By Don Feder. Boston
Herald. Wednesday, March 28, 2001.
When thinking of Fidel Castro, words like reconciliation and harmony do not
leap to mind.
Still, given the left's longstanding infatuation with the jailer of the
Cuban people, it's not surprising that a member of Norway's parliament has
nominated Castro for the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize.
Hallgeir Langeland of the Socialist Left Party admits Castro isn't exactly
Thomas Jefferson. "Even if one can ask oneself about the democratic
character of Cuba, the question of democracy is perceived differently in a Third
World country,'' Langeland explains. "What do people prefer? The right to
vote or free access to schools, health care, housing and food, as is the case in
Cuba?''
Note that apologists for communism never use this argument (a good meal
matters more than freedom from being dragged away in the dead of night) to
justify right-wing dictatorships. The position also supposes that Cuba is easy
street for the proletarian masses.
That aside, when has Castro played peacemaker? From Angola to Nicaragua, his
troops have tried to prop up Marxist states or spread communism at bayonet
point.
Fidel has murdered 75,000 Cubans outright. (The numbers would be higher if
1.5 million hadn't fled the island since 1959.) Per capita, Cuba has one of the
highest numbers of political prisoners in the world.
Freedom House rates the regime one of the dozen most repressive. A recent
Amnesty International press release began, "Cuba: New wave of political
oppression'' - a headline that may be recycled.
But you don't have to be a socialist to get warm and fuzzy over Fidel.
A Council on Foreign Relations delegation, led by capitalist stooge David
Rockefeller, visited Castro. Council Chairman Peter Peterson was "impressed
with Cuba's commitment to literacy and health care.'' Yes, and Mussolini made
trains run on time.
During the Elian Gonzalez affair last year, America's elite simpered over
Fidel and the society he forged.
"There is no question that Castro feels a very deep and abiding
connection to those Cubans who are still in Cuba,'' Dan Rather told CBS viewers
last April 22. Sure he does, much the way the warden of San Quentin has bonded
with his prisoners.
"To be a poor child in Cuba may in many instances be better than being
a poor child in Miami, and I'm not going to condemn their lifestyle so
gratuitously,'' Newsweek's Eleanor Clift courageously intoned. Would Clift like
to second Langeland's nomination?
Very well, let's judge Castro's Cuba by liberalism's materialistic standard.
Monthly rations for ordinary Cubans include six eggs, 6 pounds of rice, 2
pounds of soy mixture, 1.5 pounds of lentils and a pint of cooking oil. There's
too little meat, fish and bread to even bother rationing them.
Cubans also get a bar of soap every three months, to wash up after their
gourmet feasts. The two-liter monthly allotment of gasoline (0.53 gallon) is
more than adequate, as most Cubans don't have cars.
Some blame the U.S. embargo for the plight of the Cuban people. But
Cuban-Americans send $800 million annually to their relatives still in chains -
more than the island could earn trading with America if the embargo wasn't in
effect and Cuba had anything to sell us.
Castro guarantees free education through the doctoral level for qualified
Cubans - and a place on the unemployment line after graduation. As for Cuba's
vaunted health care, last fall two Cuban doctors who'd defected while stationed
in Zimbabwe told Congress that though Castro exports medical supplies, the
average Cuban has a hard time getting pain-killers and antibiotics.
The elite's love affair with Castro-land says much about its own
totalitarian tendencies. What is a left socialist but a Marxist without a gun?
As long as the regime lasts, left socialists and liberals will continue to
worship at Fidel's feet - while they're firmly on the backs of the Cuban people.
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