Fidel Castro writes an op-ed about.... Rahm Emanuel.

Sorry if this has already been posted, I just caught it on Huff Post. This is pretty interesting. Different anyway. :) -WB

Reflections of Fidel

Rahm Emanuel

WHAT a strange surname! It appears Spanish, easy to pronounce, but it’s not. Never in my life have I heard or read about any student or compatriot with that name, among tens of thousands.

Where does it come from? I wondered. Over and over, the name came to mind of the brilliant German thinker, Immanuel Kant, who together with Aristotle and Plato, formed a trio of philosophers that have most influenced human thinking. Doubtless he was not very far, as I discovered later, from the philosophy of the man closest to the current president of the United States, Barack Obama.

Another recent possibility led me to reflect on the strange surname, the book of Germán Sánchez, the Cuban ambassador in Bolivarian Venezuela: The transparence of Enmanuel, this time without the “I” with which the German philosopher’s name begins.

Enmanuel is the name of the child conceived and born in the dense guerrilla jungle, where his extremely honorable mother, Colombian vice presidential candidate Clara Rojas González, was taken prisoner on February 23, 2002, together with Ingrid Betancourt, who was a presidential candidate in that sister country’s elections that year.


http://granma.cu/ingles/2009/febrero/lun9/reflexiones.html

How about that?

Fidel read Kant and he's your favorite philosopher. Don't you see the connection!?!?! :rofl:

Yeah Kant is great, very complex. Not easy to read and decipher. I had a class on political theory a few years ago and he was one of the philosophers we studied.

Is 'transnationals' translated 'globalists'? Or nation of immigrants? :shrug:

... you know, like "I'm not a player I just crush a lot." lol



..... even to your average central American communist dictator icon. :)

... like the sight of the POTUS's exposed neck!!! prrrrrr!

.... and that cute little mob guy he's got working for him ....yes, I know I should not refer to the President's Chief of Staff as "that cute little mob guy" but we ALL think it! lol Who needs Pacino when you have Rahm Emmanuel? His "little friend" is the combined armed forces of the United States! ha ha, love it!

(yes, I've had all my coffee this morning, can ya tell?)

he just stepped out of a mob movie. And I don't mean that with any disrespect. I love mob movies. It's just, I see Emmanuel, and I think "consiglieri".

.... and I have a sneaking suspicion that Rahmmy stands in front of a mirror from time to time practicing his "mob face." lol

His point, and he does have one, is this:

That even if you're named after one of the best philosophers ever, it's still not enough to pull the U.S. out of our financial mess.

There's too much meandering there. But he is in is Mid 80s, so who's gonna tell him no? :shrug:

After all the hoopla and hysteria about the name "Obama."

1. What a crazy name! I wonder where it comes from. Surely I could not look this up on Wikipedia.
2. It must be from Immanuel Kant!
3. No, wait, maybe it's from this book I once read.
4. It was written by this great lady, who is an inspiration to everyone.
5. Anyway, here's some things Immanuel Kant wrote.
6. The Cuban revolution happened before Rahm was even born!
7. I believe everything anyone tells me, and so I think he fought in the Israeli army during the Gulf War.
8. Weapons are evil.
9. Racists might want to assassinate Obama, but he's got a lot of security, so he's probably going to be okay.
10. Anyway, Emanuel won't be able to save free-market capitalism, because free-market capitalism sucks.
11. Also America has protectionist policies which are bad for everyone else.

I mean, I'd say it was stream-of-consciousness, but streams don't leap across the countryside and double back on themselves like that.

Figure I got the gist of it now!

its not long, you can do it.

I heard "Castro" and thought "six hour speeches." My bad.

Rambling but interesting.

It's kind of interesting and entertaining though.

maybe the extreme far left fringe can cut Rahm some slack now.

Anybody who is an actual Democrat has to question some of the things this guy has done. By and large I like him though.

?

Constantly capitulating to Republican policies. Rahm is a political fighter, not a policy one though.

It's not hard. He was one of the main proponents of NAFTA and other corporate trade deals. He's consistently dismissed anti-war Dems even in his own Congressional delegation. He was even against a 50 state election strategy. How much do you want to bet Rahm was for watering down the stimulus bill and for the weak Geithner TARP plan? You don't want to mess with him politically because he's ruthless, but policywise his whole philosophy is to blur the lines between Dems and Republicans.

He was one of the main proponents of NAFTA and other corporate trade deals.

You mean FREE trade deals? (no one is impressed with the 'progressive' revolutionary rhetoric). The Democratic party has a long history of Free Trade deals. FDR ran on it against the protectionist policies of Hoover. Truman signed GATT, and Jimmy Carter was a BIG supporter of NAFTA.

He's consistently dismissed anti-war Dems even in his own Congressional delegation.

So what? Since when are "anti-war" Dems truer Dems than others?

He was even against a 50 state election strategy.

Leftwing myth. Emanuel was opposed to how Dean wanted to allocate funds. But regardless, being for the 50 state strategy isn't a criteria for being a Democrat.

How much do you want to bet Rahm was for watering down the stimulus bill and for the weak Geithner TARP plan?


Conjecture.

You're looking at the Democratic and Republican parties from a far left point of view. The Dem party has never been the party of left "progressives."

Oh, and by the way - NICE DLC AVATAR! lol!

Most of it is too trite to even reply to, but Rahm specifically went out of his way several times in 2006 to tell Dems to go silent on the war and not challenge Bush's position. He famously said that Jack Murtha didn't speak for Dems when he came out against the war. Yeah I have Schweitzer avatar, he's a progressive populist, so? It isn't far left to look at the parties how they historically have been before Movement Conservatism and the Third Way. It also isn't far left to not want to center my whole philosophy on capitulating to authoritarian Republicans. I don't care about kissing the ass of people who are wrong, I believe in good policy and what works. You don't.

He famously said that Jack Murtha didn't speak for Dems when he came out against the war.

Murtha called for an immediate withdrawal - something even Barack Obama hasn't called for. I suppose Obama is trite and has "blured the party lines?" LOL.

And Murtha DID NOT and DOES NOT speak for the Democratic party.

By the way, Emanuel's quote was, "Jack Murtha went out and spoke for Jack Murtha."

Yeah I have Schweitzer avatar, he's a progressive populist, so?

He's a DLCer.

:rofl:

It isn't far left to look at the parties how they historically have been before Movement Conservatism and the Third Way.

You just called the historic Democratic party "trite." That isn't surprising, given your poor knowledge of even recent party history.

So many words, so little point....

Now where's my card. Ok, I'm an Elk, a Communist, the President of the Gay and Lesbian Committee for some reason, oh here it is. The Stone Cutters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lbvSBNLLoo

--imm