Cuba's year without Fidel

Yesterday marked the 54th anniversary of the beginning of the revolution that brought dictator Fidel Castro into power in Cuba. Yesterday also marked the first year of Fidel's unprecedented absence from Cuban life since 1953.

Last year, Fidel traveled to two rallies for his annual July 26th speeches. And then he disappeared, for good. After suffering an unknown intestinal ailment and transferring power to his only slightly less elderly brother Raúl, Fidel has been photographed, videotaped, interviewed over the phone, and feted by fellow autocrats from Vietnam and Venezuela, but he hasn't been seen in public by anyone. Fidel's appetite for enervating four hour speeches and interminable television appearances quickly sparked rumors that the "real" caudillo had died on the operating table, and the "recuperating Fidel" (as seen above) was nothing more than a body double for a dictator now pushing up daisies.

Do I believe Fidel is dead? No, but I believe Fidelismo is dead, and has been dead since Cuba's oil-for-sugar deal with Soviet Union collapsed. The lingering 17 year hangover has seen the corpse animated, like a zombie, but the consciousness had been snuffed out. Cuba is now in a bizarre holding pattern, with Fidel still officially alive, while Fidel's revolution is dead but unburied. The entire world appears to be holding its breath, waiting to bury the dictatorship the second the dictator himself expires (except, of course, the people who Fidelismo even more than Fidel does). Even Raúl himself has seen the writing on the wall, but he too feels compelled to wait until Fidel's body is in the grave before he starts shoveling the dirt of la revolución on his coffin.

Après le déluge, que vient après?

UPDATE: Apparently, an editorial in the Wall Street Journal linked to this article, but it's for subscribers only.

Final finale for Fidel?

The political role of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro has been up in the air since he transferred power to his younger brother Raúl nearly a year ago. Fidel, who has not made a public appearance since the handover, was still seen as being at least nominally in charge despite the formal handover. Skepticism abounds, with some people believing Fidel may actually be dead, while others believing that he's been shunted aside, while others believing that he's primed for a comeback.

Soon, however, we may be finding out what role if any Fidel will be officially playing. Raúl has set October 21 as the date for general elections to the Cuban National Assembly, the Communist party organ that "chose" (actually rubber stamped) the country's president, who just happened to be Fidel Castro, decade after decade, by unanimous margins. National Assembly president Ricardo Alarcon declared that he would once again nominate Fidel for the presidency back in March, but if Fidel's name doesn't come up when the Assembly convenes after the election, it's a safe bet that Raúl will win the job by a Fidelesque landslide. And after that? You can bet that only time we'll be seeing Fidel in the news after that is in the obituary section.

All of this begs some interesting questions. Is Fidel out of the way for good? What sort of changes will Raúl make? Obviously, Raúl has seen the writing on the wall regarding the economic and political viability of one party socialist states after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Cuban people are becoming noisily fed up with empty store shelves and ever shrinking government rations. It's a safe bet that Raúl, who is no spring chicken himself, won't rock the boat too much (least of all on human rights). After all, he's invested too heavily in the status quo to turn Cuba into Canada, but it will certainly be interesting to see what Raúl will do once he wields the same unlimited political authority that Fidel was used to.

Lukashenko and Castro urge world to suck it

Ah, some things never change. The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has voted to remove two totalitarian police state dictatorships from its human rights blacklist, while moving to "permanently indict" Israel. Belarus and Cuba, both of whom deny even token freedoms and human rights to independent journalists, political dissidents, homosexuals and too many others to list, have been removed from the UNHRC blacklist for reasons nobody is willing to state (on the record, anyway). Israel, on the other hand, now joins countries like North Korea, Haiti (!), the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Sudan, Burma, Burundi, Somalia and Cambodia.

You may recall that the UNHRC was born out of the ashes of the widely reviled and ridiculed United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCRH), and that the new body was supposed to do a better job of keeping countries that neglect, abuse or downright disregard human rights (like Belarus and Cuba) at arm's length. Despite promises that the "new" UNHRC would start with a "clean slate" and would not "target Israel", the UNHRC has morphed, in just over a year, into the disreputable human rights body it was created to replace.

Aleksandr Lukashenko and Raúl Castro (pictured above at left), however, are in no mood to quibble. A win is a win, after all. And while neither man is any mood to legitimize the sudden boost in their image with any actual improvements on human rights in their respective countries, they'll certainly take any good publicity they can get.

UPDATE: Raúl Castro's wife has died at the age of 77. Look for absolutely no changes in Cuban politics to follow.

Fidel is apparently still alive

The latest news is that Cuban dictator Fidel Castro is apparently still alive, still looks old and feeble, and from the looks of the photo, he's also fond of sharing tight, awkward embraces with Vietnamese top dog Nguyễn Minh Triết.

The elderly Castro appeared on Cuban state television (ie, on all channels) to discuss such jaw droppingly banal topics like how great flush toilets are in Vietnam. Actually, considering how much of Castro's lower intestinal tract has been removed, I imagine the caudillo himself is probably relieving himself into a colostomy bag, but I digress.

Fidel's ridiculous television interview only dealt with softball questions about how he's feeling and what he's been eating, which means the more serious questions about whether he's going to try and drag his carcass back into the executive office to replace his brother Raúl. I would have asked him when he plans to kick the bucket so Cubans can stop living in a moribund Communist dictatorship, but there are just some things you can't say in Cuba, you know?

¡Socialismo hasta muerte!

Venezuelan autocrat Hugo Chávez held a press conference yesterday to announce that elderly Cuban dictator Fidel Castro is "in charge" once again after nearly 10 months out of power following botched intestinal surgery. Chávez went on to quote his sycophantic Bolivian counterpart Evo Morales by saying that Castro will be present in Havana for Cuba's unintentionally retro-kitsch Soviet style May Day parade.

There has been no apparent comment yet from Fidel's younger (but still elderly) brother Raúl, who assumed Fidel's title and duties when the caudillo went under the knife in July. If you think Raúl is disappointed, imagine how Cuban dissidents and journalists feel about the end of Raúl's modest experiments with liberalization.

Before his hospitalization, Fidel had moved past late North Korean tyrant Kim Il-Sung for the title of the 20th century's longest reigning leader with 47 years in power. While Fidel does not appear to be dying of cancer, he is 80 years old, which is fairly old even by communist dictator standards. Will there be a backlash by Castro? A backlash against Castro? Will Fidel attempt to pretend this interregnum never even occurred? It's all too soon to say, but if Fidel really is back, we can all look forward to rich western Marxists creaming their jeans in delight at Cuba's extended date with repression and poverty.

Comeback Castro?

Could Cuban dictator Fidel Castro be readying himself for making a political comeback?

After transferring his unlimited presidential authority to his only slightly less elderly brother Raúl following apparently botched intestinal surgery in July, Fidel Castro has been bedridden and out of the political limelight. As we all know, Fidel may be a dictator, but he's never been the shy or retiring type. So when news came out of Cuba that the octogenarian Fidel may finally be recovering from his mysterious ailment, speculation began immediately as to when he would be getting back to his more familiar role as Cuba's caudillo.

I'm taking the skeptical view, myself. At this stage, Fidel is too old, too weak, and too far removed from the levers of power after his eight month hospitalization. The constant attention of a certain deranged paramour notwithstanding, the rest of the world is waiting for Fidel to die so that they can start talking to Raúl about Cuba's long delayed entry into the club of democratic nations. He may get out of the hospital, but I just can't see him getting back into the proverbial driver's seat.

Raúl goes soft?

His brother isn't even dead yet, and already, pro tempore Cuban dictator Raúl Castro is already sabotaging "the gains of Cuba's glorious socialist revolution". First, he announces his intentions to reach out to the United States, and now he's releasing political prisoners.

Though I have announced time and time again that I am not a cynic, I have reasons to suspect that Raúl's motives are not purely altruistic. Cuba's economy has been a shambles (to put it politely) ever since the Soviet Union, and it's ridiculous sugar price supports, went the way of the great auk. Even oil handouts from Venezuela can't prevent Cuba's moribund economy from collapsing. Has Raúl read the writing on the wall?

Naturally, it's bad for this blog to hope that Raúl undoes the enormous social, political and economic damage his brother has brought upon Cuba, but communist dictatorships went out of fashion 15 years ago, and more embarrassingly, nearly all the former Warsaw pact nations now enjoy political freedoms and their attendant economic benefits that Cubans can only envy from afar. Romania, the poorest member of the Warsaw pact at the time of the organization's collapse, has a per capita GDP nearly twice that of Cuba's.

Time will tell, but Raúl will likely not produce any drastic reforms until his brother kicks the bucket sometime in early 2007. After that, all bets are naturally off. Unless the already elderly Raúl develops a terminal illness himself, time will naturally be of the essence to act quickly before a power vacuum emerges and hard liners attempt to keep the wheezing dinosaur of Soviet style communism afloat.

¡Abajo Fidel! ¡Viva Raúl!

It's all but official - Fidel Castro is a goner. After missing a rally in Havana celebrating his 80th birthday, the entire world is waiting for Cuba's longtime caudillo to hurry up and die of cancer so they can deal with Cuba's new dictator, Fidel's younger brother Raúl. As, perhaps, proof of his political ascendancy, the younger Castro has broken with his elder brother's die hard stance regarding negotiations with Washington, a move that would be unthinkable if there were any thought of Fidel recovering.

While Fidel's health is classified as a state secret in Cuba, ordinary Cubans have put two and two together and deduced that el jefe must be on his way out - permanently. Hugo Chavez (who will be re-elected today) has assured the world that Fidel is just fine - a further sign to the Cuban people that Fidel will be dead in a month. It's all over but for the grave digging, so stay tuned.