In the end, it's all semantics and propaganda. The Cubans in Miami may not like my way, but do you ever hear them talk about the way it was? No.
With them, it is all "commie," all the time. But when it was oligarchy? The Cuban people who can remember know the revolution was not perfect, but it has lasted because those who can remember know how it was before the revolution.
Jack and I almost had it worked out. It was how you say, "so close and yet so far." We did not have to have a Cold War between us, though from your end it was hot for many years. We could have coexisted. I wanted it; Jack and Bobby wanted it. But, McCarthy had a lasting impact, didn't he? Some in your country, to this day, have chills up their spine and sweat on their brow and hate in their hearts when they hear the word, "communist." Communism was the greatest evil ever known, according to some, but no one wants to admit that communism was not born in a vacuum, but birthed in reaction to centuries of despotism, aristocracy and violent oppression of the dream of the common man for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Oh yes, inalienable rights are not just for Americans.
(But then Jack was killed and the CIA tried to make my beard fall out and worse; much worse. I wonder if Bobby believed the Oswald cover story. Whatever it was that happened in America back then makes Byzantine look positively transparent.)
Nonetheless, the word 'communism' (exactly like 'terror') to this day is a hate-slathering trigger for the weak-minded and easily led.
Pavlov was a genius.
Yet, in your very own country, men and women who shared a hippie commune during the 1960s now enjoy the comforts of the boardroom and ease of the landed gentry.
Jesus was a genius too. He was a revolutionary. The Apostles were communists.
Acts 4:32-37:
And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.
And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all.
Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold,
And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.
And Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, (which is, being interpreted, The son of consolation,) a Levite, and of the country of Cyprus, Having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet. (King James Version)
Instead of name-calling me a dirty, filthy communist, maybe you should call me Thomas á Kempis. I am only following in the footsteps of Christ.
And Christ and the Apostles were Jews who taught the Torah. And Jews were among the leaders of the glorious Russian Revolution of 1917. So in a very real sense, God is a revolutionary and communist and through His grace the Cuban revolution continues to this day in spite of all the assassins, agents and sour-grapes mobsters arrayed against me for nearly half a century.
Indeed, look at the fortunes of our two nations. In spite of a superpower embargo and the Russians cutting and running (I don't blame them, the Cold War sham was an economic black-hole) Cuba still stands proud and the Cuban people stand behind their revolution. And you Americans? You are a superpower and an empire and very, very sad at the same time. You have let things get away from you. I do not blame you. You never had a chance. Americans are trusting of their government. You believed them when they shouted communist! And you believe them now when they shout "terrorist!" But what does the world believe about you? The world believes America has lost her way. She is a nuclear-tipped ghost-ship drifting aimlessly and dangerously, while the long-dead captain's flesh-stripped hands still grip the wheel. America is on a collision course with the world and there is no leader left alive and enlightened to change your course before you careen into disaster.
The world does not blame the American People. We recognize the oppressive power in play to undermine your reason and impede your wisdom. It is ironic how you roam the earth to search out and destroy the free-thinking aspiration of others in the name of freedom while your free press rivals the third world in integrity and your government lies to you like a young child whose hamster has gone missing from its cage. You can't handle the truth.
The irony is that, at long last, it is you who are in need of a new revolution. There is no difference between 'no taxation without representation' against an oppressive monarch and against a representative government that does not represent. Yet your so-called leaders, victims of corruption and enthralled to the corporate oligarchy, do not have the wherewithal to rise against their paymasters and keepers of the key to the closet full of skeletons.
And look at you common men and women, citizens of supposed self-determination, but marginalized in the political process by the special interests of greed and usurpation. Years of false security have softened you, fattened you up and made you confused about what is true versus what is taught. Your Founders traded blue-blood aristocracy for a wealth-driven oligarchy. I know it is hard to believe. You don't want to believe. But it is true. More than half the white Europeans that came to the colonies in the colonial period came as servants to the merchant/moneyed class. In New York, in the seventeenth century, under the 'democratic' rule of Governor Benjamin Fletcher, approximately three quarters of the land in New York State, was granted to about 30 people. The establishment of a new aristocracy in the 'new world' (same as the old world) took root in every one of the American colonies. The founding of America had much less to do with an altruistic dream of life, liberty and happiness for the common man, but the liberty to pursue happiness and unlimited wealth for the merchant and aristocratic class. It was not poor people who threw the tea into Boston harbor. The poor would have stolen the tea to sell for their survival, and if caught, locked in stocks for their trouble by their masters.
And so now, as I prepare to shuffle off this mortal coil, when the Cubans in Miami are dancing in the streets and salivating at the prospect of turning Cuba back a half century to a time of corruption, immorality and oppression; an oligarchical orgy of excess and ignorance, I beg of you and I pray to God that in the hate of me, the love of liberty is not tilled under the soil of the little man's aspirations.
While many Cuban Americans continue misguided propaganda, myth-making the past and propagandizing against the more than justifiable reasons for revolution, the Cuban people who have lived under necessarily authoritarian rule, brought about by counter-revolutionaries who have launched attacks against the homeland, murdered innocent civilians, attempted coups and my own assassination time and again, the Cuban people, to this day, understand and remember so much more than you can imagine. The revolution, that continues to this day, may not be perfect; they do not teach revolution in the schools, except as long ago history that has no relevance for today; but for those who remember, while not perfect, and perhaps filled with fatal mistakes, the Cuban people know that revolution at that time was the people's only answer to the corruption, repression and cruelty of those dark days. A society that enriches the few at the expense of the many is no society at all, but a fiefdom.
And what has happened since those days between Cuba and the United States did not have to happen. But America is a country afraid of words, forthright debate and intellectual honesty. Your President, George W. Bush, has proved that for all the world to see. The damage done to your once vaunted reputation (not earned, but believed nonetheless) is generations away from repair. When Cheney predicts your ideological war on terror to last 40 years, like the 40 days and nights of biblical deluge, he shows his tacit understanding of the worldwide hate he and Bush have enabled against your country.
So when I am gone and the dancing in the streets and the name-calling from the rooftops begins about my life, legacy and legitimacy, remember revolutions do not incubate in vacuums and we could have been friends, our two nations, if oligarchs, stripped of their power, shamed of their wealth and pushed off their perch, could go quietly into the good night instead of crying on Uncle Sam's uber capitalist shoulder and whining about communists. It was never about communism. It was always about justice.
It did not have to be this way between us. For nearly half a century you have made us your enemy, while we were ready at any time to sit down and reach accommodation. And perhaps when I, the lightning rod, am gone, Raul and those that follow can find a way to achieve what was possible all the time: Co-existence and mutual respect.
So, I go now, and I look forward to seeing your Jack and Bobby and toasting with aged rum what might have been, if only fear-mongers and oligarchs did not think so much of themselves and so little of you.
Vaya con Dios.