By Juana Carrasco Martin
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Esteban “Steve” Bovo, doesn’t look like a fool with his latest invention Author: Juventud Rebelde Published: 19/03/2020 | 10:50 pm
The new coronavirus has upset some people. The symptoms are a brutalization caused by bad intentions and Cubaphobia, translated into attempts to politicize the pandemic and -irrationally- to put Cuba as the focus and center of the contagion.
Of course, such bullshit could only come from Miami – a city contaminated for more than six decades by a visceral hatred and a vengeful desire for Cubans to disappear from the map, in order to appropriate this beautiful archipelago at any cost.
The most recent invention arrived with Twitter feeds and a letter sent to President Donald Trump by Commissioner Esteban “Steve” Bovo, asking him to place Cuba on the list of restricted travel to the United States, because “we need to take all preventive measures to protect Miami-Dade County and the state of Florida from the spread of COVID-19.
In Bovo County, the number of confirmed cases rose to 76 (March 18 data) and is increasing, as is the number of positive cases in all of Florida, which is almost 400, ranking among the highest in the 50 U.S. states.
Everyone knows, as do many Americans, including medical experts, and Democratic presidential hopefuls, say, that Trump did not act on SARS-CoV-2 in time, and that the public health care system — and, of course, the private health care system, plus the insurance companies — are responsive to the profits they can make, not the needs of their citizens.
Therefore, the records show that the United States is the country with the highest rate in the entire hemisphere, with 13,737 cases positive for COVID-19; 201 deaths and 108 recoveries. There are now 178 countries where the pandemic has made landfall.
However, the commissioner assures that Cuba has falsified its records, that it is rumored that the sick are Italians, that there have been no medicines in the country for a long time, and he dares to point out that “Cuba cannot protect its people, much less the tourists”.
Such is the blindness and bad temper of the aforementioned that he does not see how the world recognizes the benefits of the Cuban anti-viral recombinant Interferon alpha 2B, nor the gratitude of the passengers and crew of a cruise ship condemned to sail aimlessly through the Caribbean. [It wasn’t] until the humanism, solidarity and generosity of the largest of the Antilles and its people, opened a port and airport for them to return to the United Kingdom. A “I love you Cuba” was the best message from HM Braemar…
It would be good, in case they need it, to take into account that the Cuban pharmaceutical industry is prepared to treat thousands of possible patients with COVID-19, and our antiviral has already been successfully used in China.
The problem is that the Bovo is riding on the xenophobic bandwagon of the White House president, who never acknowledges his failures and looks for scapegoats in others, in order to also run an election campaign, since he hopes to be the mayor of Miami.
Nor does he care that if this extreme measure of cutting off travel between Havana and Miami were taken, it would totally sever the ties of Cuban families, a crime against humanity.
By Redaccion OnCuba
January 27, 2018
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews
Cuban craftsmanship in the fair Cuba Nostalgia that every year takes place in Miami. Photo: Rui Ferreira.
Padura, who was in the Spanish city of Toledo to present his new novel La transparencia del tiempo, answered reporters’ questions, that although he can’t be sure, he believes Trump is president “because in ahead of him, there was a candidate who was a woman.
And, in the United States, it was easier to have a black president than a female president, it’s a very complicated society,” he added.
Cuban writer Leonardo Padura said that the president of the United States, Donald Trump,”is the sin that Americans themselves are paying for their way of thinking”.
In this regard, he recalled that the story he tells in his latest novel takes place fundamentally in 2014 and ends with the beginning of talks between Cuba and the United States to re-establish relations.
It was a very hopeful development for the vast majority of Cubans and a large majority of Americans. But unfortunately, one of President Trump’s fundamental policies has been to dismantle President Obama’s policies,” said Padura.
I don’t believe that he has had a definite policy, except in the dismantling of what Obama created, and that’s where Cuba also fell,” said the writer, for whom relations between Cuba and the United States were restored but not normalized,” because, with an economic and financial embargo there can’t be normal relations.
In this context, he stressed that the Cuban community in Miami “is really very important.
It is a community that has made great efforts, which has even been able to accumulate capital “and will be important in the future development of Cuba,” according to Padura. He added that although in his principles this community “was characterized by being totally hostile to the Cuban revolutionary system,” now other more open generations have arrived.
The new generation of Cubans from Miami is much more open, its members travel to Cuba very often ” and they feel Cuban,” said Padura. He added that he has personally perceived that “it is increasingly possible for a Cuban artist living in Cuba to present himself as something normal in Miami.
There is an atmosphere “in which you can find some sense of hostility,” although he pointed out that “this has remained for a political class for which the bad relationship with Cuba is part of their work and is also part of their business.
But, in general, I feel that it is a community that has changed a lot in recent times. The historical exile no longer exists,” said Padura, who, for this novel brings back the character of police officer Mario Conde, who has starred in half a dozen novels.
In the plot, Conde is going to turn 60 years old and age begins to worry him. Not because of vanity,”but because he wants to witness things that may happen in the future” even though he is a man obsessed with the past “and knows that this vital period is running out”.
By Iroel Sanchez
June 17, 2017
July 30 is a day of national mourning in Cuba. On that date, each year, the streets of Santiago de Cuba are filled with a spontaneous pilgrimage; rose petals fall from the balconies, and people walk in silence towards the cemetery.
This yearly pilgrimage is a remembrance of the popular reaction of the city in response, in 1957, to the murders of young Frank País and Raúl Pujol by the police of Fulgencio Batista. It is also a remembrance of all the many who were victims of similar actions.
It was the son of one of Frank and Josue’s murderers whom the US President Donald Trump chose for the storytelling in the speech he delivered in Miami June 17. A violin in the hands of the offspring played –out of tune– the notes of the US national anthem.
In a theater that bears the name of one of the invaders that –under the orders of the CIA– suffered an embarrassing defeat at Playa Girón [Bay of Pigs], a politician many consider a “loser”, promised more of the same the whole world –and even his predecessor in office– recognized as doomed to failure.
The audience –mostly elderly Miamians who have not set foot in Cuba in decades– shouted, “USA, USA,” while the president announced that citizens of “the land of the free” will continue to be banned from engaging in tourism in Cuba. If they travel to the island they must do so in a group and with a detailed and auditable logbook, so that Big Brother can adequately confirm if they fulfill the mission that their government has given them: to overthrow the “regime” that has made sure that crimes such as those of December 30, 1957, never happen again o n the island.
The same President, who signed a $100 billion contract for arms sales to the Saudi Arabian monarchy less than a month ago, signed another in the presence of people who practiced terrorism. The objective: to prevent a single US penny from reaching the Armed Forces of the Republic of Cuba. He also promised to prevent trade and investments that do not exist today.
With the balance of his campaign promises showing more debits than credits and threatened by a congressional investigation following his pressure on former FBI director James Comey, Mr. Trump seems to have found among the Cuban-American ultra-right in Miami a way to show he is true to his word and to be applauded.
But rhetoric cannot conceal a reality: 73% of Americans and 80% of Cuban-Americans support the end of the blockade of Cuba, and Trump’s announcements this Friday will only increase that rejection. Time will tell. The day before the speech, Trump managed to make the analysts of The Miami Herald agree with those of The New York Times.
South of the Florida straits we did not have long to wait. The first results of Trump’s show in Miami are already perceptible in Cuba: there is more talk about politics. In social networks many young people, who do not usually discuss these issues, express their indignation with the Miami speech of the American President. Since the kidnapping of Elian Gonzalez, Cubans had not seen such a clear image of the Jurassic Park that would be ruling Cuba if there was no Revolution.
By Authors Name Here
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
Andrés Gómez, Director of Areítodigital / April 11, 2016
Miami.- I have lived in Miami since November 29, 1960, and now I’m 68 years old. I was 13 when I arrived with my family, much like almost 130,000 Cubans who left their country in that year as a result of the radical changes made by the Cuban revolutionary process and war threats issued by the United States that were partially carried out in April 1961, five months later, with the Bay of Pigs invasion, the defeat of which those 55 years ago will be soon celebrated by the Cuban people in revolution.
Barack Obama was born on August 4, 1961, and not in Miami. After living in that city for so many years I know very well that “clear monument”, as Obama described Miami, calling it an example of hope for the Cubans, especially the young people,” in his well-timed and much-quoted speech of March 22 in Havana’s Gran Teatro.
Like others, I have written extensively about the idyllic and unreal image of Miami that U.S. Administrations have stubbornly insisted on creating and using as a contrast for more than 57 years, since the beginning of this long-lived nightmare, to the great work and example that the Cuban people’s Revolution has been. This virtual vision is the “clear monument” that Obama brought back to life in his speech.
Above all else, Mr. Obama, Miami is the irrefutable example of the Cuban people’s success in maintaining and developing their socialist revolutionary process and, therefore, their independence and sovereignty. Miami is conclusive proof of the defeat suffered by the Cuban counterrevolutionaries and their imperial masters in their attempts to destroy Cuba’s independence.
Miami, the clear monument that Obama presents to the Cuban people as their hope for the future. It is where his terrorists live, those of the U.S. governments, who have planned and committed acts of terrorism against the Cuban people. These victims, killed as a result, have been men and women that include many, many members of that youth that you, Mr. Obama, constantly encourage to forget the past.
And those victims have also been boys and girls, fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, husbands and wives, sons and daughters, female and male friends and neighbors… It’s an endless list, Mr. Obama. Not to mention, Mr. President, the suffering of their families and friends for the loss and absence of their loved ones in so many years of horror.
In 57 years there have been thousands of terrorist acts against the Cubans as a result of the State Terrorism policy designed by U.S. governments, one of which you preside over today, brother Obama, as you were called by Fidel, whom these U.S. terrorists have tried to kill countless times.
You see, it was those U.S. governments which in 1959, two years before you were born, started to recruit, train, arm, fund and lead those terrorists who lived or are still living in Miami. Some of them, who have died –of natural causes, by the way– and the U.S. government has protected them and let them do what they do with total impunity.
Those terrorist monsters are now living freely here in Miami, your “clear monument” and example to the Cubans, “especially the young people”. They don’t worry that they will ever be brought to justice for their heinous crimes as required by law and decency, thanks to the protection that your government, Mr. President, gives them.
How many are the Cuban victims of that terrorist policy? Official figures have it that 3,478 have died and 2,099 have been physically disabled. Given the horror caused by the imperial policies of aggression and war against other peoples in the last decades, maybe the readers will not be shocked by the number of Cuban men and women who have died or been disabled in all these years of sustained terrorist campaigns led by the United States.
Fidel managed to put into the right context in his memorable speech of October 6, 2011 in memory of the 73 victims of the loathsome act committed by these same beasts when they planted a bomb on a civilian plane of Cubana Airlines and blew it out of the sky 35 years before that day.
Fidel explained then: “Comparing the Cuban population [on October 6, 1976] with the U.S. population last September 11, it’s as if seven American planes, each with 300 on board, had been shot down on the same day and at the same time… And if we compared the two populations, the 3,478 Cuban lives lost to these terrorist acts originated in the United States, it would be as if 88,434 Americans had been killed by terrorists, a number equivalent to the number of American soldiers killed in the Vietnam War and the Korean War together.”
Just as the experiences and outcomes of this vile and endless U.S. policy of State Terrorism have been terrible for the Cuban people, so too have they been for us Cubans who, also for decades, have defended our people right from the dens where these monsters who spearhead such a policy are living and enjoying the impunity offered them by Washington.
Next April 28 will mark the 37th anniversary of the bomb attack in San Juan, Puerto Rico, that caused the death, one day later, of Carlos Muñiz Varela, our companero at the National Committee of the Antonio Maceo Brigade, and his terrorist killers, who are members of the Miami-based Cuban extreme right, are yet to be taken to court so that justice is done.
The federal authorities in charge of these dreadful matters, and mainly the FBI, Mr. President, are to blame for the fact that nothing has been done about it. They refuse to disclose the evidence they have that can prove those murderers guilty.
In Puerto Rico, however, Carlos’s family and friends, Cubans and Puerto Rican alike, under the guiding hands of Carlos’s son –now considerably older than his father when he fell in 1979 at the age of 25– and our comrade Raúl Álzaga, keep demanding justice for both Carlos and Santiago Mari Pesquera, a young Puerto Rican pro-independence fighter, recently recalled again by our comrade of old, Ricardo Alarcon, in an excellent article.
So how is it, Mr. President? What’s with the “clear monument” that you hold Miami is as an example of hope for the Cubans, “especially the young people”? What about those scoundrels who are your terrorists, Mr. President, still free and unpunished thanks to your decision, not that of other presidents –ten of them, to be precise– who ruled before you, but your own one?
Here in Miami, alive and free and waiting for your decision to bring them to justice as required by law, are, among others: Félix Rodríguez, Luis Posada Carriles, Pedro Remón Rodríguez, Ernesto Lluesma Pares, Ruperto Pérez Ortega, Frank Castro Paz, Santiago Álvarez Magriñat, Reynol Rodríguez González, Osvaldo Bencomo Robaina, Sergio Ramos Suárez, Armando Ruiz Maceira, Secundino Carreras Bencomo, Ramón Saúl Sánchez, Guillermo Novo Sampol, Antonio de la Cova, Virgilio Paz Romero, Héctor Fabián, José Dionisio Suárez Esquivel and Luis Crespo.
Not many of them are mentioned here, Mr. President, Sir. The above names are just a sample of your terrorists. Many, however, are their heinous crimes.
Por Andrés Gómez, director de Areítodigital
11 de abril de 2016
Miami.- Vivo en Miami desde el 29 de noviembre de 1960 y hoy tengo 68 años de edad. Llegué a los 13 años de edad con mi familia, como también salieron de Cuba casi 130 mil cubanos aquel año de 1960, producto de los radicales cambios del proceso revolucionario cubano y de las amenazas de guerra por parte de Estados Unidos que se concretaron parcialmente en abril de 1961, cinco meses después, con la invasión por Playa Girón, cuya derrota, en su 55 aniversario la celebrará, en revolución, el pueblo de Cuba próximamente.
Barack Obama, nació el 4 de agosto de 1961, y no fue en Miami. Por haber vivido tanto años en Miami conozco a fondo a ese “claro monumento” que afirmó Obama que es Miami, “como ejemplo de esperanza para el pueblo cubano, especialmente, los jóvenes,” en su oportuno y muy citado discurso el 22 de marzo pasado en el Gran Teatro de La Habana.
Como otros, mucho he escrito sobre la obra que por más de 57 años los gobiernos de Estados Unidos se han empecinado en construir de una visión de Miami, idílica e irreal, para contraponerla desde el principio de esta larga pesadilla, al magno ejemplo y obra que ha sido la Revolución de los cubanos y las cubanas. Es esta visión virtual, “el claro monumento” que Obama resucita en su discurso en el Gran Teatro de La Habana.
Miami es, señor Obama, por sobre todo, el ejemplo fehaciente de la victoria del pueblo cubano por mantener y desarrollar su proceso revolucionario socialista y así su independencia y su soberanía. Miami es la prueba máxima de la derrota de la contrarrevolución cubana y la de sus amos imperiales por destruir la independencia de Cuba.
Miami, el claro monumento que Obama ofrece al pueblo cubano como la esperanza de su futuro, es donde viven sus terroristas, los terroristas de los gobiernos de Estados Unidos, los que han llevado a cabo actos y planes de terrorismo contra el pueblo de Cuba, cuyas víctimas, los muertos que han causado, han sido hombres y mujeres, muchos, muchos de éstos, jóvenes, señor Obama, a los que usted continuamente incita a que olviden el pasado. Como también niños y niñas, padres y madres, hermanas y hermanos, esposas y esposos, hijos e hijas, amigos y amigas, vecinos y vecinas… y así interminablemente señor Obama. Sin olvidarnos, señor presidente, de sus familiares y amigos que a través de tantos y tantos años de horror han sufrido sus pérdidas y ausencias.
Miles de acciones terroristas cometidas contra el pueblo de Cuba a través de 57 años como resultado de la política de Terrorismo de Estado de los gobiernos de Estados Unidos, el gobierno que usted preside, hermano Obama, como le llamara Fidel, a quien planes terroristas de Estados Unidos han intentado asesinar tantas, tantas, y tantas veces.
Porque esos terroristas que viven o vivieron en Miami, aquellos que han muerto –por muerte natural, debo aclarar, — y los muchos que aún viven, señor presidente, los gobiernos de Estados Unidos desde un principio, me refiero al año 1959, desde dos años antes de usted haber nacido, los comenzó a reclutar, a entrenar, a armar, a financiar, a dirigir, y hasta el presente los protege y les brinda absoluta impunidad.
Porque esos monstruos terroristas, viven hoy libremente, aquí en Miami, su “claro monumento, ejemplo de esperanza para el pueblo cubano, especialmente los jóvenes”, sin preocupaciones de ser llevados ante los tribunales de justicia por sus odiosos crímenes como la ley exige, como la decencia exige, gracias a la protección que su gobierno, señor presidente, les garantiza.
¿Cuántas son las víctimas en Cuba de esa política de terrorismo? De acuerdo a las cifras oficiales han sido 3,478 los muertos y 2,099 los incapacitados físicos. Dado el horror producto de las políticas imperiales de agresión y guerra a otros pueblos durante las últimas décadas quizás no resulte terrible a los lectores el número de cubanas y cubanos muertos y discapacitados a consecuencia de todos estos años de una sostenida campaña terrorista por parte de Estados Unidos.
Fidel lo supo poner en el contexto correcto en un memorable discurso el 6 de octubre de 2001 al recordar a las 73 víctimas del infame atentado, perpetrado por estas mismas bestias, contra un avión civil de Cubana de Aviación el 6 de octubre de 1976.
Explicó Fidel: “Comparando la población de Cuba [el 6 de octubre de 1976] con la de Estados Unidos el 11 de septiembre pasado, es como si 7 aviones norteamericanos cada uno con 300 pasajeros a bordo hubiesen sido derribados el mismo día, a la misma vez… Y si estimásemos en la misma proporción de poblaciones las 3,478 vidas cubanas perdidas debido a estas acciones terroristas originadas en Estados Unidos es como si 88,434 personas hubiesen sido asesinadas en Estados Unidos en actividades terroristas, que equivale al número de soldados norteamericanos muertos en las guerras de Corea y Vietnam.”
Interminable y terrible es la vivencia y los resultados de esta vil política estadounidense de Terrorismo de Estado contra el pueblo cubano. Como también, salvando las diferencias, duro lo ha sido para nosotros los cubanos que, también por décadas, hemos defendido a nuestro pueblo en las mismas madrigueras que los monstruos que han ejecutado esta política viven y gozan de la impunidad brindada por Washington.
El próximo 28 de abril se cumplirán 37 años del atentado y muerte, un día después, de nuestro compañero del Comité Nacional de la Brigada Antonio Maceo, Carlos Muñiz Varela, en San Juan de Puerto Rico sin que aún sus asesinos, terroristas miembros de la extrema derecha cubana radicada en Miami y Puerto Rico, hayan sido llevados ante los tribunales para que se haga justicia.
Las autoridades federales encargadas de esos terribles asuntos, el FBI principalmente, señor presidente Obama, son los culpables de que no se haya podido hacer justicia. Se niegan a hacer público las pruebas en su poder que demuestran la culpabilidad de los asesinos.
Pero en Puerto Rico también los familiares y compañeros de Carlos, cubanos y puertorriqueños por igual, dirigidos por su hijo, Carlos Muñiz Pérez, hoy bastante mayor que su padre era cuando en 1979 cayera asesinado con 25 años de edad, y nuestro compañero Raúl Álzaga, no han cesado en su empeño por lograr que se haga justicia a él y a Santiago Mari Pesquera, joven luchador independentista boricua, como recientemente nos lo volviera recordar en un excelente trabajo, nuestro compañero de siempre, Ricardo Alarcón.
¿Entonces, qué, señor presidente? ¿Qué de su ese “claro monumento” que usted mantiene que es Miami, “como ejemplo de esperanza para el pueblo cubano, especialmente, los jóvenes”? ¿Qué de esos miserables, sus terroristas, señor presidente, que siguen libres e impunes por su decisión, no la de otros presidentes, 10 para ser exactos, que gobernaron antes que usted, sino de la suya propia?
Aquí están en Miami, libres y vivos esperando, señor presidente, por su decisión de llevarlos ante los tribunales de justicia como la ley lo obliga. Algunos de ellos son: Félix Rodríguez, Luis Posada Carriles, Pedro Remón Rodríguez, Ernesto Lluesma Pares, Ruperto Pérez Ortega, Frank Castro Paz, Santiago Álvarez Magriñat, Reynol Rodríguez González, Osvaldo Bencomo Robaina, Sergio Ramos Suárez, Armando Ruiz Maceira, Secundino Carreras Bencomo, Ramón Saúl Sánchez, Guillermo Novo Sampol, Antonio de la Cova, Virgilio Paz Romero, Héctor Fabián, José Dionisio Suárez Esquivel y Luis Crespo.
No son muchos los aquí nombrados, señor presidente Obama, es sólo una muestra de sus terroristas, pero sí son muchos sus odiosos crímenes.//