Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Hillare Belloc’s “Advice to the Rich” was lost on the Castro brothers: “Get to know something about the internal combustion engine, and remember – soon, you will die.” Fidel Castro, Cuba’s deathless tyrant, died full of years a  very rich man , his foreign bank account stuffed with other people’s money, though one would never guess it reading Jesse Jackson’s encomium.

When President Barack Obama arrived in Cuba on Palm Sunday along with his retinue, so large that they displaced twelve journalism students from Central Connecticut University who were dispatched to other quarters fifty miles from Havana to make room for Mr. Obama, Raul Castro, still kicking at 85 years, did not greet the President at the airport. It should be noted before passing on  that Communist Cuba under the Castro brothers was never a hospitable place for foreign journalists. A Cuban acquaintance tells me that the Castro brothers pulled a Queen Elizabeth on the lame duck President: Some mountains will not go to Muhammad. When Mr. Obama visits England later this year, Queen Elizabeth will not attend his arrival in London; instead, the President and his traveling retinue will be transported to Windsor Castle, where he will be received right royally. Monarchs, even when they are decorative rather than functional, retain the privileges of monarchy. But the Castro brot...