It was five years ago this week, on November 25, 2016, that Cuba’s Fidel Castro died. Instead of dwelling on the repressive nature of Castro’s rule, media outlets couldn’t resist hailing him as a murderous dictator. They cheered his efforts in literacy and health care, but they were less focused on the murder and jailing.
Dec 4, 2016, NBC Nightly News Morgan Radford appeared caught up in the drama of the funeral, recounting, “Tears of grief and patriotic cries. Thousands lined the streets to greet the caravan of Fidel Castro’s ashes.” She touted, “His remains arriving in the city where his revolution was born.”
Radford found a woman who cried, “I feel sad because I feel like I lose my father.” Another touted “His ideas will always be with us.” The reporter closed by summarizing, “A final farewell to a leader with a complicated legacy.” What was that legacy, exactly? It was not explained by her.
As the MRC’s Brent Baker noted, Andrea Mitchell saluted the dictator for “dramatically improv[ing] health care and literacy.” Journalists have been parroting that talking point for years. In 2002, Barbara Walters infamously insisted, “Castro believes education is the key to freedom. If literacy were all that was important, Cuba would be ranked as the most free nation on Earth.”
Of course, if freedom was the yardstick for freedom, Castro’s Cuba wouldn’t do so well.
(For additional examples of Castro-esque gushing at Castro’s funeral see this post from the Rich Noyes at MRC.)
Continue The New York TimesThe newspaper on the flattering behavior of communist dictators. December 4, 2016 offered this headline: “A Man So Large in a Box So Small.” That was the highest ranking publication by The Associated Press, saluting the “near-religious farewell to the man who ruled the country for nearly 50 years.
In a moment that perfectly symbolized the failure of communism, the jeep carrying Castro’s body broke down during the funeral. It was ignored by the news networks. But Conan O’Brien didn’t. His TBS Show December 5, 2016., he mocked, “On Saturday, the hearse carrying Fidel Castro’s remains broke down and had to be pushed. Cuba’s minister for metaphors was driving the hearse.
You can find more FLASHBACK examples in our NewsBusters Time Machine. Go here.
[A version of this article first appeared on December 5, 2020.]
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