Theodore's World

……at the Copa … Copacabana
….. hottest spot north of Havana …. music and passion are always in fashion at the Copa …………….
Dan Rather fell in love … copa …
copacabana…….

Cuban President Fidel Castro, left, and his brother, Minister of Defense Raul Castro, attend a Cuban Parliament session in the Palace of Conventions in this July 1, 2004, file photo in Havana, Cuba. It was announced, Monday, July 31, 2006, that Fidel Castro has temporarily relinquished presidential power to his brother Raul due to illness. (AP Photo/Cristobal Herrera, file )

Castro has surgery, relinquishes power
HAVANA – Fidel Castro announced Monday night in a letter read by his secretary live on state television that due to illness he was temporarily relinquishing the presidency to his brother and successor Raul, the defense minister.
In the letter read by his secretary Carlos Valenciaga, Castro said he had suffered gastrointestinal bleeding, apparently due to stress from recent public appearances in Argentina and Cuba, and had to undergo an operation.
The operation obligates me to undertake several weeks of rest,” said the letter. Extreme stress “had provoked in me a sharp intestinal crisis with sustained bleeding that obligated me to undergo a complicated surgical procedure.”
Castro said he was temporarily relinquishing the presidency to his younger brother and successor Raul, the defense minister, but said the move was of “a provisional character.” There was no immediate appearance or statement by Raul Castro.
It was the first time in his decades-long tenure that Castro has given up power, though he has been sidelined briefly in the recent past with occasional health problems.
The elder Castro asked that celebrations scheduled for his 80th birthday on Aug. 13 be postponed until Dec. 2, the 50th anniversary of Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces.
Castro said he would also temporarily delegate his duties as first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba to Raul, who turned 75 in June and who has been taking on a more public profile in recent weeks.

From Bablau blog

“There are thousands of Cuban-Americans out on the streets of Miami right now, all of them celebrating the possible demise of fidel castro. All of them cheering and carrying Cuban flags alongside Old Glory. You can here the shouts of “Libertad! Libertad! Libertad!’ in the background on the news reports. It is, indeed, a joyous occassion. But I’d like all of you to know that behind each celebratory scream, behind every smile, behind every feeling of unbridled joy and desperate happiness, there are 47 years of tears. Forty seven years of frustration. Of anger. Of pain. Of loss. Of separated families and drowned brothers and sisters. These celebrations have been paid for in blood. And they are more than well deserved.”

From Kill Castro blog

“The population is coming out to the streets in Havana, the Brigadas de Respuesta Rapida have been patrolling with the police, but in La Vibora, Centro Habana, and El Cerro the residents are out on the streets and there are screams of ABAJO FIDEL.
Many people went down la Rampa from Coppelia towards el Malecon. There are police presence in the area of Coppelia and the Havana Hilton, and near other hotels in the Capital.”

And what about this Raul Castro??
Castro’s Younger Brother More Radical

Cuban Defense Minister Raul Castro is President Fidel Castro’s staunchly loyal younger brother and his designated successor. At 75 and five years younger than Fidel, Raul is far less charismatic than his brother though far more radical.
Three weeks after taking power in January 1959, Castro named Raul his successor, telling supporters: “Behind me are others more radical than I.”
He officially designated Raul as his successor at a Communist Party congress in October 1997, saying “Raul is younger than I, more energetic than I. He can count on much more time.”
As head of Cuba’s armed forces, Raul has been deeply involved in Cuba’s military involvement in Angola and Ethiopia during the 1970s _ as well as with the military’s successful peacetime efforts to help rescue Cuba’s economy following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
I am among those who believe that it would be in imperialism’s interest to try, with our irreconcilable differences, to normalize relations as much as possible during Fidel’s life,” Raul said in the interview with state television. Later, he said, “it will be more difficult,” implying he would be harder to deal with.
Raul, a political hardliner, belonged to a Communist youth group even before the revolution. The elder Castro didn’t publicly embrace socialism until 1961.
Like his brother, Raul has been suspicious of the United States and at a September 1960 rally denounced the U.S. Embassy as “a cave of spies.”
In a July 1962 visit to the Soviet Union, Raul was given a promise of Soviet missiles _ a development that led to the U.S.-Soviet missile crisis of October 1962 which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

Wild Thing’s comment…….
May his surgeon be a relative of one of his victims. The Devil is now on alert for a possible VIP arrival. I’m sure the liberal media is going to all be crying when their hero Castro dies and printing lots of articles with rewritten history where they claim all the good castro did. Dan Rather is probably drinking himself into a stupor at some bar right now over this news, his hero might be dying.
If Castro actually finally does assume room temperature here is the funeral guest list:
Jimmah Carter
Dan Rather
Barbara Walters
John Kerry
Steven Spielberg
Chevy Chase
Oliver Stone
Danny Glover
Whoopi Goldberg
Harry Belafonte
Ted Turner
Susan Sarandon
Robert Redford
Cindy Sheehan
Michael Moore

Ford To Put 600K Toy Cars In Cereal Boxes
DEARBORN, Michigan — Ford Motor Co., in an effort to keep promoting its Fusion mid-sized car, plans to put 600,000 toy cars into Kellogg Co. cereal boxes starting Sunday.
The boxes, each containing a Fusion Hot Wheels car, will be distributed out of discount retailer Target Corp.’s stores nationwide. Fusion photos will appear on each box, the nation’s second-largest automaker said.
The Fusion toys will be inserted in boxes of Froot Loops, Apple Jacks, Frosted Flakes and Cocoa Krispies. Ford said one red model with the Target logo will be among them, and whoever gets that box will win a real Fusion.
Continued promotion of the Fusion, one of Ford’s better-selling models, is a priority for Mark Fields, Ford’s president of the Americas. In a recent interview, he said Ford used to roll out a vehicle, then stop promoting it.
“We used to do the launch and abandon, which means advertise it for three or four months and then move onto the next product,” he said.
“In the case of the Fusion, it’s a new nameplate. We need to make sure we continually have the right care and feeding of that nameplate so that the awareness builds over time,” Fields said.
Fusion sales have grown in most months since its introduction last October, peaking 14,940 in May and dropping slightly to 13,691 in June.
Dearborn-based Ford sold 71,089 Fusions during the first half of this year, still far short of its main competitors, the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord. Toyota sold 211,131 Camrys during the first half of 2006, while Honda sold 174,871 Accords.

Wild Thing’s comment……
Nope it won’t work for me even with all this advertising. I love my Grand Jeep Cherokee soooo much. So I will stick with Cherrio’s for breakfast and someone else can have the Fusion toy car. haha

Iran supreme leader calls Hezbollah chief ‘world favorite’
TEHRAN (AFP) –
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei feted Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah as the “people’s favorite person all over the world,” state television said.
His comments coincided with Nasrallah vowing to strike cities in the centre of Israel and declaring that the Jewish state had failed to win any military victory after days of bloody clashes with his Shiite militant group.

“The courageous resistance of the Lebanese people and Hezbollah is the manifestation of the rebellious spirit of Muslim and Arab nations against America,” Khamenei was quoted as saying.

“Today all the Arab and Muslim nations are supporting Hezbollah. Since it is resisting America and the Zionist regime, the leader of Hezbollah has become the people’s favourite person all over the world,” Khamenei insisted.

The supreme leader made the comments in a meeting with visiting Venezuelan president and fellow anti-American Hugo Chavez.

The Americans are still not ready to understand what is happening, so they are accusing others of interfering in Lebanese affairs,” Khamenei said in response to those allegations.

According to Khamenei, “the Zionist aggression against Lebanon is a pre-planned plot by the Americans.”

He also hit out at the UN Security Council — currently pressuring Iran over its disputed nuclear programme — by complaining that “world bodies are not bothered and they do not object” to Israel’s attack.

“The Americans got the Zionist regime involved in it, thinking they will take a long stride towards the creation of an American Middle East. But they did not factor the Lebanese people into their calculation,” Khamenei told Chavez, who had earlier declared his unity with Iran to “defeat imperialism.”

“The Americans were aiming at creating lackey governments, but Hezbollah’s blistering attack… has foiled the American plot,” Khamenei added.

Wild Thing’s comment…….
Khamenei and Nasrallah, may the fleas of a million camels infest and torment you in the most private parts of your bodies. Just for starters anyway.

Please CLICK on the image to enlarge it………and then a second CLICK in the lower right hand corener for full size……thank you.

This weeks post was written by Heidi of Euphoric Reality blog
The North American Union, SPP, and NASCO: Erasing America’s Borders
By Heidi at Euphoric Reality
Our government has undertaken some monumental legislation that fully impacts the American way of life, our freedom, and our sovereignty. The purpose of such legislation is to homogenize Canada, Mexico, and the United States into a North American Union – and we’re all going to sleep through it.
Have you heard of a little-known program called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America? This tri-lateral partnership was signed by President Bush last year without Congressional oversight or public approval. Opponents of the SPP have called it NAFTA on steroids – and we all know how disastrous NAFTA has been for everyone except Mexico. It also appears to be modeled on the ineffective and highly unpopular European Union (unpopular with the people, that is).

* Euphoric Reallity

(more…)

Please click below for the entrie film called Obsession.

Wild Thing’s comment……
Here are some comments about the film:
Rush Limbaugh: Oh, it’s chilling. It is chilling. You know, I had not really seen the Hezbollah leader much on mainstream media. He’s all over Obsession. He’s all over your film, and some things he says — I don’t specifically remember everything, but I mean it’s amazing how he’s portrayed as he is in the American media and what he’s really telling his own people and inspiring them to do or poisoning their minds to do. It’s shocking. It’s stunning to see it.
Michael Medved (Nationally Syndicated Radio Host) ….”Obsession” is one of the most powerful, expertly crafted and undeniably important films I’ve seen this year. This courageous, utterly gripping expose’ deserves the attention of every American — and merits serious consideration for the Academy Award for Best Feature Length Documentary.”
Mary Matalin, Former Assistant to the President, Counselor to Vice President & Political Strategist and Commentator …. “Obsession is a superbly made documentary that should propel every American into action. For those people who don’t understand the threat posed by Radical Islam, and especially for those people who do understand the threat – Obsession demonstrates in the clearest possible terms that we must stand up and defend our way of life. Obsession is a landmark film that impacts in a way that speeches, books and editorials are just not breaking through to a nation in denial.”
Jerry Gordon, Former U.S. Military Intelligence officer…..”It is a brilliant assemblage of archival footage of radical Islamic barbarities perpetrated across the globe, sermons of radical Imams from 24/7 satellite TV and undercover footage from Lebanon, the Palestine disputed territories, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, London and New York.
Obsession is indeed a wake up message to a sleeping American public cowed by fear and menace by radical Islamists in our midst. And yes, the film is distressing that such hate, incitement and barbarity flourishes in the 21st century. But the film rouses the American public into concerted action then it will have served a vital and important purpose.”

* Something….and Half of Something ….thank you Linda for the film.
* Obsession the website for the film. You can also find more information here.

IDF warns Lebanese citizens to evacuate villages (July 25):

“To all citizens south of the Litani River
Due to the terror activities being carried out against the State of Israel from within your villages and homes, the IDF is forced to respond immediately against these activities, even within your villages. For your safety! We call upon you to evacuate your villages and move north of the Litani River.”

IDF: Qana building fell hours after strike
IDF is continuing to check difficult incident at Qana village, and attempting to account for strange gap between time of the strike on the building – midnight – and eight in the morning, when the building collapsed.

An IDF investigation has found that the building in Qana struck by the Air Force fell around eight hours after being hit by the IDF.
“The attack on the structure in the Qana village took place between midnight and one in the morning. The gap between the timing of the collapse of the building and the time of the strike on it is unclear,” Brigadier General Amir Eshel, Head of the Air Force Headquarters told journalists at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, following the incidents at Qana.
Eshel and the head of the IDF’s Operational Branch, Major General Gadi Eisnkot said the structure was not being attacked when it collapsed, at around 8:00 in the morning.
The IDF believes that Hizbullah explosives in the building were behind the explosion that caused the collapse.

Residents were warned days in advance that this area would be targeted by the IDF due to its use by Hizbullah in ongoing terror attacks on Israeli civilian centers.
Video proof of Hizbullah’s blatant use of Lebanese civilian centers to launch rockets
(Communicated by the IDF Spokesman)

This morning, July 30, 2006, the IAF attacked missile launch sites in the area of the village of Qana, an area from which hundreds of missiles were launched towards the city of Nahariya and the communities in the western Galilee.
The IDF will defend the citizens of Israel from attacks by the Hizbullah and the responsibility for any civilian casualties rests with the Hizbullah who have turned the suburbs of Lebanon into a war front by firing missiles from within civilian areas.
Residents in this region and specifically the residents of Qana were warned several days in advance to leave the village. Eighteen Israeli civilians have been killed and over 400 have been wounded by these rocket attacks which have disrupted the lives of tens of thousands of Israeli citizens.
The IDF regrets any harm to uninvolved civilians, but this is the result of Hizbullah terrorist organization’s contemptible use of Lebanese civilians as human shields.

UPDATE:…..July 31st, 2006
U. S. To Block U.N. Denunciation of Israel
22:06 Jul 30, ’06 / 5 Av 5766

(IsraelNN.com) The United States is expected to block a United Nations Security Council resolution denouncing Israel for the killing of about 60 civilians in the Lebanese village of Kana Sunday morning. Israel has said that the explosion in the building that caused the deaths may have been caused by stockpiles of Hizbullah weapons and not by the Israeli attack.
The Council is taking a recess at this hour and will resume its meeting in two hours.

Lebanon’s PM thanks Hezbollah

LEBANESE Prime Minister Fouad Siniora thanked Hezbollah for its “sacrifices” in its war against Israel.
“We are in a strong position and I thank the Sayyed for his efforts,” Mr Siniora said when asked about a statement by Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah calling on the Government to take advantage of Hezbollah’s steadfastness against Israeli military might.
“I also thank all those who sacrifice their lives for the independence and sovereignty of Lebanon,” he said.
Mr Siniora, a member of Lebanon’s anti-Syrian coalition, has often been at odds with the Syrian-backed Hezbollah, but the 19-day-old conflict appears to have brought the two sides closer together.

Wild Thing’s comment…….
I watched this jerk on the Sunday morning political talk shows. He is totally PRO Hezbollah.
And also this quote from Meet The Press ( Sunday July 30th 2006)
MR. FUAD SINIORA: We scream out to our fellow Lebanese and to other Arab brothers and to the whole world to stand united in the face of the Israeli war criminals.

Image from the Hezbollah television station Al -Manar aired Saturday July 29, 2006 shows Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah who in his statement threatened to attack more Israeli cities in central Israel. He also claims Israel suffered ‘serious defeat’ in ground fighting around a border town. At least 448 Lebanese have been killed in the fighting that broke out after Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others in a cross-border raid. Most casualties have been civilians, and some estimates range as high as 600 dead. Thirty-three Israeli soldiers have died in fighting, and Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel have killed 19 civilians, the Israeli army said. (AP Photo/ Aal-Manar)

Hezbollah Chief threatens rocket attacks
By ZEINA KARAM – Associated Press Writer
July 29, 2006
BEIRUT, Lebanon – Hezbollah’s leader on Saturday threatened more attacks on central Israeli cities, a day after guerrillas for the first time fired a rocket powerful enough to reach the outskirts of Tel Aviv.
Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, speaking on Hezbollah’s TV station, said he supported Lebanon’s efforts to negotiate a peace deal, but suggested tentative promises for the guerrillas to disarm would be off if conditions aren’t met.
Nasrallah also dismissed a new diplomatic effort by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to bring about cease-fire, saying the United States wants fighting to continue. His statement came as Rice arrived in the Mideast to visit Israel; a possible Lebanon stop has not been announced.
The bearded Shiite Muslim cleric, wearing his trademark black headdress, insisted Hezbollah fighters were winning the battle with Israel, now in its 18th day. Israel has not made a “single military accomplishment” in its offensive on Lebanon, he said, speaking on the group’s Al-Manar television.
He claimed Israel suffered a “serious defeat” in ground fighting around a Lebanese border town after Israeli troops pulled back Saturday afternoon. Israel said they left Bint Jbail because they accomplished their mission of wearing down Hezbollah fighters after a week of heavy battles.
On Friday, a Hezbollah rocket hit outside the Israeli town of Afula, the farthest strike yet. Hezbollah said it targeted an Israeli military base, but the rockets fell in an empty field.
“The bombardment of Afula and its military base is the beginning …, Nasrallah said. “Many cities in the center (of Israel) will be targeted in the ‘beyond Haifa’ stage if the savage aggression continues on our country, people and villages.”
He was referring to his earlier threat to attack deeper into Israel than Haifa, which has been hit repeatedly in the recent conflict.
Nasrallah said Hezbollah was willing to cooperate with the Lebanese government. He did not mention a Lebanese peace plan calling for guerrilla disarmament specifically, but suggested Hezbollah would not disarm if the government backs away from conditions outlined in its proposal.
Most notably, the proposals demand a prisoner swap with Israel and the resolution of Lebanese claims on border land that Israel controls. Israel has ruled out a prisoner swap but has not said whether it would be willing to reconsider its hold on the Chebaa farms area.
The speech was Nasrallah’s fourth taped TV appearance since fighting began, sparked by Hezbollah’s capture of two Israeli soldiers July 12.
In Beirut, drivers stopped their cars and pedestrians stood in front of shops and cafes to watch the address. Fireworks erupted in the southern neighborhoods of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, after Nasrallah finished.

Wild Thing’s comment…….
Nasrallah: put me on TV I want to be famous, I am Nasrallah. I did not serve in Vietnam but I am still famous.
Wild Thing: No you are not famous you are infamous and there is a difference. When do you wash your smelly hair under that thing?
Nasrallah: Wash my hair? Praise Allah he tells me when to do such things Praise Allah. Did I tell you I did not serve in Vietnam but that I am still famous. Now where do I look to speak to the camera? Praise Allah
Wild Thing: Vietnam? You are a coward Nasrallah and wear skirts and smell bad. This was your 4th taped appearance Nasrallah since Israel began to fight back 18 days ago, don’t you think you are showing the world you are a glutten for attention? You know a glutten like a pig feeding in a pig pen!
Nasrallah: Allah Akbar never say PIG to me. Just because I did not serve in Vietnam you have no right to speak to me of such things as P-I-G-S!
Wild Thing: well Nasrallah our time has run out and the camera is ready for your close up. You need to do something about that green thing on your front teeth before the camera man calls “action”.
Nasrallah: Now you attack my teeth?! How dare you, I have the finest rotten teeth in all of Islamhood. And my breath is sweeter then a camels in the morning. Praise Allah! In the name of Allah the Compassionate, the Merciful!
I am ready for my close up, Praise Allah.
Call for “action, camera rolling…..”
Nasrallah:Praise Allah……. I tell you this I may not have served in Vietnam but I am the voice of the Hezbollah………….. Praise Allah…… In the name of Allah the Compassionate, the Merciful! I am ready for my close up, Praise Allah.