Shallow comment of the day

I don't have anything deep to say about the not unexpected demise of a historical figure, but I'm grateful to the Guardian for devoting an extra article to all the failed attempts to kill Fidel Castro, which reminded me that long before the Orange Menace, reality beat satire every time. I mean: if someone invented said attempts, they'd be accused of over the top anti American caricature. Surely the CIA would not be that clumsy and ridiculous, etc.

Incidentally, the article included some new-to-me attempts; of course I knew about the cigars, but the cunning scuba-diving and exploding mollusks plan (are we sure a US descendant of Blackadder wasn't involved?) was new intel. Incidentally, what still surprises me from today's perspective isn't that the CIA proved so embarassing inept at killing Castro, but that when they outsourced the task to the Mafia, the mob proved equally as inept.

...then again, mobsters owe their reputations as much to Hollywood as the CIA does, so it makes sense again.