Growing up Jewish in Miami gave me an interesting perspectives on things.  I knew that I lost family in concentration camps, but they were distant relatives.  I didn’t have any survivors in my family.  I was taught about the Holocaust in Hebrew School, and a camp survivor (number tattoo and all) came to speak to us.  I had several friends who’s grandparents were survivors of the Cuban Revolution.  I would go over to their homes and their grandparents would tell us the stories of Che and Fidel’s secret police, the executions, the disappearances, the destruction of a once beautiful country by a communist dictator.  I felt as acutely about the Cuban Revolution as I did about the Holocaust, by way the first hand accounts I grew up listening to.

When I turned on the news on Friday and saw that Fidel Castro had died, I felt the same elation that many people in Miami were feeling.  Then I saw the responses from the US President and other social and world leaders.

Fidel Castro was undeniably a tyrant.  Under Fidel, thousands of Cubans were stood up against a wall and executed by firing squad.  Thousands more were murdered in political assassinations.  Fidel’s regime bled prisoners to death and sold the blood to other Communist nations for cash.  Fidel’s Cuba was one of extreme torture, political reeducation,  and the grossest violations of human rights.  Like so many other Communist leaders, while the Cuban people suffered in squalor, Fidel lived a life of affluent luxury.

Fidel’s legacy should be remembered as one of mass murder and oppression.

President Barack Obama’s official statement on Fidel’s death was a pusillanimous lack of conviction, ending with:

Today, we offer condolences to Fidel Castro’s family, and our thoughts and prayers are with the Cuban people. In the days ahead, they will recall the past and also look to the future. As they do, the Cuban people must know that they have a friend and partner in the United States of America.

No condemnation of Fidel’s 60 years of repression of the Cuban people.  No condemnation of the genocide and torture.

Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau’s official statement could only be described as fawning obsequiousness, calling Fidel “a larger than life leader who served his people for almost half a century. A legendary revolutionary and orator, Mr. Castro made significant improvements to the education and healthcare of his island nation.”

Trudeau seems to think that the disguising and derelict hospitals that the Cuban people have access to are worth the cost of the tens of thousands of Cubans that died for Fidel to seize power to build said hospitals.

Irish President Michael D. Higgins’ official statement is nearly as lauding as Trudeau’s.

Fidel Castro, known to his peers in Cuba as ‘El Comandante’, became one of the longest serving Heads of State in the world, guiding the country through a remarkable process of social and political change, advocating a development path that was unique and determinedly independent. Cuba achieved 100% literacy many years ago and built up a health system that is one the most admired in the world. With economic growth rates similar to many other Latin American countries, inequality and poverty are much less pronounced in Cuba than in surrounding nations. 

Cuba’s great economy, which is ranked 177 out of 178 nations, putting it ahead of only the People’s Republic of North Famine Land Korea, and leaving the Cuban people with an average $20 per month income.  Again, Higgins believes that this economic powerhouse is worth the total repression of the Cuban People.

The leader of the UK Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, praised Fidel’s “heroism” and said “from building a world class health and education system, to Cuba’s record of international solidarity abroad, Castro’s achievements were many.”

This is the third time that a world leader praised social reforms made by Fidel over the bodies of thousands of dead dissidents.

United Nations, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called Fidel “a strong voice for Social Justice” and said “under former President Castro, Cuba made advances in the fields of education literacy and health.”

Now we’re up to five.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker stated “With the death of Fidel Castro, the world has lost a man who was a hero for many. He changed the course of his country and his influence reached far beyond.”

Another leader praising a man who had children murdered as a hero.

Former President Jimmy Carter made a statement saying “Rosalynn and I share our sympathies with the Castro family and the Cuban people on the death of Fidel Castro.  We remember fondly our visits with him in Cuba and his love of his country.”

Fidel loved his country so much that he killed over 11,000 of his own countrymen to destroy its economy for more than half a century.

American “Civil Rights” leader Jesse Jackson responded to the death of Fidel with this Tweet:

This is something out of Bizarro World.  Fidel Castro was a tyrant who oppressed his people, crushing the freedoms of speech, the press, political opinion, and art under the heel of his Soviet issued boot.

Similar statements were made by other borderline tyrannical leaders of other barely above Thrid World nations.

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There is an Idiom attributed to Aesop: a man is known by the company he keeps.

What you see above is a list of Leftist world leaders who fell over themselves to absolve Fidel Castro of the atrocities that he committed against the Cuban people to be part of the Radical Chic.

If you want to understand why I own guns.  This is why I own guns.  This is why my father taught me to shoot.  This is why the mantra of Jews, Cubans, and so many other is (in various languages): “never again.”

It is said, scratch a Liberal and find a Fascist underneath.  The slobbering eulogies given by these leaders demonstrates that to a tee.  Not one condemned Castro for the subjugation, torture, or execution of innocents and dissidents.   No one condemned Castro’s control of the press or internet, or suppression of free expression.  They only praised his non-existent accomplishments.

It illustrates a complete lack of morality among these leaders.  Hip liberals can proclaim that Justin Trudeau is the “top woke bae” because of his feminist policies, but Trudeau ignored that Cuba’s literacy rate came at the expense of the lives of thousands of executed Cubans.

There is a quote often attributed to Joseph Stalin: “A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.”  These world leaders proved that not just is 10,000 deaths a statistic, but it is such a small statistic that it can be ignored.

If these leaders can justify political genocide with Fidel’s policies, it makes you wonder if these same leaders would be willing to commit the same atrocities in their homelands.

Would Trudeau be willing to shorten the wait times for health care by lining Canadians who disagree with him up against a wall and having them shot?

We know the history of Europe is rife with mass murder, so I wouldn’t put it past European leaders to feel this way.  There has been no shortage of European heads of state that thought they could get the trains to run on time if only they shot the right people.

Even in America, we’ve seen from the anti-Trump protests just how the far Left feels about it’s fellow Americans;  far too many call for the oppression and even death of anti-Hillary/pro-Trump people.

If a person can ignore the horrors committed by Fidel to create an honorable legacy for that tyrant, it’s not a great leap in logic to wonder if they would do the same thing themselves.

The love of tyranny that lives in the hearts of so many world leaders was on full display after Fidel’s death.  It is a horrifying reminder that we are a hair’s breadth from living under the boot of a self-aggrandizing monster.

The people of Canada and Europe may live with what little freedom they have left at the mercy of their leaders.

Here in the US, it is more important than ever to remain armed and vigilant.