How to assess the life and works of Fidel Castro?

CNN has the line. Castro was a not too bad fellow who did good things for ‘social reform’ in Cuba and who was praised in some circles for standing up to the United States. Oh, and he was criticized for oppressing human rights and freedom of speech.

Hmm.

‘Criticized’ is an interesting word. One criticizes the UK government for its approach on the Northern Rock bank. One criticizes EU MEPs for hiding in a Secret Room a report offering reasons to think that there might have been some MEP corruption.

One even criticizes the vicar for splitting an infinitive in a sermon.

The point is that ‘criticism’ is aimed at people who one thinks are are basically normal but doing something amiss. One does not ‘criticize’ Stalin for his genocide-through-famine policies in Ukraine. Or ‘criticize’ Hitler for setting up death camps and murdering millions of people.

CNN are trying to sell us the idea that Castro’s appalling record tip-toes away from the noisy condemnation it richly deserves into mere criticism. Crude Leftist agenda journalism at its most blatant, sneaking into our homes via our TV sets.

This BBC report is a more sophisticated version of the same thing, although it does at least mention the curious attempted mass exodus of Cubans in the 1990s trying to escape Castro’s exemplary social policies and free health care to get to a sad neighbouring country with neither.

But NB the obligatory BBC picture of Che Guevara in fine ‘iconic’ form, ie looking wistful and beautiful. A picture of him gloating heartily over the summary execution of prisoners in a Castro prison might have been rather more representative:

"there were about eight hundred prisoners in a space fit for no more than three hundred: former Batista military and police personnel, some journalists, a few businessmen and merchants. The revolutionary tribunal was made of militiamen.

Che Guevara presided over the appellate court. He never overturned a sentence. I would visit those on death row at the galera de la muerte. A rumor went around that I hypnotized prisoners because many remained calm, so Che ordered that I be present at the executions.

After I left in May, they executed many more, but I personally witnessed fifty-five executions. There was an American, Herman Marks, apparently a former convict. We called him “the butcher” because he enjoyed giving the order to shoot.

I pleaded many times with Che on behalf of prisoners. I remember especially the case of Ariel Lima, a young boy. Che did not budge. Nor did Fidel, whom I visited..".

When I was at Harvard back in 1999 I heard a presentation by a senior CNN journalist. He mentioned that CNN checked their ratings every fifteen minutes. This had led them to grasp that after only some 35 seconds of talking many people got bored and switched channels. So they had taken a corporate decison to scale back the use of sound-bites to 18 seconds.

There it is, in 18 Seconds. CNN’s narrative on Castro:

"A great survivor, who had a human rights problem or two. But he sure gave Cubans a great free health care system and stood up to US bullying.

In baseball today…"

Here’s my proposal for using some of the EU’s funds saved by imprisoning scores of corrupt MEPs.

It is to identify the relatives of people murdered or summarily/unjustly executed by Castro and Guevara and help them launch a vast class action law suit around the world aimed at winning huge punitive damages/compensation awards against all those firms who have made money from selling t-shirts, posters and other ephemera depicting Che Guevara as a cool dude revolutionary.

Let justice be done. Even if it takes a bit longer than 18 seconds.