Castro

[Kathleen Collins]

Here is what has happened to Elian Gonzalez, the little Cuban boy taken from his caretaker at gunpoint on the orders of stupid, cross-dressing Janet Reno: He has become a communist.

Elian Gonzalez 5 Years Later

Elian Gonzalez speaks for the first time about the battle over him five years ago between the United States and Cuba. Bob Simon interviews the 11-year-old.

Cuban youth Elian Gonzalez, right, receives from Julio Martinez, first secretary of the UJC, Young Communist Union of Cuba, an UJC's identity card during an event marking the 80th anniversary of the birth of Cuba’s revolutionary hero, Argentinean Ernesto "Che" Guevara in Havana, June 14, 2008.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/17/...amp;tag=related

(CBS/AP) The Cuban boy at the center of an international custody battle eight years ago has joined Cuba's Young Communist Union.

Gonzalez drifted into U.S. history on Thanksgiving Day in 1999, a young boy clinging to an inner tube off the Florida coast. His mother and 10 others died trying to reach the U.S. on a raft.

Now 14, Elian was 6 when Miami relatives lost their 4 ½-month fight to keep him in the United States. They argued that his future was much brighter in a free, capitalist America than a closed, communist Cuba. His father Juan Miguel Gonzalez fought just as hard, arguing nothing trumps a father's love and Elian was returned to Cuba in mid-2000.

CBS News correspondent Kelly Cobiella reports Elian has spent the past eight years living in Cuba with his father, now a member of the Cuban National Assembly. His "American" home is a museum today. Relatives have moved on and rarely talk to the media.

Cobiella reports that many in south Florida's exile community see the boy's acceptance into the Communist Party as proof he has grown into Fidel Castro's pawn and propaganda tool.

"He's been using Elian as a needle in the side of free democratic loving Cuban exiles," says Cuban-American Marc Smit, "and he's going to continue using that."

Elian was one of 18-thousand young Cubans officially inducted into the party last weekend. The communist youth newspaper, Juventud Rebelde, quoted the 14-year-old as saying he would never let down ex-President Fidel Castro or his brother, Raul.

Kathy C

[Bernice Moore]

ELIAN AT 14

[Kathleen Collins]

I can't believe there are people on this Forum who think Castro is still alive. Here is some info about his last appearance.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/17/...in4188799.shtml

HAVANA, June 17, 2008

Castro Seen In Rare TV Appearance

Cuban Television Showed Images Of The Ailing Castro Meeting With Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez

"(CBS) The following was reported and written by CBS News producer Portia Siegelbaum in Havana, Cuba.

Cubans got a brief glimpse of their former president, Fidel Castro, on video released on their main evening newscast Tuesday.

Castro, who was sidelined by complications following intestinal surgery in 2006, was seen with visiting Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Raul Castro, his younger brother who took over the presidency of the island in elections last February.

A thin but animated Castro, dressed in an open-neck track suit over pajamas, is seen in a spirited conversation with the other two men in an unidentified garden setting. There is no audio, but the government news anchor said the three were discussing the global food crisis and the U.S. elections, among other issues.

It's been exactly five months since video and photos of Castro, 81, have been made public. The last occasion was in mid-January, when he met with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

The official Cuban media reports that Castro met with Chavez for three hours on Monday and for two hours Tuesday before the Venezuelan leader left for home.

In the video, said to be from Tuesday's meeting, Castro, who is seen both sitting and standing, is making his trademark hand gestures as he speaks vigorously. Nothing was said about the state of his health, which remains a closely guarded secret, and it is impossible to draw any conclusions from the latest video, especially as he cannot be heard speaking, nor is he seen walking.

No pictures were released when Chavez visited Castro last March, nor when he was visited by Bolivian President Evo Morales last month. Morales said following that meeting that the elder Castro was "thin but lucid."

Venezuelan state television broadcast remarks made by Chavez before his departure from Cuba Tuesday describing their conversation:

"We were revising the entire plan for energy exchanges and the strengthening of refinery capacity and production of petroleum and petrochemicals.""

He was emaciated and obviously dying. No one has seen Castro in 2 years. And what we have seen -- could have been taped prior to its date for propaganda purposes after death. I didn't want to disturb the thread about Judyth, so I started this thread FWIW.

IMHO Castro is dead. Is that too far-fetched? He ruled over a country that, if possible, every citizen would leave at a moment's notice. And where would they go? Florida and elsewhere. I know when I was in grammar school, we had an influx of Cuban kids in NJ around 1962 and 1963. Most of them spoke English. It's no secret there were people in this country who wanted him dead, so they could go back to Cuba. Unfortunately, they turned their guns around and killed Kennedy instead, thinking it would be more advantageous to them. It isn't pleasant to think that Kennedy wanted Castro dead. The Catholic Diem Brothers, ruling S. Viet Nam, were assassinated too. There are authors who have said that Kennedy "allowed" the Diem Brothers to die, upsetting the Vatican.

I still think Kennedy was our best President and had a vision for this country.

Kathy C

Edited April 30, 2010 by Kathleen Collins