Che Guevara’s Daughter Spills Beans on Recent Cuban “Reforms”

“Here boys! -- Come here, boys!” yelled the Castro regime in September. Tongues out and tails wagging, those intrepid sleuths who staff the MSM (particularly its Havana bureaus) promptly mobbed the Stalinist regime’s propaganda ministry, slobbering all over them. In seconds, Communist apparatchiks began handing out their puppy treats. The intrepid and hard-nosed MSM sleuths gobbled them up, their tails wagging ever more frantically as their eager tongues lapped up every tid-bit, pausing only for a pat on the head and a “good-boy!” from the snickering Stalinists.

Here boy! Stand up and beg boy! “ “Communism doesn’t work for us anymore” Here ya go, boy! That’s a good boy! Now roll over!…that’s a good boy! here: “Private sector opening in Cuba…half a million private sector licenses to be issued.” Here ya go, boy! That’s a good boy! The Castros tossed out their treats —and the same MSM that erupts in cynical snorts rather than allowing a Republican to finish a sentence, gratefully gobbled them and dutifully transcribed them totally snark-free. Canada Free Press called out the pronouncements as another Castro con-job and called out the reporters who accepted them as donkeys—but upholding a long and illustrious tradition of MSM donkeyisms on Cuba. To wit:

“Let me be very clear. I am NOT a Communist! No Communists have the slightest influence in my government. Furthermore, political power doesn’t interest me in the slightest and I have no intention whatsoever of assuming it.” Fidel Castro, April 1959. (By this date Castro had been meeting with Soviet GRU agents nightly for three months to button-down the Stalinization of Cuba. Castro had established contact with Soviet agents in 1948.)

Reaction to Fidel Castro pronouncement from hard-nosed and intrepid MSM sleuths:

"This is not a Communist Revolution in any sense of the term. Fidel Castro is not only NOT a Communist, he is decidedly ANTI-Communist." (Herbert Matthews, New York Times, July 1959) "It would be a great mistake even to intimate that Castro's Cuba has any real prospect of becoming a Soviet satellite." (Walter Lippmann, Washington Post July, 1959) “Castro is honest, and an honest government is something unique in Cuba. Castro is not himself even remotely a Communist.” (Newsweek, April 1959) “We can thank our lucky stars Castro is no Communist,” (Look Magazine, March 1959)

Now over to the MSM’s latest donkeyisms on Cuba:

“Cuba embarks on a bold new experiment -- firing 500,000 state workers and letting them plunge into freer markets ... It's a big breakthrough, because for the first time the government acknowledges that the private sector, the small business operators are not bit players but a strategic part of the Cuban economy. “ (The Washington Post, September 17, 2010) “In perhaps the clearest sign yet that economic change is gathering pace in Cuba, the government plans to lay off more than half a million people from the public sector in the expectation that they will move into private businesses. (The New York Times, September 13, 2010)

This writer patiently explained that these “changes” and “bold new experiments,” were anything but “bold” or “new” or even “changes.” In fact they’re a time-honored Castroite ruse for when the regime gets in particularly dire financial straits and fears the pressure cooker of Stalinist privation (Slave-era food rations, $18 monthly salary) and oppression (highest political incarceration rate on earth) might finally explode. So they open a valve to vent a little steam, graciously allowing such self-employment as fruit vendor, owner of microscopic restaurant, cigarette lighter filler-upper, masseuse, animal trainer, hairdresser, rabbit and goat breeder. In essence the regime legalizes many existing black market ventures in order to lure more subjects into them and tax them confiscatorially. As soon as the Communist economy starts creaking and wheezing along semi-normally (most recently from Hugo Chavez’ subsidies) --WHACK! The Castros clamp back down, carting off as booty the meager usufructs of the ad-hoc entrepreneurs. The scheme functioned flawlessly in the mid 80’s and again in the mid 90’s. But no small claims courts in Cuba, no Judge Judy or Judge Mathis or to hear the grievances of the shamelesslessly rooked. So in 1983 11 farmers near the central Cuban town of Sancti Spiritus refused to surrender the fruits (some literal) of their private labors to the regime. They aired their grievances by burning their farm produce in front of a Government office, which was decorated with the usual images of Che Guevara. All the farmers were promptly arrested and within days all were murdered by firing squad. After all, Che Guevara himself had laid down the regime’s ground rules 14 years earlier: “We will create the pedagogy of the paredon!” Che’s daughter Aledia Guevara seems to share her late father’s propensity for indiscretion: “This privatization is also very beneficial for the Cuban state in the long run,” she recently explained to the Belgian newspaper MetroTime. “Because in the long run, if all goes well, the Cuban state will reclaim all these private initiatives.” No word from the New York Times or the Washington Post (or from the rest of the intrepid MSM sleuths so recently agog over Cuba’s announced “bold new reforms”) on Aleida’s recent disclosures.

Humberto Fontova——Bio and Archives

Humberto Fontova is the author of four books including “Exposing the Real Che Guevara and the Useful Idiots Who Idolize Him.” Visit hfontova.com.