Frankly, the alliance of the communist left and radical Islam gives me nightmares. I first became aware of this frightening trend years ago when my husband and  I noticed a definite anti-Israel bias in LA Times articles on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.   Always, always, these biased articles were penned by liberals, supposedly the tolerant, peace loving defenders of human rights. What do jihadists and the left have in common? Hatred of Judeo-Christian civilization, and an agenda for power,  their prime targets being the United States and Israel, who stand as twin pillars of freedom and democracy, entrusted as protectors of mankind's inalienable rights, granted only by God.

Remember, just months before the terrorist attacks of 9-11, in May 2001, Fidel Castro told a cheering crowd of Muslim students at the University of Tehran, "Together we will bring America to its knees,"  he wasn't joking.   The war following the attacks provided a perfect opportunity for this enemy to go on the offense.  With ally Obama in the White House, their operations became overt, the so-called Arab Spring, and the rise of Muslim Brotherhood their first victory. Who carries the saber for these destructive radicals bent on war and destruction?  The left dominated and Soros funded MSM, thats who.   CNN, long dubbed the Castro News Network, can now also be called the Crescent News Network.

From Jean-Patrick Grumberg for www.Dreuz.info, via Atlas Shrugged:

Breaking News: CNN Israel fired all Jewish Journalists

The media scandal that you are about to read was revealed to us by a totally reliable source.

It is likely to provoke a wave of shock and indignation within the North American media industry, and it certainly will not calm down the controversy over the pro-palestinian CNN treatment of the conflict.

We learned today that the Israeli branch of CNN, located in Jerusalem, is downsizing to cope with reduced income from less advertising.

What goes beyond good management is that CNN has fired four Israeli Jewish journalists (out of a crew of 8), and has retained only Arab journalists. Where, until now, CNN always sent a Jewish and an Arab journalist to cover information, now there will be only an Arab journalist. The local chief editor of the News Chanel is now Arabic.

This is a conflict where information is central to public opinion, and it weighs a lot on diplomatic decisions. Furthermore, it is no secret that Arab journalists cannot freely publish what they want without risking for their own lives when traveling to Gaza, East Jerusalem, and Judea Samaria. Thus, CNN decision to fire all Jewish journalists from its Jerusalem office is of particular concern, because the general public is unaware that they will be receiving biased information.

Update at 8:30 PST: we just received the names of the four journalists that were fired:

Moshe Cohen, editor, fired on january 30, 10 years with CNN.

Izi Landberg, Producer, about 25 years with CNN, fired on January 30.

Avi Kaner cameraman fired on january 30, 10 years with CNN.

Michal Zippori desk producer, situation still unclear.

Looking for some bang-up entertainment? Cuban-American actor, filmaker and defender of freedom, Orestis Matacena has a new film, Two de Force. It's an action packed view of what might be going on behind the officially presented view of US - China relations. The cast includes Luke Steward as President Obama, Jesse Wang as Chinese Chairman, and Patty Kelly as Hillary Clinton.

From the films official website: It is 2012. The US delegation and the Chinese delegation meet in Beijing to discuss the US debt to China and all hell gets lose in a clash between these two super powers.

Enjoy the trailer!

How easy it seems for the monsters running Cuba to impose a death sentence with no verdict named; all they have to do is ignore humanity, and mock God.  

Dania Virgen Garcia reports on Cubanet that Leonardo Brindis, age 22, died after being denied medical treatment by prison doctors.  He had been on a hunger strike for five days at the time of his death.

The story is here, in Spanish.

I was thrilled and honored when I received an email from the award winning Cuban-American novelist and playwright, Teresa Dovalpage, inviting me to review her soon to be published collection of short stories.   I'm so happy I accepted because I throughly enjoyed reading The Astral Plane: Stories of Cuba, the Southwest and Beyond, a collection of eight short stories, published by University of New Orleans Press.   

My review:

Imagine a motley group of Habaneros as disciples of self-proclaimed guru Maestro, who channels of all people, Walt Whitman and Joan of Arc.  These delightful and entertaining characters are the main inhabitants of the first and foundational story in the collection, Astral Plane.  Can you find relief from the tedium of life under communism by seeking nirvana among the Cosmic Brotherhood?  Is it possible to flee darkness? The stories that follow Astral Plane are a literary descent into the reality of being Cuban, adrift in the island’s dysfunctional ethos, whether in Havana or in exile.

 The stories are thoroughly Cuban, original, delightful, and unexpected.  In this cohesive collection, Ms. Dovalpage’s prodigious talent takes us on a dazzling journey of high drama, whimsical imagery, nail-biting suspense, and laugh-out-loud hilarity.  Along the way she lays bare the reality of life in Cuba and totally debunks the myths of the Castro Revolution. 

One favorite passage includes a lyrical, evocative description of El Malecón that made me weep with longing for the sights, sounds, and smells of that drive; a paragraph later I erupted in laughter at a character’s offhand comment.  This savory collection is certain to become a favorite read, highly recommended.

The E-book is available here.

It's Groundhog Day, and if Punxsutawney Phil is correct, we are in for six more weeks of winter before we can look forward to spring.  Sadly, the weather's temperature is not the only measure of warmth for humans.  As it is, there is no need for a weather predicting rodent in Cuba, because there is no escaping the chill of the repressive winter of the firmly entrenched Castro dictatorship.  We witness those international masses who cheered the so-called Arab Spring, who proclaim concern for universal human rights, justice, and self-determination, apply a different standard when it comes to rights for the Cuban people.  Apparently, the Castro brothers are just too sexy for condemnation, to lovable to be judged by their actions, as were other lesser tyrants long ago confined to the pages of history.  Businessmen from around the globe froth at the mouth over the delights of the island in anticipation of future profits, while turning a blind eye to the public beatings of peacefully protesting women.  The Castro's author the islands narrative; they say there are no political prisoners in Cuba, and Walla!  In lockstep, the international media ignores the reality of Cuban political prisoners, well documented by international human rights organizations, and gleefully disseminate the propaganda.  Not content with that complicity, their white wash often includes an added insult to the victims they say do not exist.  Clergy of all faiths, those representatives of human kind's morality, travel to the island to pay homage to the world's longest reigning tyrants, never minding the history of executions, the atrocities, or the testimony of survivors. 

 There's a price to be paid for this base inhumanity, as the devil always gets his due.  The forces gathering in the Middle East, their infiltration into the Americas, and the erosion of constitutions by radicals elected to power may be the beginning of payback.  If the lights of liberty darken, will that too be called justice?

If you agree that Obama is a Saul Alinsky radical, then how is Mitt going to defeat him if he doesn't recognize, or is not willing to call him what he is?

It's not just economy stupid, it's the constitution.  Live free or die!

The sole responsibility for the content of this post lies with the author. It does not necessarily imply an endorsement of any individual candidate by Babalú Blog.

Combating the icon isn't easy, but friend Christina Molina is tireless when it comes to debunking the myth of Castro's executioner, whether painted on the side of a food truck, or the t-shirt.

 Here's her latest from The Tolucan Times:

 From Pop Culture to Slop Culture: The Importance of Educating Yourself Before Jumping on a Bandwagon

Pop culture icons have been around as long as I can remember. They can be anything from a real person to a character or symbol. Some of the most well-known pop culture icons on the human side include Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Princess Diana, and Pee-wee Herman. People find ways to identify with these icons and they proudly display them on t-shirts, hats, bracelets, etc. This is a common and acceptable practice, right?

Now picture yourself walking down the street and you see a guy coming towards you. He is wearing a t-shirt with someone’s face on it. As he gets closer, you realize that the “icon” he has chosen to display on his shirt is Adolf Hitler or maybe Osama bin Laden. What do you think now? Is this just another famous pop culture icon or has this person crossed the line? Chances are you will feel shocked, confused, and offended by this ignorant display of bad taste.

Cuban Americans, many of us who live in the San Fernando Valley (especially in the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and Pasadena), are shocked, confused, and offended regularly by one of the most mass-produced pop culture images: the image of Che Guevara. In case the name doesn’t ring a bell, just think of a bearded man in a beret and at the top of the beret, a red star. Yes, that guy, made popular by bands like Rage Against the Machine and worn everywhere across the various Occupy movements in the country. To those proudly displaying his face on their clothing and hats who don’t know any better, he is a symbol of the revolution and he is a hero.

Let’s talk a bit about Ernesto “Che” Guevara and let’s discover who he really was. He was born to a wealthy Argentinean family and as a child, he loved to read. He began reading the works of Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin, which influenced him greatly in his adult life. He studied medicine, but was considered a failure because he never actually became a doctor nor did he ever open his own medical practice. He joined forces with Fidel Castro and helped him launch the revolution in Cuba, which overthrew the Batista regime. The Cuban people believed the message they had been sold by Castro and Guevara, so they initially lent their support to the cause. Sadly, they soon came to realize that everything they had been promised was a lie.

Ernesto Che Guevara did not believe in free elections, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, press, assembly or any other rights granted to us here in the United States. He was a homophobe, a racist, and had no tolerance for anyone whose beliefs differed from his. He was a mass-murderer who led firing squads that killed innocent men, women, and children simply because they did not share his ideology. He believed that a “…revolutionary must become a cold killing machine motivated by pure hate.”

Is this the kind of guy whose image someone really wants to proudly wear on a t-shirt? Are these Che t-shirt-wearing “rebels” really aware of whom the real Che was, or do they simply not care? This is the Land of the free, the United States of America, and thank goodness we have the right to wear what we want and believe in what we want. The purpose here is not to impose censorship by any means; it is to educate and open the eyes of those who probably do not know. If more folks were educated about who Che really was, then maybe parents would hesitate before buying their kids merchandise with his face on it. Maybe even adults would think twice before walking around with a red-star clad beret. Ultimately it is your choice, but if you wouldn’t walk around wearing a Hitler or bin Laden t-shirt, then why would you walk around in a Che t-shirt?

I recently purchased a t-shirt displaying Che’s face with a big red circle and slash across his face (as in “Say No to Che”). While walking with my daughter in Old Town Pasadena on Jan. 2, a man in a wheelchair began to yell at me. He screamed, “Viva Venezuela!” and then he yelled for me to kiss his rear end. (Of course he used a much more colorful word.) What could I do? Here is this man in a wheelchair and I would really look like a big jerk if I stood there and engaged in a full-scale argument with him. I simply acknowledged his remarks as trash and kept on walking. Trust me; it took everything to hold back from engaging, but I did not want to expose my daughter to further insults. This man knew who Che was and he chose to verbally attack me for wearing my anti-Che shirt, as it was his right to do so. (I can only imagine what would happen to him in Venezuela if he tried to exercise the same freedom of speech!)

On Jan. 3, I was at Disneyland with my mom, daughter, and niece. Since my dad proudly served in the United States Army, I wanted my mom to experience the daily flag retreat ceremony. (If you haven’t experienced the flag retreat at Disneyland, you are missing out — it’s a treat!) During the ceremony, members of the Armed Forces, past and present, are invited to stand around the flagpole as the flag is lowered. As the hymn of the United States Marine Corps played, an elderly woman was helped out of her wheelchair by her son. She stood there with great difficulty, but she held her head high with pride as she saluted the American Flag and tears streamed down her face. After the ceremony I approached her and I thanked her for her service. She was a WWII Veteran and had met her husband in the Marine Corps. Before I could thank her any further, she looked at my shirt and said, “I really like your shirt! A lot of people don’t know who he really was, but you know! Good for you! Thank you for wearing that!” I could not believe that this American hero was thanking me for wearing my shirt. I asked to take a photo with her and in turn, her son requested if he could take a photo with me because she wanted one with me in that anti-Che Guevara t-shirt. My mom could only look in amazement. It’s not very often that she actually tells me that she’s proud of me, but she sure let me know how impressed she was with me and how proud she is that I stand up for what I believe in.

Now that you know, will you stand up for what you believe in? Or will you choose to follow the sheepish masses as they continue to idolize a mass murderer and Communist icon? Food for thought….

The author, Cristina M. Molina, poses with a WWII Veteran and U.S. Marine who quickly recognized and commended Cristina on her anti-Che Guevara t-shirt.

Unfortunately, this is about the Cuban prisoner caught working against the U.S., not the exile accused of "terrorism" fighting for the freedom of his homeland.  I'm sure you've seen the articles celebrating that one of the "Cuban Five" was granted his requested transfer to a Florida prison to make it easier for his mother to visit him. 

How nice of us...

Meanwhile, we've learned from good friend Henry Agueros, that Eduardo Arocena, encarcerated since 1983, suffered a stroke in the Minersville, Penn, Federal Correctional Detention Center.  His wife Miriam and daughter.....were DENIED visiting privileges by the Federal Authorities.

If you agree that this is barbaric, please call the prison telephone number,  570-544-7100. Eduardo Arocena's Prison I.D. is 12573004......PLEASE CALL NOW!! and DEMAND visiting authorization for the family!

For the record, note that Eduardo's mother has only been able to visit him 5 times during his incarceration.

From a petition sent to President Obama,  pleading for clemency:

 We respectfully also ask to intercede with President Barack Obama that his sentence be commuted as Mr. Eduardo Arocena has been in prison since July 22, 1983, resulting in much suffering for him and his family. In these 28 years his wife has been able to visit him only 8 times, his children and grandchildren 3 times, and his mother who is 85 years old has visited the prison only 5 times. During all this time Mr. Arocena has been transferred to 12 different prisons, always far from his family and loved ones, making it extremely difficult and costly to visit him more often.

How's that for justice?

H/T:  Henry.  Gracias hermano.

Under a huge portrait of Che Guevara, Mercedes' Dieter Zetsche touted a vision of car-sharing. (Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET

This image has been used sell everything from watches to baby clothes, and considering the number of t-shirts, and other items we see emblazoned with the murderous mug, you might wonder, why bother getting upset? 

I'll tell you why.  Because this isn't just any old unpopular image, this is the offensive image of a mass-murdering, cold-blooded killer responsible for the deaths of thousands of  Cubans. This is the image of a abusive psychopath who enjoyed unspeakable cruelty against his innocent victims, a killer who enjoyed the added cruelty of executing the condemned in front of their family members. I've seen elderly women almost faint when unexpectedly presented with his image, so great was the trauma inflicted upon them by his brutality, that the fear is still there, decades after the deed. 

It is the responsibility of good people to speak out and denounce inhumanity.  That a German corporation would use the image of a mass-murderer to market autos is particularly contemptible.

This corrupt company, who by the way has ten dealerships catering to the elite in Cuba, can be contacted here:

Of course they do, because:

"Cuba is Canada's largest market in the Caribbean and Central American region, with two-way trade topping $1 billion in 2010. A Canadian oil and gas company, Sherritt International, is the largest foreign investor in Cuba."

From this article wherein the Canadian minister for Latin America trips all over herself  trying to display concern about Human Rights where there is none:

"We see a very significant process of economic reform and liberalization in Cuba," Ablonczy told The Canadian Press in a pre-trip interview.

 Ablonczy does not necessarily believe this will lead to greater democratic freedoms any time soon in a country where the government exerts Soviet-era control over its 11 million citizens.

 "Political change is not what Cuban leadership has in mind," she said.

 "There's a lot of debate around these things and there's a lot of caution too. But Canada, as an investor in Cuba, with lots of people-to-people contact, wants to play as positive and constructive role as possible."

 Ablonczy said Canada stands ready to share experiences and best practices "as Cuba moves forward, very gradually, towards some needed changes and modernization."

She said it's important to be very respectful of her hosts and "what they want to achieve and their own goals and objectives." 

And this:

 "In a country like Cuba, a decentralizing dynamic is also a democratizing dynamic."

  Tell that to the Chinese and Vietnamese.

Really folks, you couldn't make this up.

From Capitol Hill Cubans:

U.S. Bishops' Absurd Foreign Policy

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has unveiled its 2012 legislative agenda.

Among its priorities is ensuring that U.S. trade with democratic Colombia doesn't violate human and labor rights, while lobbying to expand trade with totalitarian Cuba despite no existing human and labor rights.

You read it correctly.

From Catholic News Service:

Richard Coll, another foreign policy adviser at the USCCB, focused on Latin America, said he'll be eyeing possible legislation related to free trade agreements, how they are implemented and how well participating countries -- notably Colombia -- are upholding their end of agreements to protect labor and human rights, for instance.

He also said he'd be watching developments related to Cuba. Several members of Congress attempted to amend year-end legislation to roll back Obama administration changes that made it easier for Americans to visit or send money to relatives in Cuba. The U.S. and Cuban bishops have opposed rollbacks; in fact they have advocated for further easing of the economic embargo the United States has had against Cuba for more than 50 years.

How about the other tyrants (and U.S. national security threats) around the world?

The USCCB seeks to "foster a measured approach to international hot spots including Iran, Syria and North Korea."

Yet, sadly, the cruelty of those tyrants towards innocent civilians is not "measured."

Friday night thinking about Cuba, these lyrics came to mind.

How many freedoms must Cubans be denied
 before their humanity is recognized?
How many must die at sea
Before they’re allowed to sail free?
Yes, how many times must the executioner prevail
Before they’re forever banned?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

 Yes, how many years can a people remain enslaved
Before humanity heeds their bondage?
Yes, how many years can some people exist
Before they’re allowed to be free?
Yes, how many times can the world turn its back
Pretending they just don’t see?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Yes, how many people must drown at sea
Before they’re allowed to travel free?
Yes, how many ears must humanity have
Before they can hear Cuba’s cry?
Yes, how many deaths will it take till they decide
That too many people have died?
The answer my friend in blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

 Borrowed from Bob Dylan´s Blowin In The Wind, 1963.

This New Year's Day marks fifty-three years of Castro's iron fisted rule in Cuba. Fifty-three years of repression and misery for the Cuban people, a reality usually ignored by the press and so-called Cuba experts.  However, occasionally the truth slips through the wall of propaganda.

Good friend Roland Alum, a political anthropologist, wrote this timely article on poverty in Cuba, and wonders never cease, the Jersey Journal published it.

CUBA’S CULTURE OF POVERTY PERSISTS
By Roland A. Alum
SPECIAL TO THE JERSEY JOURNAL

The Fidel-&-Raul Castro regime marks 53 years this Jan. 1. The brothers unquestionably enjoyed extraordinary popularity in 1959, but the enthusiasm soon vanished as they turned Cuba into a financially and spiritually bankrupt Marxist anti-utopia. As a result, nearly two million Cubans of all social backgrounds have fled, many of them settling in Hudson County.

By the 1950s, Cuba was a regional leader in numerous social indicators, notwithstanding instability and corruption during the republican era (1902-58). But since 1959 the island-nation has become a backward, closed society beleaguered by unproductivity and rationing.

Sociologist Tomas Masaryk noted that "dictators 'look good' until the last minutes"; in Cuba's case, it seems particularly fine to certain U.S. intellectuals. Comfortably from abroad, apologists contend that most of the socioeconomic problems that traditionally afflicted the prior five and a half decades were eliminated after 1959. Yet, fact-finding by international social-scientists challenges this fantasy.

An early, little-known account uncovering some effects of the Castros' regimentation came from research in Cuba in 1969-70 by U.S. cultural-anthropologists Oscar Lewis and Douglas Butterworth. They intended to test Lewis' theory that a culture of poverty would not exist in a Marxist-oriented society. They had naively presupposed that the socially alienating conditions that engender such phenomena could develop among the poor solely under capitalism.

The Lewis-Butterworth early on-the-ground scrutiny validates many accounts by respected experts and the much vilified exiles. There exists a culture of poverty in Cuba, although it is not necessarily a survivor of the old times, but seemingly a by-product of the Castros' totalitarian socialism. There were always poor Cubans, and some version of the culture of poverty might have existed before; but in my communications with Butterworth, he reconfirmed another discovery. The researchers could not document a case for a pervasive pre-1959 culture of poverty. The authorities must have suspected the prospective conclusions because the scholars were abruptly expelled and their Cuban statistician imprisoned.

Upon the 53rd anniversary, the old Lewis-Butterworth analysis invites renewed reflection. Apologists customarily replicate propagandistic clichés by blaming failures on external factors, such as the ending, two decades ago, of the multibillion-dollar subsidies from the defunct Soviet Bloc.

The anthropologists' undertaking, however, revealed that life for average Cubans in the Castros' first decade was already beset with corruption and time-wasting food lines. Likewise, Butterworth described how ordinary people were engaging in what socio-behavioral scientists now call "everyday forms of resistance." Cubans were already undermining the police-state through black-marketeering, pilfering and vandalism, as we hear that they continue to do decades later.

After more than half a century of oppression and poor quality of life, one hopes for a transition to an open society with equal opportunities for every Cuban.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The author, a long-time Hudsonite, is a political-anthropologist affiliated with Icod Associates of New Jersey. Email him at rolandnj@yahoo.com.

I encourage our Babalu family to follow the link to the Jersey Journal and leave a comment; share your experience, and let them know you appreciate reading an honest story about Cuba.

Gracias Roland.

Feliz Año Nuevo all, may this be the year we've been waiting for, may this be the year the long nightmare ends.

So far this isn't part of the tourist tour in Cuba, but at the rate violent repression is increasing who knows, perhaps those seeking "Forbidden Fruit" in Cuba will someday share the very real Cuban experience of having your head cracked open by one of Castro's mobs.

Photo captured from video posted below at the 2:23 mark:

Here's the video, Agredido por una turba el 2 de diciembre, (Attacked by a crowd December 2) in Spanish, from Hablamos Press.

In the spirit of the season, a very Happy Hanukkah gift from Bibi Netanyahu.  It's a thorough dressing down of the unethical rag--enjoy!

From Aish.com

Bibi Rejects the New York Times
by Ron Dermer, Senior Advisor to the Israeli Prime Minister

Why Netanyahu refuses to publish an op-ed in the so-called “newspaper of record.”

 Ron Dermer is a senior advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The following letter was written to the editorial board of the New York Times.

I received your email requesting that Prime Minister Netanyahu submit an op-ed to the New York Times. Unfortunately, we must respectfully decline.

On matters relating to Israel, the op-ed page of the "paper of record" has failed to heed the late Senator Moynihan's admonition that everyone is entitled to their own opinion but that no one is entitled to their own facts.

A case in point was your decision last May to publish the following bit of historical revision by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas:

It is important to note that the last time the question of Palestinian statehood took center stage at the General Assembly, the question posed to the international community was whether our homeland should be partitioned into two states. In November 1947, the General Assembly made its recommendation and answered in the affirmative. Shortly thereafter, Zionist forces expelled Palestinian Arabs to ensure a decisive Jewish majority in the future state of Israel, and Arab armies intervened. War and further expulsions ensued.

This paragraph effectively turns on its head an event within living memory in which the Palestinians rejected the UN partition plan accepted by the Jews and then joined five Arab states in launching a war to annihilate the embryonic Jewish state. It should not have made it past the most rudimentary fact-checking.

The Times consistently ignores the steps Israel has taken to advance peace.

The opinions of some of your regular columnists regarding Israel are well known. They consistently distort the positions of our government and ignore the steps it has taken to advance peace. They cavalierly defame our country by suggesting that marginal phenomena condemned by Prime Minister Netanyahu and virtually every Israeli official somehow reflects government policy or Israeli society as a whole. Worse, one columnist even stooped to suggesting that the strong expressions of support for Prime Minister Netanyahu during his speech this year to Congress was "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby" rather than a reflection of the broad support for Israel among the American people.

Yet instead of trying to balance these views with a different opinion, it would seem as if the surest way to get an op-ed published in the New York Times these days, no matter how obscure the writer or the viewpoint, is to attack Israel.

Even so, the recent piece on "Pinkwashing," in which Israel is vilified for having the temerity to champion its record on gay-rights, set a new bar that will be hard for you to lower in the future.

Not to be accused of cherry-picking to prove a point, I discovered that during the last three months (September through November) you published 20 op-eds about Israel in the New York Times and International Herald Tribune. After dividing the op-eds into two categories, "positive" and "negative," with "negative" meaning an attack against the State of Israel or the policies of its democratically elected government, I found that 19 out of 20 columns were "negative."

The only "positive" piece was penned by Richard Goldstone (of the infamous Goldstone Report), in which he defended Israel against the slanderous charge of Apartheid.

Yet your decision to publish that op-ed came a few months after your paper reportedly rejected Goldstone's previous submission. In that earlier piece, which was ultimately published in the Washington Post, the man who was quoted the world over for alleging that Israel had committed war crimes in Gaza, fundamentally changed his position. According to the New York Times op-ed page, that was apparently news unfit to print.

Your refusal to publish "positive" pieces about Israel apparently does not stem from a shortage of supply. It was brought to my attention that the Majority Leader and Minority Whip of the U.S. House of Representatives jointly submitted an op-ed to your paper in September opposing the Palestinian action at the United Nations and supporting the call of both Israel and the Obama administration for direct negotiations without preconditions. In an age of intense partisanship, one would have thought that strong bipartisan support for Israel on such a timely issue would have made your cut.

So with all due respect to your prestigious paper, you will forgive us for declining your offer. We wouldn't want to be seen as "Bibiwashing" the op-ed page of the New York Times.

 

Gorki Aguila Carrasco, Yoani Sanchez, and others on Twitter and Facebook report that popular Porno Para Ricardo guitarist Ciro Diaz has been arrested in Cuba.

This was taken November 24, 2011 around 10:30 am, on the corner of 23 and L in La Habana.

By marisolmarquez1:

"Protesters were trying to express their ideas and support the "Damas de Blanco" and Laura Pollan. Everyone was supportive except for one lady who decided to rip the sign apart. The police also saw the protesters and left them alone."

What do you make of this?

H/T: Fernando

While the MSM continues to parrot Cuban state press run by a murderous outlaw dictator, they ignore the brutal violent acts of repression against Cuba's peaceful dissidents. 

The life of Cuban opposition leader Jorge Luis García Pérez (Antúnez) is in danger.

I am pleading with the MSM and international human rights organizations to please speak out on behalf of this peaceful dissident. Look around our world; dissent and protest is universally celebrated, the Arab Spring, the OWS, the European demonstrations. Whether or not if you agree with their agendas, we should all agree that no one should be denied the right of free speech.

The above referenced acts of dissent have enjoyed wide coverage in the media. I ask, I plea and beg, why are the Cuban people excluded from international media? Are they not responsible for exposing the truth about violations of universally accepted rights? Are they no longer the so-called 5th estate? Why are peaceful Cuban dissenters, including women, and the elderly allowed to be subjected to the most agregious violations of their human rights; torture, beatings, intimidation, threats, imprisonment, and murder. Why is that when their stories are presented to international media and human rights organizations in multiple lanugages, the response is for the most part silence.

Please, please speak out in support of human rights for the Cuban people. You may save a life.

From tireless defender of rights and justice for the Cuban people Marc Masferrer at Uncommen Sense:

Antúnez on Nov. 8 was arrested, beaten and thrown into a jail cell at the police station in his hometown of Placetas. His wife, Iris Tamara Pérez Aguilera, a leading activist in her own right, told CubaEncuentro.com that she has been told that Antúnez is in poor health, suffering from chest pains and headaches.

Meanwhile, officials have threatened to hold Antúnez, one of the most forceful activists on the island, in jail indefinitely.

Pedazos de la Isla has a personal appeal from Iris:

Attention! The activist and brother of Jorge Luis Garcia Perez Antunez just arrived to my home. He tells me that officials in the Placetas Police Unit informed him that his brother is in critical condition right now. They said that Antunez is suffering from very low blood pressure and very low sugar levels. I am calling on all those people of goodwill so that they raise their voices for my husband.

The pile of mierda from official sources in Cuba gets higher every day.  Now that Cubans can supposedly buy and sell cars and real estate, it seems they now also need to respect the image of their cities.  (The article is printed on toilet paper;  I won't link, but you know where to find it.)

Cuba, to encourage tourism and to cover up the true nature of their criminal dictatorship, pretends to promote sustainable urban development to the politically correct blind to reality eco-idiots.  The official architect, titled executive and scientific secretary at the 14th International Convention on Territorial and Urban Development held in Havana declares:

When undertaking urban renewal, we must be careful not to damage the environment and the image of our cities.   To this end, we must respect and abide by building codes, he continued. Despite 76 percent of Cuban territory is urban, forum participants called for more stimulus to rural areas, since agriculture is indispensable for the national food production sector.

 Building codes?  What building codes?  Ask residents of ciudad centro about building codes.  I doubt these are on the official Havana architectural tour:

 Not to mention the dwellings of those not on the official housing recipient list:

The official statement, even when programmed for an international audience, or perhaps because of,  can't help but reveal the truth:

 In this spirit, the architect urged people to become more aware on the importance of responsible and organized urban development. He also called for implementing more efficient control mechanisms to ensure all building operations are carried out in compliance with established regulations.  (My emphasis)

 Speaking of regulations and food production, I wonder, is eating lobster in Cuba still a crime?

I came across this comment in response to Peggy Noonan's article, The Divider vs. The Thinker, in the WSJ.  It perfectly coalesces into words the reason for the unease, fear and anger I think many of us feel about the direction our country has taken.

Justin Harp wrote:

The battle of the next century for America will not be fought abroad. However it will be fought domestically in the now varying world views that the demographics that are being pitted against one another hold as Truth. When the Pilgrims came to America they were seeking religious freedom. Their trust in the God of the Bible was the common thread that held them together. For the first 200 years of the US there was a common moral compass that guided the actions of our citizens in politics, education, healthcare, business and in family. God has now been removed from each of these systems and the government has been enthroned as the guiding force. Now we have a society that battles constantly over diametrically opposed World Views. The desire is always to find common ground, the problem is there is no common ground. The same word used from either side has different meanings (ie tolerance. To one it means to coexist peacefully with an agreement to disagree. To the other it means to embrace at the cost of contradiction and hypocrisy, to not embrace is bigoted or discriminatory). Now we try to legislate morality. Isn't that what Occupy Wall St. is about? Wanting fairness through redistribution of wealth, regulation to impede greed and excess? There was a time when the system worked because the guiding principles in men's hearts compelled them to act in a "fair" manor because of their believed accountability to a higher power. Now the higher power has been excused from the room and the hope is that a depraved individual will behave as a moral one because of regulation or law. Morality is not introduced to the system from external forces; rather it is emanated outwardly by the participants. It finds its way into the players from the teachings of parents who clearly define right and wrong based upon a clear understanding of "TRUTH". Today the family is completely broken. Children are seen an anchor to parents financial aspirations. In today's world 50% or greater of Americans don't believe in truth. With this type of disparity in thinking how can we expect common ground? How can the sides come close enough together for any glue to hold us together. So the new way to political power is to determine which side is greater in number and pander to their current wishes for what they define as "justice". In the new America it will get you 4 years in the oval office. For Americans it will lead to waking up in 15 years not trusting your neighbor.