Cuba—to listen to, watch or read some of the media—is a place that
has remained unbowed in the face of impoverishment by the
U.S. embargo.
Lately what you hear is that it is attempting to make bold
reforms not
just in the economy, but socially as well (it just allowed gays to
marry!) The people still dance.
Only that the reality of Cuba bears little resemblance to the plucky
little island narrative. Cuba’s penury has nothing to do with the U.S.
decision not to trade with the
communist island, but with the fact that
the island is communist in the first place. If communism produced misery
in Europe and Asia (where one half of Germany and Korea stagnated under
repression while the capitalist halves of those countries thrived in
economic and political freedom) why would the result be different in the
Caribbean?
Communism is a human tragedy, enslaving the soul while failing to
produce enough goods for the people trudging under it. Communist
countries are large prisons; the borders must be closed lest the people
escape. And within that hell there are smaller circles where the
repression is intensified. It’s the
Gulag, the re-education camp or, in
Cuba’s case today, public beatings by government mobs for who speak up
their minds.
One would think a journalist would want report on that, especially
when—as is the case in Cuba today—the people have finally decided to
risk it all and take to the streets to voice their opposition. Reality,
however, is again otherwise.
In Cuba today there’s a growing and vibrant protestor movement,
headed by a group of women called Las Damas de Blanco (
The Ladies in
White). Originally organized by the wives of
political prisoners, it has
now galvanized others to lose their fear and voice their
anti-communist
sentiments in public.
Their acts are dignified. They march to Mass on Sunday bearing
flowers; sometimes they stand in squares and chant slogans or meet in
each other’s houses.
The repression that
Cuba’s communist regime has unleashed against
these poor ladies is anything but dignified. They have been seized by
government goons bused in for the occasion, pushed, scratched and
beaten. In one case, in the city of Santiago de Cuba, these ladies were
stripped to their waist and dragged through the streets. In another
instance they were bitten. The founder of the movement, 63-year-old
Laura Pollan, died last month and her remains were returned to
her family only after she was cremated..
We understand—though it still rankles—why journalists posted in
Havana are reluctant file stories or broadcast on these events or on the
overall mind-numbing reality of communism. If they do, they will be put
on the next plane out (a fate any Cuban would relish, of course). As
blogger
Yoani Sanchez—a rare Cuban allowed to speak her mind, with only
the occasional beating—posted last month at
Foreign Policy:
“The dilemma of foreign correspondents — popularly called
‘foreign collaborators’ — is whether to make concessions in reporting
in order to stay in the country, or to narrate the reality and face
expulsion. The major international media want to be here when the
long-awaited ‘zero day’ arrives — the day the Castro regime finally
makes its exit from history. For years, journalists have worked to keep
their positions so they will be here to file their reports with two
pages of photos, testimonies from emotional people, and reports of
colored flags flapping all over the place.
“But the elusive day has been postponed time and again. Meanwhile,
the same news agencies that reported on the events of Tahrir Square or
the fighting in Libya downplay the impacts of specific events in Cuba or
simply keep quiet to preserve their permission to reside in the
country. This gag is most dramatic among those foreign journalists with
family on the island, whom they would have to leave or uproot if their
accreditation were revoked. The grim officials of the CPI understand
well the delicate strings of emotional blackmail and play them over and
over again.”
It’s unfair to single out the press, however. The
Obama
Administration has failed, too, to bring the plight of Cubans to the
forefront, even during the current wave of repression against the Ladies
in White.
Two reasons are given for the soft approach.
President Obama may not
want to complicate the case of
Alan Gross, a Marylander Cuba has taken
hostage. Gross was sent to Cuba in 2009 by the U.S. Agency for
International Development to set up internet connectivity for Cuba’s
dwindling
Jewish community. He was arrested in December of 2009 and has
been sentenced to 15 years for the crime of bringing satellite phones
and laptops into Cuba. President Obama also wants to reach out to the
Castro brothers.
We at The Heritage Foundation agree with
Churchill and
Reagan that
tyranny cannot be appeased. We have a proud record of standing up to
communism, including its Caribbean variety, an effort led by decades by
such giants as Lee Edward, the chairman of the
Victims of Communism
Memorial Foundation.
That’s why next week, on Tuesday, Nov. 15, we will have two events on
these subjects; the first devoted to Cuba and the second to communism.
At the first event, at 10 am, we will feature a key note address by
Representative
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R., FLA), the Chairman of the House
of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, as well as a panel on the
latest from Cuba.
In the second event, which follows at 11 am, we’ll look back at the
twentieth anniversary of the fall of the
USSR, Cuba’s former patron, in a
panel featuring Heritage experts and the distinguished scholar of the
Soviet Union,
Professor Richard Pipes.
The collapse of the
Soviet Union was a tremendous victory, but the
survival of the Castro regime, and the rising tide of authoritarianism
in Russia, should remind us that not all the achievements of 1991 are
secure. So in addition to celebrating the return of
freedom to Eastern
Europe, we’ll look at how the lessons and concerns of two decades ago
are relevant to today.
By Mike Gonzalez
Source:
The Foundry
