Nicolás Guillén Landrián
"But it is not the end"
The Experimental Ethnography of Nicolàs Guillèn Landriàn
This is an entry after his death noting that Mr. Landrian’s experience as an American was only better than as a Cuban that he was not imprisoned so much as left homeless and without any health care at all. Fred Thompson didn't bother to talk about that reality, did he? :
August 5, 2003
Nicolás Guillén Landrián
Nicolás Guillén Landrián, a painter and Cuban filmmaker who was once accused of trying to assassinate Fidel Castro, died on July 22 from pancreatic cancer. He was 65.
Although Guillén directed 18 documentaries and won several awards at film festivals in Europe, he was expelled from Cuba's Institute of Cinematography for making a movie that mocked the Cuban dictator. In the late 1960s, Guillén was accused of plotting to kill Castro. He was imprisoned for two years, then confined for nearly a decade to mental institutions where he was subjected to electroshock therapy.
Guillén left Cuba in 1989, moved to South Florida and became a painter. His artwork was exhibited at the former Cuban Museum of Art to sell-out crowds. But when he ran out of money, Guillén refused to take an ordinary job. Instead, he and his wife, Grettel Alfonso, ended up living on the streets. They bounced around the country, struggling to survive in dilapidated hotels.
Guillén eventually returned to Miami to produce the documentary, "Inside Downtown," a 30-minute look at homelessness. It was released last year.
Posted on August 5, 2003 11:22 AM
Michael Moore Today
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
"So there I was in a group of sick people" -- Michael Moore
May 19th, 2007 9:04 am
'Sicko' stars thank Moore for Cuba trip
By Jocelyn Noveck / Associated Press
NEW YORK - It could have been a college reunion: hugs, tears, laughter, photos, and a big friendly guy in shorts and sneakers organizing it all. But the guy in shorts was Michael Moore, whose new documentary, "Sicko," takes aim at the U.S. health care industry with the same fury — laced with humor, of course, and plenty of statistics — that he directed at the Bush administration in his hit "Fahrenheit 9/11."
And the people who'd flown in for this intimate first screening, a day after the film had been shipped to the Cannes Film Festival, included grateful Sept. 11 "first responders," suffering lung problems or other ailments from their days at ground zero. In the film, Moore takes them to Cuba and tries to get them treated at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay — where, he contends, terror suspects were getting better medical care than the heroes of 9/11.
The Cuba trip actually accounts for just a small part of "Sicko," which aims its wrath at private insurance and pharmaceutical companies and HMOs, while praising socialized medicine in countries like France and Britain. Moore fills it with stories like that of a woman whose ambulance ride after a car crash wasn't covered — because it wasn't "pre-approved."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9817
May 20th, 2007 9:42 am
Michael Moore makes triumphant Cannes return with provocative documentary 'Sicko'
By Jill Lawless / Associated Press
CANNES, France --"Sicko," Michael Moore's attack on the U.S. health care system, got a warm welcome at Cannes Saturday that marked the director's triumphant return to the film festival and a respite from the controversy his work has started at home.
More than 2,000 people applauded loudly after the film's first Cannes screening at the packed Grand Theatre Lumiere, the main festival auditorium.
"I know the storm awaits me back in the United States," said Moore as he absorbed the enthusiastic response of critics and journalists.
The movie doesn't open until late June, but it has already been criticized by conservative politicians in the United States over scenes in which the filmmaker takes ailing 9/11 rescuers to Cuba for treatment.
By Jill Lawless / Associated Press
CANNES, France --"Sicko," Michael Moore's attack on the U.S. health care system, got a warm welcome at Cannes Saturday that marked the director's triumphant return to the film festival and a respite from the controversy his work has started at home.
More than 2,000 people applauded loudly after the film's first Cannes screening at the packed Grand Theatre Lumiere, the main festival auditorium.
"I know the storm awaits me back in the United States," said Moore as he absorbed the enthusiastic response of critics and journalists.
The movie doesn't open until late June, but it has already been criticized by conservative politicians in the United States over scenes in which the filmmaker takes ailing 9/11 rescuers to Cuba for treatment.
-- The Wall Street Journal
Michael Moore's 'SiCKO' Receives Healthy Response at Premiere
By Anthony Kaufman / The Wall Street Journal
CANNES, France -- Filmmaker Michael Moore received a warm reception at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday morning, where his latest movie "SiCKO," a critical look at the U.S. health-care system, premiered to the world's press. No stranger to the festival, Mr. Moore won the top prize, the Palme d'Or, for "Fahrenheit 9/11" three years ago here.
During the packed 8:30 a.m. morning press screening at the Grand Lumiere Theatre, several scenes in the documentary brought spontaneous applause, including a prologue segment that shows one man, without health care, stitching a large open wound on his leg with his own hand.
"SiCKO," however, does not focus on the uninsured, but the vast number of Americans who have health-care coverage, and their personal stories of frustration with the system. A teary-eyed mother recalls the story of her daughter's death when being transferred from one hospital to another owned by Kaiser Permanente. Another woman blames the U.S. system for the demise of her husband, who was denied a bone marrow transplant. After the screening, several hard-nosed U.S. critics and journalists admitted to crying during the film.
Review: Sicko
By Alissa Simon / Variety
Three years after winning Cannes' top prize for "Fahrenheit 9/11," docu helmer and agent provocateur Michael Moore returns to the Croisette with more polemics-as-performance-art in "Sicko," an affecting and entertaining dissection of the American health care industry, showing how it benefits the few at the expense of the many. Pic's tone alternates between comedy, poignancy and outrage as it compares the U.S system of care to other countries. Given Moore's celebrity and fan base, plus heightened awareness of pic resulting from the heated battle that's already begun between left and right, returns look to be extremely healthy.
Pic should also play well internationally, providing an eye-opening lesson for foreigners who may be inclined (like Moore's Canadian cousins) to take out insurance from their homeland before visiting the States.
Chief criticism of the pic is that it paints too rosy a picture of the national health care of the countries he compares America to, including Canada, England, France — and Cuba.
By Alissa Simon / Variety
Three years after winning Cannes' top prize for "Fahrenheit 9/11," docu helmer and agent provocateur Michael Moore returns to the Croisette with more polemics-as-performance-art in "Sicko," an affecting and entertaining dissection of the American health care industry, showing how it benefits the few at the expense of the many. Pic's tone alternates between comedy, poignancy and outrage as it compares the U.S system of care to other countries. Given Moore's celebrity and fan base, plus heightened awareness of pic resulting from the heated battle that's already begun between left and right, returns look to be extremely healthy.
Pic should also play well internationally, providing an eye-opening lesson for foreigners who may be inclined (like Moore's Canadian cousins) to take out insurance from their homeland before visiting the States.
Chief criticism of the pic is that it paints too rosy a picture of the national health care of the countries he compares America to, including Canada, England, France — and Cuba.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9821
-- Stephen Schaefer, Boston Globe
Michael Moore slices up US health system in new film
By Marc Burleigh / AFP
CANNES, France - Michael Moore unveiled his latest attack on America's shortcomings at Cannes on Saturday with "Sicko", a scathing documentary that exposes the dark side of the US health system and its powerful insurance lobby.
In the film, played to a packed-out crowd in the film festival's biggest, 2,000-seat theatre, Moore flays a health system that leaves 50 million Americans with no access to medical care -- and which even cruelly pulls the rug out from under many of those who mistakenly think they are properly covered.
The documentary fires off side shots at US President George W. Bush, the follow-up to the September 11, 2001 attacks and the Iraq war, all subjects of predilection for Moore, who won Cannes's Palme d'Or in 2004 for "Fahrenheit 9/11".
This time, the filmmaker has landed in hot water for a stunt in "Sicko" in which he takes a group of ailing September 11 emergency workers to Cuba, where they receive medical treatment.
Rose Ann DeMoro: "Sicko" Diagnoses a Cure for the Nation
By Rose Ann DeMoro / HuffingtonPost.com
Perhaps the exponents of expediency just haven't met the rescue heroes of September 11 still plagued by debilitating respiratory illnesses, but unable to get the healthcare they need in the country they volunteered to help in our hour of despair.
Or the machinist and his newspaper editor wife who had to sell their home and move into a cramped room in their daughter's house when his heart attacks and her cancer caused their medical bills to soar. Or the woman whose husband died after their insurer refused to authorize a bone marrow transplant from his younger brother because it was "experimental." They are among the stars of Michael Moore's riveting new film "Sicko," that we were privileged to be among 50 people in an intimate private screening in New York a few days before the premiere in Cannes Saturday night where it was the hottest ticket in town and greeted with well-deserved rave reviews. Many of those in the New York audience, the real life stars of "Sicko," were brought to tears by a film and filmmaker who viewed their lives with a lot more humanity than the insurance companies who had treated them with such calculated disregard.
By Rose Ann DeMoro / HuffingtonPost.com
Perhaps the exponents of expediency just haven't met the rescue heroes of September 11 still plagued by debilitating respiratory illnesses, but unable to get the healthcare they need in the country they volunteered to help in our hour of despair.
Or the machinist and his newspaper editor wife who had to sell their home and move into a cramped room in their daughter's house when his heart attacks and her cancer caused their medical bills to soar. Or the woman whose husband died after their insurer refused to authorize a bone marrow transplant from his younger brother because it was "experimental." They are among the stars of Michael Moore's riveting new film "Sicko," that we were privileged to be among 50 people in an intimate private screening in New York a few days before the premiere in Cannes Saturday night where it was the hottest ticket in town and greeted with well-deserved rave reviews. Many of those in the New York audience, the real life stars of "Sicko," were brought to tears by a film and filmmaker who viewed their lives with a lot more humanity than the insurance companies who had treated them with such calculated disregard.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9818
Michael Moore's new film is Cannes's hottest ticket
By Marc Burleigh / AFP
CANNES, France - Three years after triumphing at Cannes, Michael Moore returns Saturday with his latest documentary, already regarded as the hottest ticket at the film festival.
The world premiere of "Sicko", a biting and polemical look at the US health system, is considered such a must-see by the thousands of critics and reporters here that it is being shown in the festival's biggest theatre -- even though it's not even in the official competition.
His last film, "Fahreinheit 9/11" walked off with Cannes's Palme d'Or trophy in 2004 for its scathing criticism of the White House and US President George W. Bush's reaction to the September 11, 2001 attacks and the war on Iraq, and the festival premiered his "Bowling for Columbine" in 2002.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9816
Wolfowitz resigns; Bush to nominate successor soon
By Lesley Wroughton / Reuters
WASHINGTON - Paul Wolfowitz resigned as president of the World Bank on Thursday, ending a protracted battle over his stewardship prompted by his involvement in a high-paying promotion for his companion.
"The poorest people in the world ... deserve the very best we can deliver," Wolfowitz said in a statement. "Now it is necessary to find a way to move forward."
His resignation takes effect on June 30.
Wolfowitz, a former U.S. deputy defense secretary who was a controversial figure as a leading architect of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, came to the bank in 2005 despite misgivings by European countries, which are among the bank's biggest funders.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9813
Paulson Says Wolfowitz's Successor Should Still Be an American
By Matthew Benjamin / Bloomberg
May 17 -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said he will consult with international colleagues about a successor to outgoing World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, while stressing that the position should remain in U.S. hands.
``I intend to move quickly to help the president identify a nominee to lead the World Bank,'' Paulson said in a statement in Washington, referring to President George W. Bush. ``I will consult my colleagues around the world as we search for a leader.''
Wolfowitz's departure over a pay and promotion package awarded his companion, who worked at the bank, sparks a debate over the development agency's selection process. By tradition, the Washington-based bank's chief has been an American, with Europeans appointing the managing director of the International Monetary Fund.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9814
'Sicko' the Controversy
Michael Moore talks about attracting the ire of the Bush administration with his new health care documentary, and how he wishes Katie Couric would be more forthcoming with the public
By Daniel Fierman / Entertainment Weekly
It's 3:10 in the afternoon and Michael Moore has just finished making breakfast. Another episode in the lazy life of a wealthy documentary filmmaker? Hardly. Moore was up all night working on his new documentary, Sicko, a scathing look at the health care industry that's slated to debut at the Cannes film festival on May 19. Already under fire from the government for taking his crew to Cuba, Moore put aside his cereal to chat about HMOs, his treatment in the media, and (surprise!) the Bush administration.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: So what makes you think there's a problem with our health care system?MICHAEL MOORE: [laughs hard] I said to the crew on the first day, ''Let's not insult the audience by telling them that the health care system is broken. Let's start with the assumption that people know it. What kind of film would we make then?''
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9811
Michael Moore hiding new film from US authorities: producer
CANNES, France (AFP) - Michael Moore, the controversial documentary maker critical of President George W. Bush's White House, is hiding his latest movie from US authorities ahead of its screening at Cannes, his producer said Wednesday.
"The film has been placed in a secret location outside the country," a spokeswoman for the Weinstein Company, Sarah Levanson-Rothman, told AFP.
Moore, who won the Cannes Palme d'Or in 2004 with "Fahrenheit 9/11", is due to present "Sicko", his new documentary which takes a scathing look at the US health industry and its powerful insurance lobby, at the film festival on Saturday.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9809
A Challenge from Michael Moore to Presidential Hopeful Fred Thompson
May 15, 2007
Senator Fred ThompsonAmerican Enterprise Institute1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W.Washington, DC 20036
Dear Senator Thompson, Given that it has been publicly reported in The Weekly Standard, a leading neo-conservative publication, that you support Fidel Castro and the Cuban regime by being a purveyor of fine Cuban exports despite the trade embargo, I was surprised to see your recent op ed in a more traditional conservative outlet, The National Review, regarding my trip to Cuba (I suspect you choose The National Review in an effort to pander to an outlet that had criticized you for your opposition to medical malpractice legislation). In your May 2, 2007 National Review article, “Paradise Island,” you specifically raised concerns about whether my trip to Cuba with 9/11 heroes, who have suffered serious health problems as a result of their exposure to toxic substances at Ground Zero that have gone untreated, was somehow going to support Castro and the Cuban government:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?id=208
“Paradise Island”The myth of Cuban health care.
By Fred Thompson
You might have read the stories about filmmaker Michael Moore taking ailing workers from Ground Zero in Manhattan to Cuba for free medical treatments. According to reports, he filmed the trip for a new movie that bashes America for not having government-provided health care.
You might have read the stories about filmmaker Michael Moore taking ailing workers from Ground Zero in Manhattan to Cuba for free medical treatments. According to reports, he filmed the trip for a new movie that bashes America for not having government-provided health care.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OWNhNzA2YmY3NTNjZjZhNjE1NmZjMDFkOTdjN2Q4ZmE=
The next article is are not from Moore’s site, but, an entry after his death noting that Mr. Landrian’s experience as an American only better than as a Cuban that he was not imprisoned so much as left homeless and without any health care at all. If Mr. Landrian was an artist and in prison he would be given at least regular health care, even if substandard in must USA prisons. He'd still be able to paint.
August 5, 2003
Nicolás Guillén Landrián
Nicolás Guillén Landrián, a painter and Cuban filmmaker who was once accused of trying to assassinate Fidel Castro, died on July 22 from pancreatic cancer. He was 65.
Although Guillén directed 18 documentaries and won several awards at film festivals in Europe, he was expelled from Cuba's Institute of Cinematography for making a movie that mocked the Cuban dictator. In the late 1960s, Guillén was accused of plotting to kill Castro. He was imprisoned for two years, then confined for nearly a decade to mental institutions where he was subjected to electroshock therapy.
Guillén left Cuba in 1989, moved to South Florida and became a painter. His artwork was exhibited at the former Cuban Museum of Art to sell-out crowds. But when he ran out of money, Guillén refused to take an ordinary job. Instead, he and his wife, Grettel Alfonso, ended up living on the streets. They bounced around the country, struggling to survive in dilapidated hotels.
Guillén eventually returned to Miami to produce the documentary, "Inside Downtown," a 30-minute look at homelessness. It was released last year.
Posted on August 5, 2003 11:22 AM
http://www.blogofdeath.com/archives/000195.html
From the Courthouseto the White House Fred Thompson auditions for the leading role. by Stephen F. Hayes 04/23/2007, Volume 012, Issue 30
A strange thing happened a few weeks back when I went to the Café Promenade at the Mayflower Hotel for an off-the-record interview with an unpaid adviser to the non-campaign of unannounced presidential candidate Fred Thompson.
Fred Thompson showed up.
Thompson was there to have lunch with Ed Gillespie, former chairman of the Republican National Committee and a powerhouse consultant with ties to the White House. The two men worked together in the fall of 2005 on the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts. Thompson had invited Gillespie to lunch to discuss a potential presidential bid.
http://weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=13528&R=1136E33842
“Thompson's work space looks just like what the home office of a successful politician or CEO should look like--though a little messier: a large desk, dark wood, leather furniture, lots of books and magazines and newspapers, a flat-screen TV, and box upon box of cigars--Montecristos from Havana.”
Thompson's 1994 Issue Positions
Project Vote Smart, which compiles voting records and other background materials on politicians, has finally put up its page on Fred Thompson (OK, maybe "finally" isn't exactly the fairest word when Mr. Thompson hasn't even announced for president — but I've been eager to see it).
Anyway, it seems Mr. Thompson filled out a survey for Project Vote Smart back in 1994, when he was running for Senate. While it's mostly pretty predictable (boo foreign aid, yay low taxes), there are a few parts worth scrutinizing... (see: abortion, education, AIDS)
* Under health care: Mr. Thompson's already gotten in a scrape with National Review for not supporting federal medical malpractice reform while in Congress. In this survey, he notes his opposition to it — so, at least he was consistent. He also declined to check the box supporting deregulation of private health care.
http://www.nysunpolitics.com/blog/2007/05/thompsons-1994-issue-positions.html
Presidential Hopeful Fred Thompson Hides Behind His Desk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JRAlkwE3mM
Cuban missive crisis: Moore, ex-Sen. at war
By George Rush and Joanna Rush Molloy / New York Daily News
Filmmaker Michael Moore is calling out White House hopeful Fred Thompson for refusing to debate him.
The director and the former senator have been trading shots since May 2, when Thompson weighed in on the Treasury Department's investigation into whether Moore violated the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba by seeking free treatment on the Communist isle for sick 9/11 responders. Writing in the National Review, Thompson chided Moore for "gushing" over dictator Fidel Castro.
Moore, who filmed the trip for "Sicko," his forthcoming cinematic indictment of America's health care, yesterday returned fire in an open letter that pointed to Thompson's fondness for Cuban-made Montecristo cigars.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9810
One Man Revolution on Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/One-Man-Revolution-Nightwatchman/dp/B000NVJRBO/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-0385660-4148723?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1176416274&sr=8-1
Weinsteins set 'SiCKO' release date
Moore film to rollout June 29
By Ian Mohr / Variety
The Weinstein Co. has pegged a June 29 rollout for Michael Moore's Cannes-bound docu "SiCKO" and brought in Lionsgate to partner on releasing the documaker's first pic since "Fahrenheit 9/11."
Division of labor will see Lionsgate booking theaters on "SiCKO" in the U.S. while TWC handles all marketing and publicity duties and puts up all P&A costs.
TWC is also handling international rights and is offering the doc -- a critical look at the U.S. health care system -- in Cannes after its world preem.
U.S. Probe Could Boost Moore Movie
By Kathie Klarreich/Miami / TIME Magazine
Michael Moore will never get a standing ovation from the Bush Administration, but he certainly won't complain about the free publicity he's getting for his newest documentary, SiCKO. Free publicity for an adversary may not have been the government's intention, but that has certainly been the effect of the investigation Washington has launched against Moore just one week before the movie's slated premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
Last March, six months after his initial request for travel documents, the award-winning documentary filmmaker visited Cuba. There, he filmed a segment of SiCKO, his movie focusing on the failing U.S. health-care industry. For the segment, Moore had taken along ten 9/11 first-responders who have been suffering respiratory problems ever since.
By Kathie Klarreich/Miami / TIME Magazine
Michael Moore will never get a standing ovation from the Bush Administration, but he certainly won't complain about the free publicity he's getting for his newest documentary, SiCKO. Free publicity for an adversary may not have been the government's intention, but that has certainly been the effect of the investigation Washington has launched against Moore just one week before the movie's slated premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
Last March, six months after his initial request for travel documents, the award-winning documentary filmmaker visited Cuba. There, he filmed a segment of SiCKO, his movie focusing on the failing U.S. health-care industry. For the segment, Moore had taken along ten 9/11 first-responders who have been suffering respiratory problems ever since.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9790
Tenet hands Jeb Bush a big windfall
Jeb Bush will get over $450,000 in the next year from Tenet for being a board member -- about three times what the average director makes at major U.S. corporations.
By John Dorschner / Miami Herald
Shareholders officially elected former Gov. Jeb Bush to the board of Tenet Healthcare on Thursday -- a part-time job that will bring him over $450,000 in the next year.
At the hospital chain's annual shareholder meeting in Dallas, Bush received 96.56 percent of the shares voting, with 3.44 percent withheld, for a one-year post. Only one of the 10 directors elected had a higher vote.
For this, Bush has already received 34,667 shares worth $260,000, which he has registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. He will receive a $65,000 annual retainer fee, plus $1,500 per board meeting and $1,200 per committee meeting attended. And finally, he will get $130,000 annually in stock for each year he's on the board.
That doesn't make him a special case at Tenet, however, because SEC filings show the company's board members earned between $409,000 and $590,000 for 2006.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9797
President Bush Nominates Henry Paulson as Treasury Secretary
President George W. Bush shakes the hand of Henry Paulson after nominating him Tuesday, May 30, 2006, as Treasury Secretary to replace Secretary John Snow, right, who announced his resignation. White House photo by Shealah Craighead
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/05/images/20060530_p053006sc-0222-515h.html
Moore: Bush 'coming after me' for political reasons
By Kim Profant / Chicago Tribune
LOS ANGELES -- Filmmaker Michael Moore has asked the Bush administration to call off an investigation of his trip to Cuba to get treatment for ailing Sept. 11 rescue workers for a segment in his upcoming health-care expose, "SiCKO."
Moore, who made the hit documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" assailing President Bush's handling of Sept. 11, said in a letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on Friday that the White House may have opened the investigation for political reasons.
"I understand why the Bush administration is coming after me -- I have tried to help the very people they refuse to help, but until George W. Bush outlaws helping your fellow man, I have broken no laws and I have nothing to hide," Moore said in the letter, which he posted on the liberal Web site Daily Kos.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9789
Statement in Response to Bush Administration's Investigation of 'SiCKO'
'SiCKO,' Michael Moore's new movie, will rip the band-aid off America's health care industry. Premiering at the Cannes Film Festival in just one week and opening across the U.S. on June 29th, 'SiCKO' will expose the corporations that place profit before care and the politicians who care only about money. Our health care system is broken and, all too often, deadly. The efforts of the Bush Administration to conduct a politically motivated investigation of Michael Moore and 'SiCKO' will not stop us from making sure the American people see this film.
On September 11, 2001 this country was attacked. Thousands of Americans responded with heroism and courage, toiling for days, weeks and months in the ruins at Ground Zero. These 9/11 first responders risked their lives searching for survivors, recovering bodies, and clearing away toxic rubble. Now, many of these heroes face serious health issues -- and far too many of them are not receiving the care they need and deserve. President Bush and the Bush Administration should be spending their time trying to help these heroes get health care instead of abusing the legal process to advance a political agenda.
-- Meghan O'Hara, Producer, SiCKO
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikeinthenews/index.php?id=9780
Public Punditry Contest!
Deadline June 1
http://freewayblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/public-punditry-contest.html
Army Recruiters Caught on Hidden Camera
http://www.newschannel5.com/Global/category.asp?C=99556
Meet Blackwater USA, the powerful private army that the U.S. government has quietly hired to operate in international war zones and on American soil. With its own military base, a fleet of twenty aircraft, and twenty-thousand troops at the ready, Blackwater is the elite Praetorian Guard for the "global war on terror"--yet most people have never heard of it.
http://www.nationbooks.org/book.mhtml?t=scahill
Be It Resolved: You Can Impeach the President
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=622
Casualties of Iraq War
American soldiers dead, since war began (3/19/03) : 3422
http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/
October 11th, 2006 1:20 am
Study Claims Iraq's 'Excess' Death Toll Has Reached 655,000
By David Brown / Washington Post
A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimates that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8080
Digital, newspaper of Sancti Spiritus province, Cuba.
Cuba Asks UN to Circulate Official Statement on Posada
United Nations, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Cuba asked the UN secretary general to circulate a protest against the release of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles in the United States, as an official document of the General Assembly and the Security Council.
Cuban Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca said in a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon that a US court dropped all charges against the terrorist and released him on May 8.
Once again, Cuba holds the US government responsible for that decision, which is proof of Washington's double standard in its self-proclaimed "war against terrorism", the letter says.
Malmierca added that by not considering this individual a terrorist, the US government is violating international covenants and treaties, in addition to breaking its own laws.
The Cuban ambassador added that Posada Carriles's release also violates pertinent resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly and the Security Council.
He repeated his country's strongest condemnation of this new move, which he described as an insult to the Cuban people and the victims and relatives of the hideous sabotage of a Cubana de Aviacion airplane off Barbados in 1976, killing all 73 people on board.
Malmierca asked the UN secretary general to circulate his letter and an annex containing the Declaration of the Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Cuba, dated May 9, 2007, as official documents of the 61st Session of the General Assembly.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cstatement070518842.htm
Venez Urges US People to Denounce Terrorist Release
Caracas, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Failing a response from the US administration on the extradition of Luis Posada Carriles, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro has urged the US Congress and people to denounce the release of this international terrorist.
Freeing this notorious criminal is a gigantic shame, and we know that initiatives have been put forward in the US Congress, with the issue included in the legislative agenda of the next few weeks, Maduro told Prensa Latina in Caracas on Friday.
Maduro called on US legislators and the public of that country to strongly make their feelings known about the Bush administration s allowing the terrorist to freely walk US streets.
He said this move puts the security of the entire hemisphere in danger, and recalled Posada Carriles has been convicted of numerous violent acts.
Venezuela's top diplomat explained that his government is taking several actions on the international scene, including a joint presentation with Cuba before the UN Anti-Terrorist Committee.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cmaduro070518451.htm
Cuban Press vs. Terrorist Impunity
Havana, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Cuban journalists called for their colleagues throughout the world to condemn the release in United States of terrorist Luis Posada Carriles and end impunity.
Professionals and media workers met Thursday at the capital s Anti-Imperialist Tribune, under the nose of the US Interests Section, and criticized Washington s protection of Posada Carriles.
Barbara Betancourt, from Radio Habana Cuba station, Juvenal Balan and Daysi Francis, from "Granma" newspaper, Jose Alejandro Rodriguez, from "Juventud Rebelde" daily, Carlos Alberto Gonzalez, a TV journalist and Jean-Guy Allard, from Granma International paper, denounced the terrorist s crimes.
They also highlighted the international media silence over the release of the mastermind of a mid air explosion of a Cuban airplane in 1976 that cost the lives of 73 people and a series of bomb attacks in Havana hotels in 1997.
Jose Antonio Martin, vice president of the Union of Journalists of Cuba, said according to some declassified documents from the US Department of State, Posada s plans in 1976 included attacks against Prensa Latina press agencies in Panama and Colombia.
Among Posada´s new projects is to attack statesmen and leaders from social and left-wing organizations, but Cuban journalists will continue faighting with the truth the media campaign that tries to protect him, concluded Martin.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cpress070518158.htm
Bolivia Minister: Posada Release Insults Law
La Paz, May 18 (Prensa Latina) The liberation in United States of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles is an insult to international law, Bolivian Interior Minister Alfredo Rada told Prensa Latina on Friday.
According to Rada's statements, the May 8 decision by a US court to reject all charges against the criminal is also a provocation.
"For all revolutionary and sensible people of the hemisphere", said the official, "to free the confessed mastermind of the midair bombing of a Cuban airplane in 1976 with 73 people on aboard questions the Bush government s commitment to fighting terrorism". That decision, stressed the Bolivian minister, will be rejected by most of US people who, as well as in other countries, condemn all kind of violent action.
Rada trusts that world repudiation for the release of Posada Carriles will revert the situation and the murderer will return to prison, after being tried for all his crimes.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Crelease070518155.htm
Luis Posada Carriles Tried in Cuba
Havana, May 14 (Prensa Latina) Cuban youth start on Monday a two-day political trial against terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, after the US government's denial to try him for crimes against humanity.
This is the first process of this kind in the island against Posada Carriles, who was freed from jail by the Bush government, despite a Venezuelan extradition request.
Over 3,000 people have lost their lives in Cuba and another 2,000 have been mutilated in violent actions organized from US territory since 1959.
According to Julio Martinez, leader of the Cuban Young Communist League, the aim of this political trial is to prove to the world that Posada Carriles is "one of the worst terrorists on the planet".
Posada Carriles is the confessed mastermind of the mid-air explosion of a Cuban airplane with 73 people on board in 1976 and a series of bomb attacks in Havana hotels in 1997, which killed an Italian tourist, among other actions against the country.
He is also fugitive from the Venezuelan justice, having escaped from a jail of that South American nation in 1985, and was denounced by Cuban President Fidel Castro in Panama in 2000 for preparing an assassination attempt against him at the Ibero-American Summit.
Cuba demands justice in this case, after he was acquitted by the Bush administration, which has ignored the Venezuelan extradition request to try him.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cposada070514252.htm
By David Brown / Washington Post
A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimates that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=8080
Digital, newspaper of Sancti Spiritus province, Cuba.
Cuba Asks UN to Circulate Official Statement on Posada
United Nations, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Cuba asked the UN secretary general to circulate a protest against the release of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles in the United States, as an official document of the General Assembly and the Security Council.
Cuban Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca said in a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon that a US court dropped all charges against the terrorist and released him on May 8.
Once again, Cuba holds the US government responsible for that decision, which is proof of Washington's double standard in its self-proclaimed "war against terrorism", the letter says.
Malmierca added that by not considering this individual a terrorist, the US government is violating international covenants and treaties, in addition to breaking its own laws.
The Cuban ambassador added that Posada Carriles's release also violates pertinent resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly and the Security Council.
He repeated his country's strongest condemnation of this new move, which he described as an insult to the Cuban people and the victims and relatives of the hideous sabotage of a Cubana de Aviacion airplane off Barbados in 1976, killing all 73 people on board.
Malmierca asked the UN secretary general to circulate his letter and an annex containing the Declaration of the Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Cuba, dated May 9, 2007, as official documents of the 61st Session of the General Assembly.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cstatement070518842.htm
Venez Urges US People to Denounce Terrorist Release
Caracas, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Failing a response from the US administration on the extradition of Luis Posada Carriles, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro has urged the US Congress and people to denounce the release of this international terrorist.
Freeing this notorious criminal is a gigantic shame, and we know that initiatives have been put forward in the US Congress, with the issue included in the legislative agenda of the next few weeks, Maduro told Prensa Latina in Caracas on Friday.
Maduro called on US legislators and the public of that country to strongly make their feelings known about the Bush administration s allowing the terrorist to freely walk US streets.
He said this move puts the security of the entire hemisphere in danger, and recalled Posada Carriles has been convicted of numerous violent acts.
Venezuela's top diplomat explained that his government is taking several actions on the international scene, including a joint presentation with Cuba before the UN Anti-Terrorist Committee.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cmaduro070518451.htm
Cuban Press vs. Terrorist Impunity
Havana, May 18 (Prensa Latina) Cuban journalists called for their colleagues throughout the world to condemn the release in United States of terrorist Luis Posada Carriles and end impunity.
Professionals and media workers met Thursday at the capital s Anti-Imperialist Tribune, under the nose of the US Interests Section, and criticized Washington s protection of Posada Carriles.
Barbara Betancourt, from Radio Habana Cuba station, Juvenal Balan and Daysi Francis, from "Granma" newspaper, Jose Alejandro Rodriguez, from "Juventud Rebelde" daily, Carlos Alberto Gonzalez, a TV journalist and Jean-Guy Allard, from Granma International paper, denounced the terrorist s crimes.
They also highlighted the international media silence over the release of the mastermind of a mid air explosion of a Cuban airplane in 1976 that cost the lives of 73 people and a series of bomb attacks in Havana hotels in 1997.
Jose Antonio Martin, vice president of the Union of Journalists of Cuba, said according to some declassified documents from the US Department of State, Posada s plans in 1976 included attacks against Prensa Latina press agencies in Panama and Colombia.
Among Posada´s new projects is to attack statesmen and leaders from social and left-wing organizations, but Cuban journalists will continue faighting with the truth the media campaign that tries to protect him, concluded Martin.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cpress070518158.htm
Bolivia Minister: Posada Release Insults Law
La Paz, May 18 (Prensa Latina) The liberation in United States of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles is an insult to international law, Bolivian Interior Minister Alfredo Rada told Prensa Latina on Friday.
According to Rada's statements, the May 8 decision by a US court to reject all charges against the criminal is also a provocation.
"For all revolutionary and sensible people of the hemisphere", said the official, "to free the confessed mastermind of the midair bombing of a Cuban airplane in 1976 with 73 people on aboard questions the Bush government s commitment to fighting terrorism". That decision, stressed the Bolivian minister, will be rejected by most of US people who, as well as in other countries, condemn all kind of violent action.
Rada trusts that world repudiation for the release of Posada Carriles will revert the situation and the murderer will return to prison, after being tried for all his crimes.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Crelease070518155.htm
Luis Posada Carriles Tried in Cuba
Havana, May 14 (Prensa Latina) Cuban youth start on Monday a two-day political trial against terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, after the US government's denial to try him for crimes against humanity.
This is the first process of this kind in the island against Posada Carriles, who was freed from jail by the Bush government, despite a Venezuelan extradition request.
Over 3,000 people have lost their lives in Cuba and another 2,000 have been mutilated in violent actions organized from US territory since 1959.
According to Julio Martinez, leader of the Cuban Young Communist League, the aim of this political trial is to prove to the world that Posada Carriles is "one of the worst terrorists on the planet".
Posada Carriles is the confessed mastermind of the mid-air explosion of a Cuban airplane with 73 people on board in 1976 and a series of bomb attacks in Havana hotels in 1997, which killed an Italian tourist, among other actions against the country.
He is also fugitive from the Venezuelan justice, having escaped from a jail of that South American nation in 1985, and was denounced by Cuban President Fidel Castro in Panama in 2000 for preparing an assassination attempt against him at the Ibero-American Summit.
Cuba demands justice in this case, after he was acquitted by the Bush administration, which has ignored the Venezuelan extradition request to try him.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cposada070514252.htm
Cuban Doctors in Surinam Against Release of Posada Carriles
Havana, May 16 (ACN) Cuban doctors offering their services in Surinam held a scientific conference May 14 in which they condemned the release of notorious criminal Luis Posada Carriles and demanded freedom for the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters held in US prisons.
During the scientific conference, held in the capital Paramaribo with the attendance of Cuban ambassador to Surinam Andres Gonzalez Garrido, and the members of the Operation Miracle free eye-surgery program, Urologist Juan Antonio Barral Garcia gave a presentation on kidney carcinoma and offered his vast experience as specialist and surgeon. Dr. Barral Garcia has offered his services at Paramaribo's Academic Hospital for more than a year now.
Doctor Eddy Millan called on all Cuban internationalist doctors in Surinam to keep combining their medical practice with professional and scientific studies.
Ambassador Gonzalez Garrido said the work of Cuban doctors in Surinam will ratify the high prestige of Cuban medical sciences. He underscored the political will of the Cuban people to keep condemning the release of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, as they demand freedom for the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters, who have been jailed in the United States for more than eight years now.
Fernando Gonzalez, Ramon Labañino, Rene Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero and Gerardo Hernandez, known as the Cuban Five, were given extremely long and unfair sentences by a biased Miami court for having collected information on Florida-based ultra-right groups that have carried out terrorist actions against the Cuban people with the complicity of several US administrations during the past 45 years.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Csuriname0705161015.htm
Posada Carriles: Chronology of a Murderer
February 15th, 1928: Luis Posada Carriles is born in the Cuban city of Cienfuegos.
1954: He moves to Havana and meets some politicians allied to dictator Fulgencio Batista.
1955: He becomes a secret collaborator of the Batista’s police.
1957: He contacts the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI).
1959: He gets involved with counterrevolutionary groups which carry out sabotages in the island.
1960: He asks for asylum in the Argentina embassy alleging to be politically chased.
February 25th, 1961: He gets a safe-conduct to travel to Miami, where the CIA orders him to contact the counterrevolutionary organizations which are being trained for Playa Giron invasion.
March-April, 1961: He goes to Guatemala to train the mercenaries for infiltration and sabotages in Cuba's Bay of Pigs territory. He doesn’t participate in the invasion because his ship doesn't land in due time.
1961-1962: In the United States, he contacts the terrorist organization Movimiento Nacionalista Cubano (MNC).
1964-1965: He gets involved in activities against the Cuban Revolution in the United States, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.
May, 1965: The FBI informs that Posada Carriles was connected to a conspiracy to overthrow the Guatemalan government.
June, 1965: A CIA declassified memo connects Posada with Jorge Mas Canosa in Veracruz, Mexico, when trying to blow up a Soviet ship.
October, 1967: The CIA transfers Posada Carriles to Venezuela where he joins the Direction of the Intelligence and Prevention Services (DISIP) organization. Disguised under the pseudonym of “Comisario Basilio” (Commissar Basilio), he takes part in repressive activities against Venezuelan and Latin American progressive groups.
1967-1976: He simultaneously works for the CIA in the secret services of Venezuela, Guatemala, El Salvador, Chile and Argentina.
1971: He organizes an assassination attempt against Commander in Chief Fidel Castro during a tour of the Cuban leader to Chile, Peru and Ecuador.
January 21st, 1974: He is connected with explosive devices placed in the Cuban embassies in Argentina, Peru and Mexico.
July, 1974: He sends bombs in letters and books to several Cuban consulates in Latin America.
November 7th, 1974: He places bombs in the Institute of Brazilian Studies and in the Bolivia Embassy in Ecuador.
June, 1975: He opens in Caracas, Venezuela, the Enterprise for Commercial and Industrial Investigations CA (ICICA) in order to hide his terrorist activities in the region.
1976: He joins Orlando Bosch to found the Committee of United Revolutionary Organizations (CORU), an anti-Cuban terrorist organization.
April 22nd, 1976: He is connected with the detonation of a bomb in the Cuban embassy in Portugal, where two Cuban diplomats are killed.
July 1st, 1976: He places a bomb in the Costa Rica-Cuba Cultural Center in Costa Rica.
July 9th, 1976: He is responsible for a bomb found in the luggage of Cubana de Aviacion airline in Jamaica.
July 10th, 1976: He is connected to a bomb placed in the offices of Cubana de Aviacion airline in Barbados.
July 11th, 1976: He is linked to a bomb placed in the offices of Air Panama airline in Colombia.
October 4th, 1976: The CORU (Coordinator for Integrated Revolutionary Organizations) declares to have placed a bomb in a television channel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in which the Cuban film “The New School” was being shown.
October 6th, 1976: Posada Carriles is identified as the principal planner and mastermind, together with Orlando Bosch, of the sabotage to a Cuban airplane while flying off the coasts of Barbados in which 73 people were killed. Both criminals are arrested in Caracas and are prosecuted together with Hernan Ricardo and Freddy Lugo, who were the one who carried out the sabotage.
1976-1985: He is kept in prison in Venezuela waiting for the verdict of a too long judicial process.
August 18th, 1985: He escapes from prison and after a 15 day-stay in Caracas, he boards a shrimper that takes him to Aruba. Once in that country he takes a private flight to Costa Rica and then to El Salvador. All the operations are financed by the National Cuban-American Foundation (FNCA) and indirectly by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
In Ilopango’s air base, he joins the group responsible for the supplies to the counterrevolutionaries in Nicaragua. He gets involved with the arms traffic controlled from Washington by Oliver North, advisor for internal security of the then US President Ronald Reagan.
October, 1986: When the burst of the Iran-Contras scandal, he contacts a group of Venezuelan instructors engaged in training the Salvadorian police on counter-guerrilla and interrogatory techniques.
1988: He travels to Guatemala to work as security advisor for the Guatemalan Telephone Enterprise (GUATEL)
1992: The National Cuban-American Foundation (FNCA) organizes a “military section” in charge of preparing and executing terrorist activities against Cuba and its main leaders in which Luis Posada Carriles, Guillermo and Ignacio Novo Sampoll have an active participation.
1993: The FNCA terrorist group adopts another name: Cuban National Front.
1994: Posada Carriles organizes an unsuccessful attempt against Cuban President Fidel Castro in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, when the leader was touring the historic center of the city with the Literature Nobel Prizewinner Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
1994-1997: He recruits mercenaries from Central American countries to carry out terrorist attacks in Cuba, specially in the tourism sector.
July 12th-13th, 1998: In an interview with the New York Times daily, he declares to have been backed by FNCA for the bomb attacks in Cuban resorts.
November 5th, 2000: Posada Carriles arrives in Panama with a Salvadorian passport issued to Franco Rodriguez Mena (one of his alias) to organize a bomb sabotage in the meeting hall of the Panamanian University where Fidel Castro was supposed to deliver a speech.
November 17th, 2000: Fidel Castro denounces an assassination plan against himself in an Ibero-American summit in Panama. Panamanian officials discover explosive material and arrest Posada together with Gaspar Jimenez Escobedo, Pedro Remon and Guillermo Novo Sampoll.
April 20th, 2004: The saboteurs are punished with 4 to 8 year imprisonment.
August 26th, 2004: The then Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso exempts the four terrorists from imprisonment. They secretly leave “El Renacer” prison and are taken to Albrook airport from where they fly to Tocumen airport. Once there, a private jet takes them to Honduras. Posada stays in that country while the other three terrorists go to Miami.
March, 2005: Posada goes to the United States and lawyers say he is looking for asylum.
April 11th, 2005: In the first of a series of special TV presentations, Cuban President Fidel Castro denounces the complicity of the US government with terrorism when saying that Posada Carriles would possibly be admitted in that country. News received more than ten days ago informed that the terrorist is in Miami where arrangements are made to grant him asylum.
April 17th, 2005: Fidel warns about the possibility of Posada being disappeared in the United States. He asks them not to kill him now, not to poison him, he asks them not to say that he died due to a heart attack or a brain damage, he says we are ready to send doctors to care for his health, so he can tells all he knows and can be prosecuted.
May 1st, 2005: Fidel addresses over one million Cubans at the Revolution Square in Havana during the 1st of May celebrations and gives more evidences on Posada Carriles presence in Miami and the evident refusal of the White House to do something despite so many evidences on the case.
May 4th, 2005: Venezuelan Chancellor Ali Rodriguez asks the United States to obey the already signed agreements and extradite Luis Posada Carriles for trial in Caracas.
May 10th: The New York Times publishes an editorial in which it is affirmed that on behalf of credibility, consistency and justice, the US government must arrest and extradite terrorist Luis Posada Carriles.
May 11th: The Cuban president refers to a report by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) in which it is said that terrorists Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch are involved in the assassination of the Chilean ex-Chancellor Orlando Letelier and his North American secretary in 1976.
May 12th: During his special TV presentation, Fidel accuses the US government for hiding information taking into consideration that one day after the blowing up of a Cuban airliner off the Barbados coasts, the FBI and the CIA knew about the material and intellectual authors of the criminal sabotage, according to a document red by the mandatary.
May 13th: Venezuela officially asks the United States to extradite Posada Carriles. In a press conference held in Washington, relatives of victims of terrorism, academics, lawyers and leaders of social and religious organizations in the United States demand the government to arrest Posada Carriles and extradite him to Venezuela.
May 15th, 2005: The New Herald publishes the article “The war that Posada Carriles could not win to Fidel Castro” in which it is affirmed that the terrorist has been defeated.
May 17th, 2005: Over a million residents from Havana participate in a Combatant March in front of the US Section of Interests to demand justice and to end terrorism. It is a march in favor of life and peace, in favor of our people and the brother people of the United States, says Fidel before the beginning of the historic protest. Posada Carriles is arrested by federal agents and taken to South Florida where he is kept in a detention center for people with migratory problems. The Internal Security Department says the prisoner’s situation would be analyzed and the next step to follow would be informed within 48 hours. The criminal had already offered a press conference in which he confirmed his request for political asylum to the Bush administration. But later on, his lawyer Eduardo Soto informed that Posada Carriles had decided to withdraw the petition and leave the North American territory.
May 18th: Fidel calls on the progressive forces of the world to demand the US to send Luis Posada Carriles to Venezuela so he can be prosecuted there.
Sources: Juventud Rebelde newspaper, PL and AP news agencies, Cubadebate.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Posada%20Carriles-Bush/Cchronology070425111.htm
Announcement from the President to the Cuban people
DUE to the enormous effort made to visit the Argentine city of Córdoba, participate in the MERCOSUR meeting, in the closing session of the Summit of the Peoples in the historical University of Córdoba and the visit to Altagracia, the city where Che lived as a child, and in addition to that immediately attending the commemoration of the 53rd anniversary of the assault on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes garrisons on July 26, 1953 in the provinces of Granma and Holguín, compounded by days and nights of continuous work with barely any sleep have all resulted in my health, which has stood up to every test, being subjected to extreme stress and breaking down. This provoked an acute intestinal crisis with sustained bleeding which obliged me to undergo a complicated surgical operation. All the details of this health accident are confirmed by X-rays, endoscopies and filmed material. The operation has obliged me to take various weeks of rest, at a remove from my responsibilities and duties.
Given that our country is threatened in circumstances like this by the government of the United States, I have taken the following decision:
I provisionally delegate my functions as first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba to the second secretary, comrade Raúl Castro Ruz.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Fidel/Cannounce060908950.htm
January 11th: International Day to Shut Down Guantanamo
Havana (RHC) - Thursday, January 11th, marks the fifth anniversary of the opening of a prison for so-called "enemy combatants" at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo -located in southeastern Cuba and illegally occupied by the United States. January 11th has been declared "International Day to Shut Down Guantánamo".
As part of protest activities and calls for the immediate closing of the prison at Guantanamo, Thursday will be a Congressional call-in day to focus on the repeal of the Military Commissions Act and the shutting down of Guantanamo. Organizers say that those interested should visit http://www.witnesstorture.org/ for details on how to contact members of Congress on January 11th to demand an end to torture and indefinite detention.
Organizers have also announced that there will be a march to Congress on Thursday in Washington, DC - and a news conference led by lawyers representing the men at Guantanamo and family members of those detained. Marchers plan to continue from the Supreme Court to the U.S. Federal Court, theatrically taking the prisoners' case from the court that upheld their rights to the Federal Court where their cases need to be heard.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gjanuary0701101257.htm
Announcement from the President to the Cuban people
DUE to the enormous effort made to visit the Argentine city of Córdoba, participate in the MERCOSUR meeting, in the closing session of the Summit of the Peoples in the historical University of Córdoba and the visit to Altagracia, the city where Che lived as a child, and in addition to that immediately attending the commemoration of the 53rd anniversary of the assault on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes garrisons on July 26, 1953 in the provinces of Granma and Holguín, compounded by days and nights of continuous work with barely any sleep have all resulted in my health, which has stood up to every test, being subjected to extreme stress and breaking down. This provoked an acute intestinal crisis with sustained bleeding which obliged me to undergo a complicated surgical operation. All the details of this health accident are confirmed by X-rays, endoscopies and filmed material. The operation has obliged me to take various weeks of rest, at a remove from my responsibilities and duties.
Given that our country is threatened in circumstances like this by the government of the United States, I have taken the following decision:
I provisionally delegate my functions as first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba to the second secretary, comrade Raúl Castro Ruz.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Fidel/Cannounce060908950.htm
January 11th: International Day to Shut Down Guantanamo
Havana (RHC) - Thursday, January 11th, marks the fifth anniversary of the opening of a prison for so-called "enemy combatants" at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo -located in southeastern Cuba and illegally occupied by the United States. January 11th has been declared "International Day to Shut Down Guantánamo".
As part of protest activities and calls for the immediate closing of the prison at Guantanamo, Thursday will be a Congressional call-in day to focus on the repeal of the Military Commissions Act and the shutting down of Guantanamo. Organizers say that those interested should visit http://www.witnesstorture.org/ for details on how to contact members of Congress on January 11th to demand an end to torture and indefinite detention.
Organizers have also announced that there will be a march to Congress on Thursday in Washington, DC - and a news conference led by lawyers representing the men at Guantanamo and family members of those detained. Marchers plan to continue from the Supreme Court to the U.S. Federal Court, theatrically taking the prisoners' case from the court that upheld their rights to the Federal Court where their cases need to be heard.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gjanuary0701101257.htm
New Report of Torture at US Guantanamo Base
WASHINGTON, May 15.— A Pakistani prisoner at the US Guantanamo Naval Base, an offshore prison located on illegally occupied Cuban territory, said he was subjected to torture by the CIA and Pentagon.
Majid Khan, 27, said he is still subjected to "physiological torture" at the detention camp where hundreds of prisoners from dozens of nations have been held for years without proper legal rights.
As the basis for accusations against Khan, the US uses a transcription of a closed door hearing to establish the prisoner status as an "enemy combatant".
The 39-page document, which in some parts was censored, contains a summary of the torture allegedly suffered by the prisoner, reported ANSA news agency.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gagency070516413.htm
Ecuador: Cuba Talks on US-Guantanamo Naval Base
Chone, Ecuador, Mar 9 (Prensa Latina) Cuban activists in Ecuador will be presenting experiences on rejection of the US military presence in the illegally occupied territory of Guantanamo, during the closing of the International Conference for the Elimination of Foreign Military Bases.
Lourdes Cervantes, member of the Women for Peace Caravan and leader of the organization for solidarity with the peoples of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, will reiterate Cuba´s position of action against militarization and wars worldwide, during the closing of the meeting at Eloy Alfaro University, in Manta, Manabi province.
Delegates at the conference, Manta´s residents, and members of popular and social movements will march in front of the Manta military base to rebuff the US military presence there.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gecuador0703091140.htm
Pentagon Official Attacks Law Firms Representing Prisoners
Washington (RHC) - A senior Pentagon official says he is upset that lawyers at many top legal firms are representing prisoners at Guantanamo and is calling on corporate clients to consider ending their business ties.
The comments by Charles D. Stimson, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, produced an instant torrent of anger from lawyers, legal ethics specialists and bar association officials, who said that his comments displayed an ignorance of the duties of lawyers to represent people in legal trouble.
An article in The New York Times quotes Stephen Gillers, a law professor at New York University and an expert on legal ethics. Gillers said: "This is prejudicial to the administration of justice" -and that it was possible that attorneys "willing to undertake what has been long viewed as an admirable chore will decline to do so for fear of antagonizing important clients.
Other lawyers and legal experts were critical of a senior government official suggesting that representing prisoners at Guantanamo compromises U.S. interests -noting that Stimson even names the firms, giving a target to corporate America.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gpentagon0701161039.htm
British Ex-Prisoner: No Fair Legal Process in Guantanamo
London, April 5 (RHC) - A British resident released from the US prison in Guantanamo after being held for more than four years has said that the US failed to observe fair legal processes at the detention camp.
Bisher al-Rawi, an Iraqi national and British resident, had been held at the US military base in Cuba since 2002, but was reunited with his family last weekend in England.
"Allegations are made against you that are laughably untrue, but you have no chance to prove them wrong. There is no trial, no fair legal process", al-Rawi said in a statement.
Al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna, another British resident, were alleged to have been associated with al-Qaeda through their connection with Abu Qatada, a London-based cleric.
http://www.escambray.islagrande.cu/Eng/Special/Guantanamo/Gbritish070405416.htm
continued...
