Reblogged:He Reports, You Decide (If It's a Joke)

[Gus Van Horn blog]

Years ago, wrapping up a post on Poe's Law, I stated:

Past a certain point, Poe's Law doesn't just describe a resemblance between the words of a "fundamentalist" and a jokester, but an identity: Depending on how well a given pronouncement is crafted to "fit in with" the overall mis-integration of a system that incorporates the arbitrary, the only difference between a frank statement and a joke will be in who is making it.

Thoughts like this kept going through my mind when I read a Yahoo News report by one Alexandre Grosbois about the upcoming changing-of-the-guard in Cuba. I'd say that the following quote quite well summarizes the facts on the ground over there:

"They are changing the government, but it's still the same kind, it's always going to be influenced by the Castros. Even if it's another man, it's always going to be a Castro government," said Ariel Ortiz, an unemployed 24-year-old in Havana.

That said, much of the rest of the piece smacks of disgraceful boot licking, coming as it does from someone who is free to write a report any way he pleases. Here's a taste:

The outgoing president will remain at the head of the Communist Party until its next congress in 2021 -- when he turns 90 -- time enough to ensure a controlled transition and to watch over his protege when, inevitably, old-guard communists challenge his reforms.

Cuban political scientist Esteban Morales said the two would likely work in tandem, with Castro continuing to act as the ideological figurehead, while [Miguel] Diaz-Canel concentrates on the "very complex and difficult" task of running the government.

The heir to the Castros will be faced with modernizing the economy at a time when Cuba's key regional ally Venezuela, its source of cheap oil, is stumbling through an acute economic crisis, and amid a resurgence of the US embargo under President Donald Trump.

As usual, socialism, the cause of the misery in Cuba and Venezuela, remains unmentioned. Venezuela's "economic crisis" might as well be the result of Donald Trump sticking pins into a voodoo doll of Nicolas Maduro; and in any event, he's being blamed for not saving the skins of that openly hostile regime. That passage is bad enough, but this is the one that reminded me of Poe's Law:

However, despite striving for a low-key transition, there's no getting away from the fact that this represents a monumental change in Cuba.

It will be the first time in almost six decades that the Cuban president will not be named Castro, will not be part of the "historic" generation of 1959, will not wear a military uniform and will not be the head of the Communist Party.

If elected, Diaz-Canel is expected to be able to make up for his lack of revolutionary pedigree with the support of Castro watching benevolently from his perch atop the all-powerful Communist Party.

Grosbois forgot to mention that it will also be the first time in six decades that the Cuban president will not have facial hair: Maybe that will make Ariel Ortiz more optimistic about his future employment prospects in the centrally "planned" economy.

Image via Wikipedia.

Were Grosbois a Cuban reporter, the above passage would rightly read as biting sarcasm, because we would know that he'd need cojones to even think about slipping it past censors, and then again about someone sharper-witted bringing it to Castro's benevolent attention. But Grosbois is in the employ of a Western news agency, so it does not. And were his admiration of Castro not so obvious, and his evasion or ignorance of the difference between slavery and freedom not shared by so many other journalists and intellectuals in the West, it would be a lot easier to laugh about his hunting around for reasons to call this non-event "monumental".

-- CAV

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