The news is so bad these days, we could all benefit from journalists taking the time to report more inspirational tales. Thankfully, Time magazine is here to help, as evidenced by this uplifting headline: “How Che Guevara Didn’t Let Asthma Affect His Ambitions.” Wait . . . what?
Yes, that was a real article at Time. The general tone of the piece can best be described as walking a fine line between horrifying and cheeky. Here’s how it begins:
The Scrapbook does not go around wishing misery on young children, but we do note that if asthma had taken Che at a young age, many thousands more would be alive today. After all, this is the same man who presided over mass executions of people guilty of such crimes as being gay or Catholic. It must be this fanatical commitment to equality that helps explain why so many contemporary progressives still proudly wear T-shirts with Che’s likeness. That, or they’re historically illiterate peabrains.
Time, for its part, makes Che sound like a really fun guy, based on this anecdote explaining how Che became the head of Cuba’s central bank:
What a wacky mix-up! That story is even funnier when you consider that Cubans have been living in grinding poverty for the last 56 years thanks to the brutal dictatorship that runs their country.
The article notes that Che was finally able to keep his asthma in check thanks to a medication prescribed by a Soviet doctor—medicine made in America. We’d revel in the irony, but we’re too alarmed by what we saw at the last Democratic debate, where Bernie Sanders pounded the podium and declared that American pharmaceutical companies are his biggest enemy. On this issue at least, Sanders seems to be to the left of Che. The good news is that after Sanders drops out of the presidential race, there’s still a Caribbean paradise where he and his die-hard supporters can move—and it’s blessedly free from pharmaceutical innovation. Medicine may be in short supply there, but the roads in Havana are paved with good intentions.
