 HAVANA (AP)
-- The Cubans who converted a 1951 Chevy pickup into a boat and reached
within 40 miles of Florida said Thursday they were sure that the audacity
of their act would guarantee entry into the United States.
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- But a U.S. Customs plane spotted their unusual, bright-green
craft in the Florida Straits and they were sent back to the island.
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- "We thought that they would let us in because it
was so outrageous," Ariel Diego Marcel told Associated Press Television
News.
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- The truck-raft was kept afloat by empty 55-gallon drums
attached to the bottom as pontoons. A propeller attached to the drive shaft
of the green vintage pickup was pushing it along at about 8 mph.
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- "We arrived at the coast in the same truck and assembled
everything in six hours," said another of the would-be immigrants,
Eduardo Perez Gras. "If they had let us get to Key West, we would
have been able to drive it right onto the sand."
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- The nine men, two women and baby were at sea for 31 hours
before the plane spotted them. The truck was sunk as a hazard to ocean
navigation.
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- Under U.S. immigration policies, Cubans who reach U.S.
shores are allowed to stay while those caught at sea are usually returned.
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- Migrants have been founds on rafts or small boats made
out of refrigerators, bathtubs, surfboards and inner tubes, but U.S. Coast
Guard officials said this week that the truck appeared to be a first.
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- Comment
Alton Raines
7-25-03
Now, here is a perfect example of evil. It's the kind of evil that the
system has us get used to, take for granted, complacently ignore. This
administration claims to give a damn about the oppressed and slaughtered
of Iraq, even makes vague motions that it cares about the oppressed and
slaughtered of Liberia, but look at what it does to these nautical geniuses!?
These people have defied all odds, shark infested waters and the perils
of ocean travel in their struggle for freedom and democracy, for a chance
at some piece of happiness... and the government turns them back! Sends
them home to Cuba to a certain death in a country equally oppressive and
guilty of mass murder as Iraq, and one less than 91 miles off the coast
of Florida! Is this insanity or what? It's evil, plain and simple. Evil
and pathetic.
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- Comment
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- From Jim Mortellaro
Jsmortell@aol.com
7-26-3
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- It's 'pure evil' that these intrepid illegal aliens are
turned away from the shores of these United States? It should be deemed
pure evil to do the opposite, accept them. And here is one reason why ...
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- Hypothetically writing ... let's say that everyone who
wishes entry into the USA, illegally, decides like our Cuban neighbors,
to get really creative, knowing that the morons in the States will "Let
their people in!"
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- What happens now? Anyone with an ounce of brains can
make it to the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave. Anyone. Or is it
the Land of the Fee and the home of the Knave? No matter.
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- Thanks. But no thanks. This writer would close the borders
for the foreseeable future making it even more difficult for those who
would enter this nation illegally. There are way too many of us in this
country now. The cost in environmental issues, welfare, the Medicaid system
and all the rest, is overwhelming. And then there is the concern of terrorism.
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- Pure evil, eh? The so-called Cuban Boat People brought
among them some of the best citizens the USA ever had. But along with those
good, now very successful citizens, came the worst crime wave Miami (and
Florida in general) ever had. In it's entire history! I am not one fro
taking the bad with the good. Not that much bad.
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- Interested in inviting these 'creative entrepreneurs'
into your State? Howzabout your town? Block? Neighbor, neighbor?
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- Jim Mortellaro
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