Hasan's "problematic" aspect was never really the same as a lot of others. Sometimes he does get a bit libbed up, and into the electoral spectacle of it all, but he is a news commentator. He's a got a bit of that electoral horse race special interest in him, and a bit of good natured nativity. I think some of that has stripped away over time, as he's more and more hit with the grim reality of how static the system is.

But he's always been pushing an internationalist message towards the audience, about AES and US imperialism. Drip-feeding theory and challenging some of the popular misconceptions of revolutionary figures. It's not always to the same degree as what you'd see here, but he is a propagandist. The message isn't oriented directly at people who are already communists.

So to seem him do such a big action in support of Cuba isn't surprising at all to me in the ideological sense. Though it is of course a big move in real practical terms, and I'm surprised (and happy) in that regard.