The near times, vanity fair were she was contributing editor and national publications. Shes also editor of cuba, a travelers literary companion and cuba confidential. She teaches International Journalism at the university of california at santa barbara. Without fidel is a terrific book, fun to read and format it and the subject matter is endlessly fascinating. Alice castro are able to stay in power for 50 years . Why was the United States not able to topple him and how was he able to maneuver so that communism fell everywhere else in the world . And if the United States had no sway in cuba, how was it that he was not overthrown by his own people. Families in this book discusses cuba somewhat without fidel. She reports on a stillness in the relationship between raul infidel and continues to report im not part of the story that never seems to end, the miami cuba washington ballet. Well, everybody is waiting for the shoe to drop which will come first, fidel dying for cuba opening up for obama. Nice to have you with us. Its a wonderful little paragraph that i wanted to read to you that says it all. Now if i can find it. And she very first, 2009, few doubt and wrote castro celebrated a halfcentury ago a halfcentury rule. Two weeks later, barack obama became the 44th president of the United States. To the castro brothers, obama said he the 11th batter to set it to play. All told not to shabby record for a brother duo from the town of iran, cuba. These are big numbers than once a day to certain reckoning. The book i hopeful offers and answers and reflections on the diplomatic train wreck that is passed for u. S. Cuba relations and what the future might look like in both countries. And then she makes reference to one of my alltime favorite cartoons, cartoon by robert hancock, a businessman standing behind his desk and stayed on the phone, no, there is a is out. Never. Its never good for you . And that is the answer to my question. Thank you. [applause] thank you very much. Ive got to quickly respond to a couple things carla said. The payoff on the new yorker cartoon is that the digit number is over. Regarding cuba. We have been in the age of mabrey. I cant tell you its going to be totally transformative very quickly, but dh of matter we are starting to see the door open. The other thing is will fidel castro ever die . Well, theres been certain points in the writing of this book but i certainly thought i was going to go first. Anyway, thank you both for coming. Thank you politics prose for having me. I know this is columbus day and you could be doing all kinds of colombian things. Thats mac anyway, for those of you who dont know that Christopher Columbus not only discovered the United States ever and ever, on the way he stopped by in cuba. He actually stopped in a little town called bar code, which happens to be my favorite place in cuba. It is out on the eastern tip about guantanamo. I know you know about one time. One place americans know about. Just on the north of that is missing part of a special place called arakawa, where three rivers meet on a map and go into the ocean. That is where columbus landed and eventually got here. Theres another auspicious date that happened on october 10th known as cuban independence are famous for her next question al gore goes beyond that, the cry of yarborough come at the very beginning of the First Independent lawyer. You may think theres been discontent just politics postkennedy proposed fidel castro. There have been contentious politics from cuba from the spanish arrived in who is a very rough, some would say savage colonial period and the independent source did not go quickly. They took a long time. There is a 10 year war in many people tell you many cubans tell you after getting rid of the spanish they go very quickly to the United States as not quite a colonial power, but certainly i figure surrogacy. Its been a long go. And when i tell you about this book. Let me just tell you because they think i need to clarify a few things. When i was asked to write this book, fidel castro we thought was on his deathbed and i was asked to write basically a brief meditation on the death of fidel. I want you to know that was in august of 29 2006. Over three years ago i did a brief meditation. They said just 40,000 words and no court in miami, havana for the funeral and get some reaction in miami. Around a year into this project, you didnt have a funeral. Anyway, this has sort ofbecome i call this sort of Fidel Castros own outfit. I refer to it as the fidel you. What i learned is we have in a new age and fidel castro who has been blessed by the gods in so many ways so many gifts and talents and is quite tragic that he will leave the legacy he does having given so many gifts as he did if he got incredibly sick, almost mortally ill in the major tremendous medical advances. Unlike sharon, who i guess you could say things went badly from the neck up, and but few doubt just the opposite. He underwent an emergency intestinal surgery and i will read you a portion in a moment. A surgery involves so many complications and became so lifethreatening. There is nobody who could have survived would he survive and he has. He is not in great health. I know you all want the actual date. He does so to ron and soldier on as his thing. Quality of life is not that important to him. Quantity of life. In any event, what happened is this book began as a meditation and morphed into something very different. It became a trilogy and basically a long time. The second is about castros and focusing on too many particular to militant anticastro specialist i guess you could say. The last part is about raul, the rain of raul castro. We are now into this and basically in a nutshell its been a seamless transition. The casters do not leave things for accident in any way and this was well planned. Since then extremely well executed and theres a lot of casualties and that cuba and we can talk about that in a little bit. I thought it would just read a little bit to set the stage on what we thought was castros last day and then go into a couple of other things. The first chapter is the pursuit of immortality. The guy and began july 27, 2006. It is not scheduled, nor was it supposed to end that way. It would have been hard to imagine less appealing to fidel castro, a prominent kurdish man who zealously guarded his personal privacy, but there it was across the front pages of newspapers and websites five months after his neardeath following emergency surgery. Chapter and verse virtually every inch of the intestinal tract of cubas maximum leader from the lecture straight onto the end for castro and obsessive autocrat matters big and small, nothing couldve been more distressing. His control had been threat. The moat around his personal life had been breached. His patient confidentiality violated. Fidel castro have been a land of the master of his own day. A new portrait, that of a frail jim marion is carefully crafted persona of the vigilant kyra and with his infirmity, castros fierce grip on the largest island in the caribbean finally began to loosen. Disbelief and wonder millions of humans on both sides of the florida straits. Could it be fidel castro was mortal . Is the movie star dictator in the worlds longest reigning has day, and castro take his time leaving the stage. Anyway, i am going to leave that we can go do a couple of things. You can ask me questions. A lot of people have specific topics or it depends whether you want to hear more about fidel or more about role for u. S. Cuban relations question mark one of the things i would like to say is a lot of people think weve gone from fidel to rattle rattle, but the cuban army is the ceo of the country now. That is a useful way to look at it. He will never have the not nor does he ever want his brothers seem kind of niche and he will run cuba pretty much like a corporation. The cuban army has got two divisions. They are pretty much appropriated every part of the economy. They started to resent, with the Farmers Market and they are inching their way through all the of the economy. The good news about this as they are very efficient in what the army does do tends to be done more successfully with better results. But other parts of the economy do not work out as well. It was very disappointing when the succession was announced that the primary were given two people, most of 75 years of age. We have also had in march of this year basically a purge of the cuban government and many of the most familiar face as to cubans, but also to last and westerners are no longer part of the cuban government. As of friday, the Vice President was eliminated from the government. Balenciaga, castros personal assistant who is the foreign ministry. What is so interesting about this is these men had a thick waists are fidel castro and the revolution unstintingly almost 24 7 for 20 years or so and they were taken out. At least 15 people we know about. Some of you may recall right here in washington during the whole song to. There is a cuban diplomat who basically was the ambassador here. They had at the intersection for nongovernor has and he basically was the cuban point in and did a very effective job for cuba. They were the winners. The u. S. Was the losers which tends to be the case. And Fernando Ramirez is one of these men who is now gone. This is how when a highlevel purge this has been in this very interesting how little press and attention this has gotten in the United States. Tell me if im going to fire, too deep, too soon to write other and why would something that significant, almost 15 major leaders the cuban government just gone. Two of them after they were basically called out, which was done by raul castro immediately the next day but these abject letters, rall will apologize in for their errors. Right out of the old stalinist playbook although i hate to make those comparisons as cuba is not a stalinist island. Its a very different species. He was right out of that playbook. You say to yourself i did this get so little attention . This is something i wasnt planning on talking about but its really interesting. As reporters ive been guilty on occasion. They talk about the historical parallels the cuban revolution but this particular purge might not have a visa. It involves what it takes. I know. I did it for years. This is the good news about this book. I decided finally i dont care. Let them take it finally. And they did. I showed up not last year the year before and arrived at jose marti airport in the wind but man. The ministry of interior people got me and said he wont be coming in the country. This happens much more often than you might suspect and it really keeps the coverage very guarded, which is certainly not unique to us to cuba. This is the case in any place where there is an authoritarian country. I mean, they want a certain amount of what they consider the pieces that are too diligent, two critical. The visa is not. I think that this purge that happened in march was standing because basically these men who really gave their lives to the revolution were dismissed. Two of them happen to be in prison as they understand it. Two of them being charged with treason. By the way, how did these guys get in trouble . How did it happen that the 15 top officials in the cuban government get into such hot water . They were under surveillance. I talk about in this book where the officials are supposed to know they are wiretapped and this was done with a cited as evidence of liberal castro called a private screening to other officials to make the case for why these men had to be dismissed. They made casual disparaging comments those things like will fidel ever died which cubans say every day and refer to some of these leaders put in, almost all of them over the age of 75 a tightness is. And one of them, the Vice President of the country who was in charge of handling the economics of the country for so many years, the cousin who is a cardiologist made a crack about machado has been made number three after fidel, after rival and made some crack about a gas it would have had a favorite to the country if he came in with his heart problems we had to go. I understand he is facing treason, which is a very Serious Business in cuba, potentially a capital offense. Normally when people fall out of favor in cuba you go on with the pajama plan. This is much more serious than that. Its one of the things that so interesting because he lives, you know, such a part of washingtons social life. Im not going to say names. Very well known washington insiders would have been to dinner, schmooze and talk politics. Very wellliked. You dont hear anything. Its a mistake he disappeared in cuba, the show must disappear in the United States as well. That said, i dont want to give you the impression that i think cuba is a stalinist country. It isnt. There is a zone for it and complaining might be the National Pastime of cubans. But that is done privately. And you can talk about we dont have food, we dont have this or that generally can be done privately. You go outside into the public arena. You get on a soapbox. First of all, they dont like large groups that are government authorized what is interesting about them being thrown out as according to ralph castro to have been wiretapped for a year. They are in private homes. So i find that very interesting. A lot of people say what is going to be the future here after raul and then i promise to open it up to questions. A good way to think about this as a corporation that runs cuba but down the road, i think we will see some other caster is and they are not going to be fidel signs. Fidel has many son in some of you might have noticed theres a lot of publicity about various children in this book for women he didnt marry. He probably hasnt had 11 children from various people, various women. Mostly the women hes with now. But i dont think its going to be his children, but roles children. Raul has a son named alejandro and he is someone we should keep our eye on. Alejandro has a big future. Its in the ministry of interior and its got some very important part yes. Hes got china and the huge portfolio for cuba and he has intelligence and intelligence doesnt get bigger than that in cuba. Theres a very interesting daughter of fidels name, Mariela Castro and this woman is truly a liberal progressive. This is a oneman who is a bohemian. She had a chat with the trillion and now she has a couple kids and her passion is, samesex marriage, things that, believe me, this is a big deal in cuba. Any latin American Country championing. She even arranged for some couples to be married in a Government Ministry and arrange for some transgender surgery. When i say this is a free thinker, this is a free thinker. By cuban standards i tried to imagine what those old generals with roel and has been with roel for 50 years, what theyre thinking and how they are trying to be nice and with a really think because there is a significant amount of in cuba. Shes taken on her mothers sinecure running the womens federation and these are the two kids and then theres various nephews and nieces. My point being is that castros private diagnostic family of cuba contrary to what fidel has said. They are all over and various ministries. But again, nepotism doesnt necessarily protect you. There is a famous instance of fidels oldest son who is running the Nuclear Power program in the 90s and things went south in a bad way and fidel fired him very publicly inside it are not running a monarchy here. It is a mixed bag with cuba. Id like to disabuse people are thinking that as a stalinist republic, the tropical marks of them, i dont know. Raul has talked about he aspires to the chinese model of the vietnamese model and i think hes moving there. What would basically have now are openings and closings. A lot of cubans say they have whiplash. One day things are opening and we are going to have our computers and telephones and and transgender surgery and the next thing you know the Vice President is thrown in the pokey. This is the kind of paradoxical complex gray zone. They have completely and totally confused at this point, but how about at this point i throw it out then and you have some questions and you can tell me what you want to hear more about. Wonderful presentation. [applause] the microphone is right here. As you make your way to the microphone, i would like to ask you what you think will happen is the United States opens up to cuba and had some form of recognition, what you think the steps will be and what effect that will have in cuba. That is a really good question. What a lot of people dont understand is the u. S. Embargo was codified under the helmsburton act. I think it was 96, 97 after the downing of the cuban plays. The president no longer has the prerogative to take a pen and the embargo, which he did until that moment. But what can be done and what really is going on is the embargo can be dismantled surrogate keys mail and obama has 30 made a lot of moves. Basically what obama has done to this moment is he setting the clock back to work relations were with cuba before george w. Bush. During the clinton. We had a lot of travel, a lot of engagement, a lot of agreement. The last eight years you really saw the most retrograde and most tightening of the embargo. Nevermind that it did not seem. We got the results for it, but thats another story. What obama is doing is going back slowly. Theres a lot of things i think we have military agreement now, narcotics agreements. A friend of mine saw raul castro last week and told them sent in the obviously one of the leaked which they have signed agreements to fly over her to take people out of guantanamo on an as needed basis in flyover. Before that they had to go out into the ocean. We may see our intersections become embassiesagain. They are small finetuning things because president obama is not going to risk a lot of capital. Hes got a lot on his plate and he doesnt want a firestorm. That said, the climate has changed dramatically in miami and the opposition, much of the opposition is now moved to the sun or from the far right where we refuse to have any policy that the embargo. But now we see some of the most prominent names in the miami political firmament now on engagement. I think what obama sees is the wisdom of the endlessly tightened it up on cuba for 50 years. We really didnt get anywhere. Basically were walking away empty handed. Who do you work for . It worked for a few dow castro