Patterico's Pontifications

2/19/2008

So Long, Fidel

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:09 am



Go get you some of that good Cuban health care. Sounds like you need it.

P.S. The linked L.A. Times story is conspicuously missing one word: “dictator.”

26 Responses to “So Long, Fidel”

  1. NWhen castro finnaly ends up in that flamming pit far below will liberals demand we fly old glory at half staff? TELL THEM TO GO TAKE A HIKE

    krazy kagu (956b5b)

  2. the point about liberalism, is so long as your not hurting anyone, you can fly old glory any which way you please..

    chris (1a5917)

  3. Cuba will be Venezuela’s East Germany. Actually, it already is.

    Amphipolis (fdbc48)

  4. Unfortunately for them, Cuba is really Venezuela’s . . .um . . . Cuba.

    JVW (b03dfa)

  5. In the picture at the top of the article Castro looks like kind of like Christopher Lee. He *must* be evil!

    //

    And here I was thinking the old man would be the first known case of zombie-ism.

    Joe M. (5d215f)

  6. Like it or not, Castro is a great man of history. Mostly because of us. Has anyone else been in a war against America for fifty-five years and survived? I’ll miss him.

    nk (798403)

  7. I can’t wait for the old SOB to kick off. I’ve been to Cuba and it is the single saddest sight I’ve ever seen. Teenage girls working as prostitutes, theft, bribery (and this was in the good part of town). It’s a shame, because the Cuaban people are really nice, but wow, leadership is everything.

    The fact that we’ve maintained a 0.5 assed blockade is even worse. Either make it a real one or drop it.

    Dr T (69c4b2)

  8. I can’t help but compare Castro vs. America to 300 Spartans, 2,000 helots and five thousand unreliable allies vs. three million Persians.

    nk (798403)

  9. Cuban health care is the last thing he needs now. He had Cuban surgeons operate on his colon and they botched the job. They had to get Spanish surgeons to come in and save the old bastard. The rumor is, they didn’t do a colostomy and the anastomosis leaked. Top surgeons can do these (especially with modern staplers) without a colostomy but they’d better be good. They weren’t.

    Mike K (6d4fc3)

  10. The Castro regime never should have been tolerated in the first place–Eisenhower should have ordered an immediate invasion when it was clear that Castro was going to set up a Soviet satellite state: the Soviets–having not long ago invaded Hungary for far less provocative behavior–would have been in a poor position to object, and the rest of the world would have gotten over it. The failure to do so almost led to nuclear war, and left the Cuban people at the mercy of a Soviet lackey for decades.

    M. Scott Eiland (b66190)

  11. Without the Soviet Union, Castro became no more than a knat on an elephant’s ass. I know that other than the fear of possible destruction in Oct 62, he hasn’t affected my life, or the lives of millions of other Americans at all. Too bad the same can’t be said of the millions of Cubans who have had to endure his insanity. He got to lead this great crusade, and they got to endure un-ending poverty, deprivation, and death.

    Another Drew (f9dd2c)

  12. Mike K,

    I think the woeful state of Cuban health care was one of Patterico’s points. Castro likes to brag about how wonderful Cuba’s health care is, especially compared to the US. The fact that Cuban health care is what ultimately ended his rule is deliciously ironic.

    DRJ (3eda28)

  13. The problem with castro is not his legasy, but, what he destroyed.

    A Comparative Look at Socio-Economic Conditions
    in Pre-Castro and Present Day Cuba

    http://www.state.gov/www/regions/wha/economic_conditions.html

    Silvester Lewis (d671ab)

  14. 638 assassination attempts. Tough little gnat on an elephant which could not scratch its own ass.

    nk (798403)

  15. According to ABC’s Diane Sawyer, Castro was a “dashing revolutionary.”

    DRJ (3eda28)

  16. According to ABC’s Diane Sawyer, Castro was a “dashing revolutionary.”

    Sawyer, per your link, said he “played the part of the dashing revolutionary coming to New York, getting rock star treatment. It took time for everyone to grasp the ferocity of his communism, even as he bankrupted his country and history passed him by.”

    Do you sense there’s a disconnect, there, DRJ?

    steve (ae908a)

  17. Steve,

    I did not mean to imply that Diane Sawyer thought Castro was a romantic figure at the time of his death* resignation, but I can see now that my stand-alone statement might have given that impression. I’m sorry. My goal was to provide a link to the way some in the media are covering Castro’s swan song.

    However, I do think Sawyer used a strange choice of words to describe the young Castro. I don’t think many people would describe the young Adolph Hitler or Joseph Stalin that way, even though by these standards they certainly could.

    * EDIT: Sorry. Freudian slip.

    DRJ (3eda28)

  18. She’s not your average MSM marquee player.

    Sawyer devoted four years to the Nixon White House, stayed beyond ’74 to help the transition team to Gerald Ford and then worked as an assistant to Nixon writing his memoirs.

    steve (ae908a)

  19. I know her background. She was also a Miss Teen USA. Does any of that somehow help you better understand her statement?

    DRJ (3eda28)

  20. He didn’t bankrupt his country. We bankrupted his country. As for history passing him by it would be to his credit if true — history is written with blood. He is no Hitler nor Stalin nor like anyone else. He is unique.

    nk (798403)

  21. Sawyer was clearly referencing either or both of Castro’s UN appearances, the first replete with media hordes, motorcades, Malcolm X and Langston Hughes photo ops and street throngs. He booked 20 rooms at the Shelburne Hotel, complained about everything and switched to 40 rooms at a Harlem hotel. His every calculated move all but overshadowed the Eisenhower and Khrushchev arrivals.

    steve (93dc3c)

  22. NK,

    Have you been reading CNN’s talking points?

    By the way, whether it was the right thing to do or not, I agree the embargo hasn’t accomplished what it was designed to do.

    DRJ (3eda28)

  23. The embargo delivered the votes of exiles, accomplishing one of its designs. It also secured Canada a foothold in Cuban commerce. Carter’s dropping the ban on travel to Cuba and on U.S. citizens spending dollars in Cuba improved Reagan’s chances in 1980. Reagan promptly re-imposed it.

    steve (93dc3c)

  24. i wish all the cuba hysteria would die down. cuba hasn’t threatened us in the last 45 years. we’re in a position to make friends with it if we play our cards right. step one would be returning guantanamo to cuban sovereignty. why does the greatest nation in the world need an offshore gulag? our policy is driven by former batististas who fled to florida after the revolution and have been whining for the return of their assets ever since.

    step two would be the installation of a major league baseball franchise in havana (and another one in mexico city). if i were commissioner of baseball, that’s what i would do first.

    assistant devil's advocate (119102)

  25. With a friendly government in Havana, Gitmo would not be an issue for either side.

    As to baseball…Why not. The 3-A International League had a team in Havana, did it not? Mexico City…I don’t think so.

    And, there are a lot more than former “Bautistas” that are still waiting for compensation for the property that Castro seized. If it is right and proper for Germans to have their properties returned in the former East Germany, why would it be wrong to return Cuban property to Cuban families that were forced from it, or fled for their lives?

    Another Drew (8018ee)

  26. Gitmo…(more)…
    And, why would we give it back if it still served a valid function? Why do have a valid contract with the Government of Cuba, do we not? And, as the lawyers amongst us would say: A contract, is a contract!

    Another Drew (8018ee)


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