The View From Cuba

Retired Cuban dictator Fidel Castro issued a report card of sorts on the administration of President Barack Obama from his perch in the state controlled media where he maintains a column.

Sad to say, relations between Cuba and the United States have soured – again – after an impertinent American bureaucrat announced the United States was alarmed by Cuba’s treatment of its prisoners, one of whom died in February after a long hunger strike.

Castro and Cuba, a distinction without a difference, were irked when Cuba was included earlier in the year on a list of countries the United States considers state sponsors of terrorism.

In an essay at the end of March, Castro characterized Obama as a "fanatic believer in capitalist imperialism" but Castro folded a few sweets into his column, praising Obama "unquestionably intelligent. I hope that the stupid things he sometimes says about Cuba don't cloud over that intelligence.”

In his lengthy piece, Castro praised Obama for having pushed his health care plan through a bitterly divided congress. The reform, Castro thought was a “miracle” and victory for the Obama presidency.

And then, spreading ashes over the compliments, the self congratulatory Castro found the Unites States wanting in a comparison with his own utopia.

"It is really incredible that 234 years after the Declaration of Independence ... the government of that country has approved medical attention for the majority of its citizens, something that Cuba was able to do half a century ago," Castro wrote…

And on, and on, and on...

Actuarial tables give the United States some reason to believe that the Cuban people – minus the protestor who was permitted to starve himself to death – will in the near future be rid of this useless, tyrannical bore.

Casey Chadwick’s Uneasy Life after Death

Casey and her mother Wendy "I just started grief counseling. I'm always sad. I'm sad and in pain and I miss her." Wendy Hartling Hartling is the mother of Casey Chadwick, murdered in 2015 by Jean Jacques , an illegal Haitian immigrant. Jacques was convicted of the murder of Chadwick in a New London Superior Court jury trial and sentenced by Judge Barbara Bailey Jongbloed to a 60 year term in prison. Since Jacques is 44 years of age, the sentence was, in effect, a life sentence. Connecticut Commentary coverage of the Chadwick murder may be found here , and here and here . Jacques could not have been sentenced to death because Connecticut’s Democrat dominated General Assembly, under pressure from the state Supreme Court, had abolished Connecticut’s death penalty law in 2012 . The slaughter of Chadwick was particularly brutal. Her body had been found by a friend who, opening a door to a closet, discovered Chadwick stuffed in a dark corner drenched in blo...

Understanding North Korea Through Dramaturgy

The U.S. military is sending the Vinson Strike Group, including the carrier and two guided-missile destroyers, to operate in the Western Pacific Ocean in response to Pyongyang’s recent missile tests. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, asked about the strike force, issued a terse statement: “The United States has spoken enough about North Korea. We have no further comment.” Is this a post-Syrian bombing mission? Will the US take out North Korea’s missile launching sites, possibly with the unspoken concurrence of China? Never let a bombing go to waste. There are some in the United States who think any such incident should be used to rid North Korea of that runty little totalitarian cock-of-the-walk who keeps his countrymen starved, in fear and at his knees. Since we only have one chance, they say, go for the clean sweep -- no more Kims. Connecticut Commentary is reprinting an earlier piece about the Kims here. Best read with a glass of port.

The Blumenthal Burisma Connection

Steve Hilton , a Fox News commentator who over the weekend had connected some Burisma corruption dots, had this to say about Connecticut U.S. Senator Dick Blumenthal’s association with the tangled knot of corruption in Ukraine: “We cross-referenced the Senate co-sponsors of Ed Markey's Ukraine gas bill with the list of Democrats whom Burisma lobbyist, David Leiter, routinely gave money to and found another one -- one of the most sanctimonious of them all, actually -- Sen. Richard Blumenthal."

Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

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