Cuba Then Venezuela Now

By Armando Simón

            Many, many years ago, having come to the United States after the Communists took over Cuba, as a young man I would go to small events where American intellectuals would declare that China’s Cultural Revolution, or Castro’s takeover of Cuba, were wonderful. Being embarrassingly naïve then, I actually thought their salivating admiration was due to ignorance of what Communism really was. So, I would present them with facts about the censorship, indoctrination and political repression. Nothing made any impression on them. Facts, logic, reasoning slid off their faces like they were coated with Teflon. Even more bizarre, they, who were not Cubans, and who had no knowledge of Cuban history, culture, or geography, and did not speak one word of Spanish, were arguing with me, who was Cuban. They actually believed they were speaking on behalf of the Cuban people.

The same pattern is being presently replayed regarding the recent events in Venezuela. That country was the richest country in South America because of its vast oil deposits. After Hugo Chávez and Nicolas Maduro incrementally implemented Communism, the economy became moribund, and censorship and repression became permanent. Criminal gangs loyal to the regime further terrorized the citizenry, and hunger was widespread. As happened before with other Communist regimes, eight million fled the country. Like Cuba.

Last year, Maduro was also about to invade neighboring Guyana which also has vast oil deposits, but Trump threatened Maduro against doing so and the dictator backed down.

Maduro’s regime also became involved in narcotrafficking, and forming close ties with countries hostile to the USA (China, Russia and Iran).

Now that Trump removed Maduro from power, Venezuelans worldwide have become delirium with happiness, celebrating like it was New Year’s Day in 2000. You can see images of these celebrations in Spain, Chile, Florida, Argentina, Australia, and Perú. Venezuelan Nobel Prize laureate, Maria Corina Machado, publicly thanked Trump.

Predictably, American liberals, including Democrat politicians, automatically became outraged and instantly formed demonstrations in San Antonio, New York, DC, Denver and Chicago with their incurable parroting of slogans, their premade signs demanding the dictator be returned to power, denigrating America, condemning Trump, and claiming the removal of the dictator was really about taking over Venezuela’s oil (incidentally, they used the same, exact, signs in demonstrations in every state, demonstrations formed just minutes apart). And not a single Venezuelan among them.

The fact that Venezuelans were thanking Trump and flying the American flag must have choked some of them.

Oh, and liberal white saviors—who cannot even define what a woman is—also claimed to be representing the Venezuelan people. But, as one Venezuelan girl stated, “If you’re not Venezuelan, shut the fuck up! I’ve seen a lot of videos of gringos trying to explain Venezuela to Venezuelans! You don’t even know the difference between Venezuela and Mexico!”

But what is so striking now, as was many years ago for me, was how deep is their lack of self-awareness. They don’t realize how ridiculous, how bizarre, is their support for a dictator. It speaks volumes about liberals.

In all these many years, they . . . have not . . . changed.

What has changed, though, is now we have Instagram and YouTube and the Venezuelans are roasting American supporters of the dictator.

Maduro está podrido.

Armando Simón is a retired psychologist and historian, author of Humorous Stories of the Great Pandemic of 2020, and, Stories for Lions and Other Felines.