Not Only Obama Supporters Love Che

All this time I figured Che Guevara was popular only among whacked-out Obama campaign employees and leftist judges.

Well, it turns out there are plenty of fruitcakes in his native country of Argentina as well.

A bronze statue of Ernesto "Che" Guevara was unveiled on Saturday in the Argentine city where he was born exactly 80 years ago, the first such monument to the revolutionary in his homeland.

Thousands of students, leftist activists and residents marched through Rosario to pay homage to the long-haired guerrilla fighter, who left his country as a young man to lead armed struggles including Cuba's 1959 revolution alongside Fidel Castro.

"I believe in the revolution, that's why I love Che," said Monica Nielson, 49, wearing a soldier's beret with a single star like that worn by Guevara in a photo that turned him into a 20th Century icon.

"El Che," a national hero in Communist Cuba, is one of Argentina's most famous sons. But he has been slow to get recognition as a national figure at home.

For years after CIA-backed troops executed him in the Bolivian jungle in 1967, he was still too controversial for public recognition in Argentina.

The leaders of the country's 1976-83 "dirty war" dictatorship banned his image, and attackers bombed the middle-class Rosario apartment building where Guevara was born in 1928 after the local council put up a commemorative plaque there.

A handful of high schools bear Guevara's name, and a small museum opened in one of his former homes in 2001. But in a country with a penchant for naming streets and avenues after obscure Spanish viceroys, his absence is notable, said leftist historian Felipe Pigna.

"It's disgraceful that in a city like Buenos Aires ... there's not a single street named after Doctor Guevara," he said.

You see, he was just misunderstood. And besides, it was the mean rightwingers who didn't even want to discuss him.

"Che is more of a historical figure nowadays," said Horacio Ghirardi, organizer of the tribute in Rosario. "He was always very controversial in the country, especially among the right, which couldn't stand him or even tolerate debate about him."

Gosh, such intolerance, dismissing as unworthy a mass murderer.

Not everyone has slurped the Che Kool-Aid, thankfully.

For some, he is still a threatening figure.

"He was a terrorist. There are a lot of other people who deserve to have statues. It's not right to give killers monuments," said taxi driver Diego Benitez. "To cap it off they use public money. We all pay whether we like it or not."