Take off that shirt: Che Guevara sucked!

The ubiquitous image of Ernesto "Che" Guevara adorns a panoply of commercial products these days: t-shirts, banners, hats, even coffee mugs. Snarky political commentators correctly point out two things (in between patting their own back): 1) the majority of those wearing/purchasing this merchandise don't know the second thing about him (they know the first, "rebel"); 2) as an ardent Marxist, he would greet this phenomena similar to a Pope discovering that his face was on currency in hell.

Guevara is rightly portrayed as an anti-establishment rebel that fought against perceived injustices. More educated adherents to his cult of personality know of his strong Marxist beliefs and consequent abhorrence of all things capitalistic. These same fools, undoubtedly surf the web in affluence, a position that no Marxist can reconcile, lest it be he that enjoys the affluence.

Guevara is often cast as a paragon of virtue; a man who died loyal to his values of revolution and "power to the people." Unfortunately for many Cubans, Che's values had a price: their lives. In carrying out the bloody Cuban revolution, Che advocated guerrilla warfare. Upon the disposition of the Batista regime, Che was elevated by his comrade Fidel Castro to serve as "supreme prosecutor." In this role, he presided over the executions of over one hundred in the Batista regime without regard for due process. Functioning as the sword of Castro, though under the "legitimate" aegis of the judiciary, Che's role was no less despotic than his former tormentors. Surely no social justice was meted out by virtue of his farcical foray into justice. Guevara was a man who did not compromise: "the enemy" was to be hated. This point is best illustrated by considering his claim that had the Cubans gained control of the nuclear arms present in Cuba during the missile crisis, he would have launched them.

Consigned to an ignominious death at the hands of the CIA and the Bolivian regime, Che's bitter tears are boiling on his face in hell. His "philosophy" has proved a failure; communism has been nearly eradicated from the globe, with those surviving regimes either drifting quickly towards capitalism (China) or totalitarian to the core in line with Batista (DPRNK). His message of hate and Marxism has been drowned out by his thriving t-shirt industry. He is the political version of James Dean's rebel, not without a cause, but who's cause has been obscured.