Judi Lynn
Judi Lynn's JournalNY Times article from last year, on Trump & Cuba:
Trump Tightens Cuba Embargo, Restricting Access to Hotels and Businesses
By Gardiner Harris
Nov. 8, 2017
Leer en español
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Wednesday tightened the economic embargo on Cuba, restricting Americans from access to hotels, stores and other businesses tied to the Cuban military.
A lengthy list of rules, which President Trump promised in June to punish the communist government in Havana, came just as Mr. Trump was visiting leaders of the communist government in Beijing and pushing business deals there. Wednesday’s announcement was part of the administration’s gradual unwinding of parts of the Obama administration’s détente with the Cuban government.
Americans wishing to visit Cuba will once again have to go through authorized tour operators, and tour guides will have to accompany the groups — making such trips more expensive.
. . .
Among the hotels left off the banned list was Marriott International’s Four Points Havana Hotel, owned by the Cuban government, while a competitor operated by a foreign rival, the Gran Hotel Manzana Kempinski La Habana, is on the banned list.
More:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/08/us/politics/trump-tightens-cuba-embargo-restricting-access-to-hotels-businesses.html
Brazil's Bolsonaro says he intends to use armed forces to fight violence
Source: Reuters
OCTOBER 21, 2018 / 3:00 PM / UPDATED 7 MINUTES AGO
Maria Carolina Marcello
2 MIN READ
SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil’s leading presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro said on Sunday that, if he is elected, he intends to use the armed forces for routine street patrols, describing the country as “at war.”
. . .
“If Congress grants permission, I would put armed forces in the streets,” Bolsonaro said.
A 63-year-old, seven-term congressman who openly defends Brazil’s 1964-1985 military dictatorship, Bolsonaro is widely expected to win the presidency this month. Opinion polls show him leading his leftist rival Fernando Haddad by 18 percentage points just a week ahead of the Oct. 28 second-round vote.
. . .
Bolsonaro, a polarizing candidate who has been charged with hate speech for his comments regarding gays, blacks and women, has pitched himself as the anti-establishment choice, appealing to voters fed up with political corruption and violent crime.
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-election/brazils-bolsonaro-says-he-intends-to-use-armed-forces-to-fight-violence-idUSKCN1MV0W8?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Reuters%2FworldNews+%28Reuters+World+News%29&&rpc=401
Thousands rally against leading, far-right Brazil candidate
Source: Associated Press
Stan Lehman, Associated Press
Updated 7:30 pm CDT, Saturday, October 20, 2018
Photo: Eraldo Peres, AP
IMAGE 2 OF 9
Women carry signs that read in Portuguese "Dictatorship Never Again" during a protest called "Women against Bolsonaro," in Brasilia, Brazil, on Saturday, Oct. 20, 2018. Women and left-wing militants held protests across the country against the right-wing presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro.
SAO PAULO (AP) — Thousands of people took to the streets in Brazil Saturday to protest the candidacy of presidential front-runner Jair Bolsonaro, shouting "Not him!" which has become the rallying cry against the far-right former army captain.
In Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia and 24 other cities, large crowds filled avenues and squares a week before the Oct. 28 second-round vote polls suggest Bolsonaro is likely to win.
Bolsonaro, who has angered many Brazilians by praising the country's 1964-1985 military dictatorship and making comments offensive to gays, women the far-right former army captain.
In front of the Sao Paulo Art Museum, people beat drums and waved gay pride flags as they denounced Bolsonaro. Many carried cardboard signs bearing Haddad's name and photo.
Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/world/article/Thousands-rally-against-leading-Brazilian-13323551.php#photo-16367050
Found by accident, info. on a new book, being made into a movie, re: Cuban Mafia (Miami).
The Corporation, a History of the Cuban Mob, Is a Made-in-Miami Story
DAVID MINSKY | MARCH 22, 2018 | 8:00AM
Miami has provided the setting for truly epic crime tales turned into movies, such as War Dogs and Blow. The upcoming film The Corporation tells the story of Cuban crime lord Jose Miguel Battle’s rise to power in the underworld. The project stars Benicio del Toro, is based on a history penned by best-selling author T.J. English, and will be distributed by Paramount Pictures.
But none of it would've happened without a local film student.
Jose Daniel "J.D." Freixas, a Miami native who studied film at the University of Miami more than a decade ago, helped conceive the idea of Battle that would eventually turn into a much-anticipated book and Hollywood film production.
Freixas learned of Battle in 2006 while in school. He'd been following the story of the Cuban-American criminal organization known as La Corporación, or the Corporation, in the news. The group had working relationships with the Italian Mafia and raked in proceeds from gambling, drug trafficking, and other illegal enterprises, according to court documents. Battle was its leader.
More:
https://www.miaminewtimes.com/arts/the-corporation-a-history-of-the-cuban-mob-is-a-made-in-miami-story-10186614
Bolsonaro's son banned from WhatsApp amid claims of fake news campaign
Source: Guardian
After Flávio Bolsonaro tweeted his banishment, WhatsApp said it had ‘proactively banned’ accounts in the Brazil election period
Tom Phillips Latin America correspondent
Fri 19 Oct 2018 14.31 EDT
The politician son of the far-right favourite to become Brazil’s next president has been evicted from WhatsApp amid allegations that his father’s push for power has been turbocharged by an illegal fake news blitz on the Facebook-owned messaging app.
. . .
Haddad called for Bolsonaro to be barred from the presidential race as a result of what he called a criminal “defamation campaign” of fake news and lies.
Polls suggest Bolsonaro – a pro-torture former army captain who enjoys an 18-point lead over Haddad – is on course for a landslide victory in the 28 October runoff vote.
. . .
One of the most outlandish lies being peddled involves the bogus claim that, as São Paulo’s mayor, Haddad equipped schools with so-called “mamadeiras eróticas” (erotic baby bottles) with penis-shaped teats in an supposed bid to fight homophobia.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/19/flavio-bolsonaro-banned-whatsapp-fake-news-campaign
How a Dictator Got Away With a Brazen Murder in D.C. in 1976
OCT 16, 2018
General Pinochet’s agents hunted down Chile’s former Ambassador in the first state-sponsored international terrorist attack on U.S. soil.
BECKY LITTLE
One September morning in 1976, a bomb blew up a car as it was driving up Embassy Row in Washington, D.C. When police arrived at the scene, they found a human foot in the road, and a man lying on the pavement who was missing half his legs. Minutes later, he was dead.
That man was 44-year-old Orlando Letelier, the most prominent Chilean exile living in the U.S. The former ambassador had fled his country two years before to escape persecution under General Augusto Pinochet. Chile was an American ally during the Cold War, and it seemed unthinkable that Pinochet would be so bold as to carry assassinate him in the U.S. capital. But as we now know from declassified documents, that’s exactly what he did. In fact, he even considered killing his head of intelligence to cover his tracks.
Letelier had been an ambassador to the U.S. under Chile’s democratically elected president Salvador Allende, whose administration the CIA covertly undermined. On September 11, 1973, Pinochet succeeded Allende in a coup d'état. That same day, Pinochet’s people arrested Letelier and other officials from Allende’s government and sent them to concentration camps.
After nearly a year in prison, Chile released Letelier under international pressure from Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, among others. Letelier sought refuge the U.S., and while traveling through Venezuela to get there, he told The New York Times: “they're going to kill me.” The “they,” he seemed to imply, were the National Intelligence Directorate, or DINA—Pinochet’s secret police.
More:
https://www.history.com/news/pinochet-terror-attack-dc
Even as Donald Trump rails about immigrants, Wisconsin dairy farmers build bridges to Mexico
IMMIGRANTS NOW MAKE UP MORE THAN HALF OF ALL DAIRY WORKERS. SAYS JOHN ROSENOW: 'THEY ARE SENDING US THEIR BEST.'
Madeline Heim
Published 12:00 p.m. CT Oct. 17, 2018 | Updated 12:02 p.m. CT Oct. 17, 2018
John Rosenow is photographed with the family of his employee, Roberto Tecpile, at their home in rural Mexico in January 2017. Rosenow made the cultural immersion trip with a program sponsored by Puentes/Bridges to meet his employees’ families and learn more about their lives.
(Photo: John Rosenow)
Roberto Tecpile often puts in 70 hours a week at the Rosenholm dairy farm in Cochrane, Wis. — a place where winter days are short and can be bitterly cold. It is a job that farmers say most Americans refuse to do.
Tecpile, a native of Astacinga, in the Mexican state of Veracruz, has spent nearly 20 years in the United States, the past four working for farmer John Rosenow. According to his boss, Tecpile is the “go-to guy” for fixing farm equipment — whether it be a lawnmower or a gauge. Tecpile said the job is going well, and right now it is the most important thing as he prepares to return home in a year or two.
Tecpile is saving money to build a kitchen for his wife, Veronica, “with cabinets and everything.” She currently cooks outside in their mountain village for their two sons, Kevin, 15, and Aaron, 9, and their daughter, Megan, 4.
“I want to work a little bit more … I want to buy a kitchen for my wife, and for the kids, I want them to have something better,” the 39-year-old dairy worker said. “At times we say being able to be together would be much better, but at the same time, we still don’t have everything arranged.”
More:
https://www.jsonline.com/story/opinion/contributors/2018/10/17/wisconsin-dairy-farmers-build-bridges-mexico/1670444002/
Military men on the threshold of taking power again in Brazil
BY JORGE SVARTZMAN (AFP) 3 HOURS AGO
More than three decades after the end of military dictatorship, army men look to be on the threshold of returning to power in Brazil, this time through elections in a crime-ridden country whose official motto is "Order and Progress."
The comfortable favorite in an October 28 presidential run-off is Jair Bolsonaro, a former army captain who has chosen a newly retired general, Hamilton Mourao, as his vice president if he wins.
At least four others with military backgrounds are tipped to enter government under a president Bolsonaro.
The 63-year-old candidate has vowed to rule "with authority, but without authoritarianism" -- though his nostalgic talk of the 1964-1985 dictatorship he served, his promises to arm "good" citizens, and his talk in favor of torture have chilled many voters.
More:
http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/world/military-men-on-the-threshold-of-taking-power-again-in-brazil/article/534878
Food, water, ride: Guatemalans aid Honduran caravan migrants
Source: Associated Press
By SONIA PEREZ D.
39 minutes ago
ZACAPA, Guatemala (AP) — Sweaty, sunburned and exhausted, Jonathan Zuniga had been carrying his 1-year-old baby in his arms for five hours when help arrived unexpectedly from a local woman who offered him a used baby carriage.
“Thank you, thank you very much,” Zuniga told her, accepting the gift with a broad grin. “I couldn’t stand it anymore.”
Many of the more than 2,000 Hondurans in a migrant caravan trying to wend its way to the United States left spontaneously with little more than the clothes on their backs and what they could quickly throw into backpacks.
In neighboring Guatemala, where their journey continued Wednesday amid warning tweets from President Donald Trump and other U.S. officials, they were helped at every turn by residents who offered them food, water and rides in pickups or on flatbed of semi-trailer trucks.
Read more: https://apnews.com/9919ff5a85e248d5aa96718027821aca
Trump takes aim at Cuba, holds Havana responsible for Venezuelan crisis
Source: McClatchy
BY FRANCO ORDOÑEZ
fordonez@mcclatchydc.com
October 17, 2018 04:04 PM
Updated 6 hours 33 minutes ago
WASHINGTON
The White House plan to turn up the pressure on Cuba for its role in what a senior administration official on Wednesday said was its efforts to subvert democracy in Venezuela and propping up President Nicolás Maduro.
The senior administration official said Maduro would be out of power if it wasn’t for the Cuban intelligence operatives who help him control restless Venezuelans and block efforts to replace him.
“The issue of Cuban involvement in Venezuela is a fact. It’s not a theory,” said the official, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity per administration policy.
President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, John Bolton, will unveil more details on the work of Cuban operatives in Venezuela, but the senior administration official said the United States plans to ratchet up its pressure on Cuba, especially the Cuban military that assists with Venezuela’s intelligence and counterintelligence efforts.
Read more: https://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/world/article220177985.html
(Clearly the Orange Prince knows the public will not support an attack on Venezuela, so he's going to try the back door to an attack by claiming Cuba is responsible for Venezuela's problems, and create an opening for a Bay of Pigs II.)
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