Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Sep 20/05 - On an editorial cartoonist's view of Cuban presence in Venezuela


PMBComment: for those of you who forgot your periodic table O2 is plain old oxygen – essentially the majority of the air we breathe.

G2 on the other hand is shorthand for the DGI - Directório General de Inteligencia - the Cuban Department in charge of collecting intelligence and carrying out covert operations outside Cuba. With 45,000 Cubans purportedly in Venezuela at this time – a mix bag of doctors, sport instructors, macroeconomists (isn’t misery-economists a more apt description?), “civil servants”, spies and soldiers - it is not surprising that even the cartoonists - Weil in this case - have taken note. The question is: How long will they be able to make their more than relevant point so openly? PMB

PS: a few months ago a foreign diplomat described Caracas as “Casablanca on the Caribbean” – apt account of a situation in which spies of all stripes trample over the remains of a once proud, independent and democratic nation. Ridding our nation of this most unfortunate consequence of the so called “Bolivarian revolution” will be a mayor future task for Venezuelans of ALL stripes. For now one can only imagine what it must have been like for Simon Bolivar to ready for the battle of Carabobo that brought independence to Venezuela...the first time around.

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