Fidel is in Hell

Where he belongs.  Raoul next.

The Miami Herald has a comprehensive obit that is a great read.

One of my room mates in college was born in Cuba, and had to leave as a baby when his parents fled Castro.  He enjoyed teaching me naughty Spanish words that I would then repeat in front of his mother, who would then explode at Ralph, demanding furiously that he stop teaching me such language.

When the two of us rode my beat up Toyota hatchback into Mexico for adventure, he would inevitably bring the Mexicans to a halt by speaking his Cuban Spanish to them.  They could tell he was a native speaker, but they could not for the life of them place his accent.  We liked watching the wheels spinning as they tried to figure him out.

Years later, he and his family returned to Cuba on vacation, and found the house they had lived in before Castro.  It was sadly run down, but of course, when the government owns everything, nothing gets maintained.

Naturally, Ralph's parents had made a good life for themselves in the states, and could enjoy the fruits of their labor and send their kids to college.  They were a loss for Cuba, and a gain for us, but then again, isn't that the story of the rise of America?  Castro was a fool, and it's too tragic by far that he had to drag his island nation down along with him.   It's a lesson we here should learn well when we assess our own politicians and their lust to power.