Will the US push Honduras over the Edge?

It sure looks like our government is trying to do just that:

Honduras at the Tipping Point
Why is the U.S. not supporting the rule of law?

Good question. We are siding with the dictators of Venezuela and Cuba. Why?
     

The fun music of ''Rumba King" Xavier Cugat

We've had this CD for years, and every once in a while I pull it out an play it. I played it for dinner on new year's eve, and gave it another spin last night:



Rumbas! Tangos! Congas! (24 Songs)

This particular album has three songs on it that are sung by Dinah Shore:

track 01: The Breeze and I (can be heard on the YouTube soundtrack below)

track 11: La Cumparsita

track 18: Quierme Mucho (Yours)

It made me curious about his career and the people he worked with, so I did a Google search. Here are some of the things I discovered.

I got the cover photo of my CD from Amazon.com, where you can buy used copies for $1.98. One might think his music has faded away, but it hasn't. There are many other albums of his work that are selling quite nicely.




Xavier Cugat was Born January 1st, 1900, in Catalonia, Spain. He died in 1990 from heart failure. But in those 90 years, he had a very interesting life.

This Unofficial Xavier Cugat website gives a short summary of his life and work:

Xavier Cugat, the king of the Rhumba, was born in Gerona, Spain, on January 1 1900. At a young age, Xavier Cugat, became fascinated by the towns violin-maker. According to legend, the violin-maker was so fed up with the young boy's questions, that, on his saint's day, he gave him a violin. Soon, thereafter, his family emigrated to Cuba, where young Xavier, became entranced with the intriguing rhythms and melodies of the tropics.

By the age of twelve, the young Mr. Cugat, held the position of first violinist in Havana. At the age of fifteen, Xavier, left Cuba for the United States and immediately found work touring with Enrico Caruso. a perfectionist, Xavier Cugat, vowed that if he were not the world's greatest violinist by a certain date, he would quit. Although he was well received by musical audiences the world over, he was not satisfied with his progress, and quit.

Cugat then went to work for the Los Angeles Times as a caricaturist. The deadlines were to demanding and eventually Cugat went on to form his first band, Cugat and the Gigolos. He captivated audiences and dancers with their then unusual music, later to be known as, the Rhumba. Cugat then set up shop in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel and became the Hotel's resident group. "Cugie" was a notorious womanizer and of his four wives many of them appeared in his bands. In the 50's Abbe Lane did most of the singing, and later on in the 70's and 80's Charo (wife #4) sang for him, billed as a "folk" singer. Xavier Cugat died on October 27, 1990.

For a more complete biography, see the link below, the biography at SOLID! But I'll try to summarize a few of the things I've read about him at various places.

His family moved to Cuba when he was 5. They immigrated to the USA (NYC) when he was 15. After trying for a career as a classical violenist, he got a job as a cartoonist for the LA Times newspaper. He disliked the deadlines the newspaper required, and pulled together a band that performed in nightclubs in LA. This launched his long career in music, bringing Latin music into the American mainstream via live performances, radio, movies and even a TV show. He became a regular feature at New York's Waldorf Astoria, and spend much time traveling between LA and NY. Many of the details of his career can be found at the Xavier Cugat Wikipedia page.

He followed the fun dancing trends, making records for the conga, the mambo, the cha-cha-cha, and the twist when each was popular. He had a reputation for marketing. Often he was photographed holding a chihuahua and a pipe. He sold "Cugat" chihuahua's, and his own line of pipes, even though he didn't smoke! He was once rumored to have said, “I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve.”


Xavier Cugat with wife Charo

He was married four or five times (there are conflicting reports). His last wife was "Charo". He was 66 when he married her, and she was 15, passing for 25! From Charo's Wiki page:

[...] Official documents in Murcia, Spain (where she was born) and the United States indicate she was born in 1941, but Charo insists she actually was born in 1951, a claim that has been upheld in court (see below).

The performer has said in past interviews that her parents allowed her to falsify her age to appear to be older after marrying 66-year-old band leader Xavier Cugat when she was 15. Further complicating the question is the fact that contemporary press reports gave her age at marriage as 21, an April 1966 column on the wedding plans stated she was 20 and Cugat was 60, and columns less than two years before the marriage refer to her as Cugat's "18-year-old protegée"—which, if she was falsifying her age, would have made her actually 13 at the time. [...]

(see link for footnotes) In an interview in 2005, Charo described her marriage to Cugat as a "business contract":

[...] In a February 2005 interview with the Los Angeles-based Spanish-language newspaper La Opinión, Charo claimed that her marriage to Cugat had been merely a "business contract," a way for him to legally bring her over to the United States, where he was based. She moved to 257th street in The Bronx, New York City along with her mother and aunt, and was regularly featured in shows with Cugat's orchestra in New York and Las Vegas, as well as in overseas engagements in Latin America and Europe. She claims he was confident in her eventual success from early on, and that she gave him a Rolls-Royce as a parting gift once she came of legal age. [...]

In 1971, Cugat suffered a stroke, and retired from show business. After his divorce from Charo in 1978, he moved to Barcelona, where he ended his days.

A video clip, "She's a Bombshell from Brooklyn" (From "Stage Door Canteen", 1943. 3 minutes and 19 seconds):



Carmen Miranda-Orq Xavier Cugat (3 minutes 31 seconds):



Xavier Cugat orq-Lina Romay-Carlos Ramirez-Esther Williams (6 minutes, 2 seconds):



Xavier Cugat - "The Breeze And I" Recorded in 1940 Vocals by Dinah Shore (3 minutes 33 seconds):




Related Links:

Xavier Cugat biography at SOLID!

IMDB Xavier Cugat

You Tube videos
     

McCain, offshore drilling, China and Cuba

So the latest thing that has people on the far left and far right screaming is that McCain wants to lift ban on offshore drilling. The Right says he needs to drill ANWAR too, the Left says it proves he's not serious about the environment or global warming.

To me, it proves he's very much a genuine centrist. A centrist is willing to compromise, which always infuriates the extremists who are unwilling to bend.

I've been maintaining that many of the environmentalists are really just leftists wanting to use environmental causes to fight capitalism. Here is a good example. They don't want to let us drill off our coastlines, but they say nothing about Cuba hiring China to drill for oil just outside of where our drilling rights end. From last Friday's Nealz Nuze:

SO ... IS CHINA REALLY DRILLING OFF CUBA?

Yesterday Florida Senator Mel Martinez said that China drilling off the coast of Cuba was merely an urban legend. So because we here at the Neal Boortz Show are so incredibly fair and balanced ... we have tried to get to the bottom of this mystery. Here's what we found.

All the way back in 2004, China's Petrochemical Corporation known as Sinopec signed a memorandum of understanding with Cuba's national oil company, known as Cupet to explore four oil blocks in Cuba. Keep in mind that both of these companies are owned by their communist governments. China's Sinopec conducted six months of geological studies of the four Cuban blocks. This was the first attempt by Sinopec, China's second largest oil and gas company, to enter oil and gas exploration and production in Cuba.

Then in 2005, China's Sinopec signed an agreement with the Cuban government to jointly produce oil in Cuba off the coast of Pinar del R�o. Ok so let's get this straight. The governments of China and Cuba enter into a production sharing agreement ... what exactly does that mean? This is when the Cuban government awards the execution of exploration and production activities to an international oil company like Sinopec. The contractor bears the mineral and financial risk of the initiative and, when successful, recovers capital expenditure and costs incurred in the year (cost oil) by means of a share of production.

So now, for your reading pleasure (and Mel Martinez's) is a timeline of China's oil exploration efforts in Cuba. This is from the World Security Institute ...

2005

January 31: Cuba and China signed a contract in Havana providing for the Asian giant's participation in extracting oil from a deposit off the island's north shore, the press reported. The deal is between Cubapetroleos and the Chinese oil company Sinopec, said the official daily newspapaer Granma. In December, Fidel Castro announced discovery of oil at a site offshore from Santa Cruz del Norte, some 55 kilometers (33 miles) east of Havana. The deposit is believed to hold some 100 million barrels of "light" crude, or the equivalent of 14 million tons. (EFE, Prensa Latina, 31/1/05)
February 8: China's oil giants began cultivating their virgin soil in Cuba. China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), as the first comer, has inked a contract with Cuba Oil Company (Cubapetroleo) to jointly exploit oil in the Caribbean country. Under the terms of their contract, the two sides will join forces to prospect and exploit a potential oil-producing region. Chinese experts believe it is a significant beginning of the cooperation between China and Cuba in the petroleum industry. (SinoCast, 8/2/05)
March 22: Chinese oil drilling equipment has begun arriving in Cuba as state-run Cubapetroleo (Cupet) and its foreign partners prepare to significantly increase drilling along the northwest coast, industry sources said. "Four service units and a small rig have arrived and we are waiting for more," said a Cuban oil service manager, asking his name not be used. There are currently five rigs operating along the northwest heavy oil belt, an 80-mile (128-km) stretch of coast in Havana and Matanzas provinces from whence come all of Cuba's 70,000 to 80,000 barrels per day of heavy crude at 8 API to 18 API and with a high sulfur content. The poor-quality oil is burned in modified power plants and factories. (Reuters, 22/3/05)

April 6: The operator of China's second-largest Shengli oilfield is stepping up overseas exploration, spending more on such ventures this year as the world's No. 2 oil user grapples with falling reserves, officials said. Shengli Oilfield Administration Bureau, a unit of state-run Sinopec Group, will spend about $40 million drilling for oil and gas in Cuba, Iran and central Asia in 2005, company officials said. "This will be the heaviest spending in a year and we expect the pace to continue in the next few years," a Shengli executive told the press. Shengli, which is among the first Chinese companies to venture abroad, will sink a total of eight wildcat and appraisal wells this year, four in Kazakhstan, two in Iran, and one each in Cuba and Kyrgyzstan. (Reuters, 6/4/05)

November 24: PetroChina Great Wall Drilling Co., Ltd. and Petroleum Company of Cuba held a ceremony for signing two drilling service contracts on November 3, 2005. It is the second-time cooperation between Great Wall Drilling Co., Ltd. and Petroleum Company of Cuba after the signing of a one-year petroleum service agreement on one 1500HP drilling rig and one 2000HP rig on April 8 this year. The contract signed this time includes three 2000HP drilling rigs. The contract has a period of one year and a value of over US$24 million. The project will be launched in January 2006. (China Chemical Reporter, 24/11/05)

December 22: Sinopec of China signed an agreement earlier this year to jointly produce heavy oil with Cupet in westernmost Pinar del R�o province, with drilling expected to begin in 2006. (The Oil Daily, 27/12/05)

Still not convinced Senator Martinez? Here are some more reports from 2005 from the Energy Intelligence Group and National Post's Financial Post & FP Investing in Canada.

... China is seeking oil everywhere and Cuba is no exception. Three large Chinese companies, SINOPEC, Petro China and CINOOC - China National Offshore Corporation, are involved in a large agreement, perhaps already underway, for coastal and deep-water explorations. Most significant to this topic, especially in light of other Chinese investment in Cuba, is the fact that Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, has stated a goal of helping boost Cuba's domestic oil production and producing 60% of its oil needs by 2006 ... Additional plans for exploration and development of other blocs of potential reserves were announced by two other Chinese oil companies, China National Petroleum Corp. and China National Offshore Oil Corp., after talks with CUPET, Cuba Petroleum. Some exploration will be in coastal regions but much, based on the better quality of the oil, will take place in off-shore deep waters.

Let's cut to the chase ... and pardon me if I scream here:

The point isn't that China is not presently drilling for oil within 90 miles of the U.S. The point is that they CAN! --- and, thanks to the Democrat congress --- we CAN'T.

Democrats would like us to wrangle over what IS happening. The issue is what CAN happen. They can drill. We can't. They're planning to. We aren't. Even government educated Democrat myrmidons can understand that.

So Cuba, with China's help (and the help of the Leftists in the USA), can drain the oil reserves WE don't ALLOW ourselves to drill, by drilling on the edge where our water rights end. The Commies win, we loose. Because we LET them.