FIU cancels baseball game w/former players for Cuban baseball team - Vigilia Mambisa takes credit

[Mika]

Cuban Baseball Games Cancelled by FIU to Be Played in Fort Lauderdale
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Former players for a Cuban baseball team were scheduled to have a special reunion game at FIU's baseball stadium on August 10th and 11th. But, the game was abruptly canceled.
An anti-Castro group calling themselves "Vigilia Mambisa" claimed responsibility for the cancellation, saying that they had "won a fight against Castro supporters," and had FIU officials cancel the games.

But Fort Lauderdale has stepped up, and will allow the game to be played on Saturday at Fort Lauderdale Stadium instead.

According to a press release from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the ballplayers are set to play a double-header featuring former players currently living in Cuba and those who had played in Cuba but left their oppressed island nation for the U.S.

In what is supposed to be the 50th anniversary of Havana's baseball team "Los Industriales," the games are intended to be a symbolic reunion for the players whose lives and, in some cases, careers, have been affected by the Castro regime. It's intended to be a spring board for possible future games and reunions.

But, the ACLU says, this recent cancellation by FIU is just another incident in which "government entities in Miami-Dade County have used their power to attempt to ban from Miami Cuban musicians, artists, and performers."

More at ... http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2013/08/cuban_baseball_games_cancelled.php



Freedom. Miami style.

[Judi Lynn]

1. Good for Fort Lauderdale. Hope they get a huge turnout,

and not from Vigilia Mombisa. They've done quite enough.

I still hold a grudge toward them for making so much trouble at the Miami-Dade 2000 Presidential Election vote recount. How dare these mutants force everyone to bow to their political dictates. Jerks!

Thanks to the ACLU for their help in making sure the bigger, better plan prevailed.

Thanks, Mika.

[Judi Lynn]

2. Retired Cuban baseball stars' Fla. game rained out

Retired Cuban baseball stars' Fla. game rained out

By LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ, Associated Press Writer | August 31, 2013 | Updated: August 31, 2013 12:55pm

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Baseball, the national pastime of Cuba, has long united exiles and those still on the island. But it also has divided them.

Over the years, dozens of top players have defected to the U.S. On Saturday, a retired group of those players finally matched up against their island counterparts in a game that would have been inconceivable a decade ago - and was nearly derailed earlier this summer.

But the Fort Lauderdale game between former members of the Industriales, the Yankees of Cuba, was cut short Saturday. It was canceled after just a few innings because of a thunderstorm.

The celebration of the team's 50th anniversary had been slated for last month at Florida International University in Miami. But in July, the university canceled the deal, citing "contractual issues." The university has refused to say more publicly, but a letter from the school's attorney sent to the ACLU showed officials got twitchy about the event's political nature.

A small but vocal exile group had threatened to protest the games, the first of which was also set for the same day as a conference at FIU, organized by a coalition of exile organizations seeking greater U.S. sanctions against Cuba and more limited travel to and from the island.

More:
http://www.chron.com/news/us/article/Retired-Cuban-baseball-stars-Fla-game-rained-out-4777319.php?cmpid=usw