The Clinton Visit to Latin America

Starting tonight and going through the week, US Sec State Clinton is in Latin America on a tight schedule of visits. IKN helps you out with the Clintontracking by publishing this handy cutty-outy-keepy agenda of the Clinton agenda.

	Hillary	Bill
March 1, Uruguay	inauguration of Pres. Mujica	whorehouse!
March 2, Chile	meeting Pres Bachelet & Piñera	whorehouse!
March 3, Brazil	meeting Pres.Lula, trade agenda	whorehouse!
March 4, Costa Rica	meeting Pres Arias	whorehouse!
March 5, Guatemala	meeting Pres Colom, poss. Lobo	whorehouse!

We aim to please.

It's Kafka time! Miss Universe visits Guantanamo Bay

Dayana Mendoza (for it is she)

I really, truly and honestly don't know where to start with this report of Miss Universe 2008, (Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela) and Miss USA (Crystle Stewart) recounting their fun days out at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. So I'm just going to translate it directly with no further comments and let you enjoy it, too.

Translated via Ottotrans™, and here's the original Spanish report to prove that I am not making this shit up. I promise I'm not. It's word for word. Enjoy, gentle reader.

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YVKE World: International

"It was an incredible trip"

Venezuela's Miss Universe: "Guantanamo Is So Interesting"

Venezuelan Dayana Mendoza, Miss Universe 2008, visited the Guantanamo military base two weeks ago to "entertain" the soldiers stationed there. The beauty queen said that she had been in the detention camps. "We saw the jails, where they bathe, how they are entertained with movies, art classes, books."

YVKE Web Press / Agencies
Tuesday March 31, 2009. 3:30pm

Miss Universe 2008, Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela, and Miss USA, Crystle Stewart, paid a visit to the US naval base and detention centre for alleged terrorists at Guantanamo Bay and found it "interesting".

On her web page, Mendoza explained that both beauty queens visited the Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba on Friday March 20th in order to greet and entertain the military personnel stationed there.

"It was an incredible experience," said the Venezuelan. "They (in Guantanamo) knew that Crystle and I were coming to visit and the first thing we did was to sit down to an enormous lunch. Later we went to one of the bars they have there."

Since the beginning of 2002, the USA has held hundreds of men at Guantanamo, captured in different parts of the world as supposed terrorists and has held them prisoner without trial or appeal. Many of them have been subjected to torture, according to reports from human rights organizations.

Mendoza said that she and her friend talked with Guantanamo personnel "about the base and what life was like there, and in the following days we had a great time, it was a really memorable trip." The base personnel took the two women on a visit in a 'boat', unidentified by Mendoza, and a sightseeing tour that "was a lot of fun."

"We also saw the military dogs and they gave us a cute demonstration of their obedience", added Mendoza. "All the army people behaved themselves very well with us".

"We visited the detention camps and saw the jails, where they bathe, how they are entertained with movies, art classes and books", she added. "It was very interesting". The young Venezuelan added that "the water in Guantanamo Bay is sooooo beautiful. It was incredible and we were able to enjoy it for at least an hour."

UPDATE: The NYT's lede blog is running the story too. I could have saved myself all that translation bother. Thanks for the link, RB.

Quiztime! The answer

Wow, eleven replies to last night's question! Not bad in such a short space of time. And even better is that nine of you got the answer right. The correct answer is that:

They have all visited Cuba

Yep, that's six heads of state racked up by Raul inside the first two months of anno domini two thousand and nine. For sure Chávez isn't much of a surprise, but Bachelet? That's the first Chilean visit since Allende if memory serves (historians feel free to correct). And Martín Torrijos made his second visit in less than a year. The USA losing regional influence? Surely not!

Anyway, the winner is the fabulous Bina, who managed to get her answer timestamped at 9:10pm last night, less than an hour after I hit the 'publish' button. Good job and rapid fire, Bina. The prize she asked for is a nude photo of Rafael Correa, which explains the image above. Waist-up only, Bina (though I can confirm Correa = 10X Berlusconi).

The final word goes to the most eloquent answer received, from reader MH. A very nicely written mail and deserves a wider audience. Particular agreement Chez Otto for the last sentence:

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Well I'd say they've all managed to catch the attention and likely 'outrage' of a certain group of Miami 'exiles'. The cause of this outrage is most likely because Bachelet, Chávez, Colom, Correa, Fernández and Torrijos have been able to have a native mojito with real Cuban mint and rum unencumbered by an embargo and travel restrictions, which means unlike a 'real' democracy all those leaders of faux 'dictatorships' have been able to visit Cuba in 2009.

I don't know if this however is held in common between all those leaders - but I hope it is true given how much Cuba has helped Latin America (Guatemala, Venezuela, and Ecuador I am sure about) - that all of these leaders have also pledged to help Cuba rebuild after the devastating hurricanes last year. The people of Cuba are amazing resilient, but they should never be forced to go it alone.

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