Most people haven't realized that it's been a battle in the trenches between Francis Suarez and Joe Carollo to see who can portray themselves as being the most ardent supporter of the plight of the Venezuelan people.

In Carollo's case, he at least can claim that his wife is Venezuelan, but for Suarez, his constant appearances and comments seem either to be an effort to bank support from Venezuelans for his future political aspirations, or as a way to deflect attention from the fact that as the part-time ceremonial Mayor of Miami he has a lot of free time on his hands, and popping up in front of microphones and showing up at rallies outside of the city limits are as good a way to spend that time as any, plus it does offer him the opportunity to preen and portray himself as a champion of freedom and liberty.

Now, that's not to say that the good folks in Venezuela don't need and deserve all the support that they can get to try and rid themselves of that thuggish moron who's currently El Presidente, because they do, but there's a disturbing pattern of behavior that exposes itself every time Miami politicians decide to stand up and champion their fellow Latins who are being abused in foreign countries.

More often than not, the Latins that get the support are White, and being subjected to the terror of leftist dictators.  Seldom, if ever have Miami's politicians stood up and voiced their opposition to the terror inflicted to our Brown Latin brothers and sisters being terrorized by rightwing dictators!

Last June, with a collection of other Mayors, Francis Suarez flew to the Mexican border for a photo op with other mayors, and had the gall to declare that this photo op was little more than a political stunt.

Here is the photo I posted the photo at the time with my comment about Suarez's behavior..

The real evidence that this Mexican border crossing photo op, was just that and nothing more, was that Suarez upon his return did not pop up in front of microphones denouncing the Trump administration's behavior, nor did he show up at the next Commission meeting with a Resolution in support of all of those poor, Brown women and children who were obviously suffering as much, if not more at the hands of the dictators and gangs in their countries than the Venezuelans were in their country.

Terrible, nasty, vicious and deadly violence doesn't make distinctions for skin color or for political parties and ideologies!

What Suarez did do was proclaim that he wanted to lead a group of local Mayor's to the Homestead facility where several hundreds children were being held, and after 30-40 days, by which time everyone else looking for a photo op had managed to make their way to the front of the Homestead facility, Suarez and his little band of local municipal mayors showed up for their photo op, and just as quickly, went away never to return or to say jack shit about the plight of the children inside the building.

That was months ago, and Suarez has remained silent, just as Carollo has remained silent, about the treatment of the children in the facilities.  

To truly appreciate the abject cowardice of Francis Suarez, Joe Carollo, and all the other right-wing so-called Cuban patriots who pop up like Jack-In-The-Boxes whenever a White Latin man, woman or child is perceived to be in harms way, while ignoring the plight of the Brown men, women and children who are being fucked over, including those being fucked over by our own country.

It's been 55 years since the Pedro Pan flights out of Cuba started, and there is not a month, or often a week that goes by that some Cuban exile who was on one of those flights doesn't talk about the impact of what that separation from his/her family meant.

Imagine what we would be going through today if those Cuban children, instead of being spirited off to a hopefully better life had been snatched at the Miami International Airport by immigration officers and carted off to detention facilities?

The cowardice, and the failure of Francis Suarez, Joe Carollo, Manolo Reyes, Willie Gort and Ken Russell to have months ago stood up and proclaimed with the same exclamations of freedom, liberty and humanity that they extol when declaring the evils that have befallen the Cuban and Venezuelan children that the housing children in a detention facility our county was completely unacceptable behavior is evidence of the self-serving political exploitation that these people engage in whenever the opportunity arrises!

Here are just a handful of Suarez's Twitter pronouncements of the plight of the folks in Venezuelan people. You'll not find any similar pronouncements on the plight of children in detention facilities in this country, or this county!

SUAREZ TWEETS

This isn't a story about the proposed changes to the Neighborhood Conservation Districts (NCD's) that have sparked so much controversy and concern among so many folks in Coconut Grove over the last few months, because I neither understand, or care about how the final vote comes down. That's a problem and concern for the folks in Coconut Grove - rich and poor - to sort out because they are the ones who are going to be forced to live with the consequences.

My concern, when I received the above notice was about the obvious refusal to have these Sunshine Meetings televised.

Understand, the Sunshine Law doesn't require that ANY meetings be televised or video recorded, but just about every municipality does so, some record all meetings, and some record some meetings.

I would not have been concerned if, as has happened on other occasions a Sunshine meeting between commissioners was held in a location away from city hall, where it would have caused a problem and expense to record the meeting on video, much less to broadcast it live, but in this case these meetings were going to be held in the Commission Chambers during regular work hours, and given all the aggravation, allegations, accusations, and anger generated by the efforts that these changes have already generated, I figured that more transparency and exposure, and not less, was something that needed to accompany any meetings where these issues were going to be discussed.

So, I wrote Commissioner Russell, who had called for these meetings.

It took 2 days to get a response from his Chief of Staff Rebecca Wakefield because the Commissioner never responds to email, unless its from someone who's kissing his ass, or wanting to give him a campaign contribution.

I have not, nor do I expect to receive a response, but if you share in the concern for these meetings to be video recorded and televised live, then send Commissioner "Sellout" an email, and send Rebecca one too.

krussell@miamigov.com <krussell@miamigov.com>

rebecca <RWakefield@miamigov.com>

I found Rebecca's response to be lacking, and responded.