New York Honors Fidel Castro With Statue

He craved the nuclear incineration of the entire metropolis. "If the missiles had remained we would have used them against the very heart of the U.S., including New York City," admitted his sidekick Ernesto "Che" Guevara, thinking he was speaking "off the record" to London's Daily Worker in November 1962.

But Fidel Castro first tried baiting his Soviet patrons into the act. A full-scale Yankee invasion of Cuba was hours away, Castro disclosed to Khrushchev on October 26th 1962. His agents had ready proof. Don't delay, he urged the Soviet premier! Now's the time to launch a surprise Nuclear strike on America's major cities! Hurry!

Khrushchev panicked. But not from fear of any Yankee invasion of Cuba. He knew better. He had JFK's number from the Bay of Pigs and the Vienna Summit the previous year. Now the craven tone of Kennedy's messages about those Missiles confirmed that Camelot's backbone was still spaghetti-like.

No, what alarmed the Butcher of Budapest was the stridency and sincerity of his Cuban confederate's craving to plunge the world into a nuclear war that would kill millions of Americans and Russians along with millions of Cubans (minus Fidel of course, who, along with Che and Raul, had secure reservations at the new Soviet-built bomb-shelter in Cuba.) "We'd better get those missiles out of Cuba, all right," reasoned Stalin's former henchman. "This Cuban lunatic might get his finger near the button!"

Camelot's press agency (the Beltway media, academia, Hollywood and New York publishing) spun a sharply different version of the rationale for that decision, which still prevails among the cheese and Chablis set.

Foiled in October 1962 by Khrushchev's prudence, the very next month Castro's agents plotted to incinerate and entomb thousands of New Yorkers while employing more conventional means. 500 kilos of TNT were slated to explode in Manhattan's most crowded settings during their most crowded stage.

Macy's, Gimbel's, Bloomingdale's and Grand Central Terminal were the targets, and the day after Thanksgiving 1962 was when the 12 detonators would explode. In the nick of time J. Edgar Hoover's FBI uncovered the plot, arrested the Castroite plotters, and nixed the slaughter of thousands of New York holiday shoppers (these plots are fully documented in "Fidel: Hollywood's Favorite Tyrant").

So it's only fitting that New York honor Fidel Castro with a massive monument in Central Park to be unveiled November 8th. "The portrait celebrates Castro's humanitarianism," gushes David Kesting, the spokesman for the statue's sculptor. "Inspiration for the gilded head of Castro, large enough to belong to a 25 foot man, comes from Harlem's acclamation for Castro's contributions to civil rights," reads a wire story. "This may be the last opportunity to say farewell" to the man some revere as a champion of civil rights ... The Central Park unveiling of his portrait is an attempt to bring Harlem's adoration for Castro to the rest of the world."

"Useful Idiocy" simply wont do. American Castrophilia requires a term all it's own. No tribute that Walter Duranty, Roger Baldwin, Dashiel Hammet, Albert Einstein, Woody Guthrie, Paul Robeson, or even Franklin Delano Roosevelt lavished on Stalin approaches Ted Turner's, Harry Belafonte's, Jesse Jackson's, Norman Mailer's, Charlie Rangel's and those multitude of other plaudits to Fidel Castro.

A monument heralding Hitler in Warsaw, London or Rotterdam would make more sense. Had the wishes of the man commemorated in that Central Park statue prevailed, Central Park itself might still be radioactive, and the charred remains of New York residents Charlie Rangel (who specializes in passionate bear-hugs of Castro) and Norman Mailer (who hails Castro as "the Hemisphere's greatest hero!") would fit in a milk carton.

A monument to Hideki Tojo in Honolulu would be more appropriate. One to Osama bin Laden in New York would also fit. In the fall of 1962 only Khrushchev's discretion and the FBI's competence saved New York from a Castro-instigated murder toll that would have dwarfed both Pearl Harbor's and 9-11's.

The planning and will for the fiery mass-murder of thousands of New Yorkers were certainly there, only the means were foiled at the last minute. Morally speaking, this leaves Fidel Castro culpable of crimes bin Laden envisions only in his fondest dreams.

The amalgam of willful ignorance, hypocrisy, stupidity, and masochism displayed by Castro acolytes in the U.S. has rarely been matched by the public utterings of any group of politicians or pundits in modern history. National Review's Jay Nordlinger calls it "the most grotesque phenomenon of our time." The phrase strikes me as perfectly fitting.

Unlike Charlie Rangel, Maxine Waters, Dannie Glover, Harry Belafonte, David Kesting and those multitudes of Harlem Castro fans, Mr Eusebio Penalver, a black Cuban, actually lived in Castro's fiefdom. "N*gger!" taunted his all-white Castroite jailers between tortures. "Monkey!" they laughed. "We pulled you down from the trees and cut of your tail!" they taunted while throwing him in solitary confinement. For opposing the re-installation of slavery in Cuba, Mr. Penalver suffered longer in Castro's dungeons than Nelson Mandela suffered in South Africa's, and more defiantly and heroically.

The man honored by Harlem for his "humanitarianism" and dedication to civil rights" jailed more of his subjects for political crimes than Hitler and Stalin. More uproariously ironic, he is (or was) a lily white European soldier's son who not only jailed Penalver, the longest-jailed Black political prisoner in modern history, but also overthrew a Cuban government where Blacks served as President of the Senate, Minister of Agriculture, Chief of Army, and Head of State (Fulgencio Batista).

Today the prison population in Stalinist/Apartheid Cuba is 90 percent black while only 9 percent of the ruling Stalinist party is black. Most of Cuba's current political prisoners are black, including Jorge Antunez and Dr. Elias Biscet, a Martin Luther King and Gandhi disciple.

Mr. Antunez's 18-year sentence and daily tortures result essentially from quoting Martin Luther King in a public square. Dr. Biscet's 25-year sentence and daily tortures result from being overheard saying about Castro what the Dixie Chicks, Nancy Pelosi and Charles Rangel bellow into microphones about President Bush.

It's worth repeating: The Nov. 8th unveiling and celebration is motivated by "Harlem's acclamation for Castro's contributions to civil rights."

I'll defer to Jorge Antunez's sister, Berta: "The Cuban government tries to fool the world with siren songs depicting racial equality in our country," she reports clandestinely via a Cuban Samizdat. "But it is all a farce, as I and my family can attest, having suffered from the systematic racism directed at us by Castro's regime. My brother suffers the scourge of racial hatred every day. The beatings are always accompanied by racial epithets. They set dogs on him. They deny him medical attention. They kept him from attending his mother's funeral."

"The racist mentality is so ingrained among Cuba's agents of repression," reports Mrs. Antunez, "that when mixed race groups are stopped on the street, only the blacks are asked for their identification papers."

"The only thing I have to thank the Cuban revolution for" she quoted her brother as saying, "is for restoring the yoke of slavery that my ancestors lived under."

Please, please, please don't waste your time looking for any mention of these valiant blacks in the mainstream media. Please, please, please don't bother looking for them hailed during Black history month on NPR, CNN, The History Channel or Oprah. These heroes defied the hemisphere's premier slaver, you see, who also happens to be the Left's premier pin-up boy. So their courage, sacrifices and suffering don't qualify as politically-correct news and documentary fare.

If the term "slaver" strikes you as hyperbolic, consider this story from last week's Miami Herald: "In reality we were slaves," says Cuban refugee Alberto Rodriguez who before escaping was forced to labor 116 hours a week at 3 and a half pennies per hour.

"Amazingly, this labor went on in a shipyard in Delray Beach, Florida. Mr. Rodriguez and 2 other escapees were 'employees' of Curacao Drydock Co., headquartered in Curacao but who obtained some of their laborers from the Cuban Government. This government, lauded worldwide as a champion of the laboring classes, pocketed the difference between the 3 pennies and hour and Curacao Drydock's normal wage."

The forced-laborers were rounded up in Cuba and shipped to Curacao where their passports were promptly confiscated. Their "supervisor" was a Fidel Castro nephew. "We worked in broiling heat, in the most dangerous part of the ship, where all of the regular workers refused to go - that's where they forced the Cubans to work," recounts Rodriguez. His co-slave, Luis Casanova, was badly electrocuted but forced to work with blood pouring from his tongue. "They said if we slacked up we'd be taken back to Cuba and thrown in jail."

After these men were shipped to Florida to work for a Curacao Drydock agent, they escaped their slavers and have filed suit against them in Miami Federal court under the Aliens Tort Act. Please don't confuse their case with those of illegals who sneak in, clamor for a job, then sue the employer for "discrimination," or some such. This is a totally different animal.

Charlie Rangel raves against Republicans as closet Ku Kluxers. This July on the floor of Congress he denounced Republicans' "stinking hypocrisy" for refusing to vote to raise the minimum wage to $7.35 per hour.

I'll be surprised if Charles Rangel isn't keynote speaker at the Central Park celebration for the Stalinist/racist who jailed and tortured black political prisoners longer than Apartheid South Africa, and who kidnaps his subjects and rents them out for 3 pennies an hour. It's the least Congressman Rangel could do for the man who longed to incinerate both him and every one of his Harlem constituents.

Humberto Fontova is the author of Fidel; Hollywood's Favorite Tyrant, a Conservative Book Club Main Selection.

You talkin' about this Castro, champion of human rights from the workers' paradise?:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1727717/posts

Cuba accused of slavelike labor deal
The Miami Herald ^ | 10/28/2006 | Frances Robles

Posted on 10/28/2006 4:31:44 PM PDT by cll

The Cuban government conspired with a Curacao ship repair company to provide practically slave labor fixing up vessels, including Miami-based cruise ships, and kept workers under harsh conditions, a lawsuit filed in U.S. District court in Miami alleges.

The civil suit filed before Judge James Lawrence King alleges that up to 100 Cuban shipyard workers are forced to work against their will at Curacao Drydock Co., a ship repair company with an agent in Delray Beach, Klattenberg Marine Associates.

The suit, filed by three workers who escaped and now live in Florida, alleges they were ordered to work 16-hour shifts for $16 a month, a low wage common in their native Cuba.

''We started work at 3 in the afternoon and kept working until 7 a.m. the following day,'' plaintiff Alberto Justo Rodríguez told The Miami Herald. ``We worked in the worst, most uncomfortable parts of the ship. Where nobody wanted to go -- that's where they sent the Cubans.''

112 HOURS A WEEK

According to the suit, the men often worked 112 hours a week.

Their wage amounted to 3 ½ cents an hour.

The suit was filed two months ago and was first reported Friday by The Associated Press.

Rodríguez, a former shipyard worker in Cuba, was summoned to the Ministry of Transportation in 2001 for a mandatory transfer to Curacao. Upon arrival on the Caribbean island, he says, his passport was seized.

He and up to 100 other Cubans worked on a joint venture with the Cuban government and Curacao Drydock, a company that does shipyard repair, including work for U.S.-based cruise lines, oil companies and shipping firms.

The joint venture between the Cuban government and Curacao Drydock has Cuba providing the workers for the company, providing a source of cash for the Cuban government, the suit alleges.

Curacao Drydock, the suit alleges, knew the Cuban workers were being held against their will.

A written statement provided by Curacao Drydock attorney Matt Triggs to The Miami Herald says many of the suit's allegations are directed at the Cuban government.

''There are allegations, however, regarding the health and safety of our employees that are of great concern to Curacao Drydock Co.,'' the statement said, stressing that the company has safety measures in place. ``Nevertheless, the company is undertaking a full investigation of the allegations.''

The suit claims the men were forced to labor in sweltering weather and dangerous conditions, like hanging from scaffolds. When Rodríguez broke his foot and ankle in 2002 while scraping rust from the hull of a ship, he was sent home to heal -- and then ordered back after his recovery.

The suit claims plaintiff Luis Alberto Casanova once suffered an electric shock but was forced to finish his shift despite bleeding from his tongue.

The workers' supervisors were other Cubans, including a nephew of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, the suit alleges.

''They always told us if we didn't work, they'd throw us out of the country, fire us and send us to jail,'' Rodríguez said. ``Really, we were slaves. We didn't have a voice or a vote.''

FORCED VIEWING

On time off, Rodríguez said, they were forced to watch videos of political speeches, marches and the Cuban government Mesa Redonda -- Round Table -- TV news shows. He escaped in 2004 and now works odd jobs in Hialeah.

The suit was filed by Miami Beach lawyer John Andres Thornton under the Aliens Tort Act, which allows foreigners to file civil suits in U.S. federal courts when an international law has been violated.

Curacao Drydock has asked the judge to dismiss the complaint for lack of jurisdiction.

The suit seeks unspecified damages. No trial date has been set.

Co-plaintiffs Fernando Alonso Hernández worked in Curacao from 1995 until he fled in January 2005. He and the third plaintiff, Luis Alberto Casanova, who worked in Curacao from 2002 until 2005, now work in shipyards in Tampa.

One of the plaintiffs, Thornton said, now makes in an hour what he used to get in a month.

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