Political Quotes

“I rise today to discuss the protests we have seen erupt in Cuba over the past several days. On Sunday, shouts of ``libertad!''--freedom!--were heard in dozens of cities and towns all over Cuba as people took to the streets to protest the communist government that has had a stranglehold on that nation for 62 years. This socialist regime has tortured, killed, silenced, denied freedom, and driven into exile generations of Cubans, forcing many, including my family, to flee or to be murdered. It has cut off Cuba from the rest of the world. It has destroyed its economy so that, today, Cubans stand in long lines for food, for medicine, for basic supplies. They endure energy blackouts, and government officials can shut off their censored internet service on a whim--as they did on Sunday when the regime panicked about the protests. This battle for freedom is personal to me. When Fulgencio Batista staged a coup in Cuba and became a brutal dictator in the 1950s, my father fought against his regime. My dad was imprisoned and tortured. His captors broke his nose and bashed in his front teeth so they were dangling from his mouth. My father fled Cuba--the country he had fought for and had been brutalized for trying to save--and in 1957, my father came to the United States. He went to Texas with $100 sewn into his underwear. He had nothing. He attended the University of Texas on a student visa and got a job washing dishes, making 50 cents an hour.…”