Stoned

California writer/blogger Cathy Seipp recounts (in NRO) her conversation with liberal brat Hollywood director (redundant, I know) Oliver Stone:

I met a rather marinated-looking Oliver Stone a few years ago at a party, where we got into a little political disagreement. He didn’t scream at me, but he was belligerent.

“I think George Bush is a lesbian! A lesbian in a dress! And high heels,” he’d said conversationally, I suppose figuring I’d be appreciative. (The party was, after all, at Arianna Huffington’s house, and filled with major Democratic donors.) Why is it, I wondered, that when a man disapproves of another man the worst thing he can think of to say is that the man is really a woman?

“That’s your fantasy,” I said coldly.

“Are you calling me a...fantasist!” Stone yelled. Well, yes. Especially after he went on to say that he’d just returned from the Palestine, where he’d been interviewing Arafat. I asked if that was a package tour that included stopovers in Utopia and Xanadu. The conversation kind of went downhill from there, and luckily the valet soon pulled up with Stone’s car.

I'm surprised the creator of "JFK," "Nixon," "Commandante" and "Looking for Fidel," denies flitting with fantasies.

(source: HBO)

Indeed, it's impossible to professes astonishment or under-rate Stone, given his quotes about Cuba and Castro, about which he's made two films:

• To start with, anti-Castro groups were vital in implementing the dirty business of the butterfly ballots ensuring Bush's victory at the 2000 elections. The right wing is the same everywhere, in Cuba or Viet Nam. It is like an octopus, snatching everything with its tentacles. They control the Internet, radio and TV stations, and newspapers. But above all, they are perfectly organized. Right wingers master the art of negative publicity and are capable of destroying the image of anyone they consider to be their enemy. They annihilate anything opposed to their interests, utilizing mass emailing, articles, and reports. In the United States, censorship is the order of the day. It is really sad to think that Florida may end up deciding the November elections once again, and that the extreme-right wing, including anti-Castro groups, may manipulate the results for a second time. . .
  
  I admire Fidel because he is a survivor; He has survived several U.S. presidents who have tried to eliminate him. [Stone also said he admired Castro because of] his self confidence and honesty.
  
  WorldNetDaily, Sept 25, 2004.



• Ann Louise Baradach: Now, when you were talking to the [Cuban]prisoners who tried to hijack a plane, one told you he was a fisherman, and you said, "Why then didn't you take a boat?" Why did you ask that?
  
  Oliver Stone: Well, it seemed to me that if they were familiar with boats, it seemed to be the best way.
  
  ALB: Did you know that in Cuba there are virtually no boats? The boats that are used for fishermen are tightly controlled. One of the more surreal aspects of Cuba, being the largest island in the Caribbean, is that there are no visible boats.
  
  OS: I see. . .
  
  ALB: Let me ask you about the part [in the film] where Castro's in front of eight prisoners charged with attempting to hijack a plane [to Miami]. He says to them, "I want you all to speak frankly and freely." What do you make of that whole scene, where you have these prisoners who happened to be wearing perfectly starched, nice blue shirts?
  
  OS: Let me give you the background. He obviously set it up overnight. It was in that spirit that he said, "Ask whatever you want. I'm sitting here. I want to hear it too. I want to hear what they're thinking." He let me run the tribunal, so to speak.
  
  ALB: But Cuba's leader for life is sitting in front of these guys who are facing life in prison, and you're asking them, "Are you well treated in prison?" Did you think they could honestly answer that question?
  
  OS: If they were being horribly mistreated, then I don't know that they could be worse mistreated [afterward].
  
  ALB: So in other words, you think they thought this was their best shot to air grievances? Rather than that if they did speak candidly, there'd be hell to pay when they got back to prison?
  
  OS: I must say, you're really picturing a Stalinist state. It doesn't feel that way. You can always find horrible prisons if you go to any country in Central America.
  
  ALB: Did you go to the prisons in Cuba?
  
  OS: No, I didn't. . .
  
  ALB: What about when you ask them what they think is a fair sentence for their crimes, and one of them starts to talk about how he'd like to have 30 years in prison?
  
  OS: I was shocked at that. But Bush would have shot these people, is what Castro said. … I don't know what the parole system is.
  
  ALB: There is none unless Fidel Castro decides to give you clemency.
  
  Interview in Slate, April 14, 2004.



• "In Cuba, I observed an openness and freedom that I had not found in any other country in the region, the Caribbean or Central America. I . . . have never seen the kind of spontaneous affection for a leader expressed on the streets as I have seen in Cuba towards Fidel."
  
  Comments before the premier of his second movie about Castro, "Looking For Fidel," at the 52nd San Sebastian Film Festival in Spain, quoted by Greg Strange in Etherzone.



• Castro is isolated in the hemisphere and for those reasons I admire him because he's a fighter. He stood alone and in a sense he's Don Quixote, the last revolutionary, tilting at this windmill of keeping the island in a state of, I suppose, egalitarianism where everyone would get the break, everyone gets the education and everyone gets good water.
  
  Interview with BBC, quoted by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.



• The manifestations in the streets praising Fidel Castro are not false; if they were, the people deserve an Oscar award, because I have seen the happiness in their face when they approach the leader.
  
  Interview in Granma, Cuba's state-run official paper, September 21, 2004.



• We should look to [Castro] as one of the earth's wisest people, one of the people we should consult.
  
  Remarks at Berlin film festival, quoted by William F. Buckley, April 22, 2003.



• I thought he was a charming man, and a movie star, no question about it. The hard part of Comandante was cutting. We could have used almost anything from the 30 hours of film. I was amazed at his inner strength. His morality. He really believes in a dream. It's like Don Quixote.
  
  Quoted by Tim Adams, Guardian (UK) film writer, August 31, 2003.

Calling Castro wise, and likening him to Cervantes' loopy but lovable hero, is more than fantasy: Stone and his films are a nightmare.

More:

The truth about Cuba, part LXXVI, from Babalu Blog:

All of you on the island have to understand that despite . . . the lack of electricity, despite the lack of fresh milk for your babies, despite the all of these things, you are still human beings, you have dignity and worth, you are God’s children like the rest of us. And when the frustration is too much, you have to rise up and yell, ¡Ya no mas! -- "I've had enough!"

Everything around us, that is created by man, was once just a thought. The power of the mind to create reality is beyond dispute. These words can empower the people of Cuba with the spirit of liberty. Despite all that the government can do to them, they can still say them and they can still think them. I hope they pass the meme along, paint the words on buildings, write them on the sidewalk, write them in their ration books. All they have to do is to believe them.

"I’ve had enough."