Rand Paul know this?

In 1967 libertarian icon Murray Rothbard seemed highly bereaved and aggrieved to hear of Che Guevara’s whacking. Here’ his encomium to the Stalinist who outlawed private property under penalty of torture-chamber and firing-squad:
“Che is dead, and we all mourn him. Long live Che! Why? How is it that so many libertarians mourn this man?...What made Che such an heroic figure for our time is that he, more than any man of our epoch or even of our century, was the living embodiment of the principle of Revolution… we all knew that his enemy was our enemy–that great Colossus that oppresses and threatens all the peoples of the world, U. S. imperialism.”

Ron Paul regards Murray Rothbard as one of America’s “greatest men” and “greatest heroes of freedom.” Rand Paul, considers it an honor to have met Murray Rothbard and a “privilege” to have once driven him to the airport.

So let’s hope simple “cluelessness” motivates Rand

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.