Posted on 04/24/2003 9:32:38 AM PDT by Ebenezer
By arranging long prison sentences for 75 dissidents - librarians, journalists, people just hoping for a taste of freedom someday - Fidel Castro has disproved or at least challenged some of the most cherished hopes and ideas about him and the island state he has now tyrannized for more than four decades.
Gone is the notion that his eventual death will necessarily spell the death as well of Cuban dictatorship. Not a few analysts have told the press the crackdown has the purpose of squelching all opposition in a country Fidel wants to leave to brother Raul, hardly a liberty-loving, democracy-hugging, sweetheart of a guy.
Gone is - or ought to be - any lingering feeling that Castro is not really so bad after all, just a man propelled toward Marxism by his love of the people and strong sense of social justice. This was a fiction from the start of his murderous, life-cramping, thieving regime, but all sorts of Americans have thought it fine to play kissy-kissy with him, as if he was misunderstood and the deprivations of his people the consequence of American foul play. What say you now, friends of Fidel?
Gone is the thought that moves toward ending the U.S. embargo would bring out Castro's cheerier side. The United States was edging toward its conclusion. Even President Bush - fully aware of how angry Cuban Americans could cost him Florida in 2004 - had said good deeds could lead to reconsidered policies. Now even European leaders, always more conciliatory, are scouting about for possible sanctions.
Gone also, by the way, is any persuasive argument that the United Nations has relevance in the fight for governmental decency in this world. Its Human Rights Commission winked at Castro's latest depravity, saying only that a U.N. representative should visit the island to see what's up. Stay out, Cuba replied.
So what's to be done? Simply extending the U.S. embargo from here to eternity is unlikely to achieve much, but neither is it consonant with the lessons of history that rewarding criminals stops crime. At the least, voices must rise in fierce condemnation, and from all over the civilized world. The dissidents must be encouraged, their tormentors excoriated. The free world must not let go of its outrage, but beat the drum regularly, turning to other sanctions if effective, humane ones can be found, while insistently seeking the release of all Castro's political prisoners and the demise of his government by thuggery.
Then I would suggest that the Cuban people fight for and earn their better.......otherwise, let 'em stew in their own juices.
One of my good customers was one of the targets of the hit teams. He knew they were going to come after him and when the stupidly rang his doorbell late one night, he opened the door firing his 45. The perps were both killed and the Mexican police simply looked the other way. My friend was not charged.
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