Liberals’ love affair with Fidel revisited

By Tom Quiner

In a moment, I am going to re-run a blogpost from March 6th, 2013.

It recounts the murder/execution of Howard F. Anderson by order of Fidel Castro.

Mr. Anderson’s daughter, Bonnie M. Anderson, managed to escape Cuba and come to the U.S. where she made a name for herself with the Miami Herald, NBC News, and CNN.

Ms. Anderson won seven Emmy Awards. She was finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. She has been nominated for the Maria Coors Cabot Lifetime Achievement Award sponsored by Columbia University.

Ms. Anderson, who is now president of the Anderson Media Agency, ran across my blogpost from last year that recounted her father’s death. She sent me this response:

7 time Emmy winner, Bonnie M. Anderson

Thank you, Tom. People still don’t get it. Friends of mine recently went to Cuba… illegally, I might add. They didn’t tell me until they returned. Needless to say, we are no longer friends. If people choose to support such a regime that has repressed people for decades, incarcerated over a million, executed over 20,000 people… well, these are not people I want in my life.

Tienes razon. My first trip to Cuba (after leaving… I was born there) was as a rookie reporter for the Miami Herald. For the first time in nearly 20 years he allowed the foreign media in… He forced me to use a Cuban passport. I reported….and then when the story was over, I went to my father’s grave in Pinar del Rio. My Dad was the first American tortured and executed by firing squad. I then wrote a story for the Miami Herald (my employer) that was a Pulitzer Finalist… I mention that only because it truly ticked Castro off…. as the Miami Herald erased it’s copyright and allowed the article to be published worldwide in many languages. I was not allowed back in Cuba for 20 years. Then, as Managing Editor of CNN en Espanol, which I helped develop and run, I – at the last minute – was allowed back when Pope John Paul II was visiting. I went back to my father’s grave and – this, from the caretaker – his remains had been dug up and thrown out because Castro was ticked off by my article. If THIS is not evil, what is? Satan is proud of Castro, por cierto.

Thank you again for reminding the world.

Bonnie M. Anderson

By Tom Quiner, March 6th, 2013

Ready … aim … fire!

These were the last words Howard F. Anderson ever heard. He was executed by firing squad per the orders of Fidel Castro. He refused a blindfold so he could bravely stare down his executioners. He whistled a tune before the first bullet pierced his heart, ending his life.

Prior to his execution, Castro had most of Mr. Anderson’s blood drained so it could be put to medical use for the benefit of his revolutionary soldiers.

Howard F. Anderson was one of some 20,000 Cubans tortured and executed by Fidel Castro. Although he wasn’t in the same league with Hitler, Stalin, or Hussein, Castro was nonetheless a prolific mass murderer of his political enemies.

For some reason, American liberals, such as Barbara Walters, go out of their way to say nice things about Castro:

“For Castro, freedom starts with education. And if literacy alone were the yardstick, Cuba would rank as one of the freest nations on Earth. The literacy rate is 96%.” — Barbara Walters on ABC’s “20/20,” Oct. 11, 2002.

NBC reporter, Ed Rabel, was granted access to Cuba back in 1988. He waxed eloquent about the “Cuban paradise”:

“There is, in Cuba, government intrusion into everyone’s life, from the moment he is born until the day he dies. The reasoning is that the government wants to better the lives of its citizens and keep them from exploiting or hurting one another….On a sunny day in a park in the old city of Havana it is difficult to see anything that is sinister.”

One reporter did see something sinister. Her name is Bonnie M. Anderson, a former reporter for CNN, a 7 time Emmy Award winner, and a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Ms. Anderson was stunned by CBS News’ coverage of Castro’s illness. They repeatedly stated that:

”Castro is considered a ruthless dictator by some in Miami.”

The key word is “some.” CBS implied that there isn’t a consensus on whether Castro is a ruthless guy or not.

So why was Ms. Anderson so worked up? Because her Dad was Howard Anderson to whom I referred at the top of this post. She and her mother were able to flee to Florida to escape further persecution. She said almost every family in Cuba in some way had been touched by Castro’s reign of terror in Cuba.

She knows about the torture and the 20,000 deaths.

Ms. Anderson was writing for the Miami Herald back in the late 70s. She wrote something critical of Castro. He got wind of it and was so infuriated that he had her father’s remains dug up and thrown out.

Those are the sort of things Castro didn’t let reporter Ed Rabel see.

The American media slobbers all over the mass-murdering Castro. Here is a small sampling:

“Half of the Cuban population is under the age of 25, mostly Spanish speaking, and all have benefitted from Castro’s Cuba, where their health and their education are priorities.” [Kathleen Sullivan, CBS This Morning]

“Castro has delivered the most to those who had the least, and for much of the Third World, Cuba is actually a model of development. Medical care was once for the privileged few. Today it is available to every Cuban and it is free.” [Peter Jennings, ABC World News Tonight]

“The educational system is a jewel in the society his revolution has built….It’s a source of great pride for the President, as is Cuba’s literacy rate — virtually 100 percent.” [Dan Rather, CBS News]

Ms. Anderson sets the record straight on behalf of liberal Americans willing to ignore Castro’s grotesque record on human rights:

“If a man who murdered 20,000 people, imprisoned for decades hundreds of thousands of others, caused countless hundreds of thousands to flee the country (many losing their lives in desperate attempts to reach freedom on flimsy rafts) and has repressed a nation for nearly five decades – – denying them the most basic of human rights — is not considered a ruthless dictator by all, who the hell is? … But I have faith in my fellow American citizens. And I know, in my heart and spirit, that when the truth is known, those of us who have suffered at the hands of Fidel Castro will finally receive the compassion we are due.”

What do liberals consider to be evil?

Smoking.

Coal.

Keystone pipelines.

Big Gulps.

But in their moral confusion, they think Fidel Castro has a pretty good track record.