POLITICIANS generally irritate me. Stupid politicians more so. Uninformed politicians are the worst. Uninformed politicians with flatulently large mouths make me wish we still had the death penalty on our statute books for public indecency.
I'm not sure, Tony Leon, which of those categories you see yourself fitting into. Your predecessor, Zac de Beer, was a man I respected. There have been many others among your ranks that I have respected and even befriended. Even your current Western Cape leader, Hennie Bester, has consistently impressed me.
So why on earth are you such a twit?
I'm hugely pissed off at your intellectual masturbation over last week's address to Parliament by Cuban leader Fidel Castro. I have no problem with your disapproving of communists. As a long time fan of Ayn Rand, I'm not exactly an indiscriminate hugger of the masses myself. In fact, it's precisely because of Fidel Castro's record of ingenuity, bravery, and heroism that sets him apart from the masses that I am so fond of the man.
You called Fidel a dictator. I'm not entirely sure you understand what the word means. According to the CIA World Factbook, Cuba's chief of state is President of the Council of State and President of the Council of Ministers Fidel Castro. The president and vice president were elected by the National Assembly in elections last held 15 March 1993. Elections, Tony, do not work in dictatorships.
The cabinet is a Council of Ministers proposed by the president of the Council of State, appointed by the National Assembly. There is also a Council of State whose members are elected by the National Assembly. The legislative branch is the unicameral National Assembly of People's Power or Asemblea Nacional del Poder Popular. The 589 seats are elected directly from slates approved by special candidacy commissions. This, Tony, is very similar to the way in which you decide which of your members (and in your case, mostly white members), get to serve in Parliament. So, DP pontificating and snivelling notwithstanding, Cuba is no dictatorship.
It is a one-party state - like the US is a two-party state.
Cuba's party machinery selects candidates on their ability to deliver. The US party machinery selects candidates on their ability to obtain large amounts of campaign funding from business. (By the way, Tony, what sort of vested interest do DP members have in the pharmaceutical firms that are taking on Dr Nkosazana Zuma? Just curious.)
Cuba's leader is a hero who starting out with two other people and two guns between them toppled the US-backed dictator Batista. The US's leader is a draft-dodger who bombs innocents in third world countries without evidence.
Cuba's average life expectancy of 75 is among the highest of the world. The US has the dubious distinction of being number one per capita in executions of its own citizens.
Cuba has one of the highest doctor/patient ratios in the world (and if you don't believe those doctors are any good, look again at their life expectancy). If you are a minimum-wage dweeb flipping burgers for a living at a fast-food chain in the US, you had bloody well better be healthy 'cos you cannot afford a doctor. I know. I've lived there.
But let's leave Cuban society aside, Tony. I, as a "previously disadvantaged" person in a free South Africa owe a lot more to Fidel Castro than I do to you or yours. While your friends in the US were busy implementing Kissinger's infamous "Tar Baby" document to ensure the continuation of white supremacy in my country, it was Castro's forces' Operation Carlotta airlift in October 1975 which effectively crushed South Africa's invasion of Angola, assuring the capture of Luanda and victory for the MPLA. Was your party boycotting parliament at the time, Tony?
In my fury, I was thinking of an appropriate description for your behaviour. The Monty Python phrase "snivelling little rat-faced git" came to mind, but then I decided against it as my fury has subsided. Instead, I will leave you with with words of wisdom that may help you grow up.
A former Mexican president visiting Nicaragua shortly after the overthrowing of the Somoza dictatorship by the Sandinista revolutionaries told then President Daniel Ortega: "There have been two great Latin American revolutions, Mexico and Cuba. Both failed. In Mexico, we sacrificed justice for liberty. In Cuba, they sacrificed liberty for justice..."
With you in power, Tony, we would have neither.