UPDATE: This also is posted on DailyKos, where one of the commenters made known another post on DailyKos, a short while earlier, which was from someone in Cuba, and very good it is. The link.
Most surprising to me was the number of Republicans in South Florida who seemed to think nothing had happened. Main spreader of this line was U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25), who stood in Little Havana and told NBC Channel 6 at midday that all the Cubans were doing was changing titles, and that as long as Fidel was alive he was in power. “He can call himself the queen of England. He’s still in power.”
Well, yes, wise to be cautious, but Castro says he’s too sick to continue and he won’t run for office.
I prefer the thoughts of the challenger for District 25’s seat in the U.S. House, Joe Garcia, as much a Cuban American as the incumbent.
"We are witnessing the beginning of the end of one of the most oppressive regimes in history,” Garcia said in a statement. “Despite the symbolism of this morning's events, the world community should remain cautiously optimistic and accept nothing less than the absolute freedom of the Cuban people. The transfer of power between brothers is not change, it is nepotism. The Bush administration should act immediately with an effective foreign policy that leads to real change in Cuba, not just empty rhetoric. To help advance democracy we need to allow for the reunification of Cuban families and the direct sending of remittances to the island's brave dissidents. It's time to break from the status quo."
I looked in vain to find a comment like Garcia’s in the Miami Herald’s supposedly exhaustive wrapup of local reaction to the Castro news. The main story online at midday Tuesday had three bylines and 12 other reporters contributing, but no coverage of the Democrats challenging the three incumbent Republicans in the U.S. House. Joe Garcia had been on the Air America station commenting already at 7:30 a.m., and the statement above went to media outlets before 10:30 a.m.
Rather than the Democrats’ moderate plea to break from the status quo, the local media relied more on keep the same line. Mario Diaz-Balart, his brother Lincoln Diaz-Balart (FL-21) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-18) are the main proponents in Congress of the Bushite hard line – some call it cruel – that bars most Cuban family visits and sending remittances to Cuba. This is exactly what the Democratic challengers as a team are proposing should be changed: to permit family visits and the sending of remittances.
I should declare an interest here as a member of Joe Garcia’s media team as well as volunteer communications director and blogger for the Miami-Dade Democratic Party. But I still think it’s pretty clear that much of the media in South Florida had a hard time finding anyone to buck the official hard line on Castro.
The Miami Herald’s Naked Politics blog did run a few paragraphs of the Democrats’ plea for more family visits and remittances, but more space on that blog went to U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen’s odd comment:
"It matters nothing at all whether Fidel, Raul or any other thug is named head of anything in Cuba," she said, in part. "What the people want is freedom to express their dissent from the oppressive regime. The community machinery is enslaving them so it does not matter who the thug of the moment will be.”
She rambled on demanding indictments against the Cubans for shooting down Cuban American fliers 12 years ago.
Again from Naked Politics: “In Tallahassee, House Speaker Marco Rubio, the first Cuban-American to be elected Florida House Speaker, compared Castro to a "crazy uncle" and brushed off the news that he won't seek re-election as nothing but "40-plus years of smoke and mirrors.”
That’s another Republican saying nothing had happened. It spilled over onto CNN, where Jill Dougherty strode around in Little Havana saying on camera that few Democratic Party figures were willing to suggest changes in U.S. policy.
But Jill, what about the three Democrats running for Congress from Miami? What about Sen. Chris Dodd and others in Congress who say the whole Cuba embargo should end?
Early in the afternoon the Florida Democratic Party arranged a conference call for reporters with the chance to question Joe Garcia and his two fellow challengers for Congress, Annette Taddeo (District 18) and Raul Martinez (District 21), along with Luis Garcia, a Cuban American from Miami Beach in the Florida House of Representatives.
We can hope that from this some wider coverage will result – not so monolitihic, please.
During the conference call one reporter asked about the overall embargo – should it be lifted? Joe Garcia responded by saying the embargo was not very strong, since the United States had sold $435 million dollars worth of food to Cuba in the past year. “But it shows we stand against the brutal regime,’ he said, adding that it would be “too big a bite at once” to lift the embargo without “first steps” and signs of improved conditions in Cuba.
As always I’m too hopeful in expecting fair and broad coverage, I guess. One phrase stands out in my memory, from a Latina who called in to Nicole Sandler’s early-morning show on the Air America station, WINZ. She said she had been leery of speaking with her Cuba-born mother about the Castro announcement “because she’s so emotional about it.”
To be kept in mind: Emotional – not rational.
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