Here’s the caption to the pics above from one of the airline industry’s top news sources:
JetBlue’s inaugural to Santa Clara, in Cuba, was celebrated with a “Cuban” cake, featuring the country’s famous symbols, namely coffee, cigars and CHE GUEVARA. The flight is operated as a charter service due to the trade embargo between the two countries.
Here’s a recent post from JetBlue’s blog promoting its flights to Cuba:
Here’s a recent post from JetBlue’s blog promoting where to eat in Santa Clara:
Here’ the decor inside the Cafe Museo Revolucion, so heavily promoted by JetBlue:
But despite all of the above, according to JetBlue’s friends at the Miami Herald…Gosh?! JetBlue just CAN’T IMAGINE why ANYONE would link them to Che Guevara imagery?!…In fact any such depictions consist of a “major faux pas!” Here’s today’s story in the Miami Herald:
“An inflammatory headline on the Cuban Babalú Blog denounced a major faux pas by airline JetBlue when it started commercial flights to Cuba last week: “To celebrate new Cuba flights JetBlue bakes a Che Guevara cake.”
Below the headline is an image of a cake, complete with the JetBlue logo, Cuban flag, Cuban coffee beans — and an image of El Che.
Except the cake says “Tampa International Airport,” not Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport where the flight took place and the image is not from 2016 but rather December 2013 when JetBlue inaugurated charter flights to the island. The cake wasn’t even commissioned by JetBlue — it was presented to the airline by Tampa International Airport.
Oops.
JetBlue spokeswoman Elizabeth Ninomiya said the cake was presented to the airline by Tampa International Airport during the celebration of charter flights from Tampa three years ago.
“While the cake is from several years ago and was not designed by JetBlue, we do not believe the cake artist knowingly intended to make any political statements,” Ninomiya said.
The post’s author, Cuban-Amerian writer and political commentator Humberto Fontova, said he found the 2013 cake image while researching a follow up piece to a previous blog post about JetBlue promoting Santa Clara’s connections to El Che.
“When you see a cake with JetbBue on it and Che Guevara on it, it would seem to me if JetBlue had any objection to it they wouldn’t use it,” Fontova said. “JetBlue should thank me because they were advertising, ‘Come visit the burial site of Che Guevara.’ They should be happy I am helping spread their message. They should send me a check.”
In brief: Despite all of the JetBlue-Che Guevara links presented above (including one showing a cake,) since the picture of the cake with smiling JetBlue employees behind an image of Che Guevara on a cake promoting JetBlue flights to Cuba was taken in Dec. 2013 (as the link in the original post clearly indicated)–somehow because of this item– JetBlue is completely absolved of any links with any Che Guevara imagery!
A much better answer to this type of logic presents itself. Maybe it’s not just JetBlue pilots hitting the sauce while on-duty:
“Humberto Fontova’s book teaches us truths about Castro’s island that are very discomfiting for many intellectuals.” Ana Botella (Spain’s former First Lady while giving a book reading in Madrid, upon “Fidel; HFT” release in Spain)
“I read Humberto Fontova’s book in two sittings. I couldn’t put it down!” ( Mark Levin on Exposing the Real Che Guevara.)
Oh, for crying out loud, this is too tiresome for words. What part of utterly insensitive and disrespectful insult does the Herald or JetBlue not understand? It was quite clear from the link provided in that post that the Che cake was from December 2013 in Tampa–which does not make it one iota less offensive or in any way excusable. What are these people, Jesuits? They sound like that other Argentine trying to justify the Marxist crucifix business in Bolivia. Is this risibly unconvincing attempt at damage control just lame, or one more insult on top of the other one? It may have been better to “play the Swede” and leave the matter alone. Talk about specious spin. Sheesh.
And by the way, everyone in that damn photo smiling ear to ear behind the visage of an odious murderer should have known better, much better, starting with the JetBlue people–if only out of mere common sense. Have these idiots never heard of public relations? Lord have mercy.
For what it’s worth, after looking online, I found that the author of the article discussed in this post, Chabeli Herrera, a tourism reporter for the Miami Herald people, is Cuban-born, according to her website:
http://www.bychabeliherrera.com/#about
Well, she seemed surprised that anyone would denounce Che Guevara!
I don’t know about surprised, Humberto, but it was strange that she kept saying “El Che” as if she were talking about “El Chapo.” In any case, I expect the crux of the matter is that she figured she had a “Gotcha!” incident to show for herself, even though it was beyond obvious that what truly mattered was not whether the Che-cake infamy happened in Tampa in 2013 or in Ft. Lauderdale in 2016–the critical issue is that it should never have happened, period, and that JetBlue is still responsible for standing smilingly behind the damn cake, regardless of who designed it or who bought it (although the Tampa airport people involved are certainly culpable). Maybe she didn’t see the forest for the trees or maybe she chose to ignore it, but this situation is more than clear enough.
And by the way, I noticed that the Che cake was from Tampa in 2013 as soon as I first saw the initial post here, as I said in my comment to it written September 5th, a full day before Ms. Herrera’s “exposé” was published. All one had to do was follow the link provided in that post by its author, one Humberto Fontova.