Our National Debt

Floor Speech

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Ms. SALAZAR. Madam Speaker, he had one of the finest pens in the Cuban exile community in its 60 years of banishment from the island.

There are very few writers who could capture the suffering of the Cuban people, a country that has paid the consequences of believing in a toxic political idea.

This was a man who could warn the rest of Latin America what would happen if they followed and believed Fidel Castro's false promises.

His name was Carlos Alberto Montaner, and he just passed at 80 years old.

His great political mission was to see a liberated Cuba.

I wonder how many people like him have died waiting for the island to be freed from the jaws of Communism?

Thousands upon thousands.

How will he be remembered?

We will remember him as a good man, a decent man who was kind and humble. His only preoccupation was to deliver a message of freedom to the Cubans and to his Latin American fellow men.

His articles were impeccable, profound, and yet accessible to anyone to understand. They were full of content and historical analysis thoroughly explaining the falsehoods that Communism promises and never delivers.

Montaner's book called ``Guide to the Perfect Latin American Idiot'' is a classic. It is a manual for Latin Americans to avoid falling for communist tricks and to avoid falling for what Fidel Castro has promised this hemisphere.

The reality is that the 20 most developed countries in the world are capitalist democracies. They have free markets, and they have freedom of expression and small government where the individual is allowed to decide their fate rather than some unknown bureaucrat in a distant government office.

The government serves only to establish the rules of the game, and the winner is decided by whomever plays it best.

Montaner was my teacher. I read his articles meticulously, and by taking notes on his best ideas, I learned so much from his analyses, not just for their brilliance but also because they were full of goodwill for his compatriots. They were full of freedom.

It was an honor to know him, to interview him, and to be his friend. We will miss him, and I offer my deepest condolences to his widow, Linda and to his daughter Gina.

In the future, democratic leaders of a liberated Cuba will owe Montaner a special place in the island's conscience. He helped pave the road to the idea that democracy is the best system for humanity.

May God cover him with His glory for he acted with purpose and honor in his time on Earth, always working for the love of his Latin-American family and admiring the American agenda.

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