A-list message, [A-List] Fw: Letter to the Editor re: Cuba

"Wave of repression sweeps media"

The Toronto Star

Dear Editors,

RE: "Wave of repression sweeps Cuba" (April 13)

There was a time when the notions of context, balance, research and a keen sense for accuracy meant something to the media. Obviously, new lows can be achieved if one strives to swish down the party-line like an oyster on the half-shell, especially if this party-line is the one so ably funded by an extremist group of zealots and known terrorists resident in Miami. There are so many distortions in this article that it is pointless to try and counter them one by one.

Let me suggest that the context, which is categorically lacking in this article, might include the following:

1) the US has waged an immoral, illegal, criminal blockade against Cuba for some four decades;

2) this insidious action by the world?s most militaristic country has been condemned by virtually every country in the world, year after year, at the United Nations, with the exception of the US and Israel;

3) the US has carried on a hostile, overt, criminal campaign to oust the Cuban government over this period;

4) the kabal of thugs in Miami which carries out terrorist actions against Cuba, actions that have killed tourists, including a Canadian, have not been condemned, nor tempered, by the US government;

5) Cuba is a sovereign country, and, moreover, a country proud of its accomplishments in health care, education, science, and humanitarian ventures around the world (Cuba has doctors in 22 developing countries working with marginalized segments of the local populations for free; how many do Canada and the US have?);

6) there are five Cubans languishing in prison in the US because they had the nerve to stop terrorist activities originating in the US against Cuba (where are the articles on these five heroic souls who have led the fight against terrorism? When will Amnesty International speak out on US "repression"?);

7) Cuba is suffering economically, but why?; does the forty-year US blockade have anything to do with it?; as bad as things are today, the situation has improved markedly since 1990, when overnight Cuba lost 70% of its economy due to the collapse of the Soviet Union;

8) given the rampant hypocrisy and media misreprsentation during the invasion on Iraq, should we be in "shock and awe" that journalists feel that a little patriotism needs to be splashed on the afternoon cocktail?

About the trials that took place, does Cuba not have its own constitution, legal structure and sovereignty to determine what should take place within its borders? Canada would certainly handle its own affairs, and the US, well, what?s the point of thinking that even the United Nations could have any influence on that country? Surely, with the world?s wealthiest nation at the doorstep pounding away, literally having seized the southeast corner of the island and having installed a military base of gargantuan proportion, with all of its resources to reproduce the most fallacious lies, and all of its resources to fuel the overthrow of a regime that enjoys the popular support of the people, we must consider the context. These trials took place because of the stated US objective of regime change in Cuba, because the US was working actively with these people to overthrow the regime, because no other country on the face of the Earth would tolerate such a situation, and because Cuba is simply under siege by these forces which are operating illegally and in a criminal way.

Canada is not the US, and when our journalists comfortably inhale the insipid fumes emanating from a highly undemocratic group of discredited henchmen from the Batista era in Miami, well, we all feel a little queasy. Unfortunately, the several hundred thousand Canadians who visit Cuba annually, and the thousands of others who vigourously support the Cuba solidarity movement in Canada, not to mention the multitudes of people internationally who support Cuba through the world?s largest solidarity movement, may not see things exactly the way your reporter does. Is it too much to ask, in this day and age, to have a little context when we read about "repression"? I would agree that there is repression but I think you?ve mis-identified the true origin and victim of this repression.

Dr. Paul Carr

Canadian Network on Cuba

60 Southport Street, Unit 407

Toronto, Ontario

Canada, M6S 3N4

416-766-4485