Friday, July 30, 2010

Che Schme Guevara

Ernesto Che Guevara is one of the false gods of socialist/communist world history. That he was a coward and a fraud is well known. Through friends of my parents, exiled Cubans, we heard of the "good" work that Fidel Castro and his band of losers had done in Cuba. Quite frankly, I didn't know whether to believe the stories that I heard as a young boy. When I entered college I had the great fortune to have an American History professor who recommended many other books on various subjects. Knowing the "intellectual" love affair many students were having with the image of Che one of the books he suggested concerned the Cuban Revolution. The stories and events lined up with what I had been told as a youth.

The apotheosis of Ernesto Che Guevara is arguably the biggest historical scam of the 20th century. Aided and abetted by a gaggle of journalists and academics, this swaggering, narcissistic opportunist, devoid of genuine accomplishments, and so utterly incompetent at practically everything he set his hand to that Fidel Castro finally had to find a way to get rid of him, was magically transformed into a courageous and inspiring warrior, a Christ-like revolutionary hero. Humberto Fontova’s superb demythologization, Exposing the Real Che Guevara and the Useful Idiots Who Idolize Him, is a large bucket of cold water thrown into the rapturous faces of Guevara’s unthinking admirers.


Go read the rest of the above entry (click on the link). It is informative and gives details of Che's "bravery."
 
As a young girl my daughter wanted a Che poster to be like her friends. I told her that she could have one if she spent 30 minutes with me going over Che's real history. Ten minutes into the conversation she told me that didn't want the poster or one of anyone like Che.
 
The following year while visiting an art gallery we all had the pleasure to see and discuss Charles Willson Peale's portrait "George Washington at Princeton, 1779". She asked for and got that poster.
 

"Gunga, gunga, lagunga"

The Dali Lama loved it and repeated the line to other people.

"Caddy Shack" is 30.

I got that going for me.