The people of this Nation should be deeply saddened and
concerned by what happened this morning.
The government and the socialist media are corrupt and
complicit in the ongoing campaign to demean and destroy
the Constitution to suit their own selfish, egomaniacal,
insidious agenda.
Wake up America!
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NewsMax.com
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Analysis: Why Elian Lost
Christopher Ruddy
April 22, 2000 11:22 AM EST
Miami -- When I arrived at the scene outside of Elian's home the smell of tear
gas was still in the air.
I was there just minutes after federal marshals had conducted a Gestapo raid
on the home of law abiding citizens - to snatch a young child. This is the first
time in the history of the United States federal agents using rifles settled a
custody case.
I had gotten up about 5 a.m. and was planning to pick up syndciated radio host
Michael Reagan, to bring him to Elian's home.
Michael told me last night he had brought with him cuff links worn by his father
as president. This cherished gift from his father, Michael planned to give to
Elian.
This reminded me of a speech Ronald Reagan once gave in Miami. He
promised Cuba would be liberated. He reportedly brought the house down with
cheers.
Though Reagan tore the Berlin Wall down, Cuba is still not free.
In fact, Castro's Cuba is among the few Stalinist regimes left on the planet.
That's why Elian's mother risked the shark infested waters to bring her son
here. This is why so many - and we still don't how many - have died
escaping Fidel's "paradise."
The problem was never Elian, the father, custody issues, etc. The issue was,
and is, Castro. For four decades the American press has looked the other way
as his brutal regime represses the most basic human rights every man and
woman desire.
Elian will now be returned to Castro.
John LeBoutillier, writing in NewsMax.com, foretold the snatching of Elian.
After the joyous court ruling this past week, when everyone was celebrating,
John concluded they were going to seize the kid. John's logic was simple:
Reno and friends had to get control of the kid to have him change his mind
before his asylum hearing.
Reno claimed she worried the kid would be abused.
I worry now what will happen to the child in the hands of Castro's men. That
same fear caused Sister Jean to turn her mind 180 degrees. A bona fide
liberal, she saw through Clinton's machinations on behalf of Castro.
What more abuse could you cause a child than to have armed men in black
suits come storming into his bedroom, with automatic rifles, to steal him from
his loving environment and to whisk him away by still more strange men.
Janet Reno has always operated on the basis of twisted logic. She justified the
federal holocaust at Waco because, she claimed, there was evidence of child
abuse.
Child abuse is a constant theme in her career, and, in her mind, allows for even
the killing of the person being abused!
Reno got away with Waco. She got away with covering for one Clinton, scandal
after another. She got away with covering up for the Chinagate scandal.
Without accountability, why should she stop acting recklessly?
After repeated visits to Little Havana during this crisis, after conferring with
Jack Thompson, our reporter on the scene, and after meeting several times
with the Cuban leadership here, it became too apparent to me that Elian's
situation was very bad. Let me explain the basic reasons why I thought Elian
was in deep trouble:
1. No Strategy.
The Miami relatives and Cuban-American leadership never had a clear
strategy and were constantly reacting.
David Horowitz, in his booklet "The Art of Political Warfare" writes that the side
that has a strategy ? when fighting against a side that doesn't have one ? will
always win.
Clinton and company clearly had a strategy. For weeks they have been laying
the groundwork for the raid. The father was brought to the United States with
wife and child ? creating a powerful family image. (The press gave almost no
attention to the fact that both of Elian's grandmothers's were in detention and
apparently being held hostage.)
Meanwhile, administration friendly press conducted poll after poll indicating
most Americans wanted Elian "returned to his father." (Who would be against
that? The fact is the child is being returned to Castro where Castro has a
"readaptation" center prepared for him.) More recent polls supported taking
the child by force.
The administration stragegy continued: a government paid psychologist, close
to Hillary Clinton, who had never met with the boy, determined he was being
abused and likened his situatiuon to being held hostage. This "doctor"
recommended the boy be rescued immediately.
Then there was Mr. Smoothie, Craig Greg, the same legal eagle brought in to
get the President off his impeachment charges, demanding that poor Juan
Gonzalez should have his son returned.
As the administration laid the groundwork for this horrific seizure, the
Cuban-Americans had an elderly, heavily accented man act as their
spokesman.
They made mistake after mistake. For example, they gave hostile press like
ABC News an exclusive interview with the boy. ABC then carefully edited and
downplayed the interview. Later the family made a bold and wise move to
release a home video of the boy saying he wanted to stay in America, but it
was too late.
2. Conflicted Loyalties.
I was surpised to see how factionalized the Cuban-American community was
here.
The "Democracy Movement" led by Ramon Sanchez was calling the shots, but
the much more influential Cuban-American Foundation, I sensed, was not so
gung-ho for confrontation over this issue, perhaps because of Sanchez's lead
role.
A former Reagan official that dealt with the Cuban-American community during
the 1980s explained to me that she was always quite surprised by how divided
the Cuban-Americans were.
It was a common belief in the Reagan White House that Castro had thoroughly
infiltrated most of the groups in Miami to create as much dissension among
them, as possible. "This was the model used by the East European satellite
nations ? putting agents in the exile movements ? and Castro did the same
thing," the Reagan aide explained.
There were other conflicting loyalties.
Alex Penelas, the Mayor of Miami-Dade, is Cuban-American, but he is also a
rising star in the Democratic Party. He has been a major fund raiser for Bill
Clinton, Hillary Clinton and Al Gore. Penelas made some strong statements at
the outset of the crisis, but has been backpedaling ever since.
The vice chairman of the Dade County Democratic Party was Sanchez's right
hand man during the whole crisis. He brought on Kendall Coffey, a longtime
friend of Reno's and the former Clinton appointed U.S. Attorney in Miami, to be
lead counsel for Elian. Who's kidding who? Where are the loyalties of such
people?
Obviously the Democrats in Miami-Dade have made their bed with Clinton and
they are still sharing it.
When Penelas and Miami City Mayor Joe Carollo visited Washington this
week it was again clear to me the Clinton administration strategy was at work.
The Justice Department needed the cooperation of the local police. I am sure
that was the real reason for the meeting. I asked Carollo point blank this
morning if he had any idea the raid would take place, or if the police
cooperated in any way. He said "No," and shook his head. He had to say that.
When Penelas arrived, the crowd swarmed around him, not to welcome him,
but to shout at him. They were chanting, "Renounce the Democratic ticket!" The
people here know exactly what the score was with Penelas and the leadership.
3. Republicans Hid.
As has become typical with the Republican leadership during the Clinton reign,
they have been out to lunch in times of crisis.
Despite the usual lip service, George W. Bush has been quiet in Austin and
ditto for his brother Jeb in Talahassee. The Republicans in Congress remain
as hopeless as ever. They were much more effective as a minority. Like all
politicians, they are looking at polls. The polls may show a majority of
Americans want Elian to be "returned to his father" - but they also show at
least a third of the coutry opposed such a move.
This one-third of America is largely the base of the Republican Party. Elections
are not always won by majorities (Clinton won two in a row with less than 50%
of the vote), but they are always won on the margins.
Republican voters may just do what they did in the 1998 Congressional
elections, stay home.
Since the Republicans never really held anyone accountable for the massive
federal abuse of power at Ruby Ridge, Waco, or even with the President's
crimes laid out in the impeachment - don't count on it happening here. The
Cuban-Americans clearly failed to hold the Republicans' feet to the fire.
4. People Power.
The biggest thing Elian and his Miami relatives had going for them was
"people power" - the raw showing of popular democracy. For all their talk of
"human shields," the Cuban-American leadership here never really created
one around Elian's home. I remember when Jack Thompson and I first visited
the area outside the home. Jack turned to me and said, "This is a joke, the
Feds can come any time and take this kid."
We both noted that the so-called "human shield" was barricaded a hundred
feet at one end of the street. The other end had no protesters, was closed by
the police and gave ample opportunity for anyone to ride right up to the house.
The Feds did just that. Though they still feared "people power," they came in
the dark of the night - much like the Roman centurians who feared the
masses around Jesus.
John LeBoutiller wrote urgently this week that the Feds were coming - and
that people power would work by putting Elian in a Catholic Church. It is
doubtful federal agents would have stormed a church building with automatic
rifles.
Still, if the Cuban-American leadership had just a row or two of people around
Elian's home, I doubt the Feds would have stormed it. It was apparent from
casual observation that the boy was for the taking. Penelas knew that. The
Cuban-Amercian leadership obviously knew that and did not take steps to
avoid it.
5. Cuban Issue.
In failing to strategize the Cuban-Americans failed to demonstrate this was not
a Cuban-American issue. The press was quick to pin this on the
Cuban-Americans and to demonize them. Many members of the press wore
"Camp Elian" press cards that depicted a banana with a Cuban flag sticking
out from it.
Instead of bringing in non-Cubans to speak in Elian's favor, the leadership
stuck with Cuban-American stars like Gloria Estefan and Andy Garcia. What
they really needed was an actor like Charlton Heston, and political figures like
George Bush and Jeb Bush, and other famous political, church and media
personalities.
The battle for custody for Elian was lost but much good has come out of this,
and still may.
For one thing more people have focused on Castro and his corrupt regime.
And with the photo of Elian being taken at gun point, we can graphically
understand the meaning of "child abuse" and of a government gone berserk.
The Cuban-American leadership has had many shortcomings, but it's
incumbent on Americans everywhere to recognize this is much more than a
"Cuban" story. It is one about freedom and one that should concern every
decent American.
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