I remember a few years back, hearing stories about how Cubans in the United States were anxiously awaiting the death of Fidel Castro.
The elite among them were preparing to move right in and resurrect Cuba’s wheeling-dealing days (gambling, prostitution, drugs, and ‘capitalism’) from the 1950’s and prior. They had designs prepared for hotels and casinos. They had backers lined up. They had their boats ready and were anxious to take to the seas and get back first. All that was required was the death of Fidel.
As Fidel Castro undergoes treatment for his medical condition, Miami celebrates. Yet, strangely, nothing in Cuba is changing.
Fidel will be cold in the ground, but there will be no boats, no hotels, no casinos, no 1950’s. It is time to wake-up. It is time for both sides to reject the abject idiots they have put in the fore.
Castro and his dictatorship have done little to lift up the people. The reality of oppression and dictatorship, plus abject poverty, is the antithesis of what the common man would see as the promise of the revolution. It is only about the cult of personality in a very limited way. Mostly it is about the cult of power —“ who has and exercises control.
One of my friends once asked me if I would ever choose to take a vacation in Cuba. I told him I would not. I asked him how he would feel having to kowtow to the tourists if he were a Cuban citizen. He, having come from Poland when it was run by the communists, knew that such tourists simply take advantage of a repressed people. No one wants to support a dictator.
The Cuban nationalists in the United States are crazy too. They want a dream that died in the 1950’s. You can’t go back. You cannot recapture a lost era. They live on Fantasy Island, rather than in the real Cuba.
They are ready to go forward, replacing a communist dictatorship with a dictatorship of the financial interest groups (and by-the-way, they will be pushed aside very quickly, except a few figure heads like Battista was).
Maybe they should ask: Will the people be any less subjugated? Will your penthouse view still look down on poverty? Why are your determinations and dreams so much more important than the determinations and dreams of the millions who live in the real Cuba?
The nationalists are also idiots for lobbying to keep Cubans repressed. They punish their own people by supporting the crazy ‘blockade’ that’s existed since the 1960’s. The only proven record for bringing about political and economic change is engagement.
Nothing will change in Cuba until Cubans see the necessity for change. Nothing will change until Cubans (not South Florida residents) engage in a process of true self determination.
Those who wish to return should return and get to work. Stop the embargo, engage, help lift the people up. Maybe then the people on the street will see that reasonable capitalism will improve their lives. Maybe they will rally behind a leader who will lead them into democracy. Maybe —“ but only if they determine their own future.
For some interesting observations and links, check out Castro’s Cyber Deathwatch: Preparing For Death On The Internet by John David Powell.