The Old Babalú is Back (Not that We Are Celebrating)

With the discharge of George Moneo and chastening of Henry Gómez, a new day has dawned at Babalú, or, rather, the black night that had settled for months over it has finally lifted, revealing the old but familiar dawn. Precipitated by George's unilateral declaration that Babalú was not only a blog about Cuba but a "conservative blog," albeit one which with its frequent condemnations of John McCain and praise of Barack Obama on issues not related to Cuba, had, in effect, become an insipid and derivative liberal blog, Val Prieto had no choice but to "ponerse el jacket" and make Babalú conform again to its mission statement and the expectations of its readers.

Today we find Alberto de la Cruz likening Obama to Fidel because of the "inaccuracies, misrepresentations, and some pretty horrendous lies contained in his speeches." And Henry has re-discovered Cuba and his talent for deconstructing the writings of her maligners. I dare say we can expect no more anti-McCain canards from the "political animal since the age of 5."

Val took our advice and set his house in order. It is Val's blog that George and Henry were running into the ground. George would not change his course and even admitted his own irrelevancy when he declared in his last (deleted) post that he could not or would not write about Cuba, so Val dismissed him. Henry, apparently, has agreed to desist in his one-man campaign to install Barack Obama in the Oval Office, so he gets to stay, although, as we said, chastened by George's example. And Val has reasserted his control over Babalú after essentially being asleep at the helm for months like Rip Van Winkle while George and Henry set his house on fire and "the island on the net without a bearded dictator" in fact had two. Now the old "beerded" dictator is back, and though nothing is perfect at Babalú, everything is at least recognizable again.

It is good to hang an admiral now and then (even one who floats in a teacup) pour encourager les autres.