Family reunion
June 23rd, 2004 by Liss
Whether you root for or against the Yankees, you have to be happy for JosČ Contreras, who is finally reunited with his family after nearly two years.
Will this suddenly return him to the nearly unhittable pitcher he was on the Cuban national team? Who knows…and I would argue that it doesn’t really matter. (Although I certainly hope it helps, for the Yankees’ sake!)
When the family of a multi-millionaire sports star and (former) national hero has to seek freedom by stowing away on a smuggler’s boat with nearly two dozen others, bringing not much more than the clothes on their backs, you know that what you’re dealing with is a brutal and horrifying situation.
I haven’t commented much here (and I’m not likely to, really) about Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea or any of the United States’ other foreign policies and actions. I will say, though, that I find it shameful that one of the most oppressive dictatorships in the world exists such a small distance from our country’s border. Even more shameful is that most people in this country - politicians included - ignore it completely.
More than forty years after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, and with some flags still flying half-mast for the death of the president many credit with the end of the Cold War, Cuba’s communist dictator is still in power. Fidel Castro is one of the world’s worst dictators, by many accounts, a country rich in history and culture is being brutally oppressed, and the U.S. is, despite what many think, still entrenched in a cold war. A war that’s about far more than island vacations and fine cigars.
Just ask JosČ Contreras, Miriam Murillo-Flores, and their daughters.