Articles of Reflections by Fidel

More than two weeks ago, on January 27, 2008, the digital publication Tom Dispatch reproduced an article translated for Rebelión by Germán Leyens: Why The Debt Crisis is Now the Greatest Threat to the American Republic, by Chalmers Johnson. This American author has not been awarded the Nobel Prize, as has Joseph Stiglitz, the famous and well-known economist and writer, or even Milton Friedman himself, who inspired neoliberalism and led many countries down that disastrous path, including the United States.

When in the previous reflection I asked McCain what he thought of the Five antiterrorist Cuban Heroes, I did so because I remembered what he had published on page 206 of his book Faith of My Fathers, co-written with his assistant Mark Salter:

Yesterday, I said that while Bush was speaking to Congress, McCain was being honored at the Versailles Restaurant of Little Havana.

“Taking advantage of the negotiations to free the Bay of Pigs’ prisoners, the CIA tried to use a key person in the talks, American lawyer James B. Donovan, to deliver a lethal gift to Fidel Castro: a wetsuit contaminated with a fungus that lacerates the skin and an underwater breathing device infected with tuberculosis…the gear in fact was given to the Cuban leader in November 1962.

In that already famous Super Tuesday, a day of the week when a number of States of the Union were selecting the candidate of their choice for the presidency of the United States from among a group of contenders, one of the likely candidates to replace George W. Bush was John McCain. Due to of his pre-packaged hero image, and his alliance with strong contenders such as Rudy Giuliani, the former governor of the state of New York, other candidates had already gladly endorsed him. The intense propaganda of social, economic and political factors having great significance in his country, and his personal style had turned him into the frontrunner. Only the extreme Republican right represented by Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, in disagreement with some insignificant McCain concessions, was still offering some resistance on February 5th. Subsequently, Romney would also withdraw in favor of McCain. Huckabee is still in the contest.

I would not like to abuse of the readers patience or the exceptional opportunity Lula offered me to exchange ideas when we met. That is why I said that this will be the fourth and last reflection on his visit.

On the day when hundreds of intellectuals coming from every continent are meeting in Havana to take part in an International Conference for World Equilibrium on the date of José Marti’s birth, on that same day, by some strange quirk, the President of the United States spoke. In his last State of the Union address to Congress, making use of the teleprompter, Bush tells us more with his body language than with the words arranged by his advisors.

The demise of the Soviet Union was to us like there were no more sunrises; a devastating blow for the Cuban Revolution. Not only did this translate into a total cessation of supplies of fuel, materials and foods; we lost markets and the prices that we had attained for our products in the difficult struggle for our sovereignty, integration and principles. The empire and the traitors, full of hatred, were sharpening their daggers with those who wanted to put the revolutionaries to the sword and recover the country’s riches.

Lula warmly reminded me of the first time he visited our country in 1985 to take part in a meeting organized by Cuba to analyze the overwhelming problem of the foreign debt; participants representing a wide spectrum of political, religious, cultural and social tendencies presented and discussed their opinions, concerned about the asphyxiating drama.

He spontaneously decided to visit Cuba for the second time since he became President of Brazil, even though the state of my health did not guarantee that he would be able to meet with me.