Word: fidelity
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...assurance of being the greatest Cuban national hero since Liberator Jose Marti; Cuba today is populated by a sullen, lifeless people who dream their own dreams-of fleeing to somewhere else, as they say, "on the other side." Gone even is the ebullient, wildly spinning personality of Fidel Castro himself, replaced by a brooding, gloomy figure, rarely seen, rarely heard, struggling like any other Communist subchieftain to run a country for his masters in Moscow...
Still they come. In August alone, 259 Cubans made it across to the U.S. Two weeks ago the U.S. Coast Guard came upon two boats jammed with 67 refugees, including the chauffeur of Fidel's brother Ramon (an obscure bureaucrat in the Department of Sugar Transport) and Orlando Contreras, once one of Cuba's most popular singers, now declared "decadent." Said Contreras: "They wouldn't let me sing what I wanted to, and they wouldn't let me make a tour inside the country, and finally they put a 70% tax on my wages to make...
Some people may find it hard to imagine Fidel Castro going down the line with anyone, remembering his swagger after defeating the U.S.-sponsored Bay of Pigs exile invasion, his white fury when the Russians pulled their missiles out of Cuba, his vows that "we will never be anyone's satellite." But that was years ago, before cockeyed Communist economics, compounded by an almost willful Latin mismanagement, brought Castro's revolution to its present state of decay. "We are now," says one Havana observer, "watching the slow decline of Cuba into another Bulgaria...
...Bureau. Nowhere does the decay show more vividly than in Fidel Castro himself. The old Castro was a swinger, an extrovert who enjoyed yakking with Western newsmen or moving along the embassy cocktail circuit. He gunned around town in a souped-up Oldsmobile, showing up everywhere for spur-of-the-moment rallies, TV talkathons, hilarious games of beisbol in Havana's public parks, spearfishing at Varadero beach and interminable gabfests with the students at Havana University, where he would often hold court until 4 or 5 a.m. No more. Today's Fidel Castro has a dull, grey look...
Everyone a Loser. U.S. intelligence estimates say that only 20% to 30% of Cuba's population still actively support Fidel Castro. Aside from all the other aggravations, Castro's police state is such that virtually every Cuban has lost a relative or close friend in exile, or locked up among the 50,000 prisoners in Cuban jails, or dead at the hands of Castro's executioners. A distinguished, once-prosperous Havana doctor shrugged his shoulders disconsolately, as he explained that most of his friends are in exile. "I'd go myself," he sighed, "except that...