Biden hurting Cubans in U.S. as well as in Cuba

President Biden may come off as the loveable, sensible grandfather we’ve come to revere this year on many critical issues America faces. But for Cuban Americans he’s a heartless Grinch.

He’s continued Trump’s deplorable policy of cutting off remittances of money from Cuban Americans to their long suffering relatives and friends in a Cuba being strangled by Uncle Sam’s 7 decade embargo.

Trump initiated the curtailment of such remittances in 2017. He wasn’t a bit concerned about the Cuban people or the regime. Cutting off the flow of money was simply a way to fulfill a campaign promise to reverse Obama’s sensible Cuban détente.

Biden campaigned against Trump’s despicable actions. But once sworn in he decided to keep them in place. He’s even ratcheted sanctions up including further restrictions on the flow of Cuban American dollars south to ease American fostered pain.

To Cuban Americans trying to help their friends and relatives in Cuba, Biden’s actions give the lie to his unwarranted posturing about his decency and common sense.

New Republican meme has its limits

The GOP is using the meme 'My body, my choice' to allow its cultlike followers to not clutter up their bodies with life saving masks and vaccinations, the public be damned.

But when it comes to women's reproductive health the meme becomes, 'Your body, my choice.'

Murderous plane, drone bombings not making America safer

Just 8 months into his presidency, President Biden has launched dozens of plane and drone airstrikes against suspected bad guys in at least 4 countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and Syria.

Afghanistan gets the brunt of America’s devastating firepower. Biden is trying to slow the Taliban’s inexorable march to dethrone America’s puppet government in Kabul, about the only place they don’t yet control. But over a hundred thousand bombs in the last 20 years hasn’t deterred the Taliban from resuming control over Afghanistan. Biden’s latest bombings are simply killing people for nothing.

Iraq and Syria get Biden’s explosive treatment to send a message to Iraqi militias to stop attacking America’s illegal and immoral occupation of the Iraqi homeland we’ve been degrading in war for 19 years. They will never comply with that message as long as the U.S. refuses the demand of the Iraqi president and parliament to get out. Why did they demand our leaving? Nineteen years of war punctuated by a drone bombing at Baghdad airport that killed 10 Iranian and Iraqi military personnel.

Then there is Biden’s continuation of bombing in African Somalia. The target there is al-Shabaab, a militant group simply serving as another lame excuse explode murderous American firepower.

The president likes to say that in foreign affairs, ‘America is back.’ But when it comes to endless, senseless bombings around the world not making us any safer….America never left.

Why hasn’t Trump been arrested?

Persons who commit crimes usually try to hide their criminality unless they’re supremely stupid or supremely arrogant. One who hasn’t is Donald Trump.

His last year in office was one long crime spree against American democracy and the American people…in plain sight. He spent most of his last year refusing to take seriously a pandemic that has infected 36,414,944 Americans, of which 632,582 have died. Instead of doing everything in his power to support the scientists calling for masks, social distancing and vaccinations, he undermined their efforts by politicizing them, first as a Democratic hoax, then as an attack on our freedom.

The Lancet Commission on Public Policy and Health estimates that Trump’s negligence and overt undermining of pandemic health measures are responsible for approximately 40% of U.S. deaths. One can make a strong case that Trump’s conduct amounts to violations of his oath of office resulting in voluntary manslaughter of many thousands.

We don’t have to guess what his violations were. He spewed them out daily on Twitter, press conferences and political rallies, some of which became superspreader events he was specifically warned not to do by pandemic science experts.

There is more, involving less deaths but more overt criminality. He incited a mob of thousands of supporters to attack the Capitol in order to stop the certification of his re-election defeat. They nearly succeeded but for the heroic efforts by Capitol and DC police. Over 130 officers were injured with one dying of two strokes after being pepper sprayed by rioters. Four more officers committed suicide in the days and months afterword. Had Congresspersons been injured or killed, Trump was ready to declare a national emergency to nullify his loss to Joe Biden. Trump didn’t incite the mob in secret. He did it on national television.

A third crime, was calling election officials in Georgia demanding they overturn the certified vote for Joe Biden. His calls were taped precisely because those election officials needed proof Trump was committing election fraud, not doing his job as president. They knew no one would believe their word of his blatant criminality without evidence.

Alas, the wheels of justice turn slowly. But we are not faced here with one time crime in the past. Trump has essentially maintained his ‘pandemic is a hoax’ and ‘an attack on our freedom’ memes, getting unvaccinated Americans killed every day. He continues to incite his dead end believers about his defeat he claims was stolen. Security officials worry January 6, in some form, could happen again. Tho he’s no longer calling election officials to overturn the election, he’s cheerleading his entire party’s efforts to suppress the votes of the less privileged.

Trump the criminal is still on the loose committing crimes against our democracy and our people in plain sight. Why hasn’t he been arrested?

To become president, DeSantis has to ratchet up covid infections, hospitalizations and deaths

Tho he still claims to be a Trump supporter, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis wants to replace him as GOP standard bearer in 2024.

His campaign strategy is to coop Trump's pandemic denial. He's not only demanding freedom to skip masking and vaccinations, he's forbidding school districts and businesses from imposing mask mandates or requiring vaccinations.

He terms all such measures as Democratic governmental overreach.

While its too early to tell if this will propel DeSantis to the GOP nomination in '24, it's already having devastating effects on Floridians health. Hospitalizations are up seven fold there since mid June and the Florida infection rate is nine times that of New York.

Maybe his campaign slogan for '24 should be: 'Let Floridians die so DeSantis can live...in the White House.

After 20 years, U.S. puppet Afghan government goes POOF

For senseless U.S. wars it’s déjà vu all over again.

The mad dash of U.S. military and civilian personnel to escape the conquering Afghan Taliban after 20 years of war reminds us aging Viet Nam war protesters of the April 30, 1975 mad dash from Saigon to escape the conquering Viet Cong.

With the casualties and costs still piling up, America should take a reckoning:

Over 70,000 Afghans dead.

3,509 Allied military dead, including 2,382 U.S. military

2.7 million Afghan refugees

Over $2 trillion squandered.

In a bitter irony, the U.S. has to send in 3,000 more troops to get the remaining U.S. military and civilian personnel out safely.

The U.S. is reduced to bombing its own military gear to keep it from the Taliban

The U.S. is begging the Taliban, even offering money, not to overrun the U.S. embassy

None of this needed to happen.

The U.S. had one mission in Afghanistan after 911: bomb the terrorist sites and get out

But no, the U.S. had to impose empire in the graveyard of empires.

U.S. senseless war deadenders will say we should have stayed for more months, years, decades.

Nonsense.

In 1955, Pete Seeger summed U.S. folly up best in ‘Where Have All The Flowers Gone’:

“When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?”

Kennedy’s killer also killed U.S. Cuban détente in 1963

 

About this time 58 years ago an extraordinary development began in U.S. Cuban relations. After 4 years of embargoing, invading and pulling back from the brink of nuclear war over Cuba, both JFK and Fidel Castro began to negotiate détente.

They did so thru secret, back channel emissaries, diplomat William Attwood and journalist Jean Daniel for JFK; Cuban officials Rene Vallejo and Carlos Lechuga for Castro. To do so openly would have brought the hardliners of both governments down on them, sabotaging any chance of detente.

JFK and Castro both had an epiphany after the October, 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. So did Russia’s leader Nikita Khrushchev who served as a mentor of sorts to both leaders that Cold War hysterics was unsustainable and that shared interests in peace dictated negotiation.

Kennedy’s pivot resulted in the June 10, 1963 peace speech at American University, and the limited Test Ban Treaty he got ratified in September. Castro’s pivot was his understanding from Khrushchev that the missile crisis achieved a JFK guarantee he would not again invade Cuba.

Both leaders wanted a normalization of relations. Kennedy told a colleague that U.S. support of Cuban dictator Batista from 1933 to 1959 was unconscionable and the Cuban revolution was inevitable and necessary. Castro felt he could trust Kennedy based on his clear move toward ending the Cold War after the October, 1962 nuclear scare.

On November 22, 1963, French journalist Jean Daniel and Castro were lunching in Havana, discussing Kennedy’s intentions and goals for the upcoming secret summit. They were interrupted by a phone call advising Castro of JFK’s assassination. Castro solemnly told Daniel, “Everything is going to change.”

That change was Kennedy’s successor LBJ slamming the door shut on U.S. Cuban détente.

Here we are 58 years later with the Cuban embargo still cruelly punishing the Cuban people in the delusional belief it will affect the regime change America has championed for 62 years.

JFK’s assassination altered the arc of American history in many ways. One of the least well known is its scuttling of likely U.S. Cuban détente early on in the Cuban Revolution.

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Tangled up with Ukraine in Red White and Blue

George Washington used his Farewell Address on September 19, 1796 to warn newbie nation America to avoid foreign entanglements. He viewed them as damaging to the safety and well-being of a land largely insulated from foreign powers by two great oceans.

Alas, the U.S. has largely ignored Washington’s warning, entangling itself with friends and foes alike for most of its 245 years.

This process accelerated after WWII when America, with its unlimited power, decided to rule the world.

One of its worst entanglements in this century has been with Ukraine. Situated on a 1,200 mile border with its former ruler Russia, Ukraine has become a pawn in America’s new Cold War with Russia.

America doesn’t care a whit about the welfare of Ukraine and its people. But working with Western allies to disengage Ukraine from Russia has sadly turned Ukraine into a near failed state. The worst example of U.S. skullduggery occurred in 2013 when we helped facilitate the Ukraine coup that turned out its pro-Russian president. Civil war in the Donbas bordering Russia and Russia’s annexation of the Crimea, harboring its strategically important naval base, would likely have been averted if America minded Washington’s wise counsel.

American machinations in Ukraine were so senseless they resulted in the impeachment of President Trump for trying to use withholding needless U.S. millions in aid for help in winning re-election against Joe Biden. They even ensnared Biden thru the largely ‘no show’ job Ukraine bestowed upon Biden’s troubled son that reflected poorly on the candidate as well as his son.

On February 22 every year since 1896, the Senate honors Washington’s Birthday by designating a Senator to take the floor to recite Washington’s Farewell Address. And every year the Senators likely wait impatiently to get back to their real mission: devising new ways to entangle up America with the likes of Ukraine and others.

Time to end perpetual war, Uncle Sam

The U.S. exit from Afghanistan can't come soon enough. It should have ended 7,260 days ago, after we bombed the terrorist camps in Afghanistan in October, 2001.

The invasion to oust the Taliban had nothing to do with American national security. It was done to begin the process of regime change of targeted Middle East countries to remake the Middle East in America's image: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Iran and any other nation that dare oppose U.S. domination.

Sadly, an avalanche of criticism has begun pouring down on President Biden from the U.S. pro war establishment composed of the military, weapons makers, congressional hawks and their cheerleaders in the media. They are dominating the dialogue, claiming that ending the war is a tragedy that will haunt America.

All Americans of peace and goodwill must rally around the President. He entered office pledging to end America's longest war; one that was illegal, immoral and criminal. Biden's declaration of and commitment to ending the Afghan war is possibly the most courageous act of any president in my lifetime going back to FDR.

The only act coming close was JFK's decision to end the Cold War after the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, a principled move that may have cost him his life.

The battle for Afghanistan may be over, but the battle for the soul of America, whether it will truly seek peace, or continue perpetual war indefinitely, has just begun.

The forces promoting perpetual war and the profits, power and prestige it brings are formidable. They always drown out the voices of peace. Now is the time for every American to answer the question: Which side are you on?

Trump, Biden both did right thing on Afghan withdrawal

What we’re seeing in Kabul, as painful as it is, should not surprise us. This is what happens when imperialist powers engage in senseless wars that cannot be won. They never end well.

Vietnam didn’t. Afghanistan isn’t. Unless we get out of Iraq soon, that war won’t end peacefully as well.

If we wish to criticize anyone, it should start with George W. Bush and his war cabinet. They started an illegal, immoral and criminal war of regime change and nation building. How dare any of them now second guess our current dilemma?

Obama had eight years to end the Afghan war and punted, even tho his Vice President Biden, argued against his 2009 escalation.

Tho he got a number of innocents killed in senseless bombings, Trump made one decent move. He negotiated a firm date of May 1, 2021, sixteen months in the future, to get out.

That sent shockwaves thru the U.S. war establishment, which demonized Trump for doing the right thing.

With Biden’s election they hoped to return to perpetual war as usual. But his determination to follow thru with the withdrawal now jeopardizes their endless war gravy train.

To the critics now agonizing over Afghans at risk from the conquering Taliban, my question is….Where were you these past 20 years when our senseless war killed over a hundred thousand innocents and sent 2.7 million refugees across the border to safety from America’s 80,000 bombs?

We should acknowledge Trump’s gutsy move to set a withdrawal deadline. Hillary, a dedicated war supporter, likely would not have.

Now, more than ever, President Biden deserves our thanks and support for ending one of the worst, most grisly episodes in American history.

All nations, including U.S., should recognize Taliban Afghan government

Tho chaos still reigns in Kabul, one fact is absolute: The Taliban will form a new Afghan government. When you win a civil war and defeat an invading country, you are the legitimate new government.

If a trillion dollars, hundreds of thousands of American troops and 80,000 bombs couldn’t prevent their prevailing against the American invaders, nothing will.

Countries like Russia, China, Pakistan and others have already begun the process of establishing relations with the Taliban. So should America. I share the belief of some that their second shot at governing will be more moderate than the first, which lasted from 1996 till Uncle Sam invaded, ousting them in 2001.

Treating the Taliban as an illegitimate government not worthy of a relationship is about as senseless as deposing them in 2001. It has no upside and a big downside. America will be aced out by friend and foe alike who do partner with the Taliban, both to obtain commercial agreements and the ability to exert moral influence over them.

The Taliban can be murderous and brutal. But they are not stupid. When they inked the deal on February 29, 2020 with President Trump for the U.S. to get out in 2021, they agreed to stop killing U.S. troops. They kept their bargain up thru their August 15 victory, even tho Biden broke Trump’s agreement to be out my May 1. They are now cooperating with U.S. withdrawal forces not to interfere with evacuation efforts at Kabul Airport.

It took the U.S. 16 years to recognize the communist takeover of Russia in 1917. Let’s hope it won’t take till 2037 for the U.S. to do the same with the new, legitimate Afghan government.

Generals’ endless lies promote endless wars

No job may have more prestige than being a general in the U.S. military. But during peacetime no job may be more boring. All those medals, fancy military dress, battalions and firepower are essentially worthless without a war to use them in.

Maybe that’s why U.S. generals lie so hard and so often when America contemplates and prosecutes our endless, senseless wars.

In my lifetime alone I’ve witnessed three wars of 18, 20 and 21 years prosecuted and prolonged with generals’ lies.

The first was Vietnam, a war we inherited from its original ruler France. They were ousted in the 1954 rout at Dien Bien Phu. American generals gloried that America took up the challenge for the next 21 years. They said the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese were no match for American men and firepower. As the U.S. body county headed north from one in 1956 to over 58,000, the generals kept repeating ‘just another 50,000 more troops, please, and we can march to victory. The Pentagon Papers, purloined by antiwar hero Daniel Ellsberg, blew the whistle on the generals two decades of lies.

The 21st century gave U.S. generals two senseless wars to lie about. The first began in Afghanistan in October, 2001. After a couple of months in they claimed the Taliban was finished, never to return. More lies. The Taliban were never finished, embarking on a 20 year hit and run, guerilla campaign that defeated the world’s strongest military as well as their puppet Afghan government. Just as with Vietnam, the Afghanistan Papers catalogued 20 years of generals’ likes in the new century.

While we’re just about out of Afghanistan, we’re still negotiating with Iraq to get our 2,500 troops out of there as well. Generals’ fibs have been making a silk purse out of that war’s pig’s ears for 18 years, often with the same generals serving up whoppers in both wars to keep them going.

But that blizzard of lies keeping endless wars going would have no effect if our political leaders, our media and the American people would simply stop believing them.

For some peculiar reason, when a general emblazoned with a chest full of medals says to follow him to victory, we all fall in line like sheep.

Give thanks that the civilian leader of America, President Biden, finally had the wisdom and the guts to tell the lying generals, ‘Shut up and get out.’