It's easy to get angry and throw Tom Hayden's column in the trash and move on to happier thoughts in this season of "Navidad".
After all, Mr Hayden has very little influence. He's been irrelevant since Chicago 1968, or when he was running with other misguided fools waving Viet Cong flags!
We also remember Tom and Jane Fonda in North Vietnam in 1972! This is the picture that Jane Fonda apologized for later, specially when she was selling her "work out" videos. Jane was forced to apologize because a lot of ladies with military connections found her aforementioned 1972 performance in Hanoi just a bit too much to take.
We also remind you that Mr Hayden has been involved with most left wing movements over the years.
However, I had to respond to Mr Hayden's column because the men and women executed in Castro's political prisons deserve it. Their families in Miami elsewhere must know that they didn't die in vain. The Cubans sitting in Castro's prisons have to know that we are willing to fight for them.
Like a few others, Tom Hayden has been overwhelmed by the Castro-Obama handshake. He explains it in glowing terms. He sees it as a historically transforming moment, such as the day that man landed on the moon or Columbus discovered the New World, or something like that!
Let's just say that Mr Hayden was really impressed!
This is a bit of what Tom Hayden is writing these days about US-Cuba policies and those "....octogenarian Cuban immigrants from the Bay of Pigs generation" opposing any changes toward the island's regime:
"The Cubans are moving toward market socialism, with a strong state protecting its widely admired health care, education and social programs."
"When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, devastating Cuba’s economy, it was widely predicted that a popular anti-Castro revolution would quickly follow, as happened in Eastern Europe. But that was almost 25 years ago, and it never happened — not because Cuba is a perfect police state but because the Cuban people deeply prefer a peaceful transition to a future they themselves choose. Vain attempts to return to the past, or plunge into civil war, are not real alternatives compared with gradual evolution. "
"Cuba should release the American contractor Alan Gross, who sits in prison after taking prohibited advanced communications equipment into Cuba on multiple occasions. The United States should release four imprisoned members of the so-called Cuban Five back to Cuba. The men were convicted in Miami of conspiracy to commit espionage and other charges after the Cuban air force shot down two planes carrying anti-Castro Cuban exiles."
There is a lot more to this column but let's try these for now:
First, Cuba is not moving toward any kind of "market socialism". It is a failed state desperately looking for someone to bail them out. Mr Hayden should talk to the people who escape the system constantly or the countries that the Castro regime owes money to!
Second, the only ones who admire Cuba's health care system are the people, like Mr Hayden, who get their care somewhere else.
Third, the Cuban people have not chosen anything, unless Mr Hayden is familiar with some multi-party election that I missed since the Soviet flag come down in 1991.
Last, but not least, comparing the case of Mr Gross and "the Cuban 5" just confirms that Mr Hayden is totally out of touch with reality. How can Mr Hayden compare the two cases? Wondering if he understands that Mr Gross never got a fair trial and "The Cuban 5" did?
I'll be happy to debate Mr Hayden anytime he wants. Just contact me and we will go one and one on this topic.
I'll even introduce Mr Hayden to my "octogenarian Cuban" mother who will probably yell at him for knowing so little about Cuba!
Tags: Cuba and Mr Hayden's columns To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the My View by Silvio Canto, Jr. Thanks!
