>That a group of people that
>fled a country because of
>a dictator that didn't adhere
>to fair laws and jsutice
>will refuse to follow the
>rules and laws of this
>country that they swear is
>the ideal. Hmmmmmm.

To be clear, most of the "Miami Cubans" are people who fled Cuba when Castro and co. overthrew Batista's dictatorship, who certainly "didn't adhere to fair laws and jsutice" as well—i.e., the Cuban exile community there is the outgrowth of the rich Cubans who fled Cuba when they realized they wouldn't have the political support to keep their priviledge, so it shouldn't be at all surprising that their stated principles aren't consistent with their actions. (It is interesting that the activists who do there work in the country get much less attention than "Cubans" living in Miami, BTW.)

There are many groups of people like this around the world (thought it probably isn't good to generalize too much). For example, where I live you can meet a significant number of former Iranian citizens who moved here ~1978-82. Most of them had some major connection or were a part of the Shah's dictatorship, who fled for their lives when Ayatollah Khomeini came to power. I know they complain about the Iranian fundamentalist regime's various crimes on principle, though I don't think that's why their upset.

Regardless, there's lots of dictatorships around the world, and it makes little sense for
a child to be kept from his family for narrow political reasons (and since when does "relatives" naturally mean "distant cousins"?). But in the average American's mind today's Cuba is rather like hell, with barbed wire running along the whole shoreline, pictures of Castro everywhere, military police on every corner with AK-47s, no power and electricity, young prostitutes on every corner, etc. This Elian thing isn't a hard story for the media to sell.

CJL