I’m no big fan of Fidel, and his passing won’t upset me that much when he’s gone. After all, he locks people up without benefit of trial, let alone accusations, he intimidates the press, in the past he’s exported young Cuban soldiers to wars that they had no business fighting in, he’s lied to and manipulated his people, often against their best interests and betrayed many of the ideals he once espoused, and as his star wanes he seems bent on installing his brother as the new leader. Ok, Ok… we here in 2006 America don’t have a lot of room to talk about other country’s leadership, but still an end to the Castro stalemate is inevitable and I for one sadly, am not optimistic. A Cuba that could keep the best parts of the revolution, the highest literacy in the western hemisphere, the high number of doctors and professionals and the relative lack of racism amongst other things, while opening up to America would be a triumph. A strong Cuba, a worker’s Cuba that survived and prospered and kept its identity and remembered its past, good and bad would be a beacon in Central America and the Caribbean, a balance and a counterweight against the US and the drug cartels and the big corporations. But it won’t happen. The Cubans that come after Castro will try to carry on, they may dream of a Chinese soft landing with economic growth and the remnants of one party rule, but they don’t have the economic heft to stand alone and it will collapse quickly, and once the money from the US starts to flow into this wonderful and very poor country it will be “welcome to the wild, wild west, 90 miles from Miami”. Drugs, crime, casinos and a poor but highly educated population that will work for cable TV and IPods, what a great new “market” eh? They’ll sell the cool old cars and “renovate “and “gentrify” the old quarters of Havana and the money will pour in and the new masters will do their best to eradicate everything that was good about the revolution. Many Cubans will fight to keep the hard victories they’ve won, they’re smart and they’re proud and they may not succumb immediately, but in the end they’ll be buried under the torrent of “culture” and “free trade” and before long the block leader and the female doctor will be happy enough to have their jobs at McDonald’s and Wal-Mart, and when the shift is over they can always go home and watch “Cuban Idol” on TV. “Revolution or death” my ass! What a shame.

Good lord, as a liberal southerner all I can say to my cranky co-regionalists is y’all get a grip. I think y'all got your overalls on too tight. As the immortal Foghorn Leghorn was want to say "it's a joke son, a joke... don't you see". Now if y'all will excuse me, I have to go out in the yard and tell my child bride Missy Lou to stop flirtin' with that door to door salesman and run down to the Dixie Pig and get me an RC Cola and Moon-pie... and tell Earl to put a couple peanuts in the pop bottle like I likes it.