Class Discussion on Fidel Castro

Today, we had a very interesting class discussion on Fidel Castro's rise to power.  We discussed every aspect of it - his motives, his potential, and what he did versus his intention.  We came into class prepared with a list of "reasons the rebels were fighting".  Many people had the same things, but we ended up not really using them.  The conversation went on pretty well on its own.  As we were discussing the lists, we realized that a lot of them were things that Castro used to appear a better candidate for a Batista replacement.  Things that he might have used as reasons that he was the best person for the position.  My favorite thing that we talked about was how we viewed Castro - politician or army leader?  He seemed to have an agenda when he was overthrowing Batista which made him appear as more of a politician, but he also organized the entire rebel forces to overthrow Batista.  We also talked about how it seemed to be OK for politicians to make promises for what they're going to do but completely ignore them once in office.  Fidel made a lot of promises that he didn't keep - about half of the things he said he was going to do in the reading.  When we were talking, I'm sure that you noticed that Max and I were talking on our own for a section of it. We were actually having a serious discussion comparing Castro to Obama.  And every time a new element was brought up, we would discuss its connection to our current day government.  It all started with the things that Castro said that he was going to do and did, then what he said he was going to do but didn't, then what he didn't say he was going to do but did anyway.  We discussed the possibility of our own country's government going askew, and how it might come about.  I really enjoyed this discussion as well as the group discussion.