Timcast IRL - Tim Pool - Timcast IRL - Anti Castro Underground From 60s Cuba Joins To Discuss Communism w-Ricardo Lamas

00:00:00.000 There is no turning back.

00:00:19.000 That's how Politico reported it.

00:00:21.000 People are starting to rise up in Cuba.

00:00:22.000 The police are not happy with it.

00:00:24.000 The regime is not happy with it.

00:00:26.000 There's some pretty crazy witness reports coming out that people are being beaten and disappeared, and it's hard to know exactly what's happening when the country is silencing people and shutting down the internet.

00:00:36.000 So we need to talk about this.

00:00:37.000 Well, in the United States, we have the rise of Black Lives Matter. 0.97

00:00:37.000 Why? 0.97

00:00:41.000 I'm sure there are many people who are Democrats or leftists who absolutely love and will defend Black Lives Matter tribalistically.

00:00:48.000 But you take a look at the things they support.

00:00:49.000 What do they support?

00:00:50.000 The Cuban regime.

00:00:51.000 They support Castro.

00:00:52.000 They issued this tweet saying, rest in power Fidel Castro.

00:00:58.000 They're very much communists.

00:00:59.000 And right now, even Ocasio-Cortez is defending what the government of Cuba is doing to their people. 0.75

00:01:05.000 And it's scary.

00:01:06.000 It's scary to realize that if we don't pay attention to what is happening in our own country, we might end up suffering the same fate as many of those in Cuba who are trying to fight against this communist regime.

00:01:15.000 So we're going to talk about it, and today's going to be a bit more conversational because we've got some excellent guests.

00:01:20.000 We've got Ricardo Lamas, who is an MMA fighter who runs a UFC gym, and you're also an activist for Cuban freedom.

00:01:27.000 And then we have your dad, Jose Llamas, who was actually an anti-Castro member of the underground movement against Castro in the 1960s in Cuba.

00:01:37.000 He's going to tell us all about what he went through, what's happening now, and what we can do, what anyone can do to help Cuba.

00:01:43.000 But I will mention one quick thing, just as an aside.

00:01:47.000 We actually had to deal with some of the communism here in America because they have some shirts they wanted to share, but we had a conversation about it.

00:01:54.000 I don't think anybody was happy.

00:01:56.000 Couldn't show them.

00:01:57.000 We'll show them on the after show, though.

00:01:58.000 And it's because YouTube would probably delete this show if we showed the activist t-shirts that they had prepared.

00:02:04.000 But we will show them for the members-only show.

00:02:07.000 So do you guys want to just do a quick introduction for yourselves, Jose or Ricardo?

00:02:12.000 Yeah, Pop, go ahead.

00:02:13.000 You start.

00:02:13.000 Okay, my name is Jose Llamas.

00:02:15.000 I am a Cuban citizen still today.

00:02:20.000 I was a very happy kid in Cuba.

00:02:24.000 I hope someday Cubans that are born there could enjoy the many things that as a child are enjoying in Cuba.

00:02:39.000 Especially being able to think, to explore, To be free to do things that nobody will tell me about it.

00:02:49.000 To join the Cub Scouts.

00:02:53.000 To be a Boy Scout with a promise of being always ready to serve.

00:02:59.000 And that is my dream.

00:03:00.000 That someday Cuban kids will be born with my same opportunity.

00:03:06.000 You were born in a democratic Cuba.

00:03:08.000 Yes, in 1940, when the 1940 Constitution was born, I was born right there.

00:03:15.000 And maybe because of that, I have always thought about the ruling of our Constitution.

00:03:23.000 That was a very advanced constitution.

00:03:26.000 Actually, many people considered the 1940 constitution to be too much progressive.

00:03:32.000 All political parties in Cuba participated in the drafting of that 1940 constitution, including the Socialist Party of Cuba.

00:03:41.000 At that time, it was not known as the Communist Party, which is the only party in Cuba since the revolution took over.

00:03:50.000 And so I believe that the return to freedom in Cuba and liberty has to be based on that last constitution that Fidel, when attacking the Moncada barracks, said that he wanted to establish, to bring back, which he never did.

00:04:13.000 He ruled the country without constitution, without any constitution, for 17 years.

00:04:20.000 Let's, uh, we'll get into all that, uh, you know, for sure.

00:04:22.000 Yeah.

00:04:23.000 Um, some reviewers might know me, uh, if they're MMA fans, I fought in the UFC, uh, for quite a while.

00:04:29.000 I signed my first contract with the parent company Zufa LLC in 2009.

00:04:33.000 And I was fighting in the WEC, which is a smaller organization owned by the same people.

00:04:39.000 And then in 2011, they merged us in.

00:04:42.000 Um, and you know, I just, I grew up.

00:04:45.000 Obviously with a very passionate father who, if you heard him talk, these are the stories that I heard growing up my entire life.

00:04:54.000 So I always felt a duty because being born here in the United States, I never once felt or had to deal with an oppressive government or, you know, not being able to go out and speak my mind in the street or do anything like that.

00:05:08.000 And because of the sacrifices made by people like my father, like my uncles, like my grandfather, And friends of my father, I feel like I have a duty to kind

00:05:17.000 of continue the fight for those people in Cuba that don't have a voice.

00:05:21.000 Well, you said you didn't have to live under an oppressive government, but that could be changing.

00:05:25.000 It could be.

00:05:26.000 Especially as what's happening lately.

00:05:28.000 We got Ian Schilling.

00:05:29.000 What's up, everybody?

00:05:30.000 Ian Crosland over here. Thanks for coming, guys.

00:05:32.000 No problem.

00:05:33.000 Thank you for inviting us.

00:05:34.000 Yeah, and I am so excited to have both of these guys.

00:05:37.000 I'm really excited to have Ricardo, because he fought in the MMA.

00:05:39.000 I'm so excited for his dad, because I used to love working with older people and hearing their stories, and I'm excited you guys will get to do that.

00:05:45.000 Get ready for a lot of stories.

00:05:47.000 There are a lot of stories.

00:05:48.000 I'll just say right now, we need to understand how Cuba got to that point, and I think you can help shine a light on that.

00:05:55.000 So, we'll jump into that.

00:05:56.000 Before we do, head over to TimCast.com, become a member, and you'll get access to exclusive members-only segments from this show.

00:06:02.000 You will get an ad-free experience.

00:06:04.000 We are working out the bugs, so bear with us.

00:06:06.000 We just launched the new site, and we've got a lot of bugs, don't we?

00:06:08.000 Because we're growing as fast as we possibly can.

00:06:11.000 I mean, this is only six months now we've had the site up, and we've already gotten this new iteration.

00:06:16.000 We're gonna have a members-only segment coming up from this show.

00:06:19.000 And you're also helping to support our journalists, of which we're gonna have, I think, like six or seven... I think we have six or seven writers now.

00:06:25.000 We're gonna be adding more and more people to do more real journalism, do some on-the-ground field reporting.

00:06:29.000 We've talked to some local reporters, and we're gonna start ramping things up with your help as members.

00:06:34.000 So don't forget, like this video right now, subscribe to this channel, And I'll tell you this, this is going to be a bit more conversational.

00:06:41.000 Normally we go through news segments, but we have to have a conversation about what's happening in this country and what happened in Cuba, how they got to that point.

00:06:48.000 And we've got some real experience who can break that down for us.

00:06:50.000 So share this with your friends, anybody who might be interested in hearing the story from an actual witness and activists who are fighting against communism.

00:06:59.000 Now I want to do this.

00:07:00.000 The first thing I want to do is just highlight this story to give us some contemporary context.

00:07:04.000 This is from Fox News.

00:07:06.000 Washington D.C.

00:07:07.000 removes Cuba Libre street painting from in front of the Cuban embassy.

00:07:12.000 Embassy located in the same street where Mayor Bowser ordered painting last year of Black Lives Matter.

00:07:19.000 I gotta say, I was actually shocked to see this.

00:07:21.000 Even though I know the biases of the establishment, I know that they support Black Lives Matter, I know the Black Lives Matter activists say they're Marxists, I was still surprised to see that they would be as brazen as to remove Cuba Libre from the street.

00:07:34.000 They painted Black Lives Matter.

00:07:35.000 They had no approval, they took the tax money, they painted it.

00:07:38.000 This just shows you the degree to which the establishment in the U.S.

00:07:42.000 is in favor of the communist dictatorship of Cuba, and it is very scary to me.

00:07:46.000 We also have this story.

00:07:48.000 Nicole Hannah-Jones said Cuba most equal Western country in a podcast.

00:07:54.000 The funny thing is, it's also AOC.

00:07:57.000 It's also other progressive Democrats saying that, oh, the real problem is the embargo.

00:08:01.000 It's not communism.

00:08:03.000 So I need to understand, right?

00:08:06.000 I can see what's happening here in the U.S.

00:08:08.000 I can see the changes that are happening, but I'm interested, you know, so you're both activists, Jose, you were actually born into a free and democratic Cuba.

00:08:19.000 How old were you when the communists took over?

00:08:21.000 I was 18 years old, not when the communists, when the revolution took over.

00:08:29.000 It was never intended to have a socialist revolution taking power and remaining in power for more than 62 years.

00:08:40.000 So, I was 18 years old.

00:08:42.000 I had just graduated from the Maris Brothers with a degree in Bachelor of Arts, and I was planning to attend Havana University to study journalism and law.

00:08:57.000 And so, you know, but basically what took over was a big lie.

00:09:04.000 A big lie of Fidel.

00:09:05.000 You were 18 when the revolution happened, but that wasn't a communist revolution.

00:09:08.000 No, no, when the revolution, when Batista fall down, escape Cuba, and Fidel took all the merits of the revolution that had been also launched by other organizations and by other leaders and by other movements.

00:09:24.000 But in 1959, Fidel was able to control all the power of himself.

00:09:32.000 And being a great speaker and a huge liar, he gained total support in Cuba.

00:09:41.000 That is the truth. 0.72

00:09:43.000 In 1959.

00:09:44.000 But right after that, his big lie began to dismantle.

00:09:49.000 And the truth came out.

00:09:51.000 And then those same people that were with him fighting Batista, that were with him in Sierra Maestra, like Major Hubert Matos, ten months after he took power, Told Fidel, Compañero Fidel, I cannot continue in the way the revolution is going.

00:10:10.000 I don't want to be an obstacle to you.

00:10:13.000 I want to become a teacher again.

00:10:16.000 Before I went to the Sierra Maestra.

00:10:20.000 I want to be a teacher again, and good luck with the revolution.

00:10:26.000 That's when the big lie really became an oppressive totalitarian idea of eliminating anybody who dissent with you.

00:10:37.000 And that's when Fidel Castro sent to Camagüey, where Hubert Matos was in charge of the military, Camilo Cienfuegos, the chief of the army, And with orders of apprehending him and taking him to Havana.

00:10:55.000 Accusing him on national radio, Fidel, when he sent Camilo over there, that Hubert Matos was a traitor.

00:11:04.000 And when Camilo Sin Fuego got to come away and saw Ubermatos peaceful in his home with his family and his kids, he had not rebelled against the revolution, decided to tell Uber, stay here, I gotta go back and talk to Fidel.

00:11:19.000 And then more lies began to continue.

00:11:22.000 Then they shut down Camilo because Camilo did not follow Castro's orders of apprehending Ubermatos.

00:11:33.000 How did it get to that point?

00:11:35.000 Camilo Sin Fuegos and people started to blame Ubermatos on the Fidel direction.

00:11:42.000 Now the responsible for killing Ubermatos was Uber too.

00:11:47.000 How did it get to that point?

00:11:48.000 How did the revolution happen?

00:11:50.000 The revolution happened was very simple and was a tremendous excuse for Castro. 0.57

00:11:59.000 Fulgencio Batista, March 10, 1952, who had been, by the way, I would say a good president

00:12:06.000 in 1940.

00:12:08.000 He was actually an elected president in Cuba before he threw his coup d'etat and came into power.

00:12:14.000 So that's like a little fact that maybe a lot of people don't, don't know.

00:12:18.000 So with an excuse, you know, of saving the country from fraud in the upcoming elections, Batista, a few months before Prio was going to end his presidency and new elections were coming in, he decided to start a revolution based on that, on the coup d'etat.

00:12:48.000 That was the excuse.

00:12:50.000 And this is why it's sad to say that maybe Batista was not as bad as people blamed him to be during those seven years.

00:13:00.000 But the truth of the matter is that without Batista and the good excuse to Fidel to use the coup d'etat as an excuse for his revolution, Nothing would have happened in Cuba because Fidel did not have... Fidel had tried to be in the political atmosphere, to be part of a political party, to be elected in elections for small positions, and he never won anything.

00:13:26.000 But when Batista gave the coup d'etat on the 26th of July of 1953, that was in 1952, the coup d'etat.

00:13:31.000 the 26th of July of 1953, that was in 1952, the coup d'etat.

00:13:35.000 In 26th July of 1953, he attacks the Moncada barracks.

00:13:40.000 He brings there a lot of young Cubans who were very idealist, and many of them died there.

00:13:49.000 Wow. But he gained a name.

00:13:52.000 And from that day was born the 26th of July Revolutionary Movement.

00:13:57.000 So the Batista, he was claiming there was fraud in the election?

00:14:02.000 Batista claimed that he interrupted the elections that were coming because they were going to be fraudulent.

00:14:10.000 And with that excuse, he gave the coup d'etat.

00:14:14.000 Of course, nobody believed him.

00:14:17.000 The thing, the interesting thing, if people want to think about this, is that Batista was in power. 0.51

00:14:24.000 He was a dictator.

00:14:27.000 But he didn't mess with the media.

00:14:31.000 He didn't mess with the business.

00:14:34.000 He didn't mess with enterprises.

00:14:37.000 He just wanted to make some money and be again a figure in Cuba.

00:14:45.000 But, you know, that basically did not affect at all the development of Cuba from 1953 or 1952 to 1959.

00:14:54.000 from 1953 or 1952 to 1959.

00:14:58.000 Cuba continued to grow.

00:15:00.000 Cuba continued to develop businesses.

00:15:04.000 Cuba continues to raise the standard of living of the Cuban people.

00:15:09.000 The problem with the socialism and with the revolution, the totalitarian revolution, is not only that they seek power.

00:15:18.000 It's that they destroy everything.

00:15:22.000 And it's very clear.

00:15:23.000 And I am not here to defend Batista.

00:15:24.000 I'm telling you, Batista was Sadly enough, the good excuse that Fidel had to do all these things that he did.

00:15:33.000 There's a lot of similarities there to what we're seeing in the U.S.

00:15:36.000 Donald Trump.

00:15:36.000 now.

00:15:38.000 He's not the fascist dictator that Bautista may have been, but Donald Trump has that hatred.

00:15:43.000 The excuse.

00:15:44.000 The excuse they use.

00:15:45.000 The society feels it, yeah.

00:15:47.000 To claim that they need power, they need new laws, they need to shut down their political opposition.

00:15:53.000 Quell dissent. 0.99

00:15:54.000 Go after the extremists. 0.92

00:15:56.000 Arrest them.

00:15:57.000 Expand federal resources and power and law.

00:15:59.000 I mean, you look at what they've been saying about the far right, about militia groups, and the threat of white supremacy, and of course it's not identical.

00:16:06.000 There's just a few things that feel similar. 0.85

00:16:10.000 You have this guy Trump, they call him a dictator, they call him a fascist.

00:16:13.000 But he didn't, aside from insulting the media, he didn't shut down the press.

00:16:19.000 He may have banned them from some of his events.

00:16:21.000 He didn't call in the military to go and crush protests or anything like that.

00:16:24.000 Certainly has his issues.

00:16:26.000 But because of what the media said about him, because of the view people had about him, the Democrats now, you know, getting elected, are using that as an excuse for basically everything.

00:16:36.000 Among other things, to be completely honest.

00:16:37.000 So my fear is, obviously, we have a lot of different things that are happening in the U.S.

00:16:42.000 outside of just the, you know, politics.

00:16:44.000 We have COVID, we have the pandemic, you know, lockdowns and things like that are coming.

00:16:47.000 But I, you know, I wonder with what we're seeing with the Black Lives Matter supporting the revolution, they call it, the communist dictatorship in Cuba, they call it the revolution.

00:16:58.000 These are people who are gaining power and prominence.

00:17:00.000 And I'm wondering what your thoughts are on, you know, their activism, what they've been doing and what that might mean for us in the U.S.

00:17:06.000 Well for me, Black Lives Matter is one of the worst enemies, because they are from within, that this country is facing. 1.00

00:17:19.000 And they have means And they have the support of the media and because people are afraid to speak out against them because they are most some of them black but others are not black.

00:17:38.000 But for some reason, they have obtained the ability to destroy this country, to burn, you know, to finish things, to destroy cities, to destroy property that does not belong to them, and come out as progressive people. 0.98

00:17:58.000 And that's ridiculous. 0.83

00:18:01.000 It sounds like authoritarian revolutionaries. 0.92

00:18:06.000 They've got establishment power, they control institutions, and it sounds like they're gaining control.

00:18:12.000 Tim, when I see these people that have no power doing the things they do, how much destruction and death they have caused.

00:18:23.000 People don't realize in this country that if they ever get real power, a lot of people are going to be dead.

00:18:31.000 But they do, they are gaining real power.

00:18:33.000 No, no, no. But I mean, when they reach the government, when they take over this country,

00:18:39.000 nobody's going to be safe. Only those who with them will continue to oppress the rest.

00:18:46.000 I think it might be worse than you realize.

00:18:48.000 Mark Milley, the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the U.S., is espousing their ideology, saying he's trying to learn about white rage, speaking in support of Black Lives Matter, and condemning conservatives and Republicans as the same as the Nazis.

00:19:06.000 That's the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

00:19:07.000 This is the highest level of, you know, in the highest levels of our government.

00:19:11.000 Joe Biden has, you know, removed bans on critical race theory components, critical race applied principles in government trainings and contracting.

00:19:22.000 Maybe, you know, five years ago, you know, I was probably saying the same thing as you.

00:19:26.000 If these people ever gain power and enter government, we're in serious trouble.

00:19:29.000 They're there.

00:19:30.000 They're in the movie studios.

00:19:31.000 They're in colleges.

00:19:32.000 They're in every level of government.

00:19:35.000 And you take a look at what the federal government is now doing with the Capitol Police.

00:19:38.000 The Capitol Police, they're just supposed to be for the Capitol.

00:19:40.000 They're now expanding nationwide to operate as an intelligence agency.

00:19:44.000 So I can't... I wasn't alive in pre-Communist Cuba.

00:19:49.000 But, you know, I just... I wonder, based on the things you've been saying already, even before the show, and what I've read, it seems like the U.S.

00:19:57.000 is headed down that path.

00:19:59.000 You know, you mentioned that you, or it was mentioned, I think you were going to mention

00:20:03.000 this, that you were part of the anti-Castro underground movement opposing communism.

00:20:07.000 And as noble as that sounds, it doesn't seem like it worked, right? We're still to this day

00:20:14.000 fighting against the remnants of that communist revolution.

00:20:17.000 Yes, it did not work because sadly, I have to admit, the United States did not help us the

00:20:29.000 proper way at the proper time.

00:20:32.000 Bye.

00:20:34.000 Because we were alone, we didn't have resources, we didn't have nothing to fight.

00:20:40.000 It's more or less like today, that you can see all these Cubans protesting there, They don't, they don't even, they don't even have a gun.

00:20:54.000 And they're not using guns.

00:20:56.000 And then you see the enemy that is being like into this neighborhood in 20 bus brought security forces dressed in civilian clothing, all of them with sticks and clubs.

00:21:16.000 and hitting people you don't even know they are the state security.

00:21:20.000 So it's a situation where always our underground for different reasons never got the right

00:21:27.000 support.

00:21:28.000 From the very beginning the United States should have helped us Cubans, not intervene.

00:21:33.000 No, no, we had enough combatants inside Cuba.

00:21:38.000 Well there was the fear of the Soviets. 0.78

00:21:40.000 You know, if we intervened, the Soviet Union would have, you know, threatened us or pushed back, maybe even could have ignited nuclear war.

00:21:46.000 I wasn't alive back then, so, you know, I can't speak as the sentiment from the people or in the press or anything like that.

00:21:52.000 Well, I think that there were plenty of opportunities to help Cubans in different ways.

00:21:58.000 That's what the whole Cuban Missile Crisis was about, too.

00:22:03.000 Yeah.

00:22:04.000 The Soviets were putting missiles in Cuba, right?

00:22:07.000 Yeah, and pointing them at the United States.

00:22:09.000 So that's why in the schools, you know, in those times, I think it was in the 50s, right?

00:22:15.000 No.

00:22:15.000 Or the 60s?

00:22:16.000 Yeah.

00:22:19.000 It was in 1962, the October crisis.

00:22:24.000 And basically it was known that the Soviet Union had established missiles in Cuba and it was discovered.

00:22:38.000 And then Kennedy and Khrushchev worked out a treatment, a treat, and then as part of that treat, where the United States was supposed to do this and the Soviet Union was supposed to do that, The sad thing is that the United States, I think, committed not to ever help Cubans.

00:22:59.000 To freedom themselves.

00:23:01.000 And that's where the destiny of the Cuban people was sealed until today.

00:23:08.000 And that has to be broken.

00:23:09.000 That needs to be broken.

00:23:11.000 Absolutely.

00:23:12.000 You know, in thinking about what you're saying about Black Lives Matter and An Enemy From Within, I mean, they're becoming so prominent. 0.97

00:23:19.000 It's almost like, I don't know if you guys are familiar with the graphic novel, I Am Legend.

00:23:24.000 So, in this story, it's basically, I'll give you the very rough summary, because there's probably a lot of nuance I'm missing as, you know, it's been a really, really long time since I read it.

00:23:32.000 He's a vampire hunter, and he goes around, you know, driving stakes through the hearts of vampires.

00:23:37.000 But the vampires keep spreading, they keep infecting more people, and eventually, everyone is a vampire but him.

00:23:44.000 And then so, when they arrest him, as you know, he's this monster.

00:23:47.000 It turns out, when the majority of the society are all vampires, they look to him and they say, you're the bad guy. 0.74

00:23:52.000 The monster who lurks while we sleep, killing our loved ones. 0.91

00:23:57.000 So, from our perspective, you know, he's hunting vampires, they're bad.

00:24:00.000 But once everyone's a vampire, he's bad.

00:24:02.000 So what I mean by that is, the way it feels in the United States is that, sure, we may be freedom-loving individuals who talk about free speech and the rights of, you know, freedom of association movement, the right to keep and bear arms, but it looks like if Black Lives Matter, Bill de Blasio, New York, He paints Black Lives Matter without legal justification, without proper tax appropriation funding, and then he puts police on top of that painting in the street in front of Trump Tower, and they arrest people who dare defy him.

00:24:33.000 We're already at that point where the communists, the Marxists, the socialists, they're in the institutions.

00:24:40.000 They control the major cities.

00:24:41.000 They control the police departments.

00:24:43.000 So we, you know, we can refer to them as bad people, but they're in control.

00:24:49.000 It may not represent most people, but...

00:24:51.000 It's definitely spreading around.

00:24:53.000 I see it too on social media just from these last few weeks where I've been sharing all this stuff about Cuba.

00:24:59.000 All of these socialist sympathizing people are coming out of the woodwork to combat me on my posts.

00:25:06.000 You know, try and say that Cuba is such a great country, the U.S.

00:25:11.000 shouldn't talk, we're worse than Cuba. 1.00

00:25:14.000 I'm like, listen, it's getting to a ridiculous point where they even try to compare a country like the U.S. 0.96

00:25:19.000 to Cuba.

00:25:19.000 And I always come back with them like, do me one thing, right?

00:25:22.000 Go outside your house and go badmouth the president to your neighbors or to whoever will listen to you.

00:25:28.000 And if the police don't show up and arrest you or beat you, you're in no position to compare the United States to a country like Cuba.

00:25:35.000 So I think, I don't know where this fascination came from.

00:25:38.000 It might come from kind of mainstream media.

00:25:40.000 It might come from like celebrities who kind of push these ideologies on these younger kids.

00:25:45.000 But it's a scary place to be right now and it's even more scary to think about what the future would be like for my kids growing up in this country.

00:25:54.000 Well, we're certainly not as bad as Cuba is yet. 0.99

00:25:59.000 And that's why there's there's hope that, you know, maybe our underground movement or, you know, resistance might actually stop the encroachment of this this communist authoritarian ideology.

00:26:10.000 For now, we're able to have these conversations, but you take a look at what's happened to people's careers.

00:26:15.000 When they dig up, you know, your history from 20 years ago, they get you fired because of things your parents said.

00:26:19.000 We're certainly not at that point where they're gonna come to your house and they're gonna beat and arrest you.

00:26:24.000 However, we are at that point where we have seen rioters go to the homes of people, say, in Portland.

00:26:29.000 They threatened to burn down a man's home because he had an American flag.

00:26:33.000 Many people have started saying that flying the American flag is a sort of underhanded way of showing that you support Donald Trump or that you support this country, the United States.

00:26:42.000 And I'm kind of like, well, waving the flag shows you're waving the flag for this country.

00:26:47.000 But in certain cities, it can be...

00:26:50.000 It can be bad news for you.

00:26:51.000 If one of these riots breaks out, if Black Lives Matter has sufficient numbers or Antifa and you're flying that flag, they will beat and attack you. 0.98

00:26:57.000 In fact, in Boston several years ago, there was a rally against Nazis.

00:27:02.000 Of course, there were no Nazis showing up in Boston.

00:27:05.000 It was just hysteria.

00:27:07.000 But you had 40,000 people protesting who they thought were Nazis when it was actually some Indian guy who's, you know, like running for office.

00:27:14.000 But there was an older woman. 1.00

00:27:16.000 who I believe was in her late 50s early 60s and she was holding an American flag 0.63

00:27:19.000 and some far left individual grabbed the flag and pulled it from her dragging her on pulling 0.99

00:27:25.000 her to the ground and then dragging her as they tried to take her her flag from her. 0.99

00:27:30.000 So we're certainly at the point where they have institutional authority and that you are right

00:27:34.000 you said if these people ever get true power what do you think these people are going to do

00:27:38.000 if they're given a badge? That is truly worrying to me that we're you know we're seeing that

00:27:44.000 starting to happen in the United States.

00:27:45.000 Not that they're getting badges, of course, but they're trying to.

00:27:48.000 They want these woke police. 0.93

00:27:50.000 I don't know if you saw what happened at Evergreen College, where these leftist extremists took baseball bats and were walking around campus attacking people.

00:27:58.000 Or what happened at the quote-unquote autonomous zone, the no-go zone in Seattle.

00:28:02.000 Where several of the security forces for the Seattle Autonomous Zone opened fire on an SUV with some teenagers in it, severely injuring and killing one.

00:28:12.000 If these people are successful in abolishing the police in the way they want, and creating, or I should say, not even abolishing the police, but creating their social justice, as they call it, police forces, then you will have people show up at your house and say, you've bad-mouthed the movement, and they'll start beating you.

00:28:28.000 Jose, what was the gun rights like in Cuba in the 40s and the 50s?

00:28:34.000 You could have your guns and you could go, you know... Target practice?

00:28:43.000 No, to hunt animals.

00:28:47.000 There was no problem and Cuba was very peaceful.

00:28:51.000 For guns, To be something so bad.

00:29:01.000 Some illness has to be in the minds of so many people that they use them wrong, probably.

00:29:09.000 But the problem are not the guns, are the people.

00:29:12.000 And if you have people that hate, whether it's a gun or not, you can go and smash somebody's head or destroy somebody's property, which is the same thing.

00:29:24.000 And you can do it with a gun or with no gun.

00:29:26.000 Did Bautista take the guns?

00:29:28.000 No, no.

00:29:30.000 No, no.

00:29:30.000 Castro?

00:29:31.000 Castro, yes.

00:29:32.000 What year?

00:29:32.000 Yeah, in 1959.

00:29:35.000 I tell you, I tell you what, there was a speech, a famous speech of Fidel.

00:29:41.000 The problem is this.

00:29:43.000 Fidel takes over, but really there are other organizations and movements that also had guerrilla forces fighting Batista.

00:29:53.000 from different organizations, okay?

00:29:56.000 Revolutionary organizations and students' organizations, like the Directorio Revolucionario Estudiantil, that, you know, they had fighting fronts, okay?

00:30:08.000 And then, in order for Fidel to control the movement, he needed to disarm everybody else.

00:30:17.000 And then he asked a beautiful question.

00:30:21.000 Guns for what?

00:30:26.000 For what?

00:30:28.000 And then he demanded that all politic, all organizations that had fought Batista give their guns.

00:30:39.000 It seems like it was a mistake.

00:30:41.000 And they all, did they all do it peacefully?

00:30:43.000 Yes.

00:30:44.000 Yes.

00:30:45.000 Because Fidel had at that time a tremendous power on the people.

00:30:51.000 Not because people wanted to have a socialistic dream that he had made them think of.

00:30:59.000 Fidel never spoke about socialism or spoke good about communism.

00:31:05.000 He always denied that.

00:31:09.000 But he was a charismatic leader that somehow made people think at the end, well, if you say you are communist, if you say you are socialist, put me in the list.

00:31:21.000 And that is the mentality that really made it very difficult for us to fight in the 1960s,

00:31:31.000 1961, 1962, 1963, Fidel.

00:31:37.000 Because still there were people believing that he was like a god.

00:31:42.000 Bye.

00:31:44.000 But that had nothing to do with whether they wanted socialism or not because not until 1961 Fidel declared the revolution socialist.

00:31:53.000 That was the headline using the invasion of Iran Well, then he stopped lying.

00:32:01.000 In 1961, the 17th of April of 1961, the newspaper Cuban Revolution had a headline with six words.

00:32:10.000 We will defend our democratic and socialist revolution.

00:32:19.000 The invasion of Iran as an excuse to then declare socialist Cuba.

00:32:25.000 You mentioned that he was very charismatic and he had this hold on the people.

00:32:29.000 I wonder what your thoughts are on Trump.

00:32:33.000 Well, look, I am not a hypocrite.

00:32:38.000 I like Trump.

00:32:41.000 I like the fact that a person speaks out what he has in his mind.

00:32:49.000 I credit that.

00:32:51.000 Maybe because I knew another leader, Fidel Castro, who did the contrary.

00:32:56.000 He lied.

00:32:57.000 He lied.

00:32:59.000 And he lied again, and he lied again, until he found the way to say his truth when the invasion came in, and used that as an excuse to declare the socialist state.

00:33:13.000 Let me clarify something about Trump, okay?

00:33:17.000 I am a Cuban citizen still.

00:33:20.000 I didn't come to this country to be an American citizen.

00:33:24.000 I came to this country to continue being a freedom fighter.

00:33:28.000 And to do that, I needed to remain a Cuban, because I was committed for life.

00:33:33.000 If I become an American citizen, then I have other things.

00:33:36.000 No, no.

00:33:37.000 I wanted to remind myself, no matter how good or bad I was, And I started working in factories, in production lines, in a print shop because I love papers and printing and propaganda.

00:33:53.000 And I had success.

00:33:55.000 I made a lot of money, but it never was my intention.

00:33:59.000 I didn't come here to make money, didn't come here to look for food, to buy me choose.

00:34:05.000 I came here because at a time all the avenues in Cuba were closed to me.

00:34:10.000 Closed.

00:34:11.000 Closed.

00:34:12.000 I was emotionally destroyed after an event that didn't go the way it should have gone.

00:34:20.000 And I don't see how it would have been gone good anyway because it was crazy what we did.

00:34:26.000 And that destroyed me.

00:34:28.000 And my organization said, Bonifacio, I think, if you want, we have the embassy for you, and you can continue working there, and that's what I did.

00:34:37.000 But let me finish about Trump something.

00:34:41.000 I like that man.

00:34:43.000 I have never voted for anybody.

00:34:45.000 And I am not here to say, vote for Trump in a second, whatever.

00:34:49.000 I don't care about that.

00:34:51.000 But Americans have to understand that in this country, Anybody should have the right to speak out what they think.

00:35:00.000 Nobody should have the right to lie, okay, and not to be confronted.

00:35:05.000 The media says that Donald Trump lies all the time, though.

00:35:08.000 What is his lie?

00:35:08.000 No.

00:35:10.000 I mean, tell me a couple of those lines.

00:35:12.000 I don't know if he lies or not, but he's saying something openly. 0.99

00:35:18.000 And you can prove he's a liar, then you know he's a liar.

00:35:22.000 But the problem is that how many people are here telling us lies and nobody says anything about it? 0.64

00:35:29.000 I would just say if the media institutions are supporting, you know, Black Lives Matter, the individuals who are praising Castro and right now praising the communist regime.

00:35:38.000 And look, I fact check news stories every single day.

00:35:43.000 They use deceptive framing techniques and manipulation to present falsehoods, as it were.

00:35:49.000 And then when I look at the things they've said about Donald Trump, you know what? He lies.

00:35:54.000 But he lies about really dumb things, like how many women he's been with or like, 0.99

00:35:58.000 you know, how he's the best and everyone knows it. It's like really... 0.97

00:36:01.000 How much money he has.

00:36:03.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there's something amazing in that even the Intercept,

00:36:07.000 which is very anti-Trump progressive, called him simultaneously the most, like,

00:36:11.000 deceptive and honest president we've ever had. There's one very famous moment where he's,

00:36:17.000 you know, he's about to get on the helicopter and they asked him what was happening, you know,

00:36:21.000 with Saudi Arabia and stuff. And he goes, oh, it's fantastic. We're doing this excellent

00:36:24.000 weapons deal. We're going to make millions of dollars. And everyone and all the anti-war left

00:36:29.000 activists, their jaws hit the floor like Trump just came out and said it. There was another point.

00:36:34.000 where Trump was trying to withdraw troops from Syria. And he goes, they tell me that we can't

00:36:38.000 take out our Trump, all of our troops from Syria. So we're leaving 200, you know, for the oil,

00:36:42.000 because we're going to protect the oil. And then everyone's just like, he's just admitting

00:36:47.000 what the US does with their foreign policy. So I think one of the challenges is that

00:36:52.000 there's always a risk as a charismatic leader who's going to come in who's going to entrance

00:36:56.000 people and lie to them. But I have been I've been wading through the muck in the mire for years.

00:37:03.000 And I can just see nonstop lies from the media.

00:37:08.000 So it's different.

00:37:09.000 It's not the same.

00:37:09.000 You say Fidel Castro was his charismatic leader.

00:37:11.000 He had everybody.

00:37:12.000 I mean, where was the press?

00:37:13.000 Were they challenging him?

00:37:15.000 Were they calling him a liar?

00:37:16.000 He destroyed the press.

00:37:16.000 What press?

00:37:18.000 What year?

00:37:20.000 By 1960, you could not really, you know... For example, I didn't tell you this.

00:37:29.000 In 1959, when the revolution took over, I began to think about a figure of the revolution that was very important during the organization of the 26th of July movement that nobody spoke about him anymore.

00:37:47.000 And we had a radio program where we started to talk about this Cuban figure.

00:37:57.000 And three or four weeks after we were on the air, Fidel asked the director of the radio station that had given us the time to put us off the earth.

00:38:08.000 And that was 1960.

00:38:10.000 They had already confiscated that radio station.

00:38:14.000 They were already putting coletillas, where a newspaper writes a small column, and then the government will put at the end of that column a coletilla, the ending phrase, saying this is a lie and all that.

00:38:31.000 And then immediately after that, there was no more, no more.

00:38:34.000 Cuba doesn't know.

00:38:35.000 Castro's Cuba didn't know right after he took over what was freedom of the press.

00:38:43.000 All media was controlled and is controlled by the government.

00:38:45.000 There is no other opinion, nothing else.

00:38:48.000 You cannot create even good or bad public opinion.

00:38:52.000 The government is the one that creates the opinion they want.

00:38:55.000 What are we seeing now with Joe Biden?

00:38:57.000 The Biden administration?

00:38:58.000 That they are currently flagging misinformation for Facebook.

00:39:03.000 That they are pushing a list of the greatest misinformation individuals on the internet.

00:39:10.000 That they're working with the DNC, the Democrats, and phone carriers to censor private text messages.

00:39:17.000 So when I see a bombastic man of Donald Trump, But one who mostly just insulted the press compared to what the current administration is doing in actually trying to circumvent the Constitution to take away the rights of people just to shut down their free speech and their allies, very much progressive leftists in big tech.

00:39:38.000 It sounds like we're heading towards a similar direction to what happened in Cuba.

00:39:43.000 That's why a lot more people need to look at, you know, Cuba's only 90 miles away from from our shores.

00:39:49.000 And it's the perfect blueprint of what happens when you put in place a communist dictatorship or communism and socialism.

00:39:55.000 Everything's ruined.

00:39:56.000 Everything's falling apart.

00:39:57.000 Nothing has moved on that island since 1959.

00:39:59.000 That's why People drive around in all these old cars that they literally have to just keep inventing things to keep the cars running.

00:40:08.000 You know, buildings are falling apart.

00:40:10.000 I believe those last year, there were three little girls playing in the street.

00:40:15.000 They were killed just from falling rubble of a building.

00:40:19.000 You know, everybody's houses are falling apart, but they're building hotels for the tourists to come and stay at, which Cuban citizens are not allowed to use. 1.00

00:40:26.000 I was gonna say, the progressives in this country say that's the fault of the U.S.

00:40:30.000 and their embargo.

00:40:31.000 No.

00:40:32.000 But they're building hotels.

00:40:34.000 In my opinion, whether the embargo stays or is lifted, the Cuban people are going to be in the same spot.

00:40:39.000 Because for the regime, it's all about control.

00:40:41.000 They control everything that comes in, they control everything that goes out.

00:40:45.000 As it is, with the scraps that they have, they can barely afford those scraps.

00:40:50.000 The average Cuban makes about $20, $30 US dollars a month.

00:40:54.000 They're paid.

00:40:55.000 They're not even paid in dollars.

00:40:56.000 They're paid in pesos in Cuban pesos But at the stores where you go and you want to buy something you have to buy it in dollars Wow, so how does that make sense at all?

00:41:04.000 You know and it's Man, it's just everything's like upside down.

00:41:08.000 There's broken.

00:41:09.000 Yes completely.

00:41:10.000 Oh So you ended up in the underground movement against Castro?

00:41:14.000 Yes.

00:41:15.000 During the initial confrontation where people realized, at the beginning I thought that, for example, I went to Sierra Maestra as a volunteer teacher.

00:41:30.000 Before I, when I graduated.

00:41:32.000 Just to put context, Sierra Maestra was the mountain range in Cuba where Fidel's army was, was hiding out during the revolution.

00:41:39.000 So that's where all of his troops were.

00:41:41.000 And so my dad went up there as a volunteer.

00:41:43.000 Okay.

00:41:44.000 Castro make a call to secondary graduates.

00:41:51.000 People have just graduated from secondary to go to teach and read the farmers.

00:41:57.000 And then I volunteer.

00:42:00.000 And the sad thing is that I volunteered in 1959, and they called me in 1960.

00:42:07.000 And we went to Havana University.

00:42:10.000 They got us together.

00:42:12.000 There were about, you know, a thousand applicants.

00:42:16.000 They gave us like a test.

00:42:19.000 I remember one question.

00:42:21.000 When was the first battle of the guerrilla in Sierra Maestra?

00:42:30.000 I remember, December 5th, Alegría del Pío.

00:42:34.000 So they gave us a test, probably to make sure how much we knew about the revolution, and they selected 500 of those kids that volunteered to become teachers of farmers.

00:42:46.000 So, in 1959, I wanted to do that.

00:42:50.000 Actually, I would have loved to be a teacher, not only a journalist or a lawyer, but I liked... Actually, in Channel 44, that I ran for 10 years, I developed a cold show, but a cheat, a little path.

00:43:05.000 A kid's show.

00:43:06.000 And we won an Emmy with it.

00:43:08.000 Oh, Channel 44 in Chicago.

00:43:09.000 Yeah.

00:43:10.000 I always joked that my dad was the Cuban Mr. Rogers.

00:43:10.000 Oh, yeah, yeah.

00:43:13.000 Oh, wow.

00:43:14.000 I used to watch him.

00:43:15.000 He was he was on the show.

00:43:17.000 I did a show.

00:43:18.000 Pets, the best friends of kids.

00:43:21.000 And this guy had a few pets.

00:43:23.000 Yeah.

00:43:24.000 So he came in the show.

00:43:25.000 He came to our to our Taekwondo school, too.

00:43:27.000 That was the first time I displayed my martial arts on TV.

00:43:31.000 When I was little, we didn't have cable, and the only way to watch Dragon Ball Z was in Spanish on Channel 44.

00:43:35.000 Oh, wow, that's crazy.

00:43:37.000 I can tell you a lot of stories about Channel 44, because when I went to Channel 44 for the first time, it was not to run Channel 44, but I bought an hour once a day, and I run a Spanish sub-opera, and I did all my logs and my slides and my production sitting in the cafeteria.

00:43:56.000 At that time, Channel 44 was White Sox, Bulls, and Bob Luce in wrestling.

00:44:04.000 Those shows.

00:44:05.000 Well, let's go back to what you were saying about... Okay.

00:44:08.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:44:08.000 So you volunteered for this?

00:44:10.000 Yeah, I volunteered because... But the sad thing is that I volunteered myself in 1959 And they called me in 1960, in May, to go to Sierra Maestra.

00:44:24.000 I had already been, I had already considered that the revolution betrayed Yuver Matos, but still I wasn't ready to fight the revolution.

00:44:37.000 I didn't, I didn't know how to do it.

00:44:41.000 I felt persecuted.

00:44:43.000 They wrote an article in the newspaper saying that at the Maris Brothers, the school where I studied, there was a fight between two kids.

00:44:56.000 One that was a revolutionary kid and one that was not a revolutionary kid.

00:45:00.000 And that the revolutionary kid got the bad energy of it.

00:45:07.000 And then they, that was the first attempt to destroy in Cuba private education.

00:45:15.000 I wrote an article.

00:45:16.000 No, I asked the director of the school to allow me to go class by class to investigate where that incident had occurred.

00:45:25.000 In third grade, I found two kids that because one wanted to erase the blackboard and the other didn't want after school helping the teacher.

00:45:35.000 They got into a little match, and nothing happened there.

00:45:39.000 So, I wrote an article called, FALSA, FACIL, Y FATUA, LA DENUNCIA DE JESÚS SOTO.

00:45:49.000 False, easy, or very easy to make a statement that is not true.

00:45:58.000 Completely false.

00:46:01.000 The accusation of Jesus, what was the last name again?

00:46:06.000 He was the non-revolutionary kid that was in the fight?

00:46:09.000 No, no, no, no.

00:46:10.000 Jesus Soto is the revolutionary leader that made the accusation that in that school, that incident happened.

00:46:17.000 And that was at the midst of when the government wanted to destroy private education.

00:46:23.000 I did a little research, wrote an article, and said that this wasn't true.

00:46:30.000 And I went to the newspaper in Old Havana that had published that article, okay?

00:46:35.000 And I asked for them to publish the article.

00:46:39.000 And they threw me down.

00:46:42.000 In Old Havana, the buildings have very long stairs.

00:46:46.000 And the guy took me and pushed me down.

00:46:49.000 I almost got killed.

00:46:51.000 Still, I thought that there was a mistake.

00:46:56.000 Okay?

00:46:56.000 That this guy made a mistake.

00:46:57.000 Not that the revolution was bad.

00:46:59.000 So this is why I went to Sierra Madre.

00:47:03.000 I thought that maybe still there was a hope that the revolution wouldn't end up the way I was beginning to see.

00:47:12.000 And then my mother said, look, go and talk to your father before you go to Sierra Maestra, because my father, who was a very civic and patriotic person, who had been in jail during Batista, His brother spent time in prison during Batista II.

00:47:30.000 His brother ended up being a captain of the Revolutionary Police of Cuba, serving a sentence of 20 years and ended up being 23 years.

00:47:39.000 So I went to talk to my father because my mother said, look, you are going to go.

00:47:45.000 You haven't asked permission from your father.

00:47:49.000 And my father said, niño, he called me boy.

00:47:51.000 I was the smaller of the three brothers, although we were apart only one year and a half.

00:47:57.000 And he said, niño, why do you want to go as a volunteer teacher?

00:48:02.000 I said, Dad, you know, I love teaching.

00:48:06.000 This is a commitment I made, you know, a year ago.

00:48:10.000 And they called me, and I told him, don't worry about it, because you know how much I love the teaching and the doctrine of José Martí.

00:48:19.000 I have read Josemarty a lot.

00:48:22.000 Sometimes I wrote things that looked like Josemarty.

00:48:26.000 And I wasn't copying Josemarty.

00:48:29.000 I was so much enticed by the teachings of our patriarch Josemarty that I told him, nobody's going to be able to get me out of that route.

00:48:40.000 And I was right.

00:48:41.000 I didn't know.

00:48:44.000 In May 19, 1960, being at Sierra Maestra, May 19 was the day in 1885 that Martí died, fighting for Cuba's independence.

00:48:58.000 And in the Sierra Maestra, a group of my companions, we decided to organize a tribute to José Martí's anniversary.

00:49:08.000 And I spoke there.

00:49:10.000 And what I said about José Martí, and since my speech did not refer to nothing of the

00:49:16.000 revolution or nothing like that, just about the spirit of the doctrine of José Martí,

00:49:24.000 the chief of the, the guy that was in charge of the campament called me and said, and no

00:49:29.000 more talking now.

00:49:31.000 You guys go and finish.

00:49:32.000 We were building a barrack because we had just gotten there.

00:49:36.000 We were building a barrack for us to hang our sleeping bags or whatever.

00:49:41.000 And then he said, you guys are not going to eat until you finish building the barrack.

00:49:47.000 And I, and I told this guy, and I was expelled in the point.

00:49:51.000 I told this guy, listen, wait, wait, wait, wait.

00:49:53.000 How do you call me?

00:49:55.000 Volunteer teacher?

00:49:57.000 Do you know what volunteer teacher means?

00:50:00.000 I am here as a volunteer.

00:50:03.000 And I am not gonna build any, finish any barracks.

00:50:07.000 If you have food, you have to give it to us now.

00:50:10.000 And that's it.

00:50:11.000 And that was night.

00:50:12.000 And then they expelled me.

00:50:15.000 I left Sierra Maestra walking.

00:50:18.000 I go to Minas del Frio.

00:50:22.000 Minas del Frio was right there next to Pico Turquino, the biggest mountain of Cuba.

00:50:27.000 You could see from there.

00:50:29.000 It was a valley among the mountains, like a flat terrain, and that was a school for the military.

00:50:41.000 Farmers and things, and they had a lot of arms there, and ammunition, and there was a mayor, okay?

00:50:48.000 And that Major, I went to him and said, this is what happened to me at La Magdalena.

00:50:55.000 La Magdalena was the campament where I, there were three campaments for the 500 volunteers, and that was one.

00:51:03.000 And his name was Aldo Santa Maria, the Major Aldo Santa Maria.

00:51:07.000 I was looking for the revolution to, again in my case, fix a mistake.

00:51:12.000 And then I look for Aldo Santa Maria de Tomis in the Capitania.

00:51:16.000 I went over there.

00:51:17.000 There were about 10 captains in a wooden, big, like a little office.

00:51:22.000 How do you call it?

00:51:23.000 A cabin or whatever.

00:51:26.000 And then I said, Comandante, I said, what do you want?

00:51:31.000 I said, well, I need you to investigate something.

00:51:34.000 I came here as a volunteer teacher from La Magdalena.

00:51:37.000 I just was expelled.

00:51:40.000 Why?

00:51:41.000 No, I just want you to go investigate.

00:51:44.000 We were just talking about Yosemite.

00:51:46.000 And then this guy said, look.

00:51:50.000 Have you eaten?

00:51:51.000 No.

00:51:52.000 He said, okay.

00:51:53.000 He took me to the front of the cabin.

00:51:55.000 You see over there?

00:51:56.000 There is food over there in a huge tent.

00:51:58.000 You go there, sleep the night there, and I am going to investigate what happened.

00:52:03.000 Come here tomorrow at six o'clock in the morning.

00:52:05.000 This is in the middle of La Mina del Frio.

00:52:09.000 A huge Secret military base where they have a lot of things, important things going on in there.

00:52:16.000 So I go there, next morning I go to see Aldo Santamaria.

00:52:22.000 Aldo Santamaria was the brother of Abel Santamaria, who was one of the biggest and first martyrs of the Cuban Revolution.

00:52:32.000 And him, he had died, and his brother now was a major commander of the revolution.

00:52:38.000 So I was impressed having met Aldo Santa Maria.

00:52:43.000 And then he says, OK, come back.

00:52:44.000 I went back.

00:52:45.000 And when I go back, I enter the cabin.

00:52:49.000 There were a lot of captains there.

00:52:52.000 And he says, OK, I did not send anybody to investigate.

00:52:59.000 I have a request for you.

00:53:03.000 Stay here with me.

00:53:05.000 Stay here with me.

00:53:09.000 And he really took me off, because I have been a Boy Scout.

00:53:13.000 I love mountains.

00:53:16.000 I never liked guns, but the discipline, I mean, the challenge.

00:53:23.000 I felt like enticed maybe to say yes.

00:53:26.000 But I said, Mayor Santa Maria, I did not come here to become a soldier.

00:53:34.000 If you cannot address my problem, then I must leave.

00:53:41.000 I don't want to be here.

00:53:43.000 And then he said, fine.

00:53:45.000 I said, well, how am I going to leave?

00:53:47.000 When we came in, they brought us.

00:53:49.000 To go out, there were a lot of posts where you need to be identified to get out from there.

00:53:56.000 You are in a military territory.

00:53:59.000 And he said, don't worry about it.

00:54:00.000 He wrote in a piece of paper to let me go through everything.

00:54:04.000 And he gave it to me and said, thank you very much.

00:54:06.000 And I hit the door.

00:54:07.000 And when I was leaving, Aldo Santamaria said, Joven, boy, what is your name?

00:54:15.000 I said, Jose Francisco Llamas.

00:54:19.000 And then he challenged me for the rest of my life.

00:54:22.000 He said, Jose, you are going to be or very good or very bad.

00:54:30.000 But he let me go.

00:54:32.000 And these are, when you say, you know, the beginning of the revolution, me and I am putting myself only as an example of many people that loved the revolution, that tried to serve the revolution, that tried to wait for the 18 months for having general elections, and that waited for the Constitution to be in place, the 1940 Constitution, which were the two main promises of Fidel Castro.

00:55:01.000 To establish the 1940 Constitution, to call for elections.

00:55:05.000 When we saw none of that happening, and when me, as a person, me, realized that I was being persecuted, I found myself that the only way that I could get out of that situation was fighting the revolution that I thought at the time that might have been a good thing.

00:55:23.000 And that is the process.

00:55:25.000 But the time that we decided to do that...

00:55:27.000 Fidel had imprisoned most of the big leaders of the good revolution that did not become part of the communist takeover.

00:55:36.000 And we were, you know, we had no resources and we had no help and there was no press

00:55:42.000 and we did crazy things.

00:55:44.000 But we cumplimos con nuestro deber.

00:55:50.000 We fulfilled our duty.

00:55:52.000 This is what a lot of the young people here in the US and many other places don't realize.

00:55:56.000 That if they actually get their revolution, they're actually the biggest threat to those who want to seize power.

00:56:03.000 The layabouts in this country, the regular people who don't do anything, well they're no threat to the authoritarians.

00:56:09.000 They don't do anything.

00:56:10.000 Revolutionaries!

00:56:11.000 They're a big threat to revolutionaries.

00:56:13.000 So that's why I'm not surprised to hear that, you know, Fidel imprisoned the other leaders in the revolution.

00:56:18.000 Immediately.

00:56:19.000 And it was not only in prison. 1.00

00:56:21.000 Send them to the firing squad.

00:56:24.000 Send, like, you know, the only reason why he could not do that to Uwe Matos is because Uwe Matos was, I would say, in the five major leaders of the revolution in the Sierra Maestra, Uwe Matos was one of them.

00:56:38.000 The biggest shipment of guns that got to Sierra Maestra, Ubermatos delivered from Costa Rica.

00:56:46.000 He landed there with a small plane, and he brought the best armament that the guerrilla had seen.

00:56:52.000 And Ubermatos, being a teacher, he was a teacher to his soldiers.

00:56:58.000 his troops were really committed to ideals, not to following people.

00:57:07.000 He spread among his followers in his troop the thoughts of democracy and fighting for freedom, and so he had a very

00:57:21.000 cohesive army.

00:57:23.000 He exposed who were not the real good people that were convinced of his ideals.

00:57:32.000 And Fidel was afraid that that had permeated among other ranks of the revolution, and was afraid to imprison, to kill Ubermato.

00:57:43.000 But he tried to destroy him, and he spent 20 years in prison.

00:57:48.000 Were there counter-revolutionary forces?

00:57:50.000 People opposing... Obviously, there were battles.

00:57:52.000 No, there were... We never... No, they call us counter-revolutionaries.

00:57:57.000 The revolutionaries that opposed the revolution, we were called counter-revolutionaries.

00:58:03.000 But we were the revolutionaries with the revolution.

00:58:07.000 Now, the problem is, when you oppose the revolution, then you are a gusano. 0.76

00:58:13.000 Yeah.

00:58:14.000 And you are a counter-revolutionary.

00:58:16.000 I haven't changed.

00:58:18.000 You know, ideas do not change.

00:58:21.000 Okay?

00:58:22.000 Sometimes you are in favor, you can do it in favor.

00:58:25.000 Sometimes you gotta do it against.

00:58:27.000 But that doesn't mean you are a counter-nothing.

00:58:30.000 You are pro your own ideal, if you have ideals.

00:58:33.000 The problem in this country is that I don't think people have the right ideals.

00:58:37.000 else.

00:58:38.000 How long were you in this underground movement against Castro?

00:58:42.000 How long were you actively trying to oppose Castro?

00:58:45.000 1960 to the end of 1962.

00:58:51.000 And I mean, living wherever I could, sleeping wherever I could, and I didn't even know that

00:59:00.000 I was missing anything.

00:59:02.000 It never occurred to me, okay?

00:59:04.000 I live, I don't know even how, but I live.

00:59:08.000 And I was fully embraced by what we were doing with my friends.

00:59:16.000 Like Lucia Sanchez that might be listening to this podcast right now in Chicago. 1.00

00:59:22.000 When she was young, as I was young, I was a little bit older than she was.

00:59:28.000 And I was so much in love with our group and we became family.

00:59:37.000 Then she married one of our companions that went to jail.

00:59:42.000 the brother of a companion of ours that when I was the national head of the student sector of the 3rd of November Revolutionary Movement and I seek refuge at the Brazilian embassy, I gave him the folder that I had kept with all our papers.

01:00:00.000 That was at the end of July 1962.

01:00:03.000 His name was Luis Sánchez Carpente.

01:00:06.000 And he was caught On the 30th of August, and on September 21st, he was already executed.

01:00:18.000 Wow.

01:00:21.000 What was the regime's excuse?

01:00:24.000 Oh, because this is my theory.

01:00:31.000 The regime had different ways of destroying the opposition.

01:00:37.000 The number one was to infiltrate our groups.

01:00:42.000 Our group, the 30th November Revolutionary Movement, Franc Pays, since it was a group that came from the revolution itself, it was very easy that anybody, being an official of the revolutionary government, would come to us.

01:01:01.000 Because we were identified throughly with the real revolution and with the real purposes of the revolution.

01:01:08.000 So if a G2 guy comes to us and he declares that, you know, he wants to be with us, you know, we were like a perfect target for people that were revolutionaries to join us.

01:01:21.000 G2 were like the military police of Castro's revolution. 0.90

01:01:25.000 Okay.

01:01:26.000 And the second thing that they did, and this is what happened to my friend, They know, the security knows you have a plan.

01:01:39.000 And they had a plan.

01:01:41.000 On August 30th of 1962, there will be a general insurrection of Cuba.

01:01:49.000 And at that time, all those military people and a lot of people still were in power were supposed to join us, join my group and the other groups to rebel against the revolution.

01:02:02.000 But that plan was really built by the state security police.

01:02:12.000 Okay?

01:02:13.000 They really controlled the organization of that thing.

01:02:18.000 Because there is no other way of explaining that if there are, let's say, 10,000 people organized to do something on a particular day, a particular night, that that morning everybody gets into prison?

01:02:35.000 How in the world could that happen unless that uprising had been planned by the regime?

01:02:45.000 The trap.

01:02:46.000 The trap.

01:02:47.000 So is this when you went to the Brazilian embassy and this is when you fled?

01:02:51.000 No, no, no.

01:02:52.000 He was already in the Brazilian embassy when his group was infiltrated.

01:02:56.000 Okay.

01:02:57.000 No, no, my group was infiltrated before by many other people in many other ways.

01:03:01.000 That, that movement... But when they were all arrested.

01:03:03.000 Yeah, that movement was something that they created, I don't know from, from where, because in July 28, okay, I participated in an action to disarm, okay, some people.

01:03:20.000 Okay?

01:03:21.000 Because we didn't have arms.

01:03:24.000 And somebody in my organization told me, I'm going to be leaving the embassy.

01:03:28.000 I got to go to the United States.

01:03:30.000 When I come back, I'm going to organize something to come back.

01:03:33.000 I need you to have arms.

01:03:36.000 And he gave me two ways of getting the arms.

01:03:40.000 Go to Oriente Province, where in Cienaguilla, we had a front, and the people that were in the guerrilla force at that place were destroyed and assassinated.

01:03:53.000 But it looks like there were some arms that were hiding somewhere in Oriente Province, okay?

01:04:00.000 In a town called Campechuela.

01:04:02.000 So this guy, that at the time was sort of my boss, said, you go to Campechuela and find those arms.

01:04:12.000 And I went to Campechuela with a friend of mine.

01:04:15.000 There is another episode of something ridiculous that happened to us, the biggest scare that I had in that trip.

01:04:21.000 But anyway, I go to Campechuela, and the lady that I'm supposed to see in this town, she doesn't know nothing about anything, or she didn't trust me.

01:04:30.000 So I asked, knowing that I might not find the arms, I asked my boss or my leader, what do I do if I don't find the arms?

01:04:40.000 He said, well, take it away from the army.

01:04:43.000 Okay.

01:04:44.000 And we developed a crazy idea, a crazy plan of young people going to take the arms with no, you know, we, we had some arms.

01:04:52.000 Okay.

01:04:53.000 And that was a catastrophe.

01:04:56.000 Yeah.

01:04:56.000 Okay.

01:04:57.000 So that happened at the end of July of 1962 in that catastrophe.

01:05:02.000 Okay.

01:05:04.000 I shot trying to defend a friend of mine.

01:05:08.000 I mean, he was paralyzed.

01:05:09.000 Jorge Luis Aguilar Garcia.

01:05:12.000 I have been hiding in his house.

01:05:13.000 He was one of my closest friends in the underground.

01:05:18.000 The other, the other, there were three participants in that plan.

01:05:23.000 The other person that was participating, both are dead already.

01:05:26.000 This is why I'm telling this story.

01:05:28.000 I'm the only one alive.

01:05:30.000 The other one was shot in the leg by crossfire.

01:05:34.000 We tried to steal a car.

01:05:36.000 We needed to steal a car to use that car to go and do the operation and then move the little arms that we got into our other car.

01:05:46.000 So we didn't want to burn our only car, our only transportation.

01:05:50.000 So when we went to steal this car, that's when the whole situation came about.

01:05:58.000 Because what happened to me, and what I did accidentally, I was emotionally destroyed.

01:06:08.000 That day I escaped miraculously.

01:06:12.000 Because where the incident happened, near to Malecón, a lot of resonance, a few shots, And all of a sudden, when I am trying to get my friend out of the car that was shot, I didn't know how seriously at the time, I heard boots of people running, walking, cha, cha, cha, cha, like a group of soldiers.

01:06:39.000 Okay?

01:06:40.000 And my friend said, go, Bonnie, go!

01:06:43.000 And I started to walk away.

01:06:46.000 And I heard saying, Bonnie, you killed me.

01:06:50.000 And I came back.

01:06:52.000 And at the end he said, Bonnie, go.

01:06:54.000 And I went.

01:06:55.000 But I took a pistol from the other friend of mine that was shot in the leg and the pistol that I had.

01:07:03.000 And instead of going that way, I came, I went into the same direction where the, where the soldiers were coming.

01:07:11.000 With one hand in one pocket and one hand in the other pocket. 1.00

01:07:15.000 And the idiots let me go through them. 1.00

01:07:18.000 And I said, call... We can't hear you. 1.00

01:07:21.000 I said, I'm sorry.

01:07:23.000 I said, I said, call emergency.

01:07:26.000 There are people hurt in that car over there.

01:07:29.000 And they let me go through.

01:07:32.000 Brilliant.

01:07:34.000 That situation forced me physically and mentally to leave the underground.

01:07:43.000 Because the only thing that I could have done at that time is to allow them to get me.

01:07:48.000 I had no more spark.

01:07:50.000 To jump out of a car as I did once, to run out of my house when the G2 came to get me, and resulted in my parents being under arrest for two weeks because they were waiting, they didn't want my parents to go out, to think that there was nothing wrong in my house, and they thinking that I will come back.

01:08:08.000 I escaped on many occasions in many different ways.

01:08:12.000 But I never had emotionally been hurt or emotionally felt that I needed to do something else, that I didn't want to continue.

01:08:22.000 And that's where, the next day, I called Luis Sánchez Carpente.

01:08:29.000 At El Prado, Paseo del Prado, where as a kid, I have been playing in the Iron Lions that are in this Paseo del Prado, beautiful, you know, walk-through with trees.

01:08:40.000 And as a kid, my father used to take me there.

01:08:43.000 And in one of those benches, with the folder of my organization in my hand that I had collected from all the things that we had done, with Robert Stapp of the organization, I gave it to Luis Sánchez Carpente.

01:08:56.000 Okay?

01:08:57.000 That was about July 29 or July 30.

01:09:03.000 After that, the next day I met with the coordinator of my organization, a Cuban architect that liked me a lot and protected me a lot and said, I said, Bonnie, I have secured an entrance to the Brazilian embassy in case I need it, but I think you need it.

01:09:22.000 Do you think you want to go to exile?

01:09:25.000 And I said, Enrique, Where else can I go?

01:09:30.000 I am destroyed.

01:09:32.000 And then I went there and there was another story how I had to wait for a minute between two soldiers, when I had been persecuted and when I had participated in so many things, waiting for the guy to open the door in the embassy.

01:09:46.000 I tried to get a friend of mine that is listening to, Tony Antilles, who was a lieutenant of Cato's Railroad Army.

01:09:52.000 I have to, once I got to the embassy, I got a permit to get him in.

01:09:57.000 And when he got there, and stood in front of the same door, and pressed the button, the soldier got him, and that let him get into the embassy.

01:10:06.000 Wow.

01:10:06.000 So that was terrible.

01:10:10.000 So this is you basically leaving, you're going into exile?

01:10:14.000 going into the embassy.

01:10:16.000 Right there, of course, they didn't give me my safe conduct.

01:10:19.000 There were a hundred Cubans there, and the strategy of the Minister of Public Relations of Cuba, who should have given us our safe conduct, was not to give anybody a safe conduct, so the embassy could not bring any more people there.

01:10:34.000 But what happened?

01:10:35.000 Because of the assassination that was in there and the problems that we faced there, two people got killed inside the embassy.

01:10:42.000 And then the government of Brazil, one committed suicide.

01:10:47.000 One was killed.

01:10:50.000 and one committed suicide.

01:10:53.000 Because that trauma in the embassy, the government of Brazil that was socialist at the time

01:10:59.000 or friendly with the Cuban government, there were not too many other countries

01:11:03.000 that had diplomatic relations in 1962 with Brazil, they sent a military representation of Brazil,

01:11:14.000 a military plane, and they told simply, Raul Roa, who was the minister of exterior relations.

01:11:24.000 You either give us the 100 safe conducts of these political exiles or we break relations.

01:11:31.000 Wow.

01:11:32.000 And they gave us our safe conducts and then I was able to leave Cuba.

01:11:37.000 You went to Brazil.

01:11:38.000 After seven, no.

01:11:39.000 They gave us the opportunity.

01:11:41.000 to go to the United States to San Juan.

01:11:44.000 So they flew us in this military plane that we saw at the beginning that was like a sabotage to kill us because it was an old artifact from the Second World War.

01:11:52.000 It didn't have any seats.

01:11:54.000 It looks like a transport.

01:11:56.000 It looks to us when we got in the plane that they were going to drop us somewhere, you know, not in Puerto Rico.

01:12:01.000 But we reached Puerto Rico.

01:12:04.000 And I spent two weeks in Puerto Rico.

01:12:07.000 I had a brother in Chicago who sent me the money, and then I flew two weeks after that from San Juan to Chicago, and I have been in Chicago since February of 1963.

01:12:19.000 It's been a long time since 1962, but now we're seeing people in Cuba start to protest, sitting down with dictatorship.

01:12:26.000 Are you getting that spark back?

01:12:28.000 Do you feel hopeful?

01:12:29.000 He never lost that spark.

01:12:31.000 I mean, since he left, I think there hasn't been a day that's passed that he hasn't thought about, uh, you know, the cause of bringing freedom back to Cuba.

01:12:39.000 And he, he, every, every single day that I can remember every single chance that he's had, he is, uh, dedicated his life here to that fight for freedom in Cuba, whether it's through his, uh, Cuban civic committee, where they put on, um, events throughout the year to raise money.

01:12:54.000 Yeah, but I mean there was tons of stuff that he's been doing so to answer your question There was no spark that needed to come back.

01:13:01.000 It was the fire has always been burning since the day he left If I if I understand your question is well, what is my reaction well is is a reaction of Sadness That people had no other chance of surviving than living day by day and could not really free themselves because they, in my case, okay, I had no problem in being in the underground.

01:13:35.000 It was for me great!

01:13:38.000 I didn't have anything, didn't have no security, didn't have, I wasn't afraid of anything, didn't even know that I was in danger.

01:13:47.000 But I never had a son that would go to bed without milk.

01:13:56.000 I never had a mother that was dying with no medical services.

01:14:03.000 I was a young, healthy Cuban doing whatever he needed, he learned in school.

01:14:10.000 As I said, I had the pleasure of having had a better education than the economic situation of my parents could afford.

01:14:20.000 But we didn't have a car.

01:14:22.000 We lived in a middle class neighborhood, low, lower middle class, not bad. 0.99

01:14:28.000 In El Cerro, it was okay.

01:14:31.000 And I had a good standard of living.

01:14:35.000 But people today have not been able to do what I did because they had responsibilities with their families I didn't have.

01:14:44.000 There are many young people that don't have families, but they needed to survive on a day-to-day, day-to-day, day-to-day.

01:14:50.000 They never took... For me, it was not a process of not being able to eat or to find food to fight.

01:15:02.000 I fought and then I had no food and I didn't give.

01:15:07.000 I don't want to say it anyway.

01:15:10.000 Okay?

01:15:11.000 Never.

01:15:12.000 Never felt hungry.

01:15:15.000 On the contrary, I always felt okay.

01:15:19.000 And then my friends would come, and one would say one day, oh, what shoe size you wear?

01:15:25.000 Because he saw holes on my shoes.

01:15:29.000 I was sitting on a bench in Parque Central waiting for Alejandro.

01:15:34.000 Moreno, Maya, one of the guys that was with me the day that I jumped out of a car when they were taking me to prison.

01:15:43.000 And Alejandro Maya looked at my shoes and said, what size do you wear?

01:15:47.000 OK, so next week I am in the Parque Central de La Habana waiting for him again, and he comes laughing with a box of shoes, new shoes.

01:15:56.000 And you know, I didn't even know I didn't have, but I didn't even care about the shoes that I have.

01:16:02.000 But today, and the revolution has been able to control the Cuban people by scarcity.

01:16:09.000 By hunger, by starvation.

01:16:11.000 But there is a point, a breaking point, for people to... I would like to talk, I don't want to forget, right there.

01:16:20.000 I want to talk about the Sue, the Cuban program in Hanoi, during the Vietnam War.

01:16:26.000 Oh yeah.

01:16:28.000 Okay?

01:16:28.000 But now, the people have suffered so much, that I think they are in a catatonic state.

01:16:39.000 They don't give nothing about what happens now.

01:16:43.000 They are willing to risk it now.

01:16:45.000 They have nothing to lose.

01:16:47.000 Now Castro's dead and his brother, Raul, is he dead?

01:16:52.000 No, he's alive.

01:16:53.000 Is he in control?

01:16:54.000 No, he's not.

01:16:55.000 He was and then he relinquished.

01:16:56.000 He designated Diaz-Canel president.

01:16:59.000 Miguel Diaz-Canel is now the acting president and face of the regime in Cuba now.

01:16:59.000 He's still there.

01:17:05.000 Is he willing to give it up?

01:17:06.000 No, no, no, no.

01:17:06.000 No.

01:17:08.000 He's a bureaucrat.

01:17:09.000 He's a bureaucrat.

01:17:10.000 He has power.

01:17:11.000 He did nothing for the revolution.

01:17:12.000 He didn't fight Batista.

01:17:14.000 He did nothing.

01:17:15.000 He just was, you know, a good, he absorbed the theory of Marxism.

01:17:21.000 He lives in a huge mansion with swimming pool.

01:17:27.000 Do you think he's going to give up that?

01:17:29.000 His, his actual, you know, he, he was addressing, um, I saw a video he's addressing people about the protests and his exact words were, uh, you know, if they want to face off with the revolution, they're going to have to walk over our dead bodies.

01:17:43.000 So, you know, his answer is he, and he gave an order for combat in the streets.

01:17:48.000 We're going to go to the streets and we're going to. 0.95

01:17:50.000 Dictators and traitors. 0.94

01:17:51.000 They are traitors to the revolution. 0.92

01:17:52.000 revolutionary citizens to fight back.

01:17:54.000 It's amazing how they refer to themselves as the revolution when they've been the dictators for decades and generations. 0.81

01:17:59.000 Dictators and traitors. 0.93

01:18:01.000 They are traitors to the revolution. 0.93

01:18:05.000 And by the way, when we use the word revolution, really, it was not a revolution with social or nothing.

01:18:15.000 It was a movement to get rid of a dictator that we have for seven years and go back To what we were, not jumping with ideas and plans and things that never happened or that would never never achieve their things like the stories of the chickens in the farm.

01:18:34.000 Fidel said, oh, we got started with this farm.

01:18:36.000 We're going to have so many chickens and then we're going to have a hundred million chickens here soon.

01:18:42.000 And there were no chickens and nothing appeared.

01:18:44.000 And nothing happened.

01:18:46.000 Do you understand?

01:18:47.000 Yeah, the command economies don't work. 0.96

01:18:50.000 I know we saw it with Mao when he said, kill all the birds, kill all the pests.

01:18:53.000 And then they destroyed their ability to farm.

01:18:56.000 All of a sudden the locusts came and started sweeping across China.

01:19:00.000 No, no.

01:19:00.000 Farmers in Cuba now are starving.

01:19:02.000 They are not allowed to sell what they can produce.

01:19:06.000 They are not allowed to produce.

01:19:07.000 Everything has to be controlled by the government.

01:19:10.000 Everything has to go to them.

01:19:11.000 This is why I say...

01:19:13.000 Please, Americans, open your eyes. 0.68

01:19:16.000 Cuba doesn't need food.

01:19:19.000 Cuba doesn't need humanitarian aid.

01:19:23.000 Cuba needs to get rid of the dictatorship that will absorb anything you send over there.

01:19:30.000 Nobody in the streets is saying, I want food, I want a vaccine against COVID.

01:19:35.000 No!

01:19:36.000 They want freedom.

01:19:37.000 They know it's the only thing.

01:19:39.000 Well, what can America do?

01:19:41.000 Well, America should get involved in that.

01:19:43.000 I think that the American government should help us at this time.

01:19:49.000 Do you know what happened in 1961 with the invasion of Iran?

01:19:54.000 Okay, there were, you know, in Miami, as young Cubans began to go from Havana, from Cuba to Miami, in Miami when they knew they were going to prepare a force to fight, they already started to volunteer.

01:20:11.000 Also known as a Bay of Pigs.

01:20:13.000 That's right.

01:20:13.000 Oh, yes.

01:20:14.000 Right, right, right, right.

01:20:15.000 Okay.

01:20:15.000 They started to volunteer and they wanted to go to Cuba to liberate Cuba.

01:20:22.000 But then Kennedy changed the plans.

01:20:26.000 And Kennedy was told, but listen, what do we do with the 1,500 Cubans that want to go? 0.98

01:20:37.000 And then his advisor said, well, Mr. President, they want to go to Cuba.

01:20:42.000 They want to go to fight.

01:20:43.000 And then he said, OK, send them.

01:20:46.000 But no air coverage.

01:20:51.000 No support.

01:20:53.000 That was like sending the best of the Cuban youth in exile to die. 1.00

01:21:03.000 This country has to pay us back.

01:21:08.000 Because after that, you know what has happened in 62 years.

01:21:15.000 We humans expect the United States to behave like the United States maybe in the 50s.

01:21:21.000 I don't know.

01:21:22.000 I don't know when to go back.

01:21:25.000 But I do know that the United States had a prestige, an international prestige, that we Cubans were in love with the American dream, that we were living in our own country, and that we relived when ours ended and we came here looking to establish, you know, a new life.

01:21:46.000 I came looking for something different, to tell you the truth.

01:21:48.000 In Miami, this past election, there was a safe Democrat district in an urban center.

01:21:55.000 No one saw this coming.

01:21:57.000 The Republican got elected.

01:21:58.000 The continuing pushes from the far left, the Marxists, the Black Lives Matter groups, is turning many of these, you know, in like South Texas, for instance, and in Florida, it's turning Democrat areas into Republican areas. 0.71

01:22:11.000 And it's very likely because, especially in Miami, obviously, The people who know the horrors of socialism and communism are seeing that within the United States and pushing back against it.

01:22:20.000 So perhaps that's a sign of hope for us here, that we won't let it happen.

01:22:26.000 And I wonder if people in the United States are willing to do anything to help Cuba.

01:22:31.000 You know, here the Cubans are pushing back against the problems here, but will it go the other way?

01:22:35.000 I think about the Spanish-American war.

01:22:38.000 In 1898, when the Spanish Empire controlled Cuba, and the Americans liberated Cuba, and then let it go.

01:22:46.000 No, it's not correct.

01:22:47.000 What happened?

01:22:48.000 It's not correct.

01:22:49.000 Your statement is... I mean, maybe you read it in a book like that, but Cuba has fought for its freedom since 1821.

01:22:58.000 In 1851, there were different movements.

01:23:01.000 There were different movements.

01:23:03.000 1868, El Grito de Yara.

01:23:07.000 Ten years fighting the Spaniards, okay? 0.99

01:23:12.000 The Cuban Guajiros, the Mambice Cubanos. 1.00

01:23:16.000 Then came the 1895 war, okay?

01:23:22.000 And after we had done most of the fighting, and put most of the dead, the main blew up.

01:23:33.000 Somehow, I am not going to discuss here.

01:23:36.000 Some people say that the United States blew the main.

01:23:43.000 I don't believe it.

01:23:44.000 Okay?

01:23:45.000 And I don't care what happened now.

01:23:47.000 It doesn't matter.

01:23:49.000 What happened?

01:23:50.000 It doesn't matter.

01:23:52.000 It was an excuse of the United States to intervene.

01:23:56.000 And then they intervened.

01:23:58.000 But you cannot say they won the war.

01:24:02.000 No, no.

01:24:03.000 We Cubans were already in the final stage.

01:24:06.000 José Martí had already died a few months after he landed in Oriente to fight for what he had been preaching for many years.

01:24:17.000 He had been in prison when he was 15 years old by the Spaniards.

01:24:21.000 Okay, so when you say the Americans won the war, no.

01:24:26.000 They intervened.

01:24:28.000 Actually, they did a few things that were not right, like not allowing some Mambisa forces to be respected for what they were, and to be given more authority.

01:24:43.000 But the Americans, or you know, the United States, end up allowing Cuba to be a republic.

01:24:57.000 And they created, with the help of Cubans, a constitution, which in 1940 we changed and became really a Cuban constitution.

01:25:10.000 But they gave us the framework, okay, to establish a democratic republic.

01:25:17.000 But we cannot give them the credit for winning the war.

01:25:21.000 What I get concerned of is that before, when it was independent Cuba, that it was... How did Bautista come to power?

01:25:30.000 It feels like it was usurped. 0.90

01:25:32.000 It was ridiculous. 0.96

01:25:34.000 Bautista came to power without killing anybody, without fighting one shot. 0.97

01:25:42.000 He was a leader of the military.

01:25:45.000 He gave a coup d'etat, you know, without any bloodshed.

01:25:51.000 The bloodshed came, of course, when we Cubans decided that we didn't want to be a republic with a dictatorship.

01:26:02.000 We wanted to be a republic with a bad government or with a good government.

01:26:09.000 But elected by the people, not a good government.

01:26:12.000 We didn't want to have a bad government or a good government.

01:26:15.000 But Fidel said it very clearly when he was talking about why we needed to get Batista out of power.

01:26:24.000 Because Cuba was a republic, and then we had a president that you elected, and he did bad things, or good things, and then you changed to a new one.

01:26:37.000 You have the ability to do good things or bad things, but there was a rhythm, a constitutional rhythm.

01:26:44.000 And that is what Fidel interrupted.

01:26:48.000 He preached that he wanted to return Cuba to that situation, because it's beautiful to say, you made a mistake, you had a bad, you elected a bad government, or this government was bad, you have the power to change it.

01:27:02.000 And that was the biggest lie of Fidel, that he wanted to bring Cuba back to be self-determining by the people in what kind of situation we were, who was going to be the president and all that.

01:27:20.000 But, you know, that's what happened.

01:27:23.000 Did you believe in Fidel at the start of the revolution?

01:27:26.000 I did not believe in Fidel.

01:27:32.000 I knew that he was fighting, and a young person considers that you have an ideal, and you fight for it, that that is good.

01:27:45.000 So, to tell you the truth, you know, I'm never a fanatic of nobody.

01:27:52.000 And when I said about Trump, you know, that I respect him, I am not a fanatic of Trump.

01:27:57.000 And I think that Trump did some major mistakes in how he talked to the press, or how he did this, or how he did that, okay?

01:28:05.000 But I have never been moved by following anybody.

01:28:10.000 My father gave me a lesson one day, and that was during what I did against Batista.

01:28:18.000 I am at the Maris Brothers one day and they tell me in 1958, hey Jose, we are not going to come to school tomorrow.

01:28:30.000 No, it's going to be a general, a general strike against Batista.

01:28:30.000 Why?

01:28:36.000 So I said, fine.

01:28:38.000 How is this?

01:28:39.000 Well, we come in the morning, we go to, to the, to the first class for two hours.

01:28:39.000 Okay.

01:28:45.000 When we go to the recreo, to the, how do you say?

01:28:48.000 Recreation.

01:28:49.000 When you go to recreation, you come back, you come back to, to the salon, get your books and go home.

01:28:59.000 And I did that.

01:29:01.000 There were 500 students there.

01:29:03.000 Half the lower grades and half of the secondary.

01:29:08.000 So I get my books.

01:29:12.000 I start walking towards a green gate at the end of the campus.

01:29:17.000 There was a baseball camp.

01:29:19.000 I go over there where we all go and the bosses go out.

01:29:23.000 And when I look back, I see only one student behind me.

01:29:28.000 Joaquin Badel.

01:29:29.000 I remember his name.

01:29:31.000 It happens that Joaquin Badel was the son of a Batista functionary.

01:29:40.000 His father had a good job during the Batista regime.

01:29:43.000 I know because he lives in my neighborhood, and when you walk by his house, a large open, a large window was open, and you could see a painting, a painting thing of Batista, a general, you know, a nice painting of Batista, so I knew that he was for Batista.

01:30:03.000 That was the only kid that followed me.

01:30:06.000 A guy that would get in trouble with his father, Because his father was like, wait a minute, what are you joining?

01:30:11.000 What strike are you joining against Batista?

01:30:14.000 So they called us the next week.

01:30:19.000 They called my father and me and said, this is not, he said, the hermano.

01:30:26.000 Hermano is not a priest.

01:30:29.000 It's a religious order. 0.57

01:30:31.000 And they are called hermanos, not fathers or whatever.

01:30:36.000 So he said, this school, It's for learning.

01:30:42.000 This school is not to do strikes here.

01:30:48.000 And I said, well, but Cuba has a dictatorship.

01:30:59.000 And it was not even my idea.

01:31:04.000 Here, they told me it was going to happen and I just participated on it.

01:31:10.000 And then my father ended up the meeting and said, niño, you did right, but you did something wrong.

01:31:20.000 Next time you do something, know what you're committed with.

01:31:26.000 Don't commit with people that are not really committed.

01:31:29.000 So, you know, the day that youngsters in Cuba, in the future, can commit themselves to do something, I don't care if it's right or wrong, but that they have the integrity to follow through in what they think.

01:31:44.000 If they are wrong, they will realize they are wrong.

01:31:48.000 But I think I did the right thing in committing myself to do something, and my father only gave me a lesson.

01:31:56.000 Be sure that you do it with the right people.

01:32:00.000 And this is why, when I joined the Underground, I realized that I was with that kind of youth that was committed to the same things that I was committed.

01:32:11.000 It's a great lesson.

01:32:12.000 There are a lot of people who are mindlessly droning on and just following whatever it is the media says and they're putting out these messages and young people just blindly repeat it.

01:32:21.000 But let's jump into Super Chats and see what a lot of people probably have questions.

01:32:25.000 If you haven't already, give us a like.

01:32:25.000 We'll talk to the audience.

01:32:27.000 Hit that like button.

01:32:28.000 And subscribe to this channel.

01:32:30.000 Share this show with your friends if you thought these warnings and stories were very important.

01:32:34.000 And we're going to have a members-only podcast going up, usually around 11 or so p.m.

01:32:38.000 tonight, after this show wraps up, where we're going to get to talk about the censorship and other things that are affecting this country, because we're certainly dealing with it, so you'll want to see that.

01:32:48.000 But let's read some Super Chats!

01:32:50.000 All right, let's see.

01:32:51.000 Here's a totally off-topic, because a lot of people, you know, just want to ask questions.

01:32:55.000 Alexander Leonem says, First Super Chat.

01:32:58.000 This is for Ian.

01:32:59.000 Trying to discuss the tabletop RPG stream you and Tim have discussed on Mines.

01:33:03.000 Please get back to me when you can.

01:33:05.000 We will make sure Ian is aware.

01:33:07.000 I will convey this to him.

01:33:09.000 Enlightened Worm says, Tim, please stop saying San Diego has a GOP mayor.

01:33:13.000 We lost him in November.

01:33:15.000 Our new mayor is a Democrat aligning with our progressive city council.

01:33:18.000 He supports SB 145 and doubled his salary while calling people that want to work selfish.

01:33:24.000 Yes, and that is an absolutely fair point.

01:33:27.000 So to clarify my previous comments, and I did mention this a few times, the data on San Diego's mayor is outdated, and the data on the crime stuff was from a while ago.

01:33:37.000 Alright, let's see.

01:33:41.000 No, that is completely false.

01:33:43.000 This important podcast will anger Jimmy Dore.

01:33:47.000 He claims that Cuba is a CIA operation.

01:33:51.000 Do you think that the people that are rising up in protest is CIA manipulated?

01:33:55.000 No, that is completely false.

01:34:00.000 People have rebelled out of a situation that they cannot live under.

01:34:10.000 There are no CIA people talking to people in Havana or in any town.

01:34:15.000 There are no Americans there doing anything. 0.99

01:34:19.000 And to say that is coward. 0.96

01:34:25.000 It's a coward statement.

01:34:29.000 Because people, even when I was in the underground in 1960, where there were CIA people in Cuba, I never met one.

01:34:40.000 And none of my friends met anyone.

01:34:43.000 I am sure they had contacted maybe other organizations, but our own organization never had contact with the CIA.

01:34:51.000 And we didn't even know about the invasion.

01:34:54.000 But listen, if the CIA is actively trying to foment revolution, would that not be America helping Cuba?

01:35:01.000 Of course.

01:35:03.000 I think this whole CIA talk, I mean, you just have to look at the everyday life of a Cuban and what they've been living for the past 62 years where, you know, basically if you don't have family outside of Cuba, you're not going to survive.

01:35:16.000 Like these Cubans that are still on the island are getting a lot of outside help from their family members that have left.

01:35:23.000 They send them money back.

01:35:24.000 That's kind of how they survive through their day to day.

01:35:27.000 And I think a lot of these Cubans that are rising up and protesting, maybe some of the

01:35:31.000 ones that don't have that outside help, but they're just fed up with trying to survive

01:35:36.000 from day to day.

01:35:37.000 And like my father said, you reach a breaking point at a certain point where you're denied

01:35:42.000 your basic human rights every day of your life.

01:35:45.000 You're paid in a currency that isn't valuable to go out and buy things that you need.

01:35:51.000 When you do go out and get the things you need, you have to sit and wait in line all day long.

01:35:55.000 By the time you get there, oh, we don't have any left.

01:35:57.000 You got to go to this other place.

01:35:58.000 You spend your whole life sitting around waiting in line.

01:36:01.000 You have no real... You don't feel like you have a purpose in life.

01:36:06.000 And they're sick of it now.

01:36:07.000 So now they're finally raising their voices against their oppressors, which is bound to happen sooner or later.

01:36:14.000 Alright, we got James Dorpinghaus says, The stream has only just begun but I love it already.

01:36:20.000 God bless this man.

01:36:21.000 We need more good Americans like him to speak out against communism.

01:36:25.000 But, you're Cuban.

01:36:27.000 I am Cuban, but I tell you something.

01:36:30.000 The citizenship is not in the paper.

01:36:34.000 And it's true that I have not become an American citizen to remind me why I'm here.

01:36:40.000 But I am more American and feel more American that many people that really have the certificate were born here, but by their conduct they are traitors to this country.

01:36:55.000 So, you know, I really feel that I am a soldier of this country.

01:36:55.000 Yes.

01:37:00.000 And I am willing, Tim, believe me, I am willing to die for this country.

01:37:05.000 Anytime.

01:37:06.000 Okay?

01:37:07.000 With the same love and passion, even though I don't feel happy with this country sometimes.

01:37:12.000 Oh yeah.

01:37:13.000 But I am here, and I am grateful that I am here and that I was able to raise a beautiful family like my son Ricardo and all my kids.

01:37:21.000 Right on.

01:37:22.000 JR says, as a Cuban-born American citizen, I want to say thank you, Tim, for giving these men a voice.

01:37:28.000 Long live freedom.

01:37:29.000 Yeah, I saw that.

01:37:30.000 And then I just thought of something.

01:37:32.000 I'm like, you know, you're telling me the story about being in the anti-Castro underground in Cuba, being chased by these soldiers, trying to sneak past them.

01:37:42.000 And I'm like, man, this guy is a fighter.

01:37:43.000 And his son is a fighter, quite literally.

01:37:46.000 I mean, you can see that.

01:37:47.000 Apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.

01:37:49.000 Well, Tim, there is something you don't know.

01:37:51.000 My son is very special.

01:37:54.000 In many ways.

01:37:56.000 He's a great son.

01:37:58.000 He's a spectacular father.

01:38:01.000 He's a great brother.

01:38:03.000 He was a little kid.

01:38:06.000 Very special.

01:38:08.000 And all my sons are basically like that.

01:38:14.000 So I am very proud.

01:38:16.000 But there are many things about Ricardo that people don't know and that I actually sometimes I get surprised that he has been watching me.

01:38:30.000 We had in Chicago for 30 years a Cuban picnic.

01:38:38.000 And that Cuban picnic, when organizers began to die and the community became not smaller, but more Americanized, it was difficult to organize a big activity where 4,000 or 5,000 Cubans would show up to have lunch with pork and rice and, you know, our things.

01:39:02.000 So that activity that also served to raise funds for many Cuban organizations that would come together and organize it, disappeared.

01:39:14.000 And about 11 years ago, a young Cuban, half Cuban, a young person, decides to organize using the old name that we had, Festival Cubano, It's an activity but different.

01:39:31.000 Not with the purpose of bringing together Cubans to remind us of our culture and our duties and to make a contribution, but he did it to raise money.

01:39:44.000 He was an entrepreneur involved in other festivals, and he thought, wait a minute, the Cuban music, let's do the Cuban festival.

01:39:57.000 But you could not say there No political talks at a Cuban festival about Cuba that's being oppressed by a dictatorship.

01:40:11.000 The way we realize about this is because I was doing a promotion for Ricardo.

01:40:17.000 And one of the sponsors of Ricardo, a jewelry store, asked me, Jose, could Ricardo come to my table, to my area in the festival, to my tent, and be there signing posters and letting people take pictures?

01:40:36.000 I said, yes.

01:40:37.000 And then they invited us to go.

01:40:40.000 And I said, I want to introduce my son on the stage.

01:40:45.000 So I went to the stage.

01:40:47.000 introduced Ricardo and said Viva Cuba Libre.

01:40:52.000 And behind me, where it was the VIP area, I heard like something strange.

01:40:59.000 So Ricardo spoke and he said Viva Cuba Libre.

01:41:03.000 And the same reaction happened.

01:41:05.000 So in a Cuban festival where you cannot say Viva Cuba Libre, I realized... And that means, for those that don't speak Spanish, Long Live Free Cuba.

01:41:14.000 Okay.

01:41:15.000 I realized we need to picket next year's festival.

01:41:21.000 And I spent about a week in my... He used to live with us in his home, with us, in a... How do you call that, the second floor?

01:41:33.000 It's like an attic, like this up here.

01:41:34.000 You know?

01:41:36.000 Attic room.

01:41:36.000 Yeah.

01:41:37.000 And we had a... una escalera de caracol.

01:41:42.000 Yeah, the spiral walker.

01:41:45.000 So he will pass by my area where I have my desk, where I was working in some flyers, trying to come up with a propaganda thing to distribute there.

01:41:57.000 And he, every night that he sees me working there, he looks at me and then he goes up.

01:42:03.000 Then the Friday that I decide, the Friday that I started that festival, I had about 10,000 flyers that I was going to go and distribute there.

01:42:15.000 By himself.

01:42:16.000 He was going to go by himself.

01:42:17.000 Yeah.

01:42:18.000 Showing a picture of Almuerzo Campestre on a banner that the same name that these people were using in one of the latest Cuban festivals.

01:42:33.000 And I said, This is truly the real Cuban festival.

01:42:38.000 And then we described the purposes of what we were doing at that time and what this festival was.

01:42:46.000 And my intention was, which I did, to distribute there, but I didn't know.

01:42:51.000 On Friday, when I am going to walk out of my house, Ricardo comes down and says, where are you going, Dad?

01:42:58.000 I said, well, Rico, I'm going to distribute the flyer.

01:43:01.000 OK, fine.

01:43:02.000 And then he went with me.

01:43:03.000 And he was my security there.

01:43:07.000 And then, since I am very well known in Chicago, we distribute all these flights, right?

01:43:15.000 But there was an area that I wanted to enter.

01:43:19.000 It was the VIP area, where the VIPs that were behind the stage had their cars.

01:43:25.000 There were about 100 cars there?

01:43:27.000 Yeah, there were a lot.

01:43:28.000 So I approached the security people that were there, and I showed them the flyer, and they said, Festival Cubano, and I said, look, I have been distributing this in the front.

01:43:41.000 I would like to put it in the car.

01:43:42.000 They said, oh, Festival Cubano.

01:43:43.000 So they didn't read it.

01:43:45.000 So we went there, and in all the cars, we put these things.

01:43:49.000 And next, you know, next I know is they were very much upset at the next festival I couldn't pull the same trick.

01:43:56.000 But then, what we did is, instead of keeping, you know, going there to distribute flyers, we organized again.

01:44:06.000 The truly Cuban festival.

01:44:08.000 And we could not do it last year because of COVID.

01:44:12.000 It was suspended.

01:44:13.000 But this year, we probably won't be able to do it because it takes too much time.

01:44:18.000 But anyway.

01:44:19.000 There might be lockdowns coming again as well.

01:44:21.000 I mean, Mitch McConnell just said, you know, get vaccinated or the lockdowns are coming.

01:44:24.000 So we'll see.

01:44:26.000 So Ricardo has played an important role on all my family, my kids, in me being able to feel good in doing things because they support me.

01:44:38.000 They have always done it.

01:44:40.000 Let's read some more.

01:44:40.000 Very nice.

01:44:41.000 We got Trash Panda.

01:44:42.000 He says, I've heard similar horror stories from the Soviet Union.

01:44:45.000 Mr. Lamas, have you considered testifying to Congress or making videos talking about communism?

01:44:51.000 Well, I don't think that I need to go to testify in Congress.

01:44:56.000 I think that Americans should learn more about what already has been testified in Congress.

01:45:05.000 And this brings me to the Cuban program in the zoo in Hanoi.

01:45:14.000 There were 17 prisoners, American prisoners, in this torture center or program, and that program was called the Cuban program.

01:45:28.000 The main torturers there, there were three Cubans. 1.00

01:45:32.000 The prisoners themselves designated one of them with the name of Fidel.

01:45:37.000 Because what's the worst of them?

01:45:39.000 The most savage, okay?

01:45:42.000 And these prisoners were tortured and, you know, how do you say? 0.91

01:45:54.000 They were tortured with physical tortures like pulleys from trucks across their butt and their face.

01:46:05.000 And there were 17 prisoners.

01:46:08.000 These three Cubans of the Cuban program were able to break all those except one. 0.65

01:46:17.000 that was a pilot that was down.

01:46:25.000 This pilot that was down developed some brain trauma and this torturist thought or wanted to believe that he was acting up so he wouldn't be tortured.

01:46:42.000 And then they sat him on a chair and a prisoner saw it from his cell when Fidel, with a big rubber sheet from a truck, smashed this guy on his face.

01:46:56.000 He did not blink.

01:46:58.000 He did not cry.

01:47:00.000 He was in catatonic state.

01:47:05.000 Do Americans need that I go?

01:47:10.000 To testify about anything when there are information like this?

01:47:15.000 That this happened to 17 American soldiers and this country didn't react to that?

01:47:23.000 I can go to Congress, but number one is going to be, of course, there will be a translator there and people won't have to go as crazy as those people listening now trying to understand what I'm saying, because when I get to emotional topics, My Spanish culture and my Spanish language permeates my brain and even mutilates more my command of the English language when I get into emotional topics because

01:47:59.000 It's what happens.

01:48:00.000 When you speak in your language, you really feel what you are saying.

01:48:05.000 And when you say in a foreign language a dirty word, you don't even think it's a dirty word.

01:48:12.000 So when I am talking about this, I know it's hard to understand me.

01:48:16.000 But I have a message for the American people.

01:48:22.000 Try to research the information that was hidden from you.

01:48:27.000 Try to understand that this country is at a crossroads.

01:48:37.000 Principles, ideals, love for the country.

01:48:44.000 Forget about those revolutionary ideas that only destroy what you could've, what you already have.

01:48:52.000 You know, progress is a continuous effort.

01:48:56.000 It's not a, now, to five minutes from now, a huge jump.

01:49:04.000 Okay, all these people want power. 0.50

01:49:06.000 And they are gonna, they are destroying your country.

01:49:10.000 This is the greatest country in the world.

01:49:12.000 Yeah.

01:49:13.000 Yeah, absolutely.

01:49:14.000 All right, Cirilio says, My father had me read Against All Hope by Armando Valladares in middle school.

01:49:21.000 It details his experience in Castro's political prison in Gulags.

01:49:25.000 I'd love to know if this gentleman can confirm the horrors in that book.

01:49:29.000 Of course.

01:49:30.000 And actually, for his information, we brought his wife, Marta Valladares, to Chicago.

01:49:38.000 OK?

01:49:39.000 And we paid tribute to Valladares through his wife.

01:49:44.000 And yes, everything that Armando Valladares wrote, including another book, Desde Misillas de Ruedas, some people say that he pretended to be paralyzed, okay?

01:49:58.000 But he wrote poems, and he wrote that book, and everything that is in the book is true.

01:50:05.000 And the problem is that it's hard to understand And how to write when somebody stands in front of the fighting squad, and night by night you hear them saying, Viva Cuba Libre!

01:50:19.000 Viva Cristo Rey!

01:50:21.000 And you feel the shots of the squad, and then you feel the solitary shots on his head.

01:50:28.000 How can you describe that, night by night, throughout Cuba?

01:50:33.000 So, yes, Armando Valladares is, actually, he became ambassador of Cuba, of the United States, I think.

01:50:44.000 Wow.

01:50:45.000 Yeah.

01:50:46.000 All right, Hayden says, thank you guys for coming on tonight.

01:50:49.000 It's great to hear the real story of Cuba.

01:50:51.000 What can the average American do to help Cuba?

01:50:54.000 Petitioning our government isn't having much effect anymore.

01:50:56.000 What can we do to stop the U.S.

01:50:58.000 from failing that way?

01:50:59.000 I'd love your perspective.

01:51:02.000 I think...

01:51:04.000 You know, getting the Cubans' message out, number one.

01:51:08.000 The regime is constantly cutting off electricity, shutting down the Wi-Fi for the Cubans to kind of get these videos out.

01:51:15.000 So the ones that are circulating, to keep circulating them.

01:51:19.000 You know, me and my father also raise money to try and help out with these groups that are opposing the regime.

01:51:25.000 We've raised money, we've sent to Cuban dissidents. 1.00

01:51:28.000 We've sent it to other groups like the Ladies in White is another famous group in Cuba who non-violently protest for the release of political prisoners and they're daily, you know, every time they go to protest they're beaten, they're physically harassed in the streets.

01:51:47.000 So if they would like to contribute, you know, they can get a hold of me and we can set up something to do that.

01:51:54.000 Although I tried setting up like a GoFundMe page or whatever, but because of the sanctions the U.S.

01:51:58.000 has on Cuba, when I mentioned the word Cuba, they shut down the page.

01:52:01.000 So all the money that I've raised, I've raised by hand through my social media pages.

01:52:06.000 And then through contacts that my father has, we were able to get money into Cuba to Cuban dissidents to help them out.

01:52:14.000 All right.

01:52:15.000 Let's see what we got here.

01:52:17.000 Graboid Biden says, sounds like he is talking about the modern day FBI.

01:52:21.000 Makes me sad to see this country repeating the worst parts of history.

01:52:26.000 All right.

01:52:26.000 Absolutely.

01:52:29.000 Let's see.

01:52:29.000 Where are we at?

01:52:31.000 Kisham says, not surprising that Castro set up or supported purported events as cover to arrest those opposing him.

01:52:38.000 Doesn't sound familiar at all.

01:52:41.000 Well, there you go.

01:52:43.000 Let's see.

01:52:43.000 A lot of people just saying thank you for coming, which is, which is fantastic.

01:52:43.000 All right.

01:52:48.000 No, no.

01:52:49.000 We've pushed him for years and years to at least get his story down.

01:52:51.000 Keep going, sir. Thank you.

01:52:53.000 Yeah.

01:52:54.000 Have you written a book about it or anything?

01:52:56.000 No, no.

01:52:57.000 We've pushed him for years and years to at least get a story down.

01:53:02.000 I've heard it throughout my life in bits and pieces, but I've never been able to chronologically put it together,

01:53:08.000 and I think that's an important part.

01:53:10.000 And I mean, we've tried everything.

01:53:13.000 I've even bought him a tape recorder, the old school tape recorder, because I knew he wouldn't know how to, you know, handle like a digital one with the tapes and all that.

01:53:23.000 But I think, you know, you definitely have to sit down and get your story out on tape and we go from there.

01:53:29.000 Maybe get a ghostwriter.

01:53:29.000 Definitely.

01:53:31.000 Somebody just, you just tell the story to them and they write it down as you talk.

01:53:34.000 That would be one of us, one of his sons, and it would drive us crazy to be there for probably at least 10 years just continuously writing.

01:53:42.000 Do it on video when you do so they can record you telling the story as well as the writing.

01:53:49.000 Harry To says, I love this episode.

01:53:51.000 It's mind-blowing.

01:53:52.000 Thank you.

01:53:53.000 Thank you for the super chat.

01:53:55.000 This is funny.

01:53:56.000 Sermon Fapple says, Goobers in the chat keep saying, LOL, Tim is so quiet today.

01:53:56.000 I saw this one earlier.

01:54:01.000 When if I were in his position, I would have 100% focus on everything this kind gentleman has to say.

01:54:07.000 Some of y'all don't realize he's trying to warn us.

01:54:10.000 This is the point.

01:54:11.000 We have somebody who's experienced the authoritarian communist revolution, and we need to pay attention to those who have experience in this area.

01:54:22.000 I'll tell you, man, There have been conversations for a while now among people I know, like other people who are political activists, other people who are journalists, not necessarily to say that we're at the point where the U.S.

01:54:37.000 has fallen and we have to flee into exile or anything like that, but clearly with the level of political tumult in this country and the divide, the conversations have come up where people say, when is that point when you think the U.S.

01:54:49.000 is too far gone and you need to leave?

01:54:50.000 I mean, just for context, Joe Biden, Said that the Republican voting bills are the greatest threat to this country since the Civil War.

01:55:00.000 As if, you know, we have these, we have the Republicans trying to pass voter reform laws, as well as, and the Democrats trying to pass complete voter overhaul, H.R.

01:55:10.000 1, both of which are viewed by the other side as the apocalypse.

01:55:14.000 And I happen to think H.R.

01:55:15.000 1 is bad.

01:55:16.000 I fall on the side where I think the Republicans are at least doing something, though they're not doing enough.

01:55:21.000 To say, That the Republicans pushing a moderate bill is the greatest threat since the Civil War.

01:55:28.000 I mean, it sounds like we're getting to this very dangerous point with the Capitol Police setting up national offices.

01:55:33.000 We're getting to that dangerous point.

01:55:35.000 And so I guess there's a question of, you know, how do you know when things are too far gone and you just leave?

01:55:39.000 You have to get out.

01:55:40.000 Jose, is there something you think could have been done differently between 1958 and 1961 that would have prevented?

01:55:44.000 Yes.

01:55:44.000 and 1961 that would have prevented?

01:55:44.000 What?

01:55:48.000 Yes.

01:55:48.000 What?

01:55:49.000 Yes.

01:55:49.000 We should have allowed Batista.

01:55:57.000 He was going to have to be out in the other elections.

01:56:00.000 Let's say that Batista would have committed fraud in the elections.

01:56:06.000 But after that, probably another regime will come, another president.

01:56:12.000 And we could have slowly get out of it.

01:56:16.000 When Fidel took the opportunity and precipitated the revolution, he was only looking not for a solution.

01:56:23.000 He was looking for him to be the guy in charge after Batista left.

01:56:29.000 And he needed to create a convulsion to then to control it.

01:56:34.000 I think that we should have peacefully tried to manage the situation because Batista had not destroyed the press.

01:56:47.000 Batista has not destroyed the institutions of Cuba, the political institutions and the civic institutions and all the other institutions of Cuba, good organizations.

01:56:59.000 He has not touched the social standard of Cuba, the economic standard of Cuba.

01:57:04.000 To the contrary, it continues going.

01:57:08.000 And we made the mistake of trying to come up with a drastic change.

01:57:18.000 Whether it's good or bad, sometimes those changes do not work, because they don't have nothing preceding that will allow you to continue in one direction upward.

01:57:29.000 Okay?

01:57:30.000 Those changes are not good.

01:57:31.000 So, if we would have been more patient, if we would have been listening to the revolutionary spirit, you know, that Fidel tried to convey, we could have Not ending this stage and never ending a stage.

01:57:50.000 Never ending change.

01:57:54.000 Well, if you think so, then it's just incumbent upon you to share it.

01:57:58.000 That's what makes things go viral.

01:58:00.000 So it would be fantastic.

01:58:01.000 I mean, I think, you know, you've basically been telling your story and your experiences.

01:58:06.000 And I'm just wrapped up in listening to these stories because they're so important.

01:58:10.000 And I think for everybody who's listening, if you agree and you think people need to hear this, then absolutely, please share this.

01:58:18.000 Julie Simone says, thank you, Senor Lamas, for sharing your story.

01:58:22.000 We should listen to more people who understand what it is not to be free, to truly appreciate why we are so lucky and should keep up the freedom fight.

01:58:32.000 Absolutely.

01:58:34.000 Here's something interesting and totally off-topic.

01:58:37.000 Ponyboy says, if you go full screen mode on TimCast.com, then swipe out, you can listen to the podcast while browsing your phone or while your screen is off.

01:58:48.000 We'll try that later.

01:58:49.000 I guess that's the non-app hack for listening to the podcast, I suppose.

01:58:55.000 All right, let's see.

01:58:57.000 Mr. Glista says, my Cuban refugee grandfather used to tell me these same horror stories.

01:59:02.000 They sounded fictional till 2020.

01:59:03.000 Thanks for sharing your brilliant father, Coach Rick.

01:59:08.000 Is that what people call you?

01:59:08.000 There you go.

01:59:10.000 Well, no, he might be a member of my gym then.

01:59:12.000 Mr. Glista.

01:59:14.000 Okay, yeah, yeah.

01:59:15.000 I think that's Matt.

01:59:15.000 Matt.

01:59:16.000 What's up, Matt?

01:59:17.000 How you doing, man?

01:59:18.000 Right on.

01:59:20.000 All right.

01:59:23.000 Josiah, let's see.

01:59:25.000 Oh, wait, no.

01:59:26.000 Okay, I can't read that one.

01:59:29.000 All right.

01:59:31.000 Michael Volpe says, because of JFK's failure to support the Cuban people in 62, is that the reason most Cubans vote Republican?

01:59:40.000 Do Cubans vote Republican?

01:59:41.000 Yeah, I think for the most part.

01:59:43.000 Is it because Democrats are commies? 0.70

01:59:46.000 I think that's what they see, you know, and that's why they're more Republican.

01:59:52.000 And a lot of these old Cubans are more conservative too. 0.76

01:59:55.000 It kind of freaks me out when you have people who actually fled a communist dictatorship being like, I'm going to avoid those people because they're communists.

02:00:02.000 I'm like, oh, they're telling us something.

02:00:04.000 They see the warning signs already and the rest of America isn't paying attention.

02:00:08.000 Yeah, I really think that's the reason Alejandro Mayorca said that Cubans would not be welcomed into the U.S., Cubans and Haitians, because they tend to vote conservatively.

02:00:16.000 I think it's entirely political.

02:00:18.000 It was amazing.

02:00:19.000 At the southern border, they're bringing kids in, they're shipping them on planes, they're flying around, and then you've got this crisis happening in Cuba, and they're like, let us be clear, if you try and come, we're going to say I'm not saying that he's crazy, but the statement is crazy.

02:00:33.000 Cubans and Haitians. Right, right. You know, he's discriminatory and he's actually

02:00:39.000 crazy. His statement, I'm not saying that he's crazy, but the statement is crazy. 0.99

02:00:45.000 How do you, what do you mean when you say that if you come by sea you are not

02:00:51.000 gonna reach the United States? It is. So Colombia would never reach the hemisphere, right?

02:00:58.000 By sea.

02:00:58.000 Why?

02:00:59.000 What is the problem with Cubans taking to the sea, seeking for freedom?

02:01:04.000 They're anti-communist.

02:01:07.000 They're anti-communist.

02:01:09.000 When you have people coming from, with the border crisis in the U.S., we've had stories of people from Africa flying to Brazil and then traveling up to the southern border of Mexico.

02:01:18.000 These are people who are not fleeing political persecution.

02:01:21.000 Brazil is amazing.

02:01:23.000 If they've made it to Brazil, I love Brazil.

02:01:25.000 I've been to Rio and Sao Paulo and they're both just absolutely amazing.

02:01:28.000 Rio, wow!

02:01:29.000 So people want a vacation there.

02:01:30.000 But to leave these places, come to America, I get it, America's awesome.

02:01:33.000 But then you have actual Cubans who are desperately trying to build rafts to escape political persecution, torture, imprisonment, and they're like, no, no, you get sent away.

02:01:43.000 They don't care about refugees. 0.90

02:01:45.000 Imagine how bad your life has to be to risk your life by boarding just a man-made raft to try and float 90 miles across open ocean.

02:01:52.000 And Cubans have done this with their children. 0.99

02:01:55.000 I don't know if you remember in the 90s, but there was a little boy that washed up on shore, Elian Gonzalez, and his mother did not make the trip.

02:02:03.000 She died on the way.

02:02:06.000 I've said this about the border crisis in the U.S.

02:02:14.000 Every single one of these refugees who are fleeing political persecution should be granted asylum.

02:02:19.000 The issue is that most of them, the overwhelming majority, are not actually doing that.

02:02:22.000 It's like, I think, you know, something like 95 plus percent, they end up finding out it's just people who want to... They're economic migrants.

02:02:28.000 They want a job.

02:02:29.000 They want to come here.

02:02:30.000 The famous interview is where someone said, I miss Buffalo Wild Wings.

02:02:33.000 It's like, I get it, man.

02:02:34.000 I love me some B-dubs. 1.00

02:02:35.000 But when I see people who are like, if I stay in Mexico, the cartels will kill me.

02:02:40.000 And I'm like, we can't condemn these people.

02:02:43.000 And I understand it's not a perfect solution.

02:02:44.000 A lot of people probably are not a fan of, you know, America being this place where we're going to bring everybody in for asylum.

02:02:49.000 But at least in close proximity to the country, I can recognize that.

02:02:52.000 If someone's in, you know, Guatemala or Honduras, well, Mexico is right there.

02:02:56.000 If someone is in Cuba, Florida is right there.

02:02:59.000 So it's very, very different for Cuban refugees trying to escape compared to people in South America trying to come up through all these different countries and ignoring them.

02:03:06.000 But let's do this.

02:03:08.000 I want to go to the members' podcast, so if you haven't already, hit that like button, subscribe to this channel, go to TimCast.com, become a member.

02:03:15.000 As a member, you get an ad-free experience, you are helping support our journalists that we've now hired very many and are hiring very many more, and you'll get access to these members' podcasts.

02:03:24.000 We're going to talk about censorship and get more into the details.

02:03:26.000 And show, you know, what was going on and talk about a little bit what happened earlier with your guys's t-shirt.

02:03:31.000 So again, TimCast.com.

02:03:32.000 You can follow the show at TimCast IRL on Facebook and Instagram.

02:03:36.000 At TimCast underscore IRL on TikTok.

02:03:38.000 You can follow me personally at TimCast.

02:03:40.000 Do you guys have a website or any social media or anything you want to shout out?

02:03:44.000 Yeah, people can follow me on Instagram and Twitter at Ricardo Lamas MMA and that's where I do most of my fundraising work is through those social media platforms.

02:03:53.000 On Facebook you can follow my dad's group, Comité Cívico Cubano de Chicago.

02:04:01.000 So you can find the link to that on my fan page also.

02:04:06.000 Are we leaving this broadcast now?

02:04:09.000 Are we ending the show now?

02:04:11.000 This will be the end of the live version.

02:04:14.000 Can I mention that this coming Saturday we have an activity in support of the Cuban people that is going to be bringing together all Latin American residents of the city.

02:04:33.000 And we would like them to know that we are expecting them to come and support us.

02:04:38.000 the cry for freedom.

02:04:43.000 And we would like them to know that we are expecting them to come and support us.

02:04:50.000 That will be at the Humboldt Park Monument where the eagle is.

02:04:57.000 Logan Square Monument at 11 a.m.

02:05:01.000 this coming Saturday.

02:05:02.000 It's a call of dignity.

02:05:09.000 You know, and I'll mention something, too, just in our demographics.

02:05:11.000 The most populous area, in terms of our viewership, of the people who watch the show, the largest percentage live in Chicago.

02:05:22.000 Great.

02:05:22.000 For whatever reason.

02:05:23.000 I don't know.

02:05:23.000 I'm from Chicago, and I guess we have similar opinions.

02:05:25.000 Chicago people.

02:05:26.000 Ian lived in Chicago.

02:05:27.000 I sure did.

02:05:28.000 Seamus was on the show, is an Illinois boy.

02:05:30.000 Jack Murphy.

02:05:31.000 Maybe it's just we're just Chicago kind of people, but guys, it's been a blast.

02:05:35.000 Thanks for coming.

02:05:35.000 We'll obviously go to the members.

02:05:37.000 And by the way, when I say Latin American, it's because we're trying, that is a community where there were many Hispanic Americans.

02:05:46.000 Now there are other nationalities, including, of course, the Americans.

02:05:52.000 But we need the presence of the Americans, too, there.

02:05:55.000 Yeah.

02:05:56.000 And that's why our call has been done in English and in Spanish.

02:06:00.000 On Saturday, we're all Cuban.

02:06:02.000 Right on.

02:06:02.000 That's the slogan.

02:06:04.000 Hey, you can follow me at Ian Cross.

02:06:06.000 I was just thinking about it.

02:06:07.000 Yes.

02:06:08.000 Well, how do you say, we are all, como se dice, we are all Cuban en espanol?

02:06:12.000 Todos somos cubanos.

02:06:14.000 Todos somos cubanos.

02:06:15.000 Gracias.

02:06:16.000 Gracias.

02:06:19.000 I love you guys both.

02:06:20.000 Thank you guys for coming so much.

02:06:21.000 Thank you very much.

02:06:22.000 I hope that you guys can see now why I love my older people.

02:06:26.000 They have something that younger people do not have and we really need to learn from them. 0.96

02:06:30.000 So I'm so glad that Jose could come and speak to us tonight and share his story.

02:06:33.000 You guys can follow me on Twitter at Sarah Patch Lids as I attempt to gain more followers than Sarah Patch Kids.

02:06:38.000 Right on.

02:06:39.000 And you didn't mention your Twitter.

02:06:41.000 Oh, it doesn't even matter.

02:06:41.000 It's Ian Crossland.

02:06:43.000 All right, everybody, go to TimCast.com for the Members Only podcast.

02:06:46.000 We're going to address some of the censorship issues and talk about what's happened in this country.

02:06:49.000 Thanks for hanging out.

02:06:50.000 We'll see you all there.

Timcast IRL - Tim Pool - July 21, 2021

Timcast IRL - Anti Castro Underground From 60s Cuba Joins To Discuss Communism w-Ricardo Lamas

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