MURDERER GOES FREE. In one of my first posts at TAPPED, I discussed the case of Luis Posada Carriles, an anti-Castro terrorist connected with the CIA who, in 1976, murdered 73 Cubans by blowing up their airliner. The aircraft included such threats to freedom as the twenty-four members of the Cuban Youth Fencing team. Posada is wanted by Venezuela, which wishes to charge him in that attack and in others. The U.S. refuses to turn Posada over, purportedly because it fears he'll be tortured in custody. The far more likely reasons are Posada's extensive connections with the CIA and his popularity in the Cuban Exile movement.
In any case, Posada was freed last week, in preparation for a trial on immigration charges on May 11. Whether or not he'll show is an open question, as he clearly has friends with money and influence. Consider: It's not in serious question that Posada is a terrorist and a murderer. If we had a sniff that he were at all involved with a terrorist attack against the U.S., he would probably have been extradited to a third country for torture, or sent to one of our own torture facilities in Eastern Europe or Cuba. Because he murdered Cubans, and because the Exiles like him, we pretend that we care about torture and decide to set him free. Moral clarity, folks. Also see this, by the Venezuelan ambassador.
--Robert Farley
