Cuba Says U.S. Denies Visas to Grammy Nominees

[Gato Moteado]

i hope this isn't a dupe. chimpy is denying visas to the buena vista social club musicians. what next?

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040205/en_nm/music_grammys_cuba_dc

[BlueEyedSon]

1. Oh, for crying out loud!

[Judi Lynn]

2. Someone in Washington is really jerking the Cubans around

They denied Chucho Valdes the ability to show up here to claim his Latin Grammy last fall, although he had been in the States earlier in 2003, in April, for performances around the country.

He had ALSO been in the country in 2001, when the Latin Grammys, scheduled to take place in Los Angeles (after the Cuban "exiles" pitched another fit in Miami over denial of their demand to stand close to the entrance where they could attack the Cuban nominees, and the whole production was shifted back to Los Angeles) on September 11th. This program was cancelled at that time, and he and his fellow Cuban musicians stayed in L.A. long enough to all give blood before returning to Cuba.

NOW he's allowed to visit, whereas the people who are nominated THIS YEAR are refused.

No matter how small and spiteful, the _Bush regime is definitely up to the task.

[Mika]

3. What next?

The Bush admin has pulled this crap three years in a row now.

And people thought that it was Castro who wouldn't let people from Cuba go to the US.

[LostInTheMaise]

7. That's not true

Castro allowed many if not all his criminals to come freely to the US and allow him to save money on their upkeep and feeding. So Castro DOES allow certain rogue elements to slip into America.

[Judi Lynn]

21. Meanwhile Cornell scientists and ecology specialists from the Field Museum

will be conducting business as usual in Cuba until February 22nd:

Cuban and US Scientists Study Island Biodiversity

Prensa Latina
February 02, 2004

The biodiversity of Cuban eastern regions is under study by groups of US and Cuban scientists to assess and accelerate conservation, supply data on environmental deterioration and observe the pattern of flora and fauna. Ecology specialists from the Cuban Natural History Museum and the Eastern Ecosystem and Biodiversity Center are working from now until February 22 with scientists from Cornell University (NY) and the Chicago Field Museum in the protected mountainous nature areas of La Bayamesa and La Melva. The thirty experts, assisted by forest and park rangers, will calculate the bird, reptile, amphibian and insect populations of both regions, species considered very valuable, some of which are threatened with extinction.
(snip/)

http://www.globalexchange.org/countries/cuba/sustainable/biodiversity/1519.html

So far _Bush hasn't devised a way to scuttle our scientists' joint projects with Cuba, so we're not TOTALLY back to the Dark Ages, yet!

[Desperadoe]

4. Repuke Bigotry???

Or is this the Miami Mafia flexing it's muscle??

[Osolomia]

37. Ahem, what’s the difference between DU and the freerepublic

on the Buick boat people:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1071461/posts

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=346436

and denying visas to the Grammy nominee musicians:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1073188/posts

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=348528#348904

Hmmm?

H-e-l-l-o-oh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Mika]

38. Hey, no fair

On FR they would be branding pro trade/ pro travel people like us as "Castro apologists" or some such thing. :evilgrin:

[Osolomia]

39. Aha, so that's where "DUers" get it from!

Funny how thay all sound alike!
:think:

[Vogon_Glory]

5. A Talking-To Is Badly Needed

Someone needs to give the organizers of the Latin Grammys a long-overdue talking to. This is the second year that the Boosh regime's state department has played games with Cuban Grammy nominees' visas. Some bonehead handling the event should have realized that political hacks WOULD try to play games with one of the major powerhouses for contemporary Latin music.

If the Latin Grammy organizers had any guts (Which I doubt), they'd cancel any arrangements they made to hold the Latin Grammys in the US and move the events to Santo Domingo. If Jebito the Hermano Menor and members of the Miami--Dade County chamber of commerce ended up with egg on their faces, Que barbaridad! The Latin Grammys would do well to stay out of the US until enough of the US tells the Cuban exile lobby and their "Amurrican" right-wing allies to get stuffed.

:thumbsdown: :thumbsdown: :thumbsdown:

[Alenne]

6. This is the regular Grammys

but I do believe the Latin Grammys should be held in a Latin country. The Latin Grammys don't need all of the politics involved in holding it in the US.

[Vogon_Glory]

8. My Boo Boo--But I Agree With You.

My boo-boo, but I agree with you. I think that the Latin Grammys ought to be held in a Latin American country in order to escape the politics of holding it in either the US or Cuba. While I'd like them to be held here in the US, I think that the Latin Grammy organizers would do well to hold it in another country.

Mexico City is one possibility, howbeit a bit scary. I suspect that Santa Domingo has very good hotels these days as well as media and Internet connections. Perhaps even Panama might be worth considering to those prima donnas wanting deluxe accommodations prior to the event.

[Osolomia]

9. Bush has been denying visas to Cubans left right and center for years

Here's another example from today's news:

Cuban pastor worries about ties with US churches after visa denial

By ANDREA RODRIGUEZ
Associated Press Writer

HAVANA --
A Baptist minister who sits on Cuba's parliament worried Thursday that politics will hurt relations between churches here and in the United States after failing again to get an American visa for a long-planned visit.

The Rev. Raul Suarez was invited by American church groups to take part in religious conferences and other Black History Month events in Mobile, Alabama, and Boston.

"I presented my application 14 weeks ago," Suarez told The Associated Press. To participate in the planned events "I would have to travel this Sunday at the latest," he added.

Officials at the U.S. Interests Section, the American mission in Havana, declined to comment on the case, citing confidentiality rules.

Suarez is a deputy on Cuba's National Assembly, or parliament, and directs the church-run Dr. Martin Luther King Center in Havana.

... He said he was granted visas to visit the United States several times in the past. But starting in 2000, he has not received answers for several requests for American visas to participate in church events in the United States.

More...
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040205/APN/402051112

[Osolomia]

11. More visa denials by the USA

Help for twins' parents remains stalled in Cuba

Home News Tribune 1/03/04

Beatriz Alvarez gave birth to twins on New Year's Day, and the new mom was hoping her own mother would come to New Brunswick from Cuba to help care for the babies for a few months.

But despite letters from Alvarez's doctor and her congressman, as well as a bit of intervention from Greek and Swiss officials, the grandmother must stay home.

Alvarez's mother, a physical therapist in Cuba, has been denied a visa to visit the United States.

…"(My mother) really wants to be with me. She's frustrated. This would be a wonderful thing for her and for me, and they are pulling us apart without a good reason."

http://www.thnt.com/thnt/story/0,21282,881087,00.html

US National Council of Churches is Denied Visa Request for Cuban Five Family Visits
December 16, 2003

The US National Council of Churches which brings together 36 different religious denominations, has received a summary denial to its humanitarian request of the State Department to issue visas to two of the wives of the Cuban Five to enable them to visit René González and Gerardo Hernández in their respective prisons during the coming holiday season. Both of the wives, Olga Salanueva and Adriana Pérez, have been repeatedly denied the right to visit their spouses by US authorities. The younger daughter of René González, Ivette, has by extension also been denied the right to see her father.

Robert Edgar, the general secretary of the National Council of Churches, formally solicited the visas of the State Department in what the Council sees as a humanitarian gesture.

http://www.ain.cubaweb.cu/patriotas2/coberturacompleta/2003/dic1903visas.htm

Visa Denials for NYC Cultural Events Continue with Cuban Artist Unable to Attend Film Premiere

(indieWIRE: 10.10.02) -- In a continued rash of recent visa denials involving cultural exchange personalities hoping to attend New York City events, Cuban artist Salvador Gonzalez, subject of the new documentary by Bette Wanderman, has been denied an entry visa into the U.S. for the October 11 premiere of the film about his life. The State Department, under the recently enacted Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act, requires applicants from seven countries, including Cuba, to undergo extra background checks because they're named as "state sponsors of terrorism."

Gonzalez is renowned for using African-derived imagery in public spaces in Cuba in addition to murals he has created in this country in both Philadelphia and New York's Harlem. "This was suppose to be Salvador's big moment," said Wanderman in a prepared statement. "But keeping him out isn't fighting terrorism. All it's doing is impeding international cultural and intellectual exchange, the very thing the world needs more of not less." In an unrelated incident involving Cuban artists, 22 musicians were recently denied visas in order to attend the Latin Grammy Awards in Los Angeles.

http://www.indiewire.com/biz/biz_021010_briefs.html

The Miami Herald
May. 01, 2002
Cuban official's U.S. visa denied; action criticized

WASHINGTON - (AP) -- The State Department denied a U.S. visa to the head of Cuba's food import agency in March because he lobbied against American policy during his last visit, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Tuesday.

The visa denial drew criticism from Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who suggested that the action eliminated an opportunity for farmers to increase food exports.

http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/us-cuba/alimport.htm

Cubans denied visa for Bloomington conference, 6/3/2001

… Each individual Cuban invited, received letters in support of their invitations from Mayors, City Council persons, Congressional representatives,
clergy, educators, and other community leaders.

One of the invited, Juana Ortiz from Matanzas Province, was just in
Pittsburgh in March, as a guest of the city, to accept the keys to the city
and to celebrate the first state-to-province relationship (Pennsylvania &
Matanzas) in the United States.

Her visa was denied as were a dozen others whose work is to promote
international relations within their cities and provinces.

http://www.uscsca.org/thirdconfbloom.htm#Cubans%20denied%20visa

The Miami Herald
August 30, 2000
Cuba's top lawmaker denied U.S. visitor's visa

The Clinton administration has denied a visa to Cuban National Assembly
President Ricardo Alarcón to travel to the United States for an international
parliamentary conference, State Department officials said Tuesday.

Alarcón's personal assistant also was refused a visa, but visas were granted two
Cuban National Assembly deputies to attend the three-day conference in that
opens today in New York, according to U.S. officials.

… The rejection also coincided with increasing indications that Cuban President
Fidel Castro would be among the more than 100 heads of government attending a
Millennium Summit at the United Nations next week.

http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/us-cuba/alarcon-denied.htm

But DUers still swallow the US government's lies and bullshit no questions asked on why this happens:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=346436#348491

Go figure!

[Osolomia]

10. This is part of a big deal that DUers ought to know about

Homeland Security Rules Snarl Musicians’ Schedules
By JAKOB SCHILLER (01-27-04)

Berkeley flamenco aficionados anxiously anticipating last weekend’s dual performances by renowned guitarist Paco de Lucia found out they’re going to have to wait until March for rescheduled shows.
The reason? The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) denied de Lucia and his troupe entry visas .

The world’s most famous flamenco guitarist, de Lucia had to reschedule several performances on his upcoming U.S. tour—including two at Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall—when DHS flagged his Cuban bass guitarist, Alain Rodriguez, for an additional security check.

... The cancellation isn’t a one-time phenomenon for the performing world, neither in Berkeley nor across the country. According to Scott Southard, director of International Music Network, DHS checks have been forced cancellations and delays of hundreds of concerts across the country since 9/11, resulting in the loss of millions of dollars for promoters.

Southard, who represents the top four most popular groups from Cuba—including the Afro-Cuban All Stars, the Buena Vista Social Club, renowned jazz pianist Chucho Valdez and singer Cecilia Cruz, along with other popular groups around the world—has canceled or rescheduled over 200 shows since the Department of Homeland Security was created.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

Much more...
http://www.berkeleydaily.org/text/article.cfm?issue=01-27-04&storyID=18163

[Judi Lynn]

23. They're gone wacko, no doubt, according to your article

(snip) Britian’s Guardian newspaper reported Monday that five members of a Church of England girls’ boarding school were branded potential illegal immigrants and banned from a U.S. tour that included a concert at San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral. School headmistress Mary Steel called the refusal “barmy” and lodged a protest with American ambassador William S. Farish.

Cal Performances, the agency which promotes shows at Zellerbach Hall, recently had a close call with the Masters of Persian Classical Music—again because one person was flagged.

“I don’t know if the Department of Homeland Security knows that affect this process if having on business,” said Hollis Ashby, associate director of Cal Performances.
(snip)

They are runnning amock, without any restraints whatsoever. They're kicking butt on people just for the hell of it, for the pure enjoyment of having seized the reigns of power, and the opportunity to weild it anyway they want. Sick.

[Moderator]

50. Osolomia

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
news source.


Thank you


DU Moderator

[Mika]

53. Cuban bass players are now part of the axis of evildoers?

My god, what kind of bass is Alain Rodriguez playing? A stand-up bass of mass destruction?

Jeezuz, is this admin the most pathetic you've ever seen, or what?

---

Only ONE candidate for US president
openly states that he would end the
unjust policy of sanctions and embargoes
against Cuba AND Americans.

That candidate is Dennis Kucinich.

-The Democratic Presidential Candidates on Cuba-
http://www.lawg.org/pages/new%20pages/Misc/prez-candidates1.htm

[Osolomia]

12. Cuban musicians deemed "detrimental to the interests of the United States"

snip/...

Surrounded by some of the Cuban musicians nominated for awards, Acosta showed journalists the letters from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, denying their visa requests.

The letters cited Section 212f of U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Law, which states that the American president can deny U.S. entry to foreigners when their coming to the country is deemed "detrimental to the interests of the United States."

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/miami/sfl-205grammys,0,877462.story?coll=sfla-news-miami

Brainwashed Duers don't give a damn about that yet think these criminals who needlessly endager the lives of children should be a given a hero's welcome in the US:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=346436

Go figure!

[Mika]

15. Don't forget that Al Gore..

Don't forget that Al Gore and Joe Lieberman supported the Elian case going to a Miami-Dade family kangaroo court. The hard core exiles in Miami thought that Elian's mother, who put the boy on a small leaky overloaded smuggler's boat with no life vests, was a hero worthy of sainthood. If it had not been for those guys fishing discovering Elian he would be dead along with the others who died on that smuggling operation.

Looking at the Chevy truck and Buick "rafters" DU threads leads me to believe that some DUers applaud or at least want to reward Cuban illegal migrants who recklessly endanger children in this way (on completely unseaworthy "vessels" and with NO LIFE VESTS, not even for the children).

If the adults want to recklessly endanger themselves, OK. But putting minors in such a threatening and dangerous situation where drowning is a large likelihood is worthy of a family court competency hearing.

[Osolomia]

17. Evidently biased DUers are incapable of connecting the dots

between the USA’s denial of visas to Cubans and the Cubans reasons for skipping the visa process entirely and illegally driving across the Florida Straits in a ’59 Buick with 5 children on board instead.

If that stunt was a US government funded trial balloon then evidently even “progressive Democrats” will swallow it hook line and sinker no questions asked to this day, blinders firmly glued to their faces to the undeniable background facts and context of the news.

What a perfect cover for a US terrorist attack on itself in time for Bush’s November re-election! They were just talking about that in Washington a few weeks ago, nothing for DUers to concern themselves about, move along now.

[Judi Lynn]

18. Here's a new twist!

Posted on Fri, Feb. 06, 2004

Cubans found at sea on Buick seek order to reach US
CATHERINE WILSON
Associated Press

MIAMI - In a race against time, a carload of 11 Cubans found floating at sea in a vintage Buick sought a court order Friday to get into the United States against federal policy rather than face a return trip home.

Taken aboard a U.S. Coast Guard ship, the Cubans would lose their legal rights in U.S. courts if they were repatriated, so their only hope was to get a helpful court ruling while still at sea.

As many as three of the people intercepted Wednesday about 10 miles off the Florida Keys gained fame for trying to make the same mechanically challenging trip in a vintage Chevrolet pickup truck last July.

William Sanchez, one of the attorneys for the intercepted Cubans, was seeking an injunction to at least temporarily bar all repatriations of both Cubans and Haitians, the two nationalities most commonly found at sea.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/breaking_news/7892465.htm

The Miami Mafia thinks it's simply going to take matters into its own hands and bypass our established law governing repatriation altogether! Unbelievable.

[Osolomia]

20. So long as Americans let the Miami mafia walk all over them they will

Just a few months ago the Miami mafia bypassed the bipartisan majority will of Congress, what's there to stop them from doing whatever the hell they want?

I never would have believed the extent of Democratic complicity with the Bush Doctrine on Cuba if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes on DU time and time again. Truly revolting imho.

[Judi Lynn]

22. Usually you expect anyone sharing the Miami Mafia's position

would, like the Miami Mafia, represent the complete outer fringes of the right-wing of the Republican Party.

[Osolomia]

24. Yesterday DUers were saying let the boat people in

But not one if them has spoken out in support of letting the Grammy nominee musicians in or any of the many others denied visas. Go figure!!!!!!!!!!

snip/...

In March 1999, the U.S. government exempted broad categories of Cubans, including artists, from restrictions cited in Section 212f. But the Bush administration has since returned to that policy to prevent the flow of dollars through compensation received by the artists, considered to be government employees, from reaching Cuba's coffers.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/monroe_county/cities_neighborhoods/florida_keys/7887088.htm

With the silent complicity of the Dems evidently.

[Osolomia]

35. And no rebuttal from suposedly progressive Democrats

EVER!

Lacking any evidence to the contrary, what a bunch of hypocritical bigots to the core!

[Osolomia]

13. Oh my, yet another "Castro apologist" for DU to attack!

Senator George McGovern addresses Police Foundation
02/05/2004

... When asked about Cuba, McGovern said he would recognize the country and set up normal relations with them.

"We recognize China and Russia ­ I'd give Cuba the same consideration. It's in our best interest to have embassies and trade with Moscow and Beijing. If we're afraid of Castro, we need to have trained American foreign service officers watching him. I wouldn't let a handful of Cuban refugees in Miami dictate our policy. We haven't been in Cuba so we don't really know what's going on there. Since I don't have any interest in running for president, I don't have to worry about what I say. I say the same thing now I did then ­ I stand alone."

Republican or Democrat, McGovern was hardly alone when the audience stood to applaud him warmly.

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=10917942&BRD=2256&PAG=461&dept_id=455823&rfi=6

[Mika]

14. A room full of "Castro apologists"

<Blinders: on>

..McGovern was hardly alone when the audience stood to applaud him warmly.

Move along.. nothing to see here.

[Judi Lynn]

16. Good for him!

He said it in Florida, too: the same place where some of ours sleazier politicians go to prostitute themselves for big campaign bucks and the hope of votes from the Cuban "exiles."

Apparently he's not going to be intimidated by the predictable wash of seething hostility he can expect there, along with the possibility of bomb threats or worse.

Time proved him to be 100% correct on Viet Nam, and he's on the right side of the embargo, along with a majority of our Congress.

[Osolomia]

31. Oh my, yet another "Castro apologist", this time a Republican Senator!!!!!

Idaho delegation visits Cuba to spur trade



So there's no excuse for the ignorant bigotry of DU here's some more "Castro apologists" for you:

February 6, 2004 6:35 PM
The Associated Press

Boise-AP _ Senator Larry Craig and Congressman Butch Otter are off to Cuba for the weekend, leading a trade mission to open up the Caribbean island to Idaho farm products.

The two Republicans left today for Havana, along with 15 agricultural representatives, and the Idaho Hemingway House Foundation. The lawmakers have been advocating an end to the American travel ban on Cuba.

Although the ban remains in place, it's legal to sell American farm products and medical supplies to Cuba under federal law.

The lawmakers will visit biotechnology labs and meet Felipe Perez Roque (ROW-kay), the minister of foreign affairs.

More...
http://www.kbcitv.com/x5154.xml?ParentPageID=x5155&ContentID=x17587&La...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=351630

Since a picture can speek a thousand words, anyone got a pix we can add to the "Castro apologists" picture gallery?

[Mika]

32. Here's a pic of another "Castro apologist"

Canadian Heide Trampus from the Worker to Worker Canada-Cuba
Labour Solidarity Network wears a shirt opposing the imprisonment
of the five Cubans charged with espionage in the U.S. at the anti Free
Trade Area of the Americas (FTTA) summit in Havana, January 26, 2004.
Activists from 32 countries attend the summit to brainstorm on how
to kill the hemispheric trade pact backed by the U.S.
REUTERS/Claudia Daut




Leonard Weinglass:
The Arrogance of US Administration is not Surprising
http://www.freethefive.org/weinglass012304.cfm


www.freethefive.org

[Osolomia]

46. Republican Senator in stuning defiance of Bush and Dem prez contenders

Idaho Senator Larry E. Craig (R), shakes hands with Pedro Alvarez, chairman of Cuba's food import agency, as Idaho Congressman C. L. Otter looks on during a signing ceremony in Havana February 7, 2004.

Candidates on the Issues: Cuba
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=338191

Go figure!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Osolomia]

33. Yet another "Castro apologist" in today's news, this time a humanitarian

There's more to Cuba than just 48 hours
Saturday, February 7, 2004

In April 2003, we traveled to Cuba and visited for 10 days.

We were part of a humanitarian delegation, People to People International.

So it was with interest and dismay we read The Record's Jan. 30 article regarding the 48-hour visit of members of the Alex G. Spanos family.

Our Cuban visit was life-changing and one we'll never forget. The people and country are unbelievably beautiful, creative, peaceful, artistic, patient, kind, innovative, polite, gracious, tenacious and proud.

It's unfair for a member of the Spanos family to say, "If you wanted to show someone why communism doesn't work, that's the perfect example" after spending only 48 hours in a confined area.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

Stockton
http://www.recordnet.com/daily/news/articles/020704-e-4.php

[Osolomia]

40. "Castro apologists" everywhere, "exiles" going for cosmetic surgery!

Vanity surgery chic, despite the waiting
February 8, 2004
Vanessa Bauza, Sun Sentinel

... In recent years cosmetic surgery has become one of the most sought after procedures in Havana hospitals serving dollar-paying foreigners.

At the Cira Garcia clinic, which is better stocked and equipped than most hospitals serving Cuban patients, many procedures cost about half of what they do in the United States. Despite a ban on American travelers to Cuba, U.S. patients -- many of them Cuban Americans -- rank third after Bahamians and Venezuelans seeking cosmetic surgery, said Dr. Jesus Burgue, one of the clinic's surgeons.

More...
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/columnists/sfl-abauza08feb08,0,6549246.column?coll=sfla-news-col

[Judi Lynn]

41. Unbelievable, simply unbelievable.

The very people who raise hell about Fidel Castro are sneaking back to Cuba to get plastic surgery from the great Cuban hospitals at one half what they'd pay here.

Interesting story of the Montreal "exile" who has returned for multiple surgery. Quite a hike to save big bucks, and they just let them back in to take advantage of the difference in costs.

Nice work if you can get it: howl and rage against Cuba's government from Miami, then get on a plane and get down there for great deals in plastic surgery.

In the meantime, some Americans are still totally unaware that "exiles" go to Cuba for any reason, since they are living with film noire images of desperate figures running down streets trying to defect, with American officials helping them to escape from their government's secret service agents, unable to recognize fantasy, propaganda from fact.

It should always be stressed that Cuba would have been GLAD to take back Orlando Bosch, after he bombed the Cubana air liner with 73 souls on board, including students from Guyana, and the entire Cuban Olympic fencing team. He tried to get into over 30 countries which absolutely refused him entry, before Jeb Bush, with his Cuban "exile" friends got George H. W. Bush to overturn the U.S. Attorney General's decision to refuse him admittance:

(snip) In the report, acting Associate Attorney General Joe D. Whitley argued that "the evidence leads me inescapably to the conclusion that Bosch would instigate, plan and participate in terrorist actions in the United States if and when it served his purpose. I therefore conclude that he is a threat to the national security."

The material that led Whitely to this conclusion went beyond suspicion of Bosch's role in the airliner bombing. It referred to Bosch's 1968 trial and conviction in federal court for firing a bazooka at a Polish freighter docked in Miami. It included information linking him to "some 16 episodes involving bombings, attempted kidnappings, assassination and attempted assassinations in the United States, Spain, the Caribbean and South America."

The 1989 Justice Department document mentions "threats conveyed by Bosch to leaders of other countries to damage ships and planes." That same brief to deport Bosch also states that "in June 1974, Bosch publicly admitted having sent package bombs to Cuban Embassies in Lima (Peru), Madrid (Spain), Ottawa and Buenos Aires (Argentina)." Two of the bombs resulted in injury to embassy employees and a Spanish postal employee.

The FBI had reported that in 1974 and 1976 "Bosch was in possession of bombs, explosive materials and an automatic weapon."
In the late 1980s, Venezuelan judicial authorities fiddled over whether or not to retry Bosch for the airliner explosion. Meanwhile, the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela at the time, Otto Reich (now assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs), worked with then-President George H.W. Bush to return Bosch to the United States.

Even though former Attorney General Dick Thornburgh called Bosch an "unrepentant terrorist," and other law-enforcement officials urged the president to deport him, this didn't happen. Bosch got a pardon rather than the boot out of the country. (snip)

http://www.progressive.org/Media%20Project%202/mpslj1702.html

You really wonder why Orlando Bosch didn't want to go back to Cuba, too, just like these "exiles" seeking the most bang for their bucks, don't you?

[Mika]

42. I beg to differ on one thing

"The very people who raise hell about Fidel Castro are sneaking back to Cuba to get plastic surgery from the great Cuban hospitals at one half what they'd pay here."


I know that I've said this before to an unbelieving DU crowd.. not all Cuban-Americans are fervent anti-Castroists. As has been posted here many times, most Cubans immigrate to the US for the same reasons that immigrants from all over the Caribbean and the Latin Americas come to the US. Not because they hate their homeland, not because they have a visceral hatred for their head of state, but because they seek jobs and money in the USA. Many send money back home to their families and return for visits just like immigrants from all over.

Keep in mind that most Cuban-Americans have come here fully legally (only a small minority arrive illegally on smugglers go-fast boats or rafts). Many are post revolution born Cubans with no hatred of President Castro or socialism. Most are registered Dem, liberal and socially minded people whose voices have been usurped by the extremist exiles and a complicit media. Don't fall into the trap of broad-brushing all Cuban-Americans with the extremist exile's taint. The extremists want Americans to think that all Cuban-Americans are of the same extremist anti Castro "exile" mindset. It is just not so.

[Judi Lynn]

43. Would you agree on this point?

If these people decide to cast their lots with the economy in another country, they should seek things like plastic surgery within the framework of those new homelands, rather than sneaking back to Cuba for a fantastic 50% cost cut?

That truly seems wrong to me, Mika. Really does. If they want to live in America or Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Spain, or Venezuela, they shouldn't go back to Cuba for bargains so their salaries in those countries will go farther.

I definitely have learned some, but not a lot, yet, about the real differences in the Cuban community of exiles. The right-wing looney-toon First Wave "exiles" are usually the ones people outside Florida hear about, to tell you the truth.

I read it wasn't until Elián's being taken hostage by his drunken greatuncle's family that enough attention was focused on Miami to the point the extremists were shown as who they are, and lost a lot of clout nationally, and never got it back. I read at THAT time moderate groups within the community started becoming more visible.

I hope they keep on pushing.

[Mika]

44. Why

"If these people decide to cast their lots with the economy in another country, they should seek things like plastic surgery within the framework of those new homelands, rather than sneaking back to Cuba for a fantastic 50% cost cut?"


Why?

If Cuba provides a better service cheaper than the US and can still use this enterprise as a profit center to subsidize its own universal health care system, why not? Isn't the goal of normalization w/Cuba to open up travel and trade on all levels? To expand the Cuban economy? What is not right is, 1) we Americans cannot do the same thing as Cuban immigrants and are travel banned by our own gov, 2) we Americans do not have a universal health care system that makes health care affordable to all.

Rather than opposing travel and trade with Cuba, I support it. Americans included.

[Osolomia]

48. Yet another in today's news, this time a Canadian Grammy award nominee

A review of the Grammy award nominated album:

Featured Artist: Jane Bunnett
CD Title: Cuban Odyssey
Year: 2002
Record Label: Blue Note
Style: Latin Jazz / Latin Funk

... Just as you would expect Bunnett and Cramer to have expended all of their boundless energy in recording Cuban artists on the CD’s that they lead, on Cuban Odyssey, they come up with even more layers of meaning within the insulated music that, in many cases, ventured no further than the villages where it was performed—until Bunnett and Cramer came along. Their first CD’s of Cuban music took delight in recording, in many cases for the first time, the Havana musicians with whom they formed alliances and friendships. But now that they have left their comfort zone, Bunnett and Cramer are realizing that even more forms of music awaited their discovery in the 18 years that they have been flying to Cuba for artistic inspiration and support.

In between the short beginning and ending tracks, “Arrival” and “Movin’ On” (basically the same theme with different titles), Bunnett indeed takes a journey that does lead her back home again, changed and wiser, as in an odyssey. The significance of her year 2000 trip cannot be underestimated because it allowed her to appreciate the music even more. Traveling to the port city of Matanzas, to Cienfuegos and then to the countryside town of Camagüey, Bunnett and Cramer joined in with the local musicians (and in the presence of a Canadian film crew) to document generations-old music that had rarely, or never, had been recorded. The remaining tracks were recorded in the state-owned Egrem Studios in Havana, where their friends join them on Cuban choral number of “Quítate el Chaqetón,” Cramer’s and 18-year-old Thommy Rojas’ trumpets soaring above the singing. “Ron Con Ron” once again combines 9 voices with a driving percussion section and horns. Fittingly, Bunnett includes a previously unreleased track, “A La Rumba,” featuring the legendary Merceditas Valdés, who was a powerful presence on Bunnett’s Chamalongo CD, which Valdés recorded before her death.

... In addition to supporting Cuban music, Bunnett and Cramer support Cuban youth by providing opportunities for several young artists on Cuban Odyssey, including 18-year-old pianist David Virelles, the young batá drum player Vladimir Paisán and Rojas mentioned above. Beyond their support of Cuban musicians, Bunnett and Cramer have arranged humanitarian assistance for students in Havana as they have helped arrange the donations of thousands of dollars worth of instruments, reeds, parts and sheet music badly needed on an island where such things are in short supply.

There is no doubt that Jane Bunnett and Larry Cramer found their life’s calling. However, recognition of their achievements has been sporadic, most recently through the awarding of Canadian Juno Award, the equivalent of the Grammy Award. The odyssey that began with their vacation to Cuba in 1984 continues. It will never end as long as Bunnett and Cramer are able to uncover even more musical gems during their travels in Cuba. Cuban Odyssey represents the latest installment in their continuing adventures.

More...
http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:7hhFmWTp4zgJ:www.jazzreview.com/cdreviewprint.cfm%3FID%3D3943+%22Cuban+Odyssey%22+Bunnett&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

[Judi Lynn]

49. Got to hear this album, thanks so much for the article

Have heard of her and her partner for years, and never got the chance to hear their Cuba-inspired music yet. It sounds as if they are picking up more and more celebrity now. Very decent!

(The link on the thread is goofy. For some reason it produces a happy face. You'll need to check the little box beside "Check if you DO NOT wish to use emotion icons in your message" to avoid it next time. I don't know what that's about.)

http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:7hhFmWTp4zgJ:www.jazzreview.com/cdreviewprint.cfm%3FID%3D3943+%22Cuban+Odyssey%22+Bunnett&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

[Osolomia]

56. Whow, a whole gang of "Castro apologists"! What's a biased DUer to do

in the face of such a steady stream of evidence at their fingertips?

Ditch Cuba trade policy, says S.C. delegation
By Dennis Quick
Senior Staff Writer
February 9, 2004

Eliminating the 42-year-old U.S. trade em­bargo against Cuba would strengthen that country economically, make it friendlier toward the United States and bring “billions” of future dollars to South Carolina.

That’s what members of a South Carolina trade delegation to Cuba told an audience of state and local business professionals during a Jan. 23 luncheon at the Harbour Club, an event sponsored by the S.C. World Trade Center.

“I never talked politics. My business is to deliver goods,” Charleston-based Maybank Shipping President Jack Maybank said of his visit last month to Cuba. While in Cuba, Maybank and his fellow South Carolina delegates, including Lt. Gov. André Bauer, Rep. Chip Limehouse, Agriculture Commissioner Charles Sharpe and Maybank Shipping executive Jack Maybank Jr., each of whom addressed the Harbour Club gathering, signed a $10 million trade agreement with dictator Fidel Castro’s government.

... “Our Cuba policy is a failed policy,” he added, pointing out that it is also a hypocritical one since the United States trades openly with China and North Korea, two communist countries whose human rights violations are just as notorious as Cuba’s.

... Bauer said Gov. Mark Sanford supports free trade with Cuba and believes such trade “is best for diplomatic relations with Cuba.”

More...
http://www.charlestonbusiness.com/issues/10_4/news/3178-1.html

[Osolomia]

58. Yet more "Castro apologists" this time the National Council of Curches

not that many "progressive Democrats" seem to give a damn about how we treat our own next door neighbors:

NCC Delegation Says U.S.-Cuba Contacts Important in Tense Times
Date Mon, 9 Feb 2004
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

In Tense Times, Contacts Are All the More Important, Concludes NCC
Delegation to Cuba

February 9, 2004, NEW YORK CITY - Participants in a U.S. ecumenical
delegation visit to Cuba in late January returned convinced of the
importance of maintaining contacts with churches there, especially at this
time of heightened tension between the United States and Cuba. For their
part, Cuban church leaders asked their U.S. counterparts for pastoral
accompaniment and prayers.

Led by National Council of Churches General Secretary Bob Edgar, a United
Methodist, the 30-member delegation spent Jan. 22-28 in Cuba. Delegation
members participated in events surrounding the consecration of the new Greek
Orthodox Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Old Havana - a celebration led by
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, spiritual leader of the world's 250
million Orthodox Christians.

They also met with Cuban and other Caribbean and Latin American church
leaders for consultation on shared concerns, building on relationships that
have been maintained since before the Cuban Revolution. They heard their
Cuban counterparts' accounts of the ongoing hardships caused by the
U.S.-imposed trade embargo and travel restrictions, and the anxieties raised
by a rise in aggressive rhetoric on the part of the United States.

"There is real poverty in Cuba, and that doesn't have to exist," he said.
"If the United States changed its attitude toward that nation and gave it
support rather than hostility, the quality of life for the people who live
in Cuba could be improved. The Soviet Union changed because of the exchange
of people and ideas, and I think the same will happen in Cuba."

... Said Ms Hadjes, "The most important task for us in the States is to start to
understand the truth about Cuba, what the churches are doing here, what life
is like in Cuba. Most of my views and perspectives have been shaped by
media and government sound bites," she said, "and my life is busy in other
directions, and Cuba wasn't really something I was paying attention to. But
from now on I will be paying attention."

More...
http://www.wfn.org/2004/02/msg00054.html

[Judi Lynn]

19. Interesting Friday story on Miami Mafia getting "scammed" by a con-man

Posted on Fri, Feb. 06, 2004

SPY STORY
Alleged scam bait: Castro's money
A fraud artist who once claimed he was sent to blow up the Cuban American National Foundation allegedly concocted a new scheme that mixes defector spies, the CIA and Fidel Castro.
BY LARRY LEBOWITZ
[e-mail]

The convicted scam artist devised the quintessential Miami story to rope in his potential victims: Cuban exiles with plenty of anti-Castro passion -- and money -- to burn.

Roberto Martin told them he was a former Cuban intelligence officer who had defected after helping steal millions of the dictator's dollars. Martin and a pal posing as a Secret Service agent said they were working, as part of a secret CIA operation, to bring the money stateside, according to an indictment unsealed Thursday.

Anyone willing to finance some of the front-end costs would be rewarded with untold millions -- riches made all the sweeter because they were coming directly from the pockets of El Barbudo, Fidel Castro himself.

Martin, 36 of Miami Lakes, was charged Thursday with conspiracy and impersonating a federal agent, among other crimes. It wouldn't be his first time posing as a spy, records show.

In April 1996, Martin strolled into the offices of the Cuban American National Foundation and announced that he had been sent to kill Ninoska Perez Castellon, the late CANF chairman Jorge Mas Canosa and President Francisco ''Pepe'' Hernandez. Martin, who arrived by raft in 1994, claimed he was supposed to blow up the foundation headquarters with a van filled with explosives.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/7887011.htm

[Osolomia]

25. Heads up for DUers who prefer to dwell on facts not fantasy

No doubt Snow will say what the Bush Doctrine apologists want to hear:

06 February 2004

Treasury's Snow to Discuss Cuba Policy, U.S. Economy
Remarks planned for after G-7 meeting in Florida

The Department of the Treasury
February 5, 2004
Statement by Treasury Spokesman Rob Nichols

After the G7 Meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors in Boca Raton, Treasury Secretary John Snow will visit Miami, Tampa and Jacksonville, Florida February 9-10 to discuss U.S. policy towards Cuba and the President's plan to further strengthen the U.S. economy and create jobs.

On February 9th, in Miami, the Secretary will deliver remarks before an audience of Cuban Americans about the economic embargo against Castro's regime and our hopes for freedom for the Cuban people.

http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2004&m=February&x=20040206105550SAikceinawz0.2678186&t=usinfo/wf-latest.html

[Osolomia]

26. In case theres a travel banned DUer who wants to know what they're missing

instead of clinging to Cold War fantasies:

Party... and don't forget the cigars
Even after 40 years of sanctions, the joie de vivre of Cubans is undimmed. Rory Ross prepares to join Fidel Castro and a host of stars at the capital's annual cigar festival

07 February 2004

The Havana Cigar Festival is something of a misnomer. Instead of "cigar", you could insert just about any noun you want, so long as it is strongly linked with some form of self-indulgence. Cigars are merely the excuse.

Whatever your ostensible reasons for visiting Havana - music, architecture, sun, sea, sand or cigars - you cannot help but be swept up by the totality of this city's dance-happy, fluorescent, high-tempo social orbit. Once you've experienced Havana's frolicsome, bare-shouldered, orange-blossom and frangipani-scented nights, it's hard to resist going back for more. If I may inject a personal note, I'm living proof of this point. I'll soon be a veteran of three Havana Cigar Festivals, yet I've never smoked anything in my life.

The timing of the festival is critical. The harvest is in full swing, cigars are being rolled, the bougainvillea and hibiscus are in bloom, and one's children are back at school. It's time to dust down the Panama hat, take the mothballs out of the linen suit, move to the salsa beat, drink in the splendid gaiety and glittering sociability of Havana, and reflect that life can indeed have its moments.

The festival made its formal debut in 1999, when a gobsmacked Fidel (as he is known) declared, "We must do this every year." He'd just signed five humidors that raised $750,000 (£450,000) at a charity auction during the climactic Gala Dinner, attended by 850 guests, then the biggest slap-up banquet ever held in Cuba for which the organisers had to import extra plates and glasses.

Today, the festival has matured into a world event, drawing CNN and celebrities. In 2000, Gabriel García Márquez sat next to Fidel at the Gala Dinner. Last year, Gran-Corona-sized cigar personality David Tang gathered together a star-spangled coterie of Lord Rothschild, his son Nat, Bianca Jagger, Matt Dillon, Sir Mark and Lady Weinberg, Jocelyn Stevens and Vivien Duffield - the "Tang Gang". Cigar "tastings", factory tours, plantation visits, dinners and cocktail parties are played out to a soundtrack of pulsating Cuban music, against a moody backdrop of crumbling Havana. The architectural vernacular is one of Cuba's glories. It is the most sustained and magnificent anthology of Spanish colonial piecrust, garlanded with revolutionary iconography.

More...
http://travel.independent.co.uk/americas/central/story.jsp?story=488656

[Osolomia]

27. I don’t understand because I don’t feel I’m a terrorist. I am not, I can’t

... Ibrahim Ferrer, the 76-year-old singer from the Grammy-nominated Buena Vista Social Club, was dumbfounded to learn that, according to the Cuban Music Institute, the United States invoked a law that applies to terrorists, drug dealers and dangerous criminals to deny him a visa.

“I don’t understand because I don’t feel I’m a terrorist. I am not, I can’t be,” he said at a news conference.

Ferrer has won three Grammys in recent years and has traveled to the United States in the past.

http://www.thepeninsulaqatar.com/Display_news.asp?section=World_News&subsection=Americas&month=February2004&file=World_News2004020724216.xml

Keep Ferrer out but let those who needlessly endanger their children in.

SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! SHAME!

[Mika]

28. A BBC report on the Cuban musician US visa denials w/Ry Cooder

http://www.theworld.org/globalhits/index.shtml

With or without Janet Jackson, this Sunday night Los Angeles will be abuzz with Grammy fever. But for the second year in a row, most of the nominees from Cuba won't be there. The World's Marco Werman explains why.

76 year-old Cuban singer Ibrahim Ferrer's latest recording is "Buenos Hermanos." It's nominated for a Grammy award in the best Tropical latin album category. Last year, Ferrer was also nominated. And just like last year, the State department did not grant Ibrahim Ferrer a visa to make the trip.

More, w/audio link --> http://www.theworld.org/globalhits/index.shtml

[Osolomia]

29. Doesn't US "have bigger enemies to worry about than an elderly musician"

Cuban Musicians Locked Out Of Grammy Awards
Friday February 06, 2004 @ 02:30 PM
By: ChartAttack.com Staff

Call us crazy, but — with the conflict in Iraq raging on and Janet Jackson terrorizing football fans with her breasts — don’t the U.S. government have bigger enemies to worry about than an elderly musician from Cuba?

A group of Cuban musicians, including 77-year-old Ibriham Ferrer, have been denied passage to the U.S. to attend this Sunday’s Grammy Awards in Los Angeles. As a matter of protection of national security, all Cuban musicians are being barred from entering the country for the awards show.

All five nominees in the Best Traditional Tropical Latin Album — Ferrer, Septeto Nacional Ignacio Pineiro, Soneros De Verdad Presents Rubalcaba, Barbarito Torres and Amadito Valdes — hail from Cuba, so none of them will be on hand to accept the award. One Cuban artist, pianist Chuco Valdes — who is nominated for Best Latin Jazz Album — has managed to obtain a U.S. visa, but, according to Billboard.com, he refuses to attend unless the remainder of his Cuban brethren are allowed in the country.

More...
http://www.chartattack.com/damn/2004/02/0609.cfm

But if they needlessly endangered the lives of children to get to the US illegally DUers would be screaming "let them in" for their ingenuity. Go figure!

[Osolomia]

30. Maybe if Ferrer painted his car green DUers would support letting him in!

Ibrahim Ferrer

[Judi Lynn]

34. Interesting observations from an unexpected traveler to Cuba

While looking for information on Benjamin Treuhaft, and his organization, "Senda Piana to Havana," I found the following article about a man whose grandfather established the Havana Country Club.

He came back to the U.S. after the Revolution. His grandson met Treuhaft and went to Havana with him:

(snip) The Stanwoods were amazed to find that the country club was unchanged; the furniture was the same, the same two urns stood on the mantel, the same barometer hung on the wall near the fireplace. Like so much of Havana, the room had been frozen in time.

The only thing missing was the portrait of Frederick Snare, which the Stanwoods learned had been taken to the Havana Museum of Fine Arts for safekeeping after the revolution.

''All these years we always thought they had probably trashed the place. I imagined it had been burned in the name of the revolution, my grandfather's portrait slashed and destroyed as a symbol of capitalism,'' Stanwood says.

Instead they found that after the revolution the country club had been turned into Cuba's first school of the arts, the Instituto Superior de Arte. It is where the country's most talented artists come to study music, sculpture, painting, dance and theater.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

(snip/...)

http://www.stanwoodpiano.com/globecub.htm

[Moderator]

52. Judilyn

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
news source.


Thank you


DU Moderator

[question everything]

36. ABC News suggested that Bush is trying to kiss ass in Miami

yet a report from Miami did not see the musicians as communist infiltrators. I hope that someone at the Grammy will make a comment. Of course, this will be viewed as "Hollywood liberals, etc."

[Osolomia]

45. Weapons of musical destruction

Weapons of musical destruction
Stout security keeps us safe from rampaging Cuban musicians.
Sunday, February 8, 2004

The State Department has denied U.S. visas to a group of Cuban musicians who sought to attend tonight's Grammy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles.

One of them will win anyway -- all five nominees in the Latin tropical album category are Cubans -- but the Bush administration is determined to protect Americans at all costs.

U.S. officialdom has outdone itself with its rationale for such a moronic decision. Because Cuban officials are (mostly) barred from this country by U.S. law, and because "most Cuban artists are compensated by the Cuban government" and thus their income "financially enriches the Castro regime," they can't visit this country, the State Department says.

If you're having trouble getting your brain around that logic, don't bother. The real explanation is much simpler.

It has next to nothing to do with foreign policy -- or music, for that matter -- and everything to do with President Bush's election-year pandering to Cuban-Americans in the Miami area. Although their numbers are dwindling, those who demand unrelenting hostility to Havana -- even if those hurt are innocent Cubans with no affection for Fidel Castro's Communist government -- might swing the outcome in Florida in a tight contest.

More...
http://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/story/8101663p-8958165c.html

[Osolomia]

47. Oh oh, has the USSA let Jane Bunnett in for the Grammy's?

One of the nominees for Best Latin Jazz Album is Canadian. Toronto-born saxophonist and flutist Jane Bunnett fell in love with Latin music on her first trip to Cuba in 1982. Her return trips resulted in a string of recordings inspired by the country's rich musical heritage, including her Grammy-nominated album Cuban Odyssey. It was recorded in Cuba with local musicians and a group called The Afro-Cuban Rumba All-Stars.

http://www.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=00A7508B-6776-4933-A6E7E74B06AE9A24

[Judi Lynn]

51. They may still try to apply the Helms-Burton to her!

You know they would if they could!

[Osolomia]

54. What is lost by denying visas to Cuban artists? Hearts and minds

Mon, Feb. 09, 2004
What is lost by denying visas to Cuban artists? Hearts and minds
BY ENRIQUE FERNANDEZ
MIAMI HEERALD!

The decision by the U.S. government to deny visas to Cuban musicians invited to attend the Grammy Awards in Los Angeles yesterday is in sync with the sentiment of many in Miami's Cuban community. But, how smart is it?

According to Friday's Herald, a State Department official said that this denial was meant ``to prevent the flow of dollars through compensation received by the artists, considered to be government employees, from reaching Cuba's coffers.''

This is precisely the argument made by Cuban exile groups who have lobbied for exclusion of Cuban nationals from the Grammy ceremony over the past few years -- the issue over which the Latin Grammy Awards, given under the same umbrella as the national Grammy, moved from Miami to Los Angeles in 2001. That ceremony never took place, for it was scheduled for Sept. 11, 2001.

The 2001 Latin Grammy show was to exclude performances by Cuban nationals -- despite the rumors that had circulated freely in Little Havana that year. But plenty of Cuban artists came to watch the awards, dreaming of that golden gramophone, all of whom, according to the academy rules, had been invited to the ceremony.

... What is lost by denying visas to these artists? The usual. Hearts and minds. Both the U.S. government and the Miami exile community -- reviled by Castro as ''the Mafia'' -- look like yahoos. Once more.

More...
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/7909176.htm

[Mika]

55. Maintaining the status quo

The exiles need Castro in order to continue sucking at the American taxpayers teat. (Hundreds of US taxpayer supported "free Cuba" foundations in Miami.)

US politcians gain from maintaining the status quo. (Campaign contributions from interests on both sides of the US/Cuba trade & travel issues.)


We, the citizens of both countries, pay for all of this with our tax money and our rights.

[Osolomia]

57. Miami vice Or, how Cuban musicians endanger U.S.

Sacramento Bee Editorial Staff
Saturday, February 7, 2004

... U.S. officialdom has outdone itself with its rationale for such a moronic decision. Because Cuban officials are (mostly) barred from this country by U.S. law, and because "most Cuban artists are compensated by the Cuban government" and thus their income "financially enriches the Castro regime," they can't visit this country, the State Department says.

If you're having trouble getting your brain around that logic, don't bother. The real explanation is much simpler. It has next to nothing to do with foreign policy and everything to do with President Bush's election-year pandering to Cuban Americans in the Miami area. Although their numbers are dwindling, those who demand unrelenting hostility to Havana -- even if those hurt are innocent Cubans with no affection for Fidel Castro's Communist government -- might swing the outcome in Florida in a tight contest.

... Compounding the stupidity, the visa denials come at an awkward time for the administration. Just this week, Undersecretary of State Margaret Tutwiler, a Bush family loyalist whose job is to help repair the damage to the U.S. image in the world, told a House committee that "it will take us many years of hard, focused work" to do that. Barring Cuban musicians as "detrimental to the interests of the United States" can only make Tutwiler's job harder.

More...
http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/8228366p-9159251c.html

[Judi Lynn]

59. The fact these Cuban artists have been in and out of the U.S. previously

doesn't seem to phase the _Bush administration, even if it shows _Bush is actually breaking with tradition to make big points with the Miami Mafia whose favor he always expects to claim.

MANY of the Cuban musicians and the Cuban Ballet Nacional and artists, teachers, doctors, scientists, athletes have been in and out for YEARS. It looks so damned strange now when _Bush starts claiming they are undesireable agents of a sinister government.

From the article you linked:

(snip) We're not sure how much of these artists' income goes to the Cuban treasury, but we do know that their music is popular with many Americans, especially that of the Buena Vista Social Club. The group's vocalist, Ibrahim Ferrer, is among those denied a visa. Oddly enough, the group has performed in this country in the past. Was that visit and the popular film of their fine work shown awhile back violations of the Trading With the Enemy Act? (snip)

[Judi Lynn]

60. Interesting item from John Kennedy's speech writer, reference to Cuba

From Richard Goodwin:

(snip) In 1961, when I was 28 and fresh to the Kennedy White House from the campaign trail, I climbed to the upper reaches of the State Department for a high-level meeting to discuss the planned invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. Almost every top official involved in the operation, except for the president, was there. Richard Bissell, a legendary figure of cold war intelligence, the man responsible for the U-2 spy plane, assured us that once the American-backed rebels had established themselves, the Cuban people would rise up against Castro. Rather tentatively, I asked Bissell how we had reached this conclusion. He calmly turned to the general sitting beside him and said, rather casually, "We have an N.I.E. on that, don't we?" referring to a classified National Intelligence Estimate. The general nodded.

In fact, no such intelligence estimate existed. But Bissell's primary interest in intelligence data was that it help him get presidential approval of an operation to which he had devoted so much energy. Perhaps, having received so many assurances from Cuban exiles, he truly believed the claim. But he was wrong and John F. Kennedy was wrong to trust him — and the disaster that unfolded on the Cuban shore in April was the result.
(snip/...)

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/08/opinion/08GOOD.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5062&en=871ed0530397f97a&ex=1076821200&partner=GOOGLE

It's worth considering his giant mistake in accepting the word of the Miami "exiles," who, at that time, had just been thrown OUT of the country, through the revolution, and had their own axe to grind. Hardly valid sources!