Word: fidelity
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...BOTTOM LINE: This well-reported, entertaining read shows, despite the title, why Fidel remains in power...
...tale of a nation of "zombies" waiting for change makes it hard to gloat over the fall of communism. What he found was a Cuba that still respects Fidel as a well-intentioned grandfather who tried to bring equal rights, education and health to the island but is now behind the times. Oppenheimer was exhaustive in his research, which spanned two years, including five months on the hermetic island. He interviewed 500 people, from Castro's own disaffected daughter Alina to Cuba's "yummies" (young upwardly mobile Marxists). Especially telling is the contrast between Che Guevara's eldest grandchild, Canek...
Oppenheimer, who somehow obtained secret Communist Party documents, reveals how close reformers came to approving a plan to ease Fidel into a Prime Minister's job and ease out socialism at the October 1991 Party Congress. His reporting is solid and engrossing, especially on the Ochoa-De La Guardia drug scandal and Cuba's involvement with Panama's now deposed Manuel Noriega. Oppenheimer claims that Cuba was set to begin running Panama's intelligence apparatus just before the 1989 U.S. invasion. He also deals with Cuba's silent issue, the black majority who are not eager to see the white...
Hoping to flush insurgents from the bush, draw them to the negotiating table and end a two-decade-old rebellion, newly elected Philippine President Fidel Ramos has proposed legalizing the Communist Party to allow its members to participate openly in the political process. So far, rebel leaders have not rushed forth with white flags. They question Ramos' sincerity, recalling his cold-warrior reputation and tough line on negotiations when he was armed forces chief. They want more political reforms and more progress against poverty...
Just, please, don't dignify Ice-T's contribution with the word sedition. The past masters of sedition -- men like George Washington, Toussaint-Louverture, Fidel Castro or Mao Zedong, all of whom led and won armed insurrections -- would be unimpressed by Cop Killer and probably saddened. They would shake their heads and mutter words like "infantile" and "adventurism." They might point out that the cops are hardly a noble target, being, for the most part, honest working stiffs who've got stuck with the job of patrolling ghettos ravaged by economic decline and official neglect...