evidence: But a Fix review of more than 10 hours of Sanders appearances over the past three decades reveals how Sanders has often been quick to downplay abuses of authoritarian regimes, instead focusing on aspects and programs he admired. During his two presidential bids, Sanders has at times appeared to contradict or try to explain away his earlier views on authoritarian regimes, examples of which you can watch in the video above. In 1985, Sanders praised Cuban dictator Fidel Castro for his education and health-care programs. In 1986, he recalled being "very excited" by Castro’s revolution. And after he returned from a trip to Cuba in 1989, the Rutland Daily Herald paraphrased Sanders as calling Cuba a "model of what a society could be" for Latin America. [...] Much of Sanders’s past praise for socialist authoritarian regimes was rooted in his criticism of U.S. foreign policy, but as The Fix’s Aaron Blake noted this week, Sanders often went "further than just saying the United States should stay out" of those countries and has struck a different balance than other U.S. politicians who have praised some elements of countries such as Cuba.