Hades can wait
Aug 24, 2007 Oppression
Instapundit is skeptical of fresh reports that the wicked Fidel Castro is about to become El Frito. It’s true, I guess, that they
have all the time in the underworld for this murderer. On the other hand, it’s the rest of us, saddled with him in this world, who are impatient for news of his dispatch.
My mother gives lectures about pre-Castro Jewish life in Cuba, which she experienced first-hand, immigrating to this country in 1956. Her family had escaped pre-war Poland, leaving behind hundreds of relatives who did not. Thankfully, they got to Cuba before the fascist regime there starting pulling stunts such as the shame of the St. Louis (one the United States shares). These Jewish Labor Bundists toasted Castro when he fought Batista from the hills; but, utilizing the same radar they employed to get out of Poland in the early ’30′s, they got out of Cuba before the real trouble began. This time all the survivors came, with their “Guantamera” records and a strong attachment to their island home, but looking, and finally finding, safety, liberty and prosperity in America.
And that’s (in part) why I’m a conservative.
Castro was no Hitler, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. It’s mainly a matter of degree, when you’re comparing totalitarians. I’m sure they’ll have a lot to talk about, though. Hopefully, soon.
UPDATE: Naturally, here’s the spot to watch for news on this.
August 24th, 2007 at 8:14 pm
There were some 25,000 Jews in Cuba prior to Castro. They have nearly all fled the island. I don’t know what to make of this, but a disproportionate number of the Venceremos brigades that went to Cuba to harvest sugar were Jews.
August 24th, 2007 at 10:14 pm
[...] Hades can wait Instapundit is skeptical of fresh reports that the wicked Fidel Castro is about to become El Frito. It’s true, I […] [...]
August 25th, 2007 at 6:44 am
“Castro was no Hitler, but it wasn’t for lack of trying.” !!???
I think Castro’s government killed something like 15,000 people. Evil, of course, and an order of magnitude more than, say, Pinochet, but also three orders of magnitude less than Hitler. Castro has also had almost 50 years to do his evil; Hitler had only a dozen years and killed 1,000 times as many. Not every mass murderer is Hitler, or even tries to be Hitler.
August 25th, 2007 at 8:34 pm
Sapien, the Jews epitomize, almost everywhere, the middle class.
DW, you can’t just measure the Hitler comparison on a time scale. He did not engage in mass murder on the scale for which he became famous until he conquered territories where he had victims of that scale, accomplices and the fog of war as a cover. But I will agree with this: Castro did not have genocide in mind, though many of his allies (to whom he frequently sent troops and other support). Then again, Stalin probably did not either; yet by the expedient of classifying his victims by social or economic class, as opposed to ethnicity (strictly speaking), he does not escape the comparison.