The American Spectator

I’m guessing that by this time next year we all ought to be searching the skies for a mushroom cloud.
— Jay Molyneaux
North Carolina

CUBAN COUNTERPOINT
Re: Jordan Allott & Daniel Allott’s Cuba’s Hidden Heroes:

I applaud Jordan and Daniel Allott for their article on behalf of Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, but must point out two errors in the essay: First, Cuba became a signatory to International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights in February of 2008. Cuba not only signed the UN Human Rights Declaration on December 10, 1948 it also had an important role in its drafting. Second, Dr. Biscet’s month of freedom was in November 2002.

In 1945, when Cuba was a democratic republic with an anti-communist government led by Ramon Grau San Martin two very capable diplomats were representing the island nation before the recently created United Nations: thirty-year-old Guy Prez Cisneros , and Ernesto Dihigo, a Cuban law professor whose draft of a human rights declaration was among the first considered when the U.N. Commission on Human Rights began work on what would eventually become the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Not only did they have a great impact at the United Nations but before that Ambassador Dihigo successfully pushed for the Organization of American States to adopt its own American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and to establish an inter-American human-rights court that continues to operate to the present day and in many ways is superior to the UN Human Rights Council. Both charters are an enduring legacy of the Cuban republic and the aspirations of Cuban democrats. Ambassador Prez Cisneros had played a crucial role in the debate to bring about what became the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and actually made the final speech calling on all countries to vote for the declaration.

Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet founded the Lawton Foundation for Human Rights and expanded his focus from strictly pro-life to a defense of the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He organized efforts to distribute copies of the human rights declaration on the streets of Havana. On May 21, 1999 in Havana Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet representing the Lawton Human Rights Foundation along with other Cuban dissident leaders invited Cubans to take action in an open letter stating: “Yesterday we celebrated the birth of the Republic of Cuba, the pride of all Cubans. The ideals of justice and freedom of its founders remain as a goal for the Cuban people. For this reason, next June 7 a group of brothers will raise our voices to demand the observance of human rights and the freedom of political prisoners in our country, with a fast start at 10 am on the above mentioned day and culminating 40 days later in Tamarindo 34 apartment 5 []in the city of Havana.”

The 40-day-fast was successfully carried out despite repression, intimidation, and state security operations carried out by the dictatorship. Approximately, 2,093 people visited the apartment “to join in the fast or offer their support,” and 42 opposition groups in other cities staged sympathy fasts. According to Dr. Biscet the purpose of the fast “was not to lose weight or to chat. It was a fast to protest against the violation of human rights in Cuba and to demand the release of political prisoners.” Oscar Elias added that Cuban authorities “did not assault us directly — they only cut off the electricity in this building — but they did mistreat many of our visitors.

On December 6, 2002 police re-arrested Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, who had been released on October 31, 2002 after serving 3 years. The authorities arrested Biscet and 16 others to prevent them from holding a seminar on human rights education and nonviolent civil disobedience. The authorities later released 12 of the detainees, but charged Biscet, his associate Raul Arencibia Fajardo, and two others with public disorder, which carries a sentence of up to one year. On April 10, 2003 following the March 2003 crackdown Dr. Biscet was charged and sentenced to 25-years in prison although he had already been in custody since December 6. He is still imprisoned today, an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience.

The dictatorship views the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a subversive document and has presented possession of it as evidence in trials against Cuban dissidents during the March 2003 show trials. That is why it is so important to not overlook the role played by a democratic Cuba in the creation of this document and its ratification in 1948 to contrast that with the thuggish behavior of the dictatorship today.people who may believe in God, but are being taught that he is irrelevant.
— John Suarez
Free Cuba Foundation

NO SENSE OF PROPORTION
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.’s Proportional Israel:

“They have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.” — Winston Churchill, visiting bombed Coventry (comes from Hosea 8:7)

This thing of “proportionality” is a child’s, or an idiot’s, idea of warfare. It’s Rachel Maddow’s idea of warfare: “First of all, there’s the question of proportionality as to how many people those rockets have killed versus how many people the Israeli bombing has now killed.”

So according to that imbecile, “You’re only entitled by the rules to kill as many of them, as they killed of you. Once you reach that number, the whistle blows, the game ends, time out, go back to home base.”

By liberal rules, after Pearl Harbor, we would have been entitled by the rules to kill a few thousand Japanese, and then the war would have ended. On what planet do things work like that?

The question for liberals is really, how to get the country they hate — Israel — from retaliating against the people they love — the Palestinians. So liberals like Maddow busy themselves inventing sophistries, double-talk, and evasions to support their bias. Israel is our ally; therefore liberals oppose every action Israel takes in her own behalf. Israel shares our Judeo-Christian heritage, instead of medieval heathenism — therefore the heathen liberals oppose Israel. And they lie, lie, lie. That’s American liberal journalism today.
— Larry Eubank

The current Israeli attack on Hamas is comparable with the U.S. surge in Iraq, rather than with the previous Israeli attack. It is successfully killing Hamas leadership and armed personnel on a daily basis with virtually no Israeli casualties and with reduced civilian casualties.