One of the problems with being a Cuban-American of the hard-line anti-castro variety is that critics always want to label you. They call you a batistiano, even if you were born in the U.S. 10 years after Batista left Cuba.
Related to the batistiano charge is the Pinochet trap. The critics allege that we don’t have a problem with all dictatorships but only with the dictatorship in Cuba. In order to avoid this trap we must constantly denounce the evils of right wing dictatorships.
The irony is that the critics are people who constantly speak of “nuance” and claim that our arguments about things like the embargo are un-nuanced yet you can’t get into a nuanced discussion with them about the differences between the facts that surround traditional military dictatorships in Latin America and the Stalinist totalitarian rule of the castro brothers.
You can’t, for example, talk about the economic advances that Chile experienced under Pinochet which are enjoyed by all Chileans today but God forbid you ever talk about Cuba without crediting fidel for the “free” education and healthcare that Cubans receive. No, for them Pinochet had no redeeming qualities and fidel has no negative ones.
Well as Anatasio well pointed out, it’s all bullshit. Chile’s president is the left of center daughter of a victim of Pinochet. She is well regarded by most in Latin America and apparently very popular at home. But she’s the worst kind of hypocrite because she went to Cuba and knelt at the feet of raul and fidel castro and kissed their rings. She has the unmitigated gall to go there and insult of the memories of more than 10,000 victims of the castro regime.
Why should I have an ounce of sympathy for Ms. Bachelet’s personal story anymore? She’s leads what is probably the most advanced country in Latin America because the man who killed her father saved it from animals like fidel castro and she goes to Cuba to legitimize a regime that killed thousands, not to save their country, but to destroy it. I don’t want to hear about nuance anymore. If Ms. Bachelet doesn’t need it then neither do I.
I don’t know, Henry — how about dismissing both Pinochet and Castro? Dictatorships, whether from the left or right, play with gradations of evil. Chileans enjoyed a measure of economic stability yet watched Pinochet’s enemies get arrested or “disappeared” without trial. Castro can boast of “universal” literacy yet citizens have limited or no access to the Internet and the books and newspapers available to them are an insult to literacy; and I need not mention the thousands tortured and executed since 1960. Mario Vargas Llosa’s terrific novel on the last days of Trujillo “The Feast of the Goat” is another excellent study on the subject.
[name redacted] consult the transcript of the Frost/Nixon interviews, in which Nixon tries to defend U.S. policy towards Chile, trying to delicately dance around the irrefutable evidence that Henry Kissinger, acting through the CIA and Chilean anti-government forces, helped put Pinochet in power.
Alfred,
Chileans enjoyed a measure of economic stability yet watched Pinochet’s enemies get arrested or “disappeared” without trial. Castro can boast of “universal” literacy yet citizens have limited or no access to the Internet and the books and newspapers available to them are an insult to literacy; and I need not mention the thousands tortured and executed since 1960.
That’s my whole point. But how the fuck am I supposed to have any sympathy and solidarity for them when they have ZERO for us? You can argue that Pinochet did terrible things but it wasn’t because he was a sociopath with contempt for his countrymen like fidel. Look at how Pinochet went out of power and compare it to fidel el cagalitrozo.
And actions of the U.S. helped facilitate the takeover of fidel castro. The historical record is clear on that.
Henry, you are so correct.
Things cannot be taken out of context.
One of my favorite lines is that history begins where you want it to when you want to win an argument. Look who Pinochet was dealing with.
I don’t like dictators. I prefer freedom, of course. But freedom here and in Europe allows animals to call Israel Nazi and ignore Hamas’s evils.
Your comment about how Pinochet left and Castro stays is exactly on point.
It is imperative for free people to learn to differentiate between good, bad and worse.
Right now worst is Islamism and communism.
Another point to consider when we try to equate Pinochet and Castro. Did Pinochet ever allow our enemies to set up shop in his country and point nuclear missiles at our cities? Did Pinochet go about the region and the world supporting guerrilla movements to overthrow governments he didn’t like, or support terrorists in the US, etc, etc – get the point. Pinochet didn’t try to undermine US interests or destroy our society, unlike those worthless bastards in Cuba. He kept to himself, and defended himself when he needed. Yea, he was a dictator, but he fixed his country, then turned it back to its people and today it is an example for Latin America. I’m with Henry – I have no friggin sympathy for the Bachelets of the world. They’re nothing but unmitigated, hypocritical scumbags – I shed no tears for them.
I’m with Henry.
I also have a problem with the term “right wing dictatorship” altogether, since I am an American and under the political ideologies this country was founded on “conservative dictator” is a contradiction in terms. Unless someone has found a way to have a small, weak central government force it’s policies on an unwilling citizenry, that is.
Pinochet in a way was much like Francisco Franco in Spain, both nationalist dictators that squashed any opposition to them by ruthless means.
But at the same time these same nationalist dictators worked hard to improve their country’s economies and their people’s lives unlike Castro who has killed or imprisoned anyone who has opposed him and destroyed the country’s economy, the people and their way of life.
Pinochet and Franco saved their country’s future from Communism. Today these countries are democracies, while Cuba is still a Communist disctartorship.
God only knows what would have happened to Spain if the Communist had prevailed during the Civil War or what would have happened to Chile if Allende had imposed Communism there with Castro’s help.
So at the end there is a huge difference between Pinochet and Castro.
The smarmy bitch is a fraud. End of story.