Sony grows a pair; Cuba proves how little we got from them

In updated news on caving in to tyrannical communist regimes (private sector edition), it appears that Sony will be releasing "The Interview" on Christmas Day, after all:

Sony Pictures is set to release the canceled Seth Rogen-James Franco comedy “The Interview” in theaters and on video on demand, TheWrap has learned.
The plan is to release the film simultaneously in participating theaters and via video on demand. The Plaza Theater in Atlanta, the MX Theaters in St. Louis and the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema in Austin have now said they will distribute the film. The MX said it would be selling tickets as of 2 p.m Tuesday.
The release will likely be in the 200-theater range; exhibitors typically cap the rollout of films that offer day-and-date VOD at around 300 sites, because it usually cuts attendance significantly.

Looks like most of the theaters willing to show the movie are the ones that had planned to show "Team America: World Police" in its stead before Paramount went full jelly-spine and wouldn't give permission. So, instead of an old movie mocking the North Korean regime, we get a new one instead. Super! Let's hope that if the Norks try something, someone competent at a level below the Secretary of Homeland Security is on it, since Homeland Security is run by a political hack with no background in actual national security, who replaced another political hack with no background in actual national security. Maybe state and local authorities.

So, props to Sony for going ahead with the release. And fuck all those distributors who told Sony they wouldn't put the movie in their theaters, forcing Sony to temporarily cancel release plans.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Emperor Barry's "historic" rapprochement with Cuba is already going about as well as I thought it would. Did I not say that Cuba gave us nothing and we gave Cuba the store? Gosh, seems like just a few days ago, and already Cuba has proved me right:

Cuba said Monday that it has a right to grant asylum to U.S. fugitives, the clearest sign yet that the communist government has no intention of extraditing America's most-wanted woman despite the warming of bilateral ties.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has urged President Barack Obama to demand the return of fugitive Joanne Chesimard before restoring full relations under a historic detente announced by Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro last week.
Chesimard was granted asylum by Fidel Castro after she escaped from the prison where she was serving a sentence for killing a New Jersey state trooper in 1973 during a gunbattle after being stopped on the New Jersey Turnpike.

This is the kind of Eff You you get when you give tyrants something in exchange for nothing.