Dictator on the Kensington

Isn't that Fidel Castro trying to sell us a taco?

The Buffalo News

What's happened to the communists we all loved to hate?  It's bad enough that Mikhail Gorbachev is in Washington, squeezing a few meetings with George Bush into a larger lovefest with America.
It's sad enough that Daniel Ortega has been seen hugging Violeta Chamorro after losing a (gasp) election in Nicaragua.
It's shocking that smiling Russian generals have been showing up in places like the U.S. Congress for a little jovial testifying on their arms arrangements.
But we thought there was at least one scary Red we could count on not to turn into a Mr. Commie Nice Guy.  Surely the Hemispheric Horror, Fidel Castro, could be relied on to remain fierce and intimidating to the end.
So what's he doing smiling from billboards along the Kensington Expressway, and waving his cigar in newspaper ads, talking about a "dinner revolution"?  And all in the service of a suspiciously capitalist-sounding institution called Mighty Taco?
It's not that Fidel has exactly given in.  While even Albania is trying to put on a happy semi-democratic face, he has officially stood fast, still going in for table-pounding and shouts about fighting the good communist fight to the end.
Castro didn't really pose for those ads.  We suspect the use of that common running dog of advertising, a lookalike.  But even if he isn't participating willingly in the transformation, something has definitely happened to Fidel Castro's image.
Try to imagine this scene 25 years ago – or even five years ago.  Would any restaurant chain that ever wanted to sell another nacho in America have used Fidel Castro in its ads?  Even the idea would have been instant heartburn.
Sure, it's only a joke.  But the point is that it works at all.  Somehow, Fidel Castro has become credible as a friendly taco salesman.  And if that isn't the triumph of capitalism, we don't know what is.
To our knowledge, no one has yet asked Castro how he feels about having been turned into a capitalist tool.  He would be unlikely to be delighted if he knew.
But even if Castro finds out, the taco barons probably have little to fear from him in the way of a reprisal.
Filing a lawsuit would just be too bourgeois a thing to do.