Cuban TV personality defects to the US
posted at 8:29 pm on December 11, 2007 by Bryan
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One of Cuba’s most popular television personalities, humorist Carlos Otero, defected to the United States with his family, Miami’s Nuevo Herald newspaper reported on Tuesday.
Otero, 49, asked for political asylum on Monday at the U.S. border with Canada, where he was producing a television show in Toronto. He was traveling with his wife and two children.
His interview show on Sunday evenings was one of the most viewed in Communist Cuba.
“I hope to earn a living in exile and see my children grow up with the opportunity to study what they want, without having to agree with the system,” Otero told the Nuevo Herald.
Otero said Cuba was “frozen in time” and Cubans lived in great uncertainty over their country’s future since Cuban leader Fidel Castro fell ill and dropped from public view 16 months ago.
In his film Sicko, Michael Moore touts the superiority of the Cuban health care system over the US. Hollywood stars and leftwing politicians trot down to Cuba to hug the windy dictator and thumb their noses at the US. Yet not one of them has seen fit to defect to Castro’s island paradise. Funny, that.
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Why would someone defect on the eve of Cuba’s freedom? Couldn’t he wait a few more months? Or did he want to be on the right side when the change comes?
JiangxiDad on December 11, 2007 at 8:35 PM
I guess he was just tired of having so many doctor’s appointments.
d1carter on December 11, 2007 at 8:38 PM
I’m sure ol’ fat butt Moore would say that as soon as he gets a load of our terrible health care system he will swim back to padre Fidel
conservnut on December 11, 2007 at 8:38 PM
Who knows what’s going to happen there? The eve of freedom is the best possible outcome.
aengus on December 11, 2007 at 8:41 PM
Too bad he wasn’t on an exchange program. We’d be willing to offer 100:1
Zorro on December 11, 2007 at 8:42 PM
Wait, so you’re telling me Cuba isn’t some paradise where everyone gets wonderful health care and plenty of love?!
amerpundit on December 11, 2007 at 8:47 PM
Michael Moore hasn’t moved to Cuba for 2 reasons:
1: He couldn’t make films there because he’s such a provocatuer they’d never get past the censors.
2: The fatso himself knows if his heart ever gives out in Cuba he’s a dead man.
BKennedy on December 11, 2007 at 8:53 PM
The story is frustratingly sketchy. Did he really make it with his family? He asked for asylum on Monday…did he receive it officially? Is it really a defection or just an attempted defection at this point? I don’t trust Reuters — or our immigration bureaucracy.
RushBaby on December 11, 2007 at 8:56 PM
JiangxiDad on December 11, 2007 at 8:35 PM
are you a comedian JiangxiDad? satirist?
Griz on December 11, 2007 at 8:57 PM
Did he sneak in any Cohibas?
ThackerAgency on December 11, 2007 at 9:00 PM
Hopefully Janet Reno won’t have him sent back.
Limerick on December 11, 2007 at 9:10 PM
But…but….but…… Isn’t Cuba a socialist paradise? Shouldn’t he be grateful to live there?
Since this man and his family came here, can we send Cuba some people who would love to live there? Like Michael Moore, Sean Penn, and Danny Glover? It would be a more than fair trade……
mjk on December 11, 2007 at 9:13 PM
We could send them a replacement that’s already a Cuban. Mark Cuban could go and take this guy’s place.
RW_theoriginal on December 11, 2007 at 9:17 PM
Welcome to the US and Freedom
Defector01 on December 11, 2007 at 9:17 PM
Being granted Asylum is no easy task. Unless he’s been working incognito for the U.S. in some capacity, is at risk as a political target, has some juicy intel for the U.S., or has some special talent and a sponsor with tons of money, it’s tough to just walk right in and make yourself at home because you’re unhappy with the way of life in the homeland. He must have had something arranged.
I wish him, his wife, and his children best of luck and a wonderful new life.
SilverStar830 on December 11, 2007 at 9:23 PM
You talkin’ about Castro here or the moonbat expectation that President Hillary will give us BOTH unfettered amnesty and Cuban-style healthcare? From where I am sitting, Cubans should be very psyched at the possibilities for expanding La Revolucion. They can’t help but see common cause with Clinton, Obama, and Edwards.
highhopes on December 11, 2007 at 9:37 PM
We can send Cuba Harry Belafonte and call it even!
Bicyea on December 11, 2007 at 9:37 PM
Beautiful! Welcome to the United States!
CP on December 11, 2007 at 9:38 PM
Sanctuary Country!
jp on December 11, 2007 at 9:39 PM
Were I a strategic-minded government official, I’d hire this guy to continue his Sunday interview show and blast it to Cuba by any means possible.
highhopes on December 11, 2007 at 9:39 PM
>
Oh! They’d definitely bill us for that trade. I think we could send them Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon without excess liberal charges being applied.
They’re always whining about “chill winds” anyway so sending them to a country with bone crushing humidity and no air conditioning should be right up their alley.
highhopes on December 11, 2007 at 9:42 PM
We should send Lawrence O’Donnell. Or someone should just suggest it and watch him soil himself in fear at the thought of no Starbucks every morning.
baldilocks on December 11, 2007 at 9:45 PM
Amen to that!
CP on December 11, 2007 at 9:52 PM
A prominent entertainer – Hollywood is going to go nuts, the poor souls there…Schadenfreude.
Cuba will be free in my life. I will it to be!
Viva Cuba libre!!!
Entelechy on December 11, 2007 at 10:05 PM
here, here.
Griz on December 11, 2007 at 10:09 PM
True. Of course, then he could see what a government who persecutes all Christian and religious groups does. Perhaps then he’d know what real people do in the face of persecution and fear.
But then again, he’d probably just sit under a tree with Castro and extol the virtues of Cuba. All of them.
mjk on December 11, 2007 at 11:42 PM
P.S. I mean the ‘virtues of Cuba’ sarcastically.
mjk on December 11, 2007 at 11:43 PM
I wonder if the CBC or TVO will still air whatever Commie movie he was making in Toronto when he defected?
andycanuck on December 11, 2007 at 11:58 PM
Why are our leaders such p*ssies? Why don’t we surround this tiny little island with ships and call out “Raul! Surrender already!”
Congress can suggest this be our 54th state; Albania 51st, Puerto Rico 52nd, Saipan 53rd, and Cuba Libra 54!!!
AZCON on December 11, 2007 at 11:59 PM
Vent! Vent! Vent! :)
- The Cat
MirCat on December 12, 2007 at 1:24 AM
I gotta wonder what this guy’s jokes will be like: “In communist Cuba, cigar rolls you!”
James on December 12, 2007 at 7:49 AM
Headline: One of the most visible people in Cuba voluntarily leaves for a better life in America.
This is the kind of story that should catch fire in the American media, but it will die fast because it makes Castro look like a failure and America look like a success.
Now if Alec Baldwin left America for Cuba, he would become a media darling and MSNBC would give him an 8 yr contract to do a new show from Cuba.
realVerse on December 12, 2007 at 10:30 AM
Speaking as a half-Cuban, I’d just like to say I love Cuban defectors. Actually, I just like the word “defector,” it makes life seem like a Tom Clancy novel.
Enrique on December 12, 2007 at 10:43 AM
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