printA murderous, brutal dictator” is how conservative talkers have been referring to Cuban President Raul Castro, with whom Barack Obama seemed overjoyed to cavort; the president is indeed in his element in Cuba.
From conservatives I’d have liked to hear more about the glories of free-market capitalism, the suppression of which accounts for Cuba’s abject misery.
“The voluntary free market is a sacred extension of life itself. The free market—it has not been unfettered for a very long time—is really a spontaneously synchronized order comprising trillions upon trillions of voluntary acts that individuals perform in order to make a living. Introduce government force and coercion into this rhythm and you get life-threatening arrhythmia. Under increasing state control, this marketplace – this magic, organic agora – starts to splutter, and people suffer.”—ILANA (April 23, 2010)
It’s telling that the Obamas took their girls along for the Cuban experience. I bet those girls heard nothing about the forces that made it possible for them to grow so tall, healthy and lovely, and have the best of everything.
Their father, our dreadful cur of a president, spoke not about capitalism but about … race.