Fidel Castro celebrates 90th birthday, criticises Obama in public letter
Source: The Guardian (London)
Saturday 13 August 2016 22.53 EDT
Fidel Castro has thanked Cubans for their well-wishes on his 90th birthday and criticised US president, Barack Obama, in a lengthy letter published by state media. He appeared but did not speak at a gala in his honour broadcast on state television Saturday evening.
“I want to express my deepest gratitude for the shows of respect, greetings and praise that I’ve received in recent days, which give me strength to reciprocate with ideas that I will send to party militants and relevant organisations,” he wrote.
“Modern medical techniques have allowed me to scrutinise the universe,” wrote Castro, who stepped down as Cuba’s president 10 years ago after suffering a severe gastrointestinal illness.
He sat in what appeared to be a specially equipped wheelchair and watched a musical tribute by a children’s theatre company, accompanied by footage of highlights from his decades in power.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/14/fidel-castro-celebrates-90th-birthday-criticises-obama-in-public-letter
Fuck you, Fidel, and your puppet brother too! Why don't you do the world a favor by not having a 91st?
= new reply since forum marked as read
Uh huh. 
It's 2016.
CASTRO=
CASTRO= IRRELEVANT 
And why shouldn't he criticize Obama?
He was by far not the only one who thought the US president showed 'lack of stature' when he didn't apologize to the Japanese.
Also, from a few months earlier:
But in his letter Castro dismisses Obama’s comments as “honey-coated” and said that Cubans “ran the risk of having a heart attack on hearing these words from the president of the United States”.
The former president writes that Obama is asking them to forget “a ruthless blockade that has now lasted for almost 60 years,” as well over half a century of US aggression against Cuba including the decades-long trade embargo against the island; the 1961 Bay of Pigs attack and the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner by anti-Castro exiles which killed 73 people.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/28/fidel-castro-obama-cuba-trip
Many do a cursory googling and become Cuba "experts" in a minute or two.
Most all have never been there to see the island nor met any Cubans in Cuba... yet, they are "experts" on all things Cuban.
At least going there and talking to Cubans IN CUBA would lend itself to a slightly more informed view... but, not even that - and they're experts.
Response to reorg (Reply #9)
Response to reorg (Reply #87)
Response to reorg (Reply #9)
We may not agree on everything, but I nevertheless enjoy talking about Cuban politics, particularly the revolutionary years. My personal hero is Camilo Cienfuegos. I'm sure we could have a lively discussion about his views and where he would be today, but I'm sure that's another can of worms
He and Nelson Mandela wrote an excellent book on their political ideals.
(for all his faults) than they did when the U.S. stooge, Batista, was running the show.
As you note, at least with Castro they received education and healthcare - something they did not have before Castro. I doubt that most the people here who criticize Castro have any clue about what Cuba was like with Batista (except what they saw in "Godfather II"
.
That's why the working and middle classes have done so well over the last 35 years. 
looking for leftists?
What do you call Batista's death squads, who had leftists dig their own graves, then shot them when they were finished?
What do you call death squads which put leftists in gunny sacks, poured gasoline over them, and set them on fire?
What do you call Batista's killers, some of them called "Tigres," "Masferrer's Tigers" who took young people and quartered them, hanging limbs, etc. from trees, to strike fear into the citizens of their towns, and pressure them to fear Batista too much to rebel, they hoped?
[center]
Mothers of murdered young men who were tortured and murdered, some hung from trees in Santiago de Cuba.
Some mothers trying to reach US ambassador Earl Smith
to beseech him to try to influence to stop murdering their
sons, getting hosed down with fire hoses for their efforts. [/center]
Men hanging from lampposts?
People thrown out of Tigres' cars into the streets after being tortured to death. What would you call that?
Masferrer went and hid in South Florida after the Revolution, but he didn't hide well enough, as someone murdered him back there.
Why has none of this happened after the people's revolution? Not even our dirtiest propagandists have dared accuse the revolutionary government of these formerly US approved tactics under Batista.
Just keep on trying. People learn to recognize the truth when they hear it, and they learn to be able to tell if people are truthful who write it, too. Character counts.
That the Cuban government has been accused of numerous human rights abuses including torture, arbitrary imprisonment, unfair trials, and extrajudicial executions (also known as "El Paredón" . Human Rights Watch has stated that the government "represses nearly all forms of political dissent" and that "Cubans are systematically denied basic rights to free expression, association, assembly, privacy, movement, and due process of law."
That Cuba had the second-highest number of imprisoned journalists of any nation in 2008 (China had the highest) according to various sources, including the Committee to Protect Journalists and Human Rights Watch.
That Cuban dissidents face arrest and imprisonment. In the 1990s, Human Rights Watch reported that Cuba's extensive prison system, one of the largest in Latin America, consists of 40 maximum-security prisons, 30 minimum-security prisons, and over 200 work camps. According to Human Rights Watch, Cuba's prison population is confined in "substandard and unhealthy conditions, where prisoners face physical and sexual abuse."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuba#Human_rights
August 15, 2016
Fidel the Guerrilla in 2015–16 and Beyond
by Arnold August
Presentation on the panel “A Tribute to Fidel Castro on His 90th Birthday,”
World Social Forum Montreal 2016, August 12, 2016.
During Obama’s historic visit to Cuba on March 20–23, 2016, I was commentating on the event with Cuban colleagues for the Caracas-based TeleSUR television network. On the Cuban side, the event was overshadowed by Cuban diplomacy skillfully led, in a complex situation, by President Raúl Castro and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From the Obama administration’s perspective, the trip also consisted of diplomacy. However, it was tainted by a heavy dose of speeches and talks that promoted U.S. Cuba policy, which is very self-serving. The resistance in Cuba by Cubans and some foreigners, including myself, to this U.S. cultural, political and ideological assault seemed to have taken a backseat. However, on March 27, only a few days after Obama’s departure from Cuba, Fidel Castro shared his reflections, ironically titled “Brother Obama.” It hit Cuba and the world like a bomb. We will soon analyze it.
Allow me for the moment to share with you my immediate reaction. When I read “Brother Obama,” my first thought was, “Fidel Castro remains the guerrilla he always was.” A guerrilla such as Fidel leading his Sierra Maestra comrades is mobile and waits for the appropriate moment to go on the offensive. In hiding, the revolutionaries allow the enemy to wonder where the July 26 Movement is camped out. Gathering ammunition and forces among the population, the counteroffensive is mapped out and prepared in detail. No stone is left unturned. Not too early, and not a moment too late. However, all of these preparations are worked out in harmony with the people, taking into account their needs and level of preparation, including their strengths and weaknesses. The key ingredient is also the unwavering courage of the leaders, such as Fidel, who are ready to lay their lives on the line to achieve victory. Fidel the guerrilla leads by example. Taking into account all the above-mentioned ingredients, this is how, among other factors, the July 26 Movement led all the other revolutionary forces in Cuba to the Triumph of the Revolution on January 1, 1959. This watershed in Cuban and Latin American history was carried out against the overwhelmingly superior forces of the U.S.-backed Batista dictatorship.
This is the Fidel, the eternal guerrilla, whom I recognized on March 27, 2016, when he wrote “Brother Obama,” using his pen as his arm for a surprise counterattack at the moment it was most needed, in order to respond to the needs of the Cuban resistance to the U.S. offensive. He thus contributed to the depth and expansion of the growing intransigence by the majority of Cubans. It took enormous daring to challenge the international imperial tide that was seeking to engulf Cuba with the notion of the U.S. as the saviour of Cuba. The Empire immediately threw up its hands in despair and disappointment. They erroneously thought that the U.S. Cuba policy had “wrapped things” up in Cuba and internationally. Thus, once again the U.S. and the Western establishment zeroed in on Fidel as they have done without let-up since the 1950s, but this time as a spoiler in the new situation.
In preparing for this panel for today, I decided to re-read all that Fidel had written since the historic joint announcement by Presidents Raúl Castro and Barack Obama on December 17, 2014. I concentrated on those texts that touched on, even as a secondary theme, foreign affairs and especially Cuba–U.S. relations. There are six such texts. In reading them again, this time with the hindsight of “Brother Obama,” I saw in them as well the guerilla’s firmly stamped mark. This perspective was something that I had not detected at the time of their publications, and is thus the reason for my choice of title for this presentation: “Fidel the Guerrilla in 2015–16 and Beyond.” How and why beyond? We will see. I would like to begin by sharing with you my experience in reviewing these texts.
More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/08/15/fidel-the-guerrilla-in-2015-16-and-beyond/
Good Reads:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016165480
