British Elections 2019: Dodging a Pro-Castro bullet

"Let’s get this thing done – and then let’s get ready to make our case to the country against the fratricidal anti-Semitic Marxists who were in Brighton last week." - Prime Minister Boris Johnson, October 2019

Boris Johnson versus Jeremy Corbyn: Hard Brexit or State Socialism?

Good news for the United Kingdom. Jeremy Corbyn will not be the Prime Minister. Corbyn caught well deserved criticism for praising Fidel Castro upon his death in November 2016. This is part of a larger pro-communist complex that includes support for Maduro in Venezuela, covering for Russia's poisonings, and Assad's gassings. In May 2017, Corbyn defended Karl Marx as a "great economist."

Over two years ago on October 9, 2017 on the TRT World program "The News Makers" I participated in a contentious conversation on US-Cuba relations that ended up turning into a debate that hopefully generated more light than heat on the important subject of the diplomatic crisis taking place between the United States and Cuba. A crisis that involved U.S. diplomats suffering brain damage under circumstances that have yet to be cleared up more than two years later.

My adversary on this program was Robert Miller, director of the Cuba Solidarity Campaign (CSC). The organization's name is a misnomer in reality it should be called the Castro Dictatorship Support Campaign. Douglas Dowell, a self described "liberal-minded social democrat" observed that CSC was a group of "apologists for a repressive dictatorship."

CSC claims that Cuba is a democracy are even more troubling when one takes into account that Jeremy Corbyn, the Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition , and candidate for Prime Minister in 2019, is a long time supporter.

Towards the end of our debate Mr. Miller not only tried to legitimize the Castro dictatorship but also attempted to make the case that North Korea is a democracy.

The choice on election day was between a Hard Brexit and State Socialism in the United Kingdom. The subjects of the United Kingdom voted Conservative and against State Socialism by a landslide.

They dodged a bullet.

Debating the director of the Castro Dictatorship Support Campaign

Taking a closer look at a totalitarian network

Debating a supporter of the Castro regime on TRT World on October 9, 2017

On October 9, 2017 on the TRT World program "The News Makers" I participated in a contentious conversation on US-Cuba relations that ended up turning into a debate that hopefully generated more light than heat on the important subject of the diplomatic crisis taking place between the United States and Cuba.

My adversary on this program was Robert Miller, director of the Cuba Solidarity Campaign (CSC). The organization's name is a misnomer in reality it should be called the Castro Dictatorship Support Campaign. Douglas Dowell, a self described "liberal-minded social democrat" describes CSC as "apologists for a repressive dictatorship." CSC claims that Cuba is a democracy are even more troubling when one takes into account that Jeremy Corbyn, the Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition since 2015 in the United Kingdom, is a long time supporter.

The organization has engaged in lobbying of British members of parliament and the results can be seen in troubling way. Following the death of Fidel Castro on November 25, 2016 Jeremy Corbyn praised the Communist tyrant a "huge figure of modern history, national independence and 20th Century socialism" and in "our lives." In August of 2017 controversy erupted when "Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell’s parliamentary private secretary (PPS) Karen Lee tweeted 'happy birthday Fidel' when she shared a message from the Cuba Solidarity Campaign." The question raised by David Tinline, a former Labour candidate for parliament, in 2005: "Why does the left still back Castro?" is even more relevant and troubling today when one considers that the Leader of the Labour party garnered 40% of the vote in the last elections.

This is part of an international network that supports the Castro regime with branches in Ireland, Scotland, Canada (Cuba Solidarity in Canada), the United States, Australia, and the list goes on. More ominously for Venezuelans, there is now a "Venezuela Solidarity Campaign" underway that in reality should be called the Maduro Dictatorship Support Campaign to install totalitarianism in Venezuela.

There are genuinely few times that I can say I debated an unapologetic supporter of the Castro regime. This was one of them, revealing to me the importance of friends of freedom organizing into more effective support networks to provide real solidarity for the oppressed peoples of Cuba, Venezuela, China, North Korea, Laos, Iran, Syria and Vietnam.

Remembering Gandhi 67 years after his assassination

Most modern freedom is at root fear. It is not so much that we are too bold to endure rules; it is rather that we are too timid to endure responsibilities." - G.K. Chesterton What's Wrong With the World

Gandhi spinning cloth with a symbol of national resistance

67 years ago today Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated but his nonviolent legacy remains intact and continues to inspire others. Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948 while on a walk at Birla Bhavan by Hindu nationalist Nathuram Godse.  He was 78 years old at the time of his death. Below are ten quotes to read and reflect on from this nonviolent practitioner:

"No people have risen who thought only of rights. Only those did so who thought of duties."
 
"Appeasement has become a word of bad odor. In no case can there be any appeasement at the cost of honour. Real appeasement is to shed all fear and do what is right at any cost."

"I have learnt through bitter experience the one supreme lesson to conserve my anger, and as heat conserved is transmuted into energy, even so our anger controlled can be transmuted into a power that can move the world." - Young India Journal, September 1920

"It has always been a mystery to me how men can feel themselves honoured by the humiliation of their fellow beings."

"Terrorism and deception are weapons not of the strong but of the weak."

"You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty."

"A saint who considers himself superior to a sinner forfeits his sainthood and becomes worse than the sinner, who unlike the proud saint, knows not what he is doing."

"Centralization as a system is inconsistent with non-violent structure of society."

They say, 'means are, after all, means'. I would say, 'means are, after all, everything'. As the means so the end.

"The truth is that cowardice itself is violence of a subtle type and therefore dangerous and far more difficult to eradicate than the habit of physical violence." - Mohandas Gandhi