Medical Volunteers Needed, Hate Crimes, Pussy Riot, Self-publishing, Stay of Deportation, Tax Rates, WikiLeaks, Doctor Shortage, “Vigara”

One photo shows my 4-year-old great-grandson De’Andre taking a break from playing pool. The other is of us clowning around at last February’s IHS medical brigade, a photo just sent to me. If you know of any volunteer doctors, nurses, dentists, or pharmacists possibly willing to join us next Feb., please let me know ASAP.

Was the recent shooting at the conservative Family Research Council in DC as a hate crime, in that the shooter opposed the organization’s stance on gays? Is its position based on political considerations or on religious ones? If the latter, this might be considered to fall into a hate-crime category.

Now the three female Pussy Riot punk rockers have been sentenced to 2 years for criticizing Putin in a one-minute song inside a Moscow cathedral. Time-served (almost 6 months already) would have been more than sufficient for such an infraction, but guess that Putin wanted to send a message. The case has sparked international condemnation, which is not over yet.

An article in the NY Times about self-publishing observes that while an occasional self-published book becomes a best-seller like Fifty Shades of Grey, the majority sell only 100 to 150 copies. At least on that score, I’m ahead of the game, because my book has sold more than 1000 copies, some on-line, some at speaking venues. I’ve given away at least 150 more to family, friends, libraries, and reviewers, so the book is out there in modest quantities. As the article points out, the hardest thing about selling a self-published book is that people don’t know about it. Unfortunately, since the Peace Corps 50th anniversary has passed and since the Peace Corps left Honduras, my on-line sales have plummeted, as I guess that mostly volunteers en route to that country were the ones buying it. Any suggestions from blog readers about how to jazz up sales would be appreciated, as I do partially depend on those sales to finance my annual trip to Honduras and support my projects there. Also, the Salvadoran eatery outside our neighborhood Eastern Market, where I’ve sometimes tried selling my book on weekends, has put up a fenced enclosure around its outside tables, making it awkward for me to set up there any more. And although I enjoy chatting with folks about the Peace Corps when I do set up, it’s hard to be self-promoter for the book either there or anywhere else. I hate to be too pushy. And I hate gimmicks and tricks, like the first person who orders gets a free book or a discount.

As for the quality of self-published books, that’s very uneven—I can testify to that, having reviewed a number of self-published memoirs for Peace Corps Writers. A rare few are gems, but most are just junk and very amateurish. I hate to downgrade them when I post a review (on the Peace Corps Writers’ website), as I can see that an author has often poured out his/her heart and struggled to get words down on paper, but some are just terrible. I still try to find something nice to say while at the same time warning would-be buyers and readers. When a book is self-published, you just don’t know what to expect. That also applies to books from traditional publishers, I might add—some are real doozies, especially diet, dating, and financial advice books and those by someone famous. The latter are just puff pieces and much of their subject matter is trite and, while traditionally published books have fewer typos, all books have some. (I even once found a typo in The New Yorker, the gold standard.) At a public library the other day, I picked up a co-authored sex advice book from a major publisher by Dr. Ruth, whose doctorate is in education, and saw the most inane statements, such as that not spending every minute 24/7 day-after-day with your partner can often enhance desire. (Dr. Ruth was married 3 times, so guess she learned most of what she knew from experience, not from academic study.)

I chose self-publishing myself because it offered me the greatest control in terms of my book’s contents, photos, and design, but the downside certainly is recognition and distribution, especially with so many books coming out every year. If my book got even 1% of the attention and readership that a Dr. Ruth book gets, I’d be thrilled. I think it still has something to offer readers.

Maybe my book has just run its natural life course? Sarah Palin and G W Bush both sold over a million copies of their memoirs when they first came out, but I'll bet none since and, now, if at all, those books are all appearing at yard sales. Meanwhile, Barack Obama's books have staying power, although as friend has observed, once he’s out of office, they won’t be so popular any more.

Most fiction written today falls into a “genre” category: chic lit, mysteries, science fiction, horror, golf, and even sub-niches like African-American romance and detective stories. No more of the great dramas and classics of yesteryear (maybe attention spans are too short for those now). So-called non-fiction titles are mostly “how-to” books, even though the writer may not be an expert at anything. Often these latter books use numerical points, such as “Six Surefire Dating Strategies” or “Ten Steps to a Thinner You.” Never mind whether the author has actually achieved dating or dieting success personally or by helping other people. There are even on-line courses (for a price) that teach you how to write a whole non-fiction book in just days. Most such writing courses or those for marketing your book seem dedicated, as far as I can see, to getting you in the mood, making you feel (over) confident about your own success, expertise, and road-to-riches—never mind the substance of your book—also trying to get you, the would-be author, especially if you are self-published, to shell out money for the course or book that’s being offered. Thus, these advice entrepreneurs are exemplifying the very self-promoting behaviors that they plan to advocate for you and which you then need to implement in turn, like holding your own pre-paid advice webinar where you will also promote your book. It’s like a giant Ponzi scheme, all fluff, no substance, but money changes hands. My book, a simple, honest straightforward memoir, falls outside the usual categories, making it less marketable to a defined sub-group, except maybe to Peace Corps volunteers.

On the first day of the filing for the 2-year stay of deportation for young people, over 1,000 people lined up at one DC-area site. Some young undocumented immigrants have expressed fear that a Romney victory would jeopardize their status, but I can’t imagine Mitt Romney, once in office, undertaking to actually deport them. Even a tea-party Republican like Marc Rubio has suggested accommodating undocumented people brought to this country by their parents as minors. And probably a majority of Americans would not want to witness the spectacle of that group being deported. Romney doesn’t seem like a deliberately cruel guy like some politicians, just kind of an uncomfortable, inept one, who, nonetheless wants desperately to be president, a job he has been running for now for about a decade. He’s been a successful businessman, a governor, in charge of the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, and now he wants to top off his career with the US presidency.

Arizona’s Governor Jan Brewer, on the other hand, is not a nice person. She has announced that she is barring those approved under the new Obama immigration stay from getting state ID’s or driver’s licenses and, I suppose, in-state college tuition as well. She says she doesn’t want these people to be a drag on taxpayers, but if she would just give them half a chance, they would become taxpayers instead. I’d expected other Republican governors to follow her example and now the governor of Nebraska has. It’s worrisome that so many governors are defying the federal government or dragging their feet and failing to cooperate on various measures, first heath care, now this. They seem to want to go back to the old days when southern governors resisted desegregation or even to the time before we were a country, before there was a “United” States. Sheriff Arpaio is in the same mold of nasty, mean people apparently elected by the same, who must be a majority in their jurisdictions or they wouldn’t be in office. Not only is their attitude destructive for getting things done, but may also be a tipping factor in motivating some mass shootings, giving legitimacy to angry and hateful emotions. I hope they provoke a backlash for going too far. What if Brewer, Apaio, or some of their supporters suddenly discovered that they had been brought to the US as undocumented children themselves? Would they, in Romney’s words, cheerfully “self-deport”?

Before leaving the topic of nasty, mean politicians, I would also include Dick Cheney in that category. Past the age of heart transplant eligibility, he still got a scarce donor heart, I suppose because no one in the medical establishment dared oppose his request. Hope his new heart might have given him more empathy for others, though he’s been pretty quiet lately, though not displaying any big change of heart. Unfortunately, the addition of Paul Ryan to the Republican presidential ticket, while it has jazzed things up, has also further polarized the electorate and that is not good. Can we expect four more years of partisan gridlock whoever wins the presidency?

Mitt Romney has come out with a statement that he’s always paid about 13% in income taxes. Heck, many of us have paid a far higher percentage than that on a much tinier income, especially if you count social security contributions. I don’t find that percentage particularly reassuring or any evidence that he’s in touch with the common man.

As for Julian Assange, obviously, the man will do anything to avoid a trial and jail. He’s been complaining about being couped up in the Ecuadoran embassy, but that’s nothing compared to what he might face elsewhere. There he is still a celebrity, can have visitors, can use the phone and internet, and gets three meals a day and a place to sleep. Emerging on the embassy balcony recently, he was shorn of his trademark locks, perhaps trying to appear more clean cut and serious.

I received this message on Facebook: “Julian Assange must be set free as he has not committed any crimes - his only crime is to expose the United States and NATO of crimes against humanity and War Crimes committed by the Western Powers!”

Some of the information I have seen revealed by WikiLeaks has been interesting and informative, some damaging, and some actually helpful to US interests. It’s been a treasure trove of historically valuable material over the time-span represented, showing American and other diplomats around the world sometimes coming off better than might have been expected, appearing more nuanced and capable than their public personas would indicate. However, possible secret wrong-doing or wrong-headed actions by the US and other governments has also been revealed. Filmmakers Oliver Stone and Michael Moore, much of whose work I admire (though they give too much credit to conspiracy theories, in my view), have written an editorial in the NY Times hailing Assange as an honest journalist and free-press advocate.

However, I am not one of those believing that this whole WikiLeaks endeavor is something heroic and that all of diplomacy’s dirty laundry needs to be aired publicly, especially if the original communications were expected to be kept confidential. Some matters are best worked out in private, even among nations. I have no particular comment on the sex charges facing Assange in Sweden, except that one of his accusers has visited Cuba and is reported to be a friend of the Ladies in White. It’s ironic that the Ecuadorian government is offering him asylum in the name of freedom of the press when it routinely jails its own journalists for articles the president doesn’t like. Some Ecuadorian journalists have asked for US asylum even as Assange seeks refuge in Ecuador. The police surrounding the Ecuadorian embassy should carefully examine every box and laundry bag that leaves the premises, as Assange may well be squeezed inside on his way to the airport. Once he arrives in Ecuador, if ever, he will be free to visit Venezuela, Iran, Nicaragua, and even Cuba to bring them his message of press freedom.

Princeton economist Uwe Reinhardt in a NY Times op-ed (Aug. 17, 2012) has reacted to criticism of health care reform based on its supposed aggravation of the physician shortage, especially in primary care, because more patients will be seeking care. Some physicians groups have darkly hinted that doctors might just drop out if reimbursement is insufficient. As Reinhardt points out, they are not going to any earn more money by dropping out because no other profession will give them the top income, in the upper 5% of America’s income distribution, that medicine does.

I usually scroll through my spam folder before emptying its contents, as occasionally something important gets sent there. I would advise spammers to learn to spell! It’s not “lotterie win,” “lonly wife,” “xxxx freind,” or “penis enlargment,” nor is it Vigara or Canadiana Pharmacy, which popps up (whoops! you know what I mean) over and over again. These spammers seem to mostly have sex on their minds, or sex and money. And there are all those notices, in my case purportedly from Yahoo, direly warning of an immediate shutdown if certain information is not provided. I’d be really shocked if one turned out to be real and my account actually was shut down! Or if I won that thousand bucks with my name on it!

Honduran Journalist Seeks Protection, Presbyterian College, More Mass Killings, Olympics, Record Heat, Paul Ryan, Nuns, Reading Matter

According to our local Spanish language press, 120,000 Hondurans live in the greater DC area. Consulates are no longer allowed to receive cash payments for transactions, only money orders or credit or debit cards. Cash is an invitation to pocket the money, so that’s a good step.


Meanwhile, local undocumented Honduran and other young people are lining up to apply for the 2-year deportation stay offered by the Obama administration, an action that may identify them for deportation if Romney wins the presidency.

The wife of deposed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya. Xiomara Castro, is running in this November’s primaries for next year’s elections as a presidential candidate of the Libre Party founded by her husband.

Corruption is nothing extraordinary anywhere in the world, including in the US, but in Honduras, uncovering corruption is dangerous and sometimes fatal for the whistleblower as per the item below.

Honduran journalist fears for safety after uncovering financial corruption

(C-Libre/IFEX) - 2 August 2012, Tegucigalpa, Honduras - "Of course I fear for my life, but I know I am doing what is right," said Ariel D'Vicente, a journalist who uncovered that a million lempiras (approx. US$53,000) seized from the wife of the former finance minister, Héctor Guillen, had come out of a sum of 3.2 million lempiras (approx. US$170,000) in royalty payments collected from shrimp companies in southern Honduras and paid out to an official high up within the Lobo Sosa government.

D'Vicente told the national press that he is aware of the seriousness of his accusations, but added "it is my role as a journalist to report on corruption and as a citizen I have to speak out against financial scandals that impact my country's health and education."

Police commissioner Juan Carlos Bonilla, and the National Commissioner for Human Rights in Honduras (CONADEH), Ramón Custodio, decided to provide the journalist with the necessary support to protect his safety.

Both officials were in agreement that because of these allegations, D'Vicente's life is in danger and that the federal authorities must investigate the matter and protect the journalist. The first step, according to the commissioners, is to provide security measures for D'Vicente and his family.

The Public Prosecutor's Office announced that the journalist will be the main witness in the inquiries into the financial matter, so that at this time D'Vicente is prohibited from commenting on the investigation.

On 31 July 2012, during a routine operation at a post in El Durazno, police seized 1,125,000 lempiras (approx. US$60,000) from the wife of the then minister of finance. The woman, her son, and their driver were freed by the district attorney's organized crime office, but the money was seized by the district attorney pending investigations.

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On a recent Megabus trip in Virginia (just before the recent fatal Megabus accident in the Midwest), I met a pair of young men who had just graduated in religious studies from a Nashville Presbyterian college with only 1000 students in all. Interesting to talk with young people living apparently outside mainstream youth culture, guys who don’t drink alcohol, pray daily, and believe in abstinence until marriage. They also were not sure what to do now with their newly minted BA degrees. Become missionaries? Go on to study to become church pastors? Their degrees are somewhat limiting career-wise and opportunities for gainful employment within the Presbyterian church would also be limited, although 1000 students are not a great number to be absorbed. I don’t know how many Presbyterian colleges there are overall. My father, of Scottish heritage, was raised Presbyterian, but in his day, all mainstream churches, at least in the US, had more adherents and stricter expectations, an era Tea Party folks would like to return to.

Another mass shooting, this time in Wisconsin, with a gun reportedly purchased legally. Then three killed in Texas, including the shooter. Only three, does that qualify as a mass killing? We’re almost getting desensitized, as if living a in a war zone. With so many firearms already in circulation, how do we as a nation start to tackle this problem? Are we all just sitting ducks if we go out in public? There will always be people, mostly men, with grievances and anger, who will want to hurt and kill others, and certainly copy-cat behavior is involved, as well as a desire for fame and notoriety, however fleeting. Arms intended for personal defense seem to have little impact defensively—certainly they have not had a role preventing these atrocities. Mental health professionals and criminal behavior experts say it’s hard to predict who will actually carry out a violent offense. Some guys who do so have no prior record of behavior problems and the potential pool of those with anger and other issues is enormous. Other countries seem to reduce the murder rate by reducing the number of firearms in circulation. If we don’t want to do that, then what?

Obama, true to form with the last few killings, offers prayers and lamentations but doesn’t breathe any hint of gun control. Romney has pronounced them individual acts and said that gun laws are not germane. The NRA has been keeping completely silent, although attributing a gun-control agenda to Obama should he be reelected. I certainly hope so. The other factor in the Wisconsin case is misplaced anti-Muslim prejudice because of male Sikhs’ turbans and beards, a poisonous discriminatory atmosphere fomented by Tea Party and other far-right folks. Political and media leaders who feed into such hatred and try to give it legitimacy, including those stigmatizing Obama as a Muslim and born in Kenya, bear responsibility as well.

One of this blog’s readers points out that Obama showed that he knows very little about firearms when he referred to AK47s as more appropriate as battlefield weapons: “Obama would do better to keep quiet on matters he knows little about. The U.S. armed forces don't use AKs, neither the original Russian design nor Chinese knockoffs.”

Again, in the DC area, a toddler has shot himself, this time a 3-year-old who shot himself in the chest, but didn’t die, so may yet survive. Such accidents seem to happen every week, first the boy killing his father, then one killing himself, now this one seriously injuring himself. If adults want to indulge their right to bear arms, they should also have an obligation to keep them safe from use by children or even by adults who might do harm.

The Olympics have gone well, providing a good-news distraction from the usual bad news. Kudos to the UK for pulling them off successfully. I don’t have TV, so only watched at other people’s homes. My new next-door is a sports reporter for the NY Times and went to London with her infant daughter in tow to report on the games. The US won on the medals count. Now, it’s on to the Paralympics!

With record heat this summer, the corn and soy bean harvest has been decimated and wild fires have been taking their toll. We can continue to deny climate change and do nothing about it and just continue to see these effects. Climate specialists predict this will be the hottest year on record ever and July has already been the hottest month.

Romney has energized his conservative base as well as Democratic opposition with his veep pick of Paul Ryan. Ryan has some vote-getting power. The question is whether he will appeal to moderate and swing voters. He has a little more personality and conviction than Romney and is a better speaker, but his message won’t have universal appeal. We might all agree with him that health care costs need to be curbed. Either they will be controlled, as Obama has attempted to do, through better organization, economies of scale, and supporting only outcome-based interventions, or they will be controlled, as Ryan has proposed, by putting the burden on individual consumers to shop around, try to figure out what services they need while being wooed by health care advertisers, and do without when they cannot afford care. Continued growth of this sector cannot be sustained.

Meanwhile, a large portion of American Catholic nuns are seeking “dialogue” with the Vatican, whereas Pope Benedict seems just interested imposing obedience. Ryan, a Catholic, has declined to speak with the nuns. It’s a contest of wills between the nuns and the Vatican. The nuns want to work things out, stay in the church, continue their work in schools, hospitals, and social service agencies with children, the poor, the elderly, and people with disabilities. It would be a huge blow to the American church and to those constituencies and missions if a rupture should occur. Yet nuns are tired of being “put in their place” by an all-male hierarchy. They may be able to observe the vows of poverty and chastity, but obedience is proving a sticking point. The pedophile scandal and cover-up was already a huge blow to the Catholic church, which now faces this additional challenge from the nuns, something in the age of the internet and instant news that may well spread to other countries. I’m Catholic, but, as you might imagine, I side with the nuns. I haven’t abandoned the church because I think the church needs people like me. We are the church—it’s not just the hierarchy. The pope and the Catholic hierarchy, both in Rome and in the US, are short-sighted, in my opinion. Here is a church with more than one billion members in every continent and still growing, with so many dedicated lay and religious members, and yet its leaders are willing to sacrifice much of that to make a point about who’s in charge? I believe Benedict has even said something like: So what if the church shrinks in Europe, as long as it is a more faithful (obedient?) body?

I usually don’t mention the books I’m reading on this blog, but this time is an exception. I read (and write) mostly non-fiction (sometimes reading fiction in Spanish) and just borrowed a trio of books from the public library, all of them provocative. All follow a narrative of economic or power interests controlling or overwhelming ordinary people to their detriment. I would like to think that the authors exaggerate to make their point, but they end up being pretty convincing using nuances, data, and examples. From my brief description, you can decide whether you want to read them.

One is Pornified by Pamela Paul, making the case that access to porn has exploded with the internet—no longer just a matter of a Playboy magazine hidden under the mattress or a seedy “adult” movie theater. Every type of porn is available 24/7 with the click of a mouse: violence, bondage, sadism, group sex, gay, straight, involving children or animals—take your pick. Most consumers are men and many, says the author, become addicted, undermining their relationships with flesh-and-blood women. Not only does internet porn occupy these guys’ time, taking away from work, recreation, and everyday activities, but it projects an image of women being not only busty and beautiful but instantly willing to engage in sexual activities of any type. It takes away from time that might be spent with a real partner and makes actual sex seem tame. It also exploits those appearing in the segments, paying them little and exposing them to desensitizing sex and STDs. However, porn producers know they have a cash cow, which they protect under the rubrics of free speech, personal liberty, and privacy.

Another is a very thoughtful book, a personal and church history, Practicing Catholic by James Carroll, a former Paulist priest inspired by the short tenure of Pope John XXIII (like many of us). He was a fan of the Kennedy brothers and became acquainted with a number of well-known Catholic writers. Like many if not most Catholics, he makes his own judgments on issues of faith and practice, observing that the hierarchy, which warns the laity against being “cafeteria Catholics” practices a cafeteria system itself, such as by protecting pedophile priests rather than molested children, emphasizing the unborn over those facing the death penalty, and opposing contraception but not war.

The third book is Wendell Potter’s Deadly Spin, by a health industry insider who quit a job in “the high six figures” to blow the whistle on the industry’s tactics to scuttle Obama’s health care reform effort while pretending to cooperate. The pretense at cooperation was undertaken because it was felt the “Harry & Louise” tactics used to kill the Clinton health reform effort would not work this time. An early tactic was to systematically undermine Michael Moore’s film “Sicko” and undermine Moore himself, portraying him as someone out to destroy the free-market health care system and the American way of life. That onslaught succeeded to a large extent. I saw the film, which, yes, was slanted and the depiction of Cuba’s health care system was pure Potemkin, but much of it was valid. Mostly, the industry pours money into Republican campaigns and gives talking points to candidates regarding the threat of “big government,” “government bureaucrats,” “a government takeover,” “Europeans-style socialism,” and increased taxes, never mind that the “free market” keeps relentlessly driving up health care costs. Eventually these PR efforts will eventually means that industry folks will end cutting off their nose to spite their face because too many people will end up sick and dying because of lack of care, or go broke, reducing the pool of people left able to pay the high premiums demanded. (That last sentence is me, not the author.) Because of industry efforts, says Potter, the single-payer system favored by most Americans was never enacted and Obama had to compromise on too many issues to gain industry cooperation, giving us a health care reform system that ends up a hodgepodge trying to satisfy all stakeholders and ending up satisfying few, especially among consumers. By successfully creating the “Obamacare” boogeyman, the private health care industry continues to undermine many of the actual benefits of the reform act, for example, by encouraging governors to go against their own constituents by threatening not to expand Medicaid. What can the increasingly impoverished majority do against the industry’s investment in anti-health-care reform advertizing and campaign contributions? We must not listen to these attempts at persuasion and use our vote to go against these moneyed interests. And maybe the conscience of some industry reps will pinch and, like Potter, they will give up their salaries and perks and attempt to alert the public, as he is doing through his book and in congressional testimony.

It took decades for the tobacco industry to finally be controlled. And many people still smoke, including two of my kids. Eventually a tipping point will come for health care, as costs cannot keep rising forever. Real and effective health care reform, Potter suggests, will only happen when voters are able to see through and resist corporate PR. So far politicians and voters have succumbed to the influence of moneyed interests. Other massive PR campaigns successful so far, Potter points out, are the coal industry, big oil, and soda manufacturers. (To his examples, we might add the porn industry, as in Pamela Paul’s book.)

There are many outfits out there promising, for a price, to make a book a bestseller through gimmicks and trickery, the same sort of PR tactics used in politics —or so it seems to me. I do want folks to read my book to get something out of it, but not to buy it out of hype. Maybe that’s naïve and certainly hasn’t propelled my book into best-seller-dom.

Honduran from La Esperanza, Meeting with Freed Dissident, Cuban Dissident Leader Dies, AIDS Quilt, Right to Bear Arms, GAO Grads

In photos in recent postings, you have seen me wearing a red shirt and red shorts. Some 5,000 miles away in Honolulu, my daughter Stephanie sports a similar outfit on weekends, as per the photo of her here holding her pet chameleon.


The other photo is of two former Cuban political prisoners conversing at a meeting in Washington, DC. On the left is Dr. Darsi Ferrer, a recent arrival, described below. The other is Basilio Guzman, one of 26 long-term prisoners freed in 1984 with Jesse Jackson, whose names were given to Jackson by our local Amnesty International group. Guzman, who still lives and works as a carpenter in the DC area, spent 22 years in prison, two longer than his actual 20-year sentence.

At a recent interpretation assignment, this one a license suspension appeal hearing at the Maryland Motor Vehicle Department (not my favorite gig), the client was from La Esperanza, Honduras! I found that out later as we were waiting at the bus stop together after his license was suspended and he was not allowed to drive. Yes, it’s a very small world. By the way, judges in traffic court hearings—or any court appearances—always refer to me as “Madam Interpreter,” a rather formal title. I wonder how male interpreters are addressed?

At a supposed maximum security prison north of Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, a prisoner with a gun in his possession shot and wounded three other inmates. Two prison officials were suspended from their jobs as a result. At least there were some consequences for those responsible for letting weapons into a so-called high security prison, though probably not of long duration.

In early August, I had the privilege of meeting Darsi Ferrer during a Washington visit. He is an Afro-Cuban physician, a dissident and former prisoner mentioned in Amnesty International’s annual report, arrested for possession of two bags of illegal cement. He and his family had arrived one month earlier as political refugees from Cuba and had been sent by the U.S. government to live in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Dr. Ferrer said he had not wanted to leave Cuba, but his wife has a serious health condition not treatable there. He reported that the Cuban health system is on the verge of collapse, with a hidden dengue epidemic in the east and the cholera outbreak still not under control. He saw the regime as having increasing difficulty coping, especially with controlling communications via cell phones and the internet, severe restrictions notwithstanding. He predicted that the death of Venezuela’s President Chavez would deal a near mortal blow to the regime, which he characterized as holding on by its fingernails.

Another Castro regime critic, whom I met years ago on my Cuba journeys in the early 1990s, was engineer and Christian stalwart Oswaldo Payá, leader of one of Cuba’s largest dissident movements, although before his movement got underway. He was a little past 40 at the time, a very sincere, devout Catholic, trying to figure out how to organize under the strictures imposed by the government. In 1998, after spending three years in detention, he founded the Varela Project, named for 19th-century patriot Father Félix Varela. The project sought reconciliation among all Cubans and presented 25,000 signatures to the National Assembly, requesting a referendum on freedom of association, liberty of expression, press freedom, free elections, the right to operate private businesses, and amnesty for political prisoners. Predictably, the assembly made no response. Payá reportedly said, "I have been told that I am going to be killed before the regime is over but I am not going to run away." He opposed the U.S. embargo and refused aid from American sources. In 2002, he was awarded the Sakharov human rights prize. Subsequently, his namesake son was refused permission to leave the country. He was once an ally of Cuba’s Cardinal Ortega, but more recently disagreed with what he saw as the church’s coziness with the regime.

On July 22, 2012, Payá’s prediction of the manner of his own death may have indeed come true when he and a supporter were killed in a vehicular accident in eastern Cuba. His daughter, Rosa María Payá, announced that they had been run off the road by a truck that had aggressively pursued them. She said there had been witnesses and that his death was not an accident, also that he had called for just beforehand, saying another vehicle was pursuing them.

Indeed, Payá had a forewarning three weeks before that the regime might be after him when his car was overturned in Havana, leaving him unhurt. He said at the time that he couldn’t prove that it wasn’t an accident. The car had been rented for him by a Swedish Christian Democratic youth organization (“Oswaldo Paya, Cuba Dissident, Mourned,” AP, July 23, 2012). His followers directly blamed General Raúl Castro and his military junta for the deaths on the organization’s website. Witnesses pointed to the poor condition of the highway and that the two survivors, both foreigners, were the only ones wearing seatbelts.

The driver, Spaniard Angel Carromero, was arrested by Cuban authorities for vehicular homicide, which could carry a sentence up to 10 years. The other foreigner, a Swede, said he was asleep at the time of the crash and was allowed to return home. Dissidents have pointed out that the driver dares not blame another vehicle while he is Cuban custody. "Whatever they say while in the hands of police or the government of Cuba is necessarily skewed, contaminated, due to the lack of guarantees," Human Rights Commissioner Elizardo Sánchez said. "The Swede can't speak freely because his friend is still prisoner in Cuba."

The official newspaper, Granma, accused the foreign visitors of “counterrevolutionary” activities aimed at “destabilizing the country, creating conditions to repeat what happened in Libya and Syria.” (“Angel Francisco Carromero Charged In Cuba Dissident Oswaldo Paya’s Death,” Peter Orsi, AP, July 31, 2012)

At Payá’s burial service, held on July 24, several dozen mourners were reported beaten and arrested by security forces, 200 of whom surrounded the church. Those arrested were released within two days. “The authorities don’t want the public to know how many people were there and that we’re not afraid of them,” said human rights activist Guillermo Fariñas, one of those arrested.

“Tuesday’s events follow the pattern of short-term detentions and imprisonments we’ve seen
the Cuban authorities carry out time and again as a form of intimidation against dissidents and
human rights activists,” said Gerardo Ducos, Amnesty International’s Cuba researcher.
“Indeed, it was the very kind of repression which Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas dedicated his life to
combating before his tragic death last weekend.”

Two days later, on the occasion of the annual July 26 holiday, President Raúl Castro warned, "Some small factions are doing nothing less than trying to lay the groundwork and hoping that one day what happened in Libya will happen here, what they're trying to make happen in Syria."

Meanwhile, during the month of July, sections of the AIDS quilt were displayed all over Washington, DC, including in the north hall of Eastern Market in our neighborhood, where I met one of the women in charge of the exhibition. I told her about Alex, my Cuban foster son who had died of AIDS and she told me how I could have a panel in his memory added to the quilt. The quilt’s showing coincided with the International AIDS Conference being held in Washington.

As a country and as concerned citizens, we have to ask ourselves whether massacres like Columbine, Virginia Tech, Arizona, and now Littleton, are the price we have to pay for “the right to bear arms”? Does this right extend to any and all citizens, to those who, like the Littleton shooter, amass an arsenal that includes tear gas, explosives, an assault rifle, and multiple rounds of ammunition? If the right to bear arms refers to self-defense, certainly all that is much more than is necessary for personal self-defense. Since my last posting, a local 4-year-old has killed himself with a handgun. Last week, a 3-year-old killed his father. I suppose these children see guns appearing on TV and decide to pull the trigger when they find one. I wonder if there are estimates of the number of murders, accidental deaths, and suicides from handguns versus how many crimes are actually prevented by using handguns? Owners obviously don’t secure them and keep them away from kids, as my own younger son’s experience of being shot in the foot (thank goodness only that!) showed. So what about the right of citizens to life? Their right not to be shot and perhaps killed accidentally or on purpose by someone who is armed? The constitution refers to the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which are hard to achieve if someone aims a loaded gun at you.

The presidential candidates finally came out with pronouncements on the Littleton shooting. Romney apparently said that gun control would not solve all our problems, a rather bland, non-controversial statement. Obama, speaking to a friendly audience at the Urban League, called for better screening of gun buyers and mentioned that an AK-47 is a battlefield weapon, not needed for self-defense, but made no specific legislative recommendations.

Meanwhile, Romney, supposedly on an international goodwill tour designed to bolster his foreign affairs credentials, has made some blundering remarks offensive to the British, causing at least one commentator to label him “tone-deaf.” “Tin-ear” is another description that comes to mind. That seems to characterize much of what Romney says, especially his extemporaneous remarks. He should stick strictly to the scripts his advisers have prepared for him and bite his tongue if anything else comes to mind.

My visitors attending the GAO course for auditors held their graduation ceremony on July 26, where I was in the audience. There were 21 fellows in all from almost as many countries. The keynote speaker, chosen from among their ranks, was a woman from Zimbabwe, who has asked me to accommodate her, but my space was already full. Despite its somewhat corrupt and repressive government, Zimbabwe usually sends a fellow to the annual GAO course, indicating an attempt to clean things up, at least on the government auditor level. One of the countries represented was China, and I also had a GAO fellow from China staying with me a few years ago. China, despite its communist and authoritarian government, still sends students to the GAO course and also accepts Peace Corps volunteers.

More on Honduras, Ghana PC Volunteers Accused of Killing Robber, Origin of Peace Corps Name, Cuba’s Private Enterprises, Ladies in White Jailed in Cuba, Cuban Hip-Hop Prisoners, Latin America Divide, Stallone’s Son’s Death, Sheriff in the Docket, Toe-Nail Trimming & Other Medical Services, Still Another Mass Shooting

  


This time, a photo with older daughter Melanie, who was left out last time. She came again this weekend, but without the kids. Today is cool and rainy, not even 70 F, a great relief from recent 100-degree days!


A report from Tegucigalpa, extrapolated in the local Spanish-language press, is much more cavalier than most American and human rights sources about the killing of four suspected narco-traffickers in eastern Honduras, two apparently by US DEA agents. The headline is: “Guerra Contra Narcos” [War Against Narcos]. Perhaps because in Honduras, murder is so common, people are no longer shocked or overly preoccupied. It’s just become a fact of life—or death. Human life becomes cheap. And “narcos” are considered bad guys anyway, not deserving of protection. When the Honduran prison burned down last Feb., killing more than 300 people, relatives of those killed were naturally aggrieved, but many Hondurans I talked with simply said “Good riddance.”

This comment on his birth country came to me from a transplanted Honduran: I commend you and appreciate the work that you have been doing to help the people in Honduras. Too bad that such a beautiful country is controlled by gangs and corrupt politicians who cater to the drug cartels instead of focusing in building up the morale of the country, education, and health care. I’ve been living in the USA since 1980 and have no desired to go back to live in Honduras because of the unsafe atmosphere that prevails through most of the regions in the country. A lot of businesses have to pay for "protection" or what it's know as" impuesto de guerra " or war tax, imposed by thugs who will harm the small business owners if they don't pay what they ask for.

A long article in The Guardian about the historic roots of Honduran violence and the US role is at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/15/honduras-human-rights-war-drugs

Honduras holds primary elections for party candidates one year before general elections. For primary elections coming up on November 18, four parties’ candidates will be vying for their party’s nomination, two leftist parties and two rightish parties. As per the flap that led to the ouster of Mel Zelaya, the current president Porfirio Lobo cannot run again, at least he is not permitted two consecutive terms. I understand that Zelaya’s wife is one of the primary candidates. Final elections will be held in November 2013, leaving the primary victors a whole year for campaigning.

From the Peace Corps Writers’ blog, July 16th 2012: The police in Ghana have arrested two Peace Corps Volunteers in Ghana in connection with the killing of a local man who tried to rob them, police said on Monday. A police officer in the northern town of Wa said the incident happened at the weekend when they were attacked by two robbers. One Peace Corps volunteer fought back with a knife, fatally wounding one of the assailants, said the officer, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to speak to media.


The U.S. embassy in the capital Accra confirmed that police were investigating an incident involving Peace Corps volunteers.“They were involved in a safety and security situation in the early hours of Saturday and the police are investigating,” embassy spokeswoman Sara Stryker said.

More on July 18, Ghana’s attorney general is examining whether to open a formal investigation after a PCV stabbed a robber who subsequently died. PCV Andrew Kistler used a knife in self-defense and stabbed the attacker in the chest late Friday in the northern town of Wa, regional police commander Kofi Adei-Akyeampong said.


During the attack, Kistler, who was accompanied by a second PCV, Rachel Ricciardi, was injured with a machete. The police found him with a bandaged hand and a bloody shirt at his house early Saturday. “One of the assailants tried to slash him with a machete,” said deputy regional commander Osei Ampofo-Duku.

One of the two attackers, identified by police as Eliasu Najat, 22, was found dead Saturday morning.

The case has been sent to the attorney general, who will decide whether it warrants prosecution. “It is possible they committed a crime … but everyone knows they were trying to defend themselves and this was the outcome of their self-defense. There is no cause for alarm,” Adei-Akyeampong told The Associated Press.


The Peace Corps said Monday that the two Volunteers involved reported the incident, but Ampofo-Duku said Tuesday “the police got to them first.” They said that officers traced drops of blood from the crime scene to a nearby house where they encountered Kistler.


The embassy spokeswoman Sara Stryker on Tuesday reiterated that “when the crime occurred, they reported the incident to the local authorities.” Stryker added that the embassy was “closely monitoring” the investigation and offering consular services to the Americans, who are still in Ghana but no longer at their posts. She insisted that it’s not the Volunteers but the crime that’s being investigated. “They were the crime victims,” she said.

How Peace Corps got its name: John Peter Grothe died on Saturday, June 16th in Los Altos, California from brain injury caused by a fall. He was 81. John was an early and important person in the Peace Corps world, most proud of a memo he wrote back in early 1960s that gave the Peace Corps its name.

For a close-up look at Cuba’s private enterprise push, officially referred to as “employment outside the state sector,” see “Cuba Hits Wall in 2-Year Push to Expand the Private Sector,” NY Times, July 16, 20012

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As my blog readers know, one of the hats I wear is as volunteer Caribbean coordinator for Amnesty International USA. In that capacity, I would ask interested parties to write letters about the following case:

July 18, 2012, Amnesty International issues today the Urgent Action AMR 25.018.2012 on behalf of Niurka Luque Álvarez, Sonia Garro Alfonso and Ramón Alejandro Muñoz González who have been detained without charges since last March. Amnesty International believes their arrest and detention may be linked to their activism and peaceful exercise of their rights to freedom of expression. Niurka Luque Álvarez and Sonia Garro Alfonso are both members of the Damas de Blanco (Ladies in White). Please take action on their behalf.


http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR25/018/2012/en


I am delighted to be in contact with a group in Chile making a film about the 1988 “No” vote there, the plebiscite that Pinochet lost and where I was an election observer. The group wants to include current human rights concerns in Latin America, a case in Colombia and one in Cuba. We at Amnesty offered them some options and they chose the Lima Cruz brothers, which cannot hurt and only help the brothers’ cause, especially when coming not from the “empire,” but from another Latin American country. The brothers, Antonio and Marcos Lima Cruz, were arrested in December 2010 during a Christmas party at their home where they played controversial hip-hop music critical of the government and danced in the street carrying the Cuban flag. Antonio and Marcos were sentenced to two and three years respectively for “insulting symbols of the homeland” and “public disorder.”

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Dr. Carlos Sabino, a professor of sociology formerly at the Central University of Venezuela, now a visiting professor in Guatemala, has divided Latin America into two camps, the first is the Pacific Alliance: Chile, Colombia, Peru, and Mexico, along with those somewhat more loosely aligned with it: Brazil, Costa Rica, Panama, and Uruguay, as well as the smaller Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. On the other side is the Chavez-led and oil-supported “Bolivarian Alliance” consisting of Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, and Nicaragua. He says countries in the latter group, at best, have seen only 1% economic growth and, compared to the more mainstream market economies, are plagued by inflation, price controls, and social unrest and so do not offer a viable or particularly attractive alternative to the first block.

When I read about the sudden death of actor Sylvester Stallone’s son, my heart went out to him. Other famous people have lost their kids as well. When it happens, everything that they’ve achieved in life will shrink in importance, becoming like ashes in their mouth. I know; I’ve been there.

Now that Arizona’s notorious racist Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is under investigation, his office is fighting back, alleging once again that President Obama’s birth certificate is a forgery. No one raised a question about McCain’s birth certificate or birthplace, despite his Panama birth. What about Romney’s birth certificate? Maybe it’s a forgery? Really, this is getting tiresome. Already, this is Obama’s 4th year as president—it’s a fait accompli. Can’t they find something more substantive to discuss? Use a little more imagination, Obama opponents, instead of just trotting out all the same old tired stuff!

One of my readers commented on my previous observation that all kinds are services have been included under medical care, including toenail trimming. She pointed out that some arthritic and overweight elderly folks cannot trim their own toenails. Of course, there probably have been billions of older and infirm people over the course of history and around the world with that same problem, including in eras when toenail clippers had not yet been invented and when publicly funded health-care services did not exist. What did they do? Some probably suffered in silence with overlong toenails, while others called upon friends and relatives to do them the favor with the tools at hand. Where people mostly walk barefoot or with sandals, perhaps normal wear-and-tear wears down the toenails. Those same older and infirm people probably have needed help going to the latrine or using a chamber pot and when they’ve wandered off, they may have been tied to a chair rather than placed in a locked residential setting as they’d probably be today in this country. I saw an older woman tied to a chair once in rural Cuba in 1997. The point is that there are multiple ways to deal with similar problems, depending on the culture, resources, and era. Toenail trimming may indeed be defined by us now as a medical service, but it probably could be done more cheaply and just as well by pedicurist as by a podiatrist, although, in that case, it would not qualify for Medicare reimbursement. That’s just an example. What is medical and eligible for insurance coverage is a matter of definition and depends on public opinion and consensus, which is somewhat elastic. This is obvious in definitions of mental illnesses, whereby homosexuality was once a condition requiring treatment, but no more. Are Viagra, birth control, and abortion medical care and should they be covered by insurance that we all collectively finance? Obviously, purveyors of any service whether massage or chiropractic or aroma therapy will want it defined as medical in order to assure insurance coverage. The expansion of medical insurance coverage to include more services means higher payment to their practitioners and also that insurance costs will necessarily go up. If that’s what we want as a nation, as a society, then let’s put everything into the medical care basket.

Cannot fail to comment on the mass shooting in Colorado. How many of these tragedies—both large-scale shootings like this and everyday ones, such as recently the 3-year-old in our area who accidently killed his father with an unsecured handgun—have to occur before we try as a nation try to figure out how to prevent or reduce them? If every firearm owner was 100% careful, observed all the safeguards, never acted impulsively or with malice, it would be another story. But given human nature and variability, that’s pie-in-the sky. The proof is that gun massacres, murders, suicides, and accidental deaths continue to occur. I am grateful to fate or luck that when another boy accidently dropped a loaded handgun that discharged that my son Jonathan, then age 12, was only injured in his foot, not in a more vital spot. Unfortunately, after much anguish, shock, and hand ringing over the Colorado killings, with nothing whatsoever being done, the issue will be forgotten until the next episode—and we all know there will be another—then the whole process will be repeated once again. We’ve had Columbine, Virginia Tech, Arizona, and now back again to Colorado, with episodes in between with somewhat fewer casualties, and nothing is done.

Granted that there was a similar mass shooting, but with fewer casualties, in Canada recently and the horrendous mass murder in Norway, two nations where gun control is far more stringent than it is here. Nonetheless, the overall gun death rate in those countries is far lower than ours, even though such killings have not been eliminated altogether. In the U.S., gun manufacturers together with the NRA will keep any gun control debate from happening here in this election year, especially with the electorate already so polarized on other issues. I noted that President Obama steered clear of making any gun control references in the wake of the Colorado incident, only expressing condolences and prayers for the victims and their families, saying that he was “shocked and saddened.” Are such events just inevitable facts of life that we must accept, much as Hondurans have come almost fatalistically to accept that they or their associates might be killed at any moment? I know from feedback from my readers on my personal e-mail that not all favor more gun control, but I have not yet heard a convincing argument against it.

Instead, should we install metal detectors to enter malls, theaters, and subway stations? Have security guards everywhere? Passengers already complain about airline security. Or do we need to limit gun purchases, especially for assault rifles and other more lethal firearms; require training in gun use and storage; and mandate registration and background checks? And how did the Colorado shooter manage to acquire tear gas, not to mention so many weapons? It does seem that limits should be placed on the purchase of explosives, tear gas, and the sheer number of weapons and ammunition by any one person; that background checks and tracking of individuals should be required; and at least questions asked about the intended use of such purchases. The Colorado shooter, apparently with no previous record and a sterling academic background, would probably have passed any background check. But what about preventing the purchase of all assault rifles, such as one he had, which are not used in hunting and are more than what is needed for self-defense? We’re all sitting ducks unless there are some controls. We have controls for drivers and car owners, why not for guns and gun owners? According to polls, the American electorate is pretty evenly divided on “gun rights,” divided as it is on everything else and moving toward the right on that issue as on some others. Is it a reflection of the poor economy, of the usual swing of the political pendulum, or what?

In my opinion, it would be worth giving gun manufacturers freebees for not producing guns, much as we do for farmers not to grow crops, at least for a time, to help remedy this problem since apparently the gun lobby’s political clout is so great and feared and they want to maintain their profits. Bribe them to not make guns. It would cost less in the long run in pain and sorrow, not to mention burial and medical costs and those involved in supporting widows and orphans. The profit motive has now become sacrosanct, superseding any other motive, it seems. Romney is trying to make excessive money-making, even to the detriment of others, into a virtue, but don’t let me get off on that tangent right now.

Honduras is an example of a nation with a wide open gun culture, no registration, no rules—carry your weapon either concealed or in a holster, it doesn’t matter. Most guns used there are manufactured here, but some people also make their own crude firearms. All banks have metal detectors and armed guards; armed guards are also stationed in pharmacies, ice cream shops, cell-phone stores (as per photo in my book); and grocery stores (lots of jobs for security guards). In grocery stores and banks, all bags and purses must checked and not brought inside. What is the result? The highest murder rate in the world, most of it with guns.


A gun incident tipped Peace Corps over the edge and led to the departure from Honduras after 50 years. A volunteer was riding a bus when three armed men entered and robbed everyone of cash and cell phones. It might have ended there except that an armed passenger started shooting. He ended up being killed and the volunteer was shot in the leg in the crossfire. Was that effective self-defense? It was the last straw for the Peace Corps. A gun advocate might say that it could have ended differently—that the armed passenger might have dispatched the bad guys and become a hero. Well, that didn’t happen and I wonder how often it actually does happen? In Florida, neighborhood-watch volunteer Zimmerman is indicating that his killing of Martin was almost accidental. On the other hand, in the example above of Peace Corps volunteers in Ghana, their being armed with a knife meant that the pair were not robbed and ended up killing the would-be robber. Statistically, countries that enforce gun restrictions have lower murder rates, not to mention deaths from gun accidents, as so often happen here. Are people there just less prone to violence or is the easy availability of guns a factor in promoting a culture of violence? This is certainly a debate we should have as a nation after the election, NRA or no, although it is likely to be characterized by the fierce polarization shown on all other matters of national importance.

South Sudan Anniversary, Family Visit, Heat Wave Breaks, Cholera in Cuba, Rangel's Final Win, Drug War Deaths in Honduras, Gang Truce in El Salvador Reduces Violence, More on Supremes’ Health Care Decision

It may not have been a noteworthy date for most Americans, but on Sunday, July 8, 2012, those of us who have worked in South Sudan observed the first anniversary of the birth of that country. It was not a happy occasion as Khartoum has been attacking and strafing civilians in the oil-rich disputed region of Blue Nile and Kordafan, some of the areas I visited in 2006. My time then was brief, the better part of a month, but it was a well-traveled month and any travel in South Sudan, with unpaved roads and landmines, was not easy then and still is not. (My article about that visit appeared in America, Oct. 1, 2007, http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=10236.)


On July 8, together with members of the Sudanese diaspora, we in Amnesty International gathered in Lafayette Park in front of the White House (as shown). In addition to observing the first anniversary of the birth of the new nation, we were asking the White House to pressure Khartoum to stop its raids and to allow humanitarian aid to get in to civilians displaced and injured in the attacks. It was the last day of an almost 10-day heat wave, with daily temperatures around 102 F or higher, similar to temperatures in South Sudan where, however, the humidity is much lower. As we were meeting, the sky overhead began clouding up (see photos) and a few cooling raindrops fell. Evening saw a steady rainstorm, not quite as fierce as the recent one that downed trees and overhead wires, but welcome rain that lowered the nighttime temperature into the 70s. Later in the week, I heard that the leaders of North and South Sudan had met an African conference and had actually shaken hands, so perhaps they will come to an agreement. South Sudan is impoverished and undeveloped, but has oil, while Khartoum has charge of refineries, so perhaps they can work something out.

I‘d thought our local temperature had risen as high as it was going to go last time I wrote, but on Sat., July 7, it momentarily hit 106 F at Reagan National Airport, but didn’t stay the whole 3 minutes required to be an official record temperature, falling back to only 105 F. More and more, I’m remembering why I left El Triunfo, Honduras, for La Esperanza and why I stay in the south as briefly as possible on visits there. Now in Washington, DC, after a week of respite, as I write this on Sunday, July 15, the mercury is again rising, but “only” threatening to reach into the low 90s during the coming week.

Had welcome weekend with my daughter Melanie and her step-children from Virginia Beach and my granddaughter Natasha and her son from nearby Sterling, Va. That’s my granddaughter with her cell phone on the red couch and the kids on the blue couch with another electronic device. My daughter (not shown) was elsewhere talking on her cell. It’s sometimes hard to carry on a conversation when everyone is honing in on an electronic device. Maybe I need to call them or connect with them on Facebook to communicate with them, rather than face-to-face.

A cholera outbreak with several fatalities has occurred in eastern Cuba, with the government recommending extra hygiene precautions, although residents have been complaining about lack of soap for washing their hands. At least one case was reported in Havana. The word “cholera” has been avoided, the illness being referred to only as “diarrhea” or “respiratory insufficiency,” in the case of a death, shades of the dengue cover-up that I had witnessed in Cuba in 1997! Independent sources report that thousands have been affected and that perhaps 16 have died, although the government has acknowledged only three deaths, saying the epidemic is under control. Hospital employees have been forbidden to talk about it and families may not visit their hospitalized loved ones, probably increasing the public’s fear (“Cholera outbreak in Cuba sends hundreds to hospital, reportedly stirs panic,” The Miami Herald, July 7, 2012).

The vote count is over in Charlie Rangel’s NYC district and he appears to have won by 990 votes. My DR Espaillat friends’ cousin of the same last name has now conceded defeat, but Rangel had better watch out next time.

There have been disturbing reports in the last few weeks of deaths in the eastern Mosquitia region of Honduras from drug enforcement raids, joint operations conducted by Honduran forces and the US DEA. In at least one case, women bystanders were killed, allegedly by DEA operatives. Widespread condemnation of these killings and of US military involvement in Honduras have led to calls for the US military and DEA to leave Honduras. A Honduran who once advised the Peace Corps there sent the message below to former volunteers:

A recent human rights fact-finding mission also fell for the Resistencia's standard lie that when Mel Zelaya was President there was no violence, corruption, or drug trade. It is an irrefutable fact that these increased exponentially during his term. Most organizations from abroad inexplicably still insist that Mel was some sort of Thomas Jefferson overlooking the facts of his corrupt and erratic government. To call for the withdrawal of US military assistance based on this organization’s report constitutes a grave threat to our society. More than ever Honduras needs to overhaul our security system. I respectfully suggest that when groups come to do these human rights missions, they make it a point to interview a variety of informed citizens who do not just fill in the blanks in a draft of preconceived opinions. Too many NGO's are calling for the withdrawal of all international assistance in the name of human rights, not realizing that such a measure would violate even more human rights. Our leftist and right wing politicos are genetically corrupt and/or pathologically incompetent and our people should not pay for their sins.


In neighboring El Salvador, a gang truce mediated by religious and political figures has cut the murder rate—lessons there for Honduras?

Obviously, the Supreme Court decision on the Obama health reform act is not the end of the matter, since now oppositional governors are vowing what amounts to civil disobedience. Whether their actions will actually match their belligerent rhetoric or whether they are merely spewing out PR sound bites in a bid to get votes remains to be seen. But there is a risk that the result may be two-tiered system instead of a national one, with residents of some states enjoying better health care benefits than others.

July 4 Wishes, Canada Radio Interview. Oregon Visitor, Storm & Heat Wave, More on Roberts Ct., Health Care, Rangel’s Challenger, Honduran Patient, Renegade Nun, Why Nasty Review Is Gone from Amazon

Posting here a photo of a flag hanging out my bedroom window on July 4. Also, one of my kids Jon and Melanie at the beach in Hawaii, where Melanie is visiting Jon and Stephanie, my two kids living there.

My hour-long radio interview on the Vancouver station on Sunday went well and some questions even came in from listeners. But an hour wasn’t long enough for all I had to say.

On July 4 afternoon, a young visitor arrived from Oregon, where she said the temperature was 65F when she left, then she walked into 100F when she got off the plane here in DC. Still, she was game to go immediately with me to a neighborhood July 4 party and to see the fireworks on the mall. She wanted to take a jacket for later in the evening; not necessary, I assured her. At the party, quite unexpectedly, I saw a man I really never wanted to see again, someone who had argued vociferously with me about Cuba and Fidel Castro’s alleged virtues, insulted me on his blog, and castigated me for having a fundraiser at my house for a Honduran aslyee family. He is the one who actually inspired me to write my Cuba book, which when it appears, will be announced on this blog. I tried to avoid him all evening, but was uncomfortable even being with him on the same premises. Hope my readers had a good July 4.

6-29-2012--Mark Richards, weather observer at Reagan National Airport, said the temperature at 2:48 p.m. hit 104, blowing by the old June record of 102 set on June 9 in both 1874 and 2011. We are now experiencing D.C.’s hottest June temperatures in 142 years of record-keeping, he said, with an outside chance today’s high temperature could match D.C.’s hottest in any month: 106 reached on both August 6, 1918 and July 20, 1930. [So far, we have not exceeded the 106 F mark.]

Our East Coast heat wave began before July 4 and has continued afterward, with high temperatures hovering daily around 100F, the kind of weather we used to get in August, but now, one month early. It reminds me of the year-round climate in southern Honduras, even in Feb., when I usually go there. It’s also why, when I had wanted to extend my time in Honduras, that after 2+ years of unrelenting heat, sporadic electricity, and difficult transportation, I transferred to higher, cooler La Esperanza. Some poor folks in DC area suburbs have been without electricity in this heat, ever since a fierce thunderstorm Friday, June 29, resulting in many downed trees, including in my neighborhood. However, because our electrical wiring is all underground, the major damage was to cars parked under the trees, not to the electrical grid.

On my last posting, I acknowledged that the Supreme Court’s decisions on Arizona’s immigration status verification law and on the Obama administration’s health care reform program were mixed, but mostly favored the administration, with Roberts being the conciliatory vote. Now, it seems those administration victories, especially in health care, are even stronger than I had supposed at first glance. And many opponents of the health care law are calling Roberts a traitor to the Republican cause. However, Romney’s comments so far have been somewhat muted, as they should be, since he approved a similar law in Massachusetts. So far, I don’t see Romney gaining much political traction, but maybe I’m not the best judge, not being anxious to see him elected.

No doubt, Republicans will still try after November to gut the health care law. It’s very hard to implement it with all this continuing rancor and uncertainty, or even to try to find a middle ground on possible modifications, though, of course, the electorate, through their representatives, have the right to overturn any law at any time. The problem is that opinions now are so polarized and opponents of the law will do their level best to make it unworkable in any form. I’m wondering if there are financial interests behind much of the opposition—maybe some pharmaceutical companies, device and equipment manufacturers, and organizations of health professionals, who want to keep the status quo and/or to keep on expanding their piece of the health care pie? When I worked for the occupational therapists’ association, our whole thrust was to keep getting more jobs and better pay for our therapists, while also giving value to patients. Every health profession and stake holder is doing the same, constantly.

There is an almost limitless number of possible and desirable interventions available to keep an individual alive, happy, and functioning—organ transplants, joint replacements, breathing and feeding tubes, drugs, devices, psych meds and talk therapy, and myriad other treatments—even toenail trimming is allowed under Medicare. If any service becomes limited, the cry of “rationing” goes up. But health care, like any other benefit, has limits and none of us will live forever. We cannot devote the majority of GDP to health care, crowding out food, housing, environmental protection, and other life necessities, whose insufficiency will also have an impact on our health. But arriving at consensus about what health care limits should be is very difficult, especially if ourselves or our loved ones are involved. This attitude of the right to have limitless health care benefits, together with the high earnings of doctors and other health providers compared to counterparts around the world, plus the availability of emergency care for anybody, with or without insurance, all combine to make our health care in this country the very costliest. Do we want to exclude some people and allow them to suffer and die? And, as I have observed before, pharmaceuticals here are more expensive than anywhere else because the market will bear that cost, whereas in Honduras, or even Europe or Canada, the same drug costs less. Obama’s plan is a modest effort to get a handle on some of these ever-rising costs. Of course, those affected in their pocketbook are fighting back.

Remember the cousin of my Espaillat family friends in the DR—challenging Rangel in the Democratic primary? According to Yahoo News, 6-30-2012—“Later this week, with 94 percent of precincts reporting, Rangel was ahead by only 44 percent to Espaillat's 41 percent—or 16,916 votes to 15,884, a margin of just 1,032 votes, according to the Associated Press. Those totals were the latest available as of Friday.” The entire tally is not in yet.

Had an interpretation client (patient) recently whose first name was Erundina, not a name I’ve ever heard before. Amazingly, she used to live near San Felipe Hospital and the school for the blind in Tegucigalpa, my routine haunts in that city. She told me she’d had a son when she was in her early 20s and then, almost 20 years later, at age 44, without any fertility intervention, was surprised to give birth to another son. She is delighted that the older boy, born in Honduras, is eligible for the new two-year parole (or whatever) offered by the Obama administration. As I’ve said before, in my job, I never know what to expect and often it’s a nice surprise, like meeting this lady.

Jeanine Gramick, a nun who attends our masses at Communitas, was featured in an article in the Washington Monthly, May 24, 2012, entitled “The Renegade.” Jeanine, who had been inspired, as many of us were, by the reforms of short-lived Pope John XXIII, has undertaken a special mission to minister to gay and lesbian Catholics. See:

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/magazine/103094/catholic-nuns-vatican-new-ways-ministry-gramick


Among folks with whom I have shared the good news that the terrible review is gone from Amazon, I’ve had mixed advice about whether or not to post that news here. Some said I definitely should do so, since I’d mentioned it on my blog; otherwise, the matter would be left hanging and people going to Amazon now would wonder what I’d been complaining about. Others, including my kids, advised just letting it drop. “Don’t call attention,” “don’t gloat,” they said. They also feared retaliation from the guy who posted the malicious review who might accuse me of getting it erased, which I certainly did not do nor did I know how. So, I’m not gloating, just heaving a sigh of relief.

It turns out that another former Honduras PC volunteer, without any prompting from me, someone I’ve never even met, took matters into his own hands, contacting Amazon on his own. He found that the author of the nasty review had several books listed on Amazon, including a Honduras memoir, all with few reviews. Here, in case someone else ever needs it, is what Amazon told him:


What's not allowed

Amazon is pleased to provide this forum for you to share your opinions on products. While we appreciate your time and comments, we reserve the right to remove reviews that include any of the following:

Objectionable material:


spiteful remarks

sentiments by or on behalf of a person or company with a financial interest in the product or a directly competing product




I apologize for typos in any of my blogs. Sometimes, I don’t have or don’t take the time to go over them carefully. Thanks to my readers for bearing with me. You know what I meant!

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Amnesty Staff Cuts, Drone Strikes, Rangel Triumphs in Demo. Primary, Supreme Court, Moving Beyond Malicious Amazon Review, Radio Program Reminder

One of the hats I wear is an Amnesty International (AI) volunteer activist. In 1981, I helped found group 211 in Washington, DC, to which I still belong. Until I joined the Peace Corps in Honduras in 2000, I was Cuba and Dominican Republic coordinator for AI USA. After returning to Washington in 2004, I became coordinator for the entire Caribbean and Canada (with concerns there regarding indigenous and environmental rights). In 2005, I participated in an international Amnesty conference held in Morelos, Mexico. In 2011, I was in San Francisco when we celebrated Amnesty’s 50th anniversary. So, I have stuck with Amnesty through thick and thin, but now our organization is undergoing its thinnest period, facing serious financial challenges, not only in the U.S., but worldwide. The reasons are many, including the economic recession, an expansion of our mandate, and, perhaps, insufficient attention to financial and organizational matters as we confront human rights emergencies around the world, including, right now, those in Syria. It’s been tempting to respond to every identified need when we don’t really have the resources to do it all. The one staff member of AI USA supporting our volunteer efforts around the world for the last decade, working heroically with only the help of rotating volunteer interns, is now being laid off as a cost-cutting measure. As long-time volunteers working with him for years, we were not consulted or forewarned, even though Amnesty is supposedly a grassroots organization. I fear our protests after-the-fact will be to no avail. Our own experience in this regard has been repeated in organizations, public, private, and non-profit, around the country. The money just isn’t there.

My old friend Jimmy Carter has dropped a bombshell, accusing the Obama administration of violating human rights through targeted drone killings. I wondered when any prominent domestic voice was going to call Obama to task on what, arguably, are assassinations carried out without trial or due process. Even though the American public may condone them as effective self-defense, they are ethically questionable. I had thought maybe human rights organizations were shying away from direct criticism, considering Obama preferable to Romney in this case. So far, have not heard a defense from the administration.

My Dominican friends’ cousin Adriano Espaillat running in the Democratic primary in NYC against Charlie Rangel lost, so it looks like Rangel is in again. Everyone in the DR was rooting for Adriano, according to my sources. He gave Rangel a run for his money, but didn’t make it. He did get 40% of the vote, so may do better in two years time. After all, Rangel is 80, has had some ethics challenges, and the district is more Latino than before.

Mixed and somewhat confusing decisions on the Arizona immigration verification law and the Obama health plan have emerged from the Supreme Court, providing at least substantial support to the administration. The court has not split entirely along the usual ideological lines, with Chief Justice Roberts playing a mediating role. However, is becoming increasingly apparent that at least some Supreme Court justices are highly partisan, not the objective, letter-of-the- law authorities we rely on to independently resolve the nation’s most contentious disputes. It does seem that the time has come to have limited, rather life-time, tenure for the Supremes. First, there was their bald favoritism in Bush vs. Gore that possibly resulted, because of the Bush administration’s neglect of warning clues, in 9/11 and, even worse, Bush’s launching of the unnecessary, costly, and deadly Iraq war. Now Justice Antonin Scalia, whom I consider evil personified in the same mold as Dick Cheney, is denouncing the “evil effects of illegal immigration.” How about looking at the useful effects of immigration, whether legal or not? Sphinx-like Clarence Thomas, the man who never says a word, and who tried to savage Anita Hill’s reputation, probably agrees with Scalia, but will only say so in writing. From my perspective, they are both a joke, and not a funny one. In my old age, I’m becoming more pessimistic about humankind and its ability to progress or act half-way rationally. I do think the high court’s decisions on Arizona’s immigration-verification law and health care were somewhat balanced, no thanks to Scalia and company.

While I’m trying to leave behind the shock of that vicious and vindictive (why?) review of my Honduras book, the fact remains that ever since that guy put that up on Amazon in mid-May, I’ve had no sales whatsoever. If he reads my blog, that should give him some satisfaction. My sins, if any, were sins of omission in that I didn’t buy his Honduras memoir and didn’t promote it for an award. Although he has written and self-published many books, apparently none has gotten the recognition he craves. Usually, I’ve had one or two sales of my Honduras book at least every couple of weeks. Now, weeks after his posting, nada. It could be just coincidence or due to the Peace Corps’ departure from Honduras, but it’s rather troubling. If his objective was to stop my sales, he may have done a pretty good job. I also realize that a book’s sales do tend to diminish over time, not that mine were ever that robust. I anticipated that they might pick up after the Canadian radio show, but if listeners go to Amazon, I hope they won’t be discouraged by his review, which will remain there starkly visible in perpetuity. I’m open to suggestions about how to deal with this. Just ignoring it doesn’t seem to be working particularly well, though that’s the main advice I’ve gotten. Would-be readers may not take the trouble to go through all the other 5-star reviews. I notice that his own books have few Amazon reviews. One friend who has seen his review on Amazon is even worried about my physical safety, as he seems to be, in her words,
“ a nut case.” He lives in California, but was out here last September for the Peace Corps’ 50th anniversary where I don’t recall ever running into him. Others tell me he was obnoxiously trying to get everyone to buy his books, which he described as “wonderful.” I hope I’m not that pushy.

Gentle reminder about my radio interview (via telephone) this coming Sunday: Conscious Discussions Talk Radio, Vancouver, BC

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/consciousdiscussions/2012/07/01/volunteering-with-the-peace-corps

Interview Time-line

Conscious Discussions airs LIVE at 10 AM (Pacific) Sunday July 1 [Eastern time 1 PM]

The show will be 60 minutes in duration.

Canadian Radio Show, Senior Citizenship, Gabrielle Giffords, Warren Buffet, Rangel’s Challenger, Obama’s Immigration Move, Honduras HR, Cuban Leader’s Arrest, Ethiopian Dinner, My Book’s Defenders on Amazon

Posted here is a photo of Amy, my former Honduras Peace Corps volunteer colleague, with her brand new daughter. We reconnected recently at my April talk at the Mid-Manhattan public library, when Amy was obviously pregnant, and now here she is with the new bundle of joy actually in her arms. Congratulations, Amy!

Also, photos of my visitors now taking a course at GAO. They are at the GAO fellows’ “cultural day” where each of the 20 showcases his or her country. George from Georgia is wearing a fur hat used by shepherds and Tabitha from Kenya is in her tribal dress.

Next, I’ve been invited to talk about Peace Corps by a Canadian radio show, even though Canada has no Peace Corps and its citizens cannot join ours unless they become American citizens. OK, my policy is to accept any and all invitations to talk Peace Corps. I’m not sure how access works, but here is the information given to me:

Conscious Discussions Talk Radio, Vancouver, BC

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/consciousdiscussions/2012/07/01/volunteering-with-the-peace-corps


Interview Time-line

Conscious Discussions airs LIVE at 10 AM (Pacific) Sunday July 1 [Eastern time 1 PM]
The show will be 60 minutes in duration.

Have now gone back after my surgery to working as an interpreter, a job that’s not physically demanding, except for going and coming on public transportation. I was heartened recently when a Nicaraguan patient who really spoke quite passable English said he was happy to have me there for moral support anyway, “You calmed me and made me feel less nervous; I have no family here.”

I’ve become an official senior citizen now, with bus drivers no longer asking for my ID when I pay senior fare and young people sometimes offering me their seats on the metro. I have mixed feelings about being so obviously recognized as an older person!

Riding a bus back to the metro station after a recent hospital interpretation, I saw a car hit a cyclist, knocking him to the ground, evoking flashbacks of the pedestrian hit-and-run I endured now over a year ago. In this case, the driver stopped and witnesses called the police. Several people took cell-phone photos of the prone victim lying in the street. Fortunately for me, although the driver who hit me had gone on, I’m unaware of suffering any permanent injury. But when a vehicle hits you, it’s a very heavy blow and really quite a shock.

Walking by our local Eastern Market on a recent evening, I saw a big party going on inside. Those manning the door told me it was a dinner celebrating Gabrielle Giffords who resigned from Congress to focus on her recovery from gunshot wounds. She was said to be attending in person, so I tried to get a glimpse inside, but the view was blocked. I do wish her the best.

Warren Buffet, it turns out, was a graduate of Woodrow Wilson High School, a DC public school from which my kids also graduated.

The following gives more details about Rangel’s primary challenger, a distant cousin of my Dominican friends in the Espaillat family:

http://www.npr.org/2012/06/06/154452671/harlem-icon-faces-perfect-storm-in-re-election-bid

As you might imagine, I applaud Obama’s decision to give undocumented people brought to this country as children a temporary stay, though, like many others, especially those recently deported who fall into this same category, I have to ask that if this option was available before, why wait until now, in an election year, to implement it? The timing does seem a bit opportunistic. .

Honduras was singled out for a recent visit by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders, who, following her visit, asserted that: "The 2009 coup d'état aggravated institutional weaknesses, increased the vulnerability of human rights defenders and provoked a major polarisation in society. Due to the exposed nature of their activities, human rights defenders continue to suffer extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, torture and ill-treatment, death threats, attacks, harassment and stigmatisation." She went on to say, "I have observed that certain categories of human rights defenders are at particular risk, including journalists, staff of the National Human Rights Commission, lawyers, prosecutors and judges, as well as defenders working on the rights of women, children, the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Intersex community, the indigenous and Afro-Honduran communities as well as those working on environmental and land rights issues." (Wake Up Call: Human Rights in Honduras, By: Lisa Haugaard, Executive Director, Latin America Working Group, 6/8/2012)

Amid violence, lack of unity among Honduran journalists

By John Otis/CPJ [Committee to Protect Journalists] June 12, 2012

On May 25, the Honduran press corps took to the streets of Tegucigalpa and four other cities to reject the growing levels of violence against members of the media. Many marchers donned yellow-and-black t-shirts emblazoned with the words: "Killing journalists will not kill the truth."

It was an impressive show of solidarity but in the aftermath, a question hung in the air: what took them so long? Though the pace of attacks and killings of reporters picked up dramatically after a 2009 coup ousted the country's president, last month's march was the first nationwide protest by journalists.

Due to political and drug-related violence as well as widespread impunity, Honduras, a nation of 7.5 million people, is one of the most dangerous countries in the region for journalists, CPJ research shows. At least 14 journalists have been killed since President Porfirio Lobo took office in January 2010. The systematic failure of Honduran authorities to investigate these crimes has frustrated any attempt to solve the murders, CPJ said in a letter sent to Lobo in December.

The climate is so intimidating that reporters told CPJ that they don't dare probe deeply into crucial issues like drug trafficking or government corruption. Many print reporters have removed their bylines from their stories. Tiempo, a San Pedro Sula-based daily newspaper that consistently criticizes the government, has shut down its investigative unit due to safety concerns. Some reporters claim the only safe way to tell the truth about Honduras is to write a novel. "Everyone feels vulnerable," said Mavis Cruz, director of the news program Noticias a la Hora on Radio Libertad in San Pedro Sula. "There have been so many abuses against journalists and there is almost total impunity." But rather than coming together to face this crisis, Honduran journalists are deeply divided and suspicious of one another.

Besides damaging the country's democracy, the June 2009 military-backed coup that ousted leftist former President Manuel Zelaya fractured the national press corps into opposing camps, according to Juan Carlos Rodríguez, a general assignment reporter for Tiempo in San Pedro Sula.

Journalists in favor of the coup or who work for media outlets that supported Zelaya's ouster are known in Spanish as golpistas or "coup-backers," while those who opposed it have been pigeon-holed as resistencia, or part of the political resistance.

Rodríguez says that when "resistance" journalists are attacked or killed, the news receives scant attention or comment from pro-coup media--which includes most of the country's major television, radio, and print outlets. By contrast, the May 15 killing of Ángel Alfredo Villatoro, a prominent radio host and close friend of President Lobo, has been headline news for days. Indeed, it was the killing of Villatoro, one of the country's best-known journalists, which prompted the Honduran press corps to temporarily set aside its differences and stage the May 25 nationwide protest, according to Karina Interiano, who anchors the Noti6 TV news program on Channel 6 in San Pedro Sula. Journalists in Tegucigalpa did participate in a smaller march in December after the murder of reporter Luz Marina Paz Villalobos. They were beaten and tear-gassed by soldiers and police, according to press reports.

Honduras is one of the world's most violent countries. A 2011 United Nations report found it has the world's highest per capita homicide rate, with 82.1 murders per every 100,000 inhabitants.

As CPJ noted in its Journalist Security Guide released this year, professional solidarity is important in situations in which local journalists face sustained risk. "Perhaps the best step journalists can take in such environments is organizing themselves first in their newsroom, then with other journalists and news organizations within their city or region, and ultimately across their nation," the guide states. Groups such as Colombia's Foundation for a Free Press and the Brazilian Association for Investigative Reporting have played valuable roles in curbing attacks on journalists.

In Honduras, adding to the mutual suspicion among reporters is the fear that they are being spied on by colleagues who may be passing information to security forces. These journalist/informants are known locally as orejas, Spanish for "ears." The scenario is especially chilling because many reporters believe that some of the attacks on journalists have taken place with the tacit approval or complicity of the country's police and military."Lots of journalists are corrupt and receive payoffs," Cruz said. As she spoke in a hotel restaurant, a reporter suddenly approached the table, uninvited, to greet her. Later, Cruz whispered that the reporter probably doubled as an informant.

These tensions add to the regional rivalries that have long existed between reporters in Tegucigalpa, the capital, and those based in San Pedro Sula, the country's industrial center and largest city. Even within news organizations, there's often a lack of solidarity, reporters told CPJ.

Rubén Escobar, an editor at Tiempo in San Pedro Sula, told CPJ that his supervisors have failed to hold a single meeting to discuss the deteriorating security situation and have neglected to provide any guidance or training to help reporters protect themselves. "I have taken some courses in personal security but I did that myself," Escobar told CPJ.

And trying to bring rival reporters together to work out their differences is getting more difficult due to the spiraling violence. Escobar said that reporters in San Pedro Sula rarely meet after work for drinks or dinner anymore because that could expose them to shootouts between gang members or drug lords. "These days if I want to have a few beers I buy them at the supermarket and bring them home," he said.

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Not sure how to access it, but CNN (June 12) carried a story about Afro-Cuban dissident Antunez’s recent police beating and arrest, with pepper spray shot into his mouth, according to his wife, who was also briefly detained. After spending 17 years in prison, he still isn't shy about speaking out. His latest arrest happened after he gave videocam testimony from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana to a Senate committee about seeing authorities kill another pro-democracy activist, Antonio Ruiz. A few days later, he was conditionally released, but still faces trial.

In June 2012, I had the good fortune to meet a released Cuban Black Spring prisoner of conscience, Normando Hernández, on whose Amnesty case I had worked for several years. He and his family were visiting Washington, DC. During his imprisonment, I’d been in regular phone contact with his mother in Miami, Blanca González, a member of the Damas de Blanco (Ladies in White). We both were pleased when he won the PEN Freedom to Write Award in 2007, but, of course, he was unable to actually receive until after his release. Still, Normando said, word of the prize buoyed his spirits, “I knew I wasn’t forgotten.” At his release, brokered by the Cuban Catholic church, he and his family met at the airport and boarded a flight that same day to Madrid, later moving to Miami to join Normando’s mother living there.

Normando told me that he is slowly recuperating both mentally and physically from the torture, solitary confinement, and medical neglect of his seven years in prison. He still looks thin and pale and is under medical treatment. His personal life is looking up, however, although he remains gravely concerned about Cuba and its people, “those we left behind, both in and out of prison.” He called his time in prison “Hell on earth,” including three years in solitary confinement in tapiada (a covered windowless enclosure). Occasionally, when not in solitary, he received outside news from other prisoners with clandestine radios tuned to Voice of America and Radio Martí. He has authored a prison memoir, El Arte de La Tortura: Memorias de un Prisoneo de Conciencia Cubano (Hispano Cubano, Mardi, 2010) and now works as a freelance journalist and a researcher for the National Endowment for Democracy. He had been arrested for being an independent journalist and belonging to the Fundación Cubana de Derechos Humanos (Cuban Foundation for Human Rights), an organization led by Juan Carlos González Leiva, a blind lawyer and activist from Ciego de Avila. Leiva himself was imprisoned for more than two years until April 2004, held subsequently under house arrest, and detained additional times since.

Normando’s wife, Yarai Reyes, lost her teaching job as soon as Normando was arrested. Lacking funds, she said she found it hard to visit him as he was moved from one prison to another—from Boniato in Santiago, to Kilo 5 1/2 in Pinar del Río, to Combinado del Este in Havana, and to Kilo 7 in Camagüey. She joined the Damas and once, when she inquired about her husband’s whereabouts as “a political prisoner,” a female agent reportedly reprimanded her for using that term, declaring, “We have no political prisoners here in Cuba, only counterrevolutionary mercenaries funded by the empire.”

The couple’s ten-year-old daughter, Daniela, already fluent in English, said she now writes poetry in both languages, reciting for me one of the rhyming poems she exchanged with her father, also a poet, while he was in prison.

Todos sabemos lo que cuesta ser humano.
Pero no todos sabemos lo que cuesta ser cubano
Y vivir en las garras
De un gobierno tirano.


[We all know what it means to be human.
But we don’t all know what it means to be Cuban
And to live within the clutches
Of a tyrannical government.]


At the same gathering where Normando was present, I met Yuri Pérez, now performing a summer internship in the nation’s capital, who, in short order, had mastered quite fluent English. Emblematic of Cuba’s disillusioned young people, he left Cuba two years earlier at age 27 after being expelled from the University of Camagüey where he was studying law. His crime had been joining an illegal youth organization, Juvenil Martiana, named for patriot José Martí. I told him that I’d received a warm welcome from democracy activists in his hometown in 1997. As a refugee, he’d been sent directly to Las Vegas, Nevada, which has few Cuban residents and few job opportunities, but, he said, “Still better than Cuba, since we do have freedom and that is precious.”

At Amnesty International’s DC office, we held an Ethiopian dinner attended by both Ethiopian nationals and Amnesty activists. Hearing the Ethiopians talk among themselves, I was reminded of public school events where I’ve worked as a Spanish interpreter side-by-side with Amharic interpreters. The dinner was served on large spongy pancakes torn off to pickup mouthfuls of food, an eating style similar to what I experienced in South Sudan in 2006. Our two speakers at the event argued that while Ethiopia is considered a human rights and democratic success by the US and the West, it still has prisoners of conscience and human rights violations justified largely as part of the “war on terror.” Ethiopian troops are in Somalia, but are not always peace keepers, corruption can be found within the Ethiopian government, and opposition is not permitted, according to our speakers, one an Ethiopian national. There is a danger that Ethiopia and other African nations may fall back to dictatorial model of the 1990s, they warned. Africa is an area of marginal concern for the US Congress, so no one is paying much attention.

Friends have advised me to forget about my bad Amazon review, arguing that most thoughtful people will not be influenced by it, since the writer so obviously bears some sort of crazy grudge, so I’m trying to take their advice and calm down. Some have even suggested a backlash effect, giving me more credibility, though others have warned that maybe would-be readers will think all those 5-star reviews came from friends of mine. If so, I apparently have a lot of friends. A subsequent review (making no mention of his terrible one) has appeared now along with two comments, both characterizing his review as “mean-spirited,” so I’m grateful that some readers out there have come to my defense. He even took the time to rebut them, saying that my book was the worst Peace Corps memoir of the many he had read. He’s like a dog with a bone that won’t let go, hell-bent on damaging me and my sales, that’s all I can figure out and why? I don’t for a minute believe that he really believes what he has said. It’s pure meanness or else a mental health crisis on his part. What did I do to arouse his ire? Didn’t buy his Honduras book, didn’t vote for him to get an award from PC Writers, got awards myself, I guess. Although I’d sent him my book a couple of years ago, he waited until now to pan it. His little book, the one that he’d sent in exchange for mine, was not about Honduras; it was sloppily written, but frankly not the absolutely worst PC-related book I’ve ever read. It’s a real puzzle. If I should ever run into that guy at a Peace Corps or Honduras reunion, it will be hard for me to remain civil. A friend now in Peace Corps Response, a shorter-term service for volunteers who have already completed a full term, reacting to my critic’s posting (privately, not on Amazon), said he still considers my book top-notch, and he has read and reviewed a ton of PC memoirs. He even envisions a film with Judi Dench playing me! Thanks so much to all who have come to my defense.

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