Fidel Castro, Internet News Junkie 241
pickens writes "The LA Times reports that 84-year-old Cuban ex-President Fidel Castro consumes 200 to 300 news items a day on the World Wide Web. In a recent interview he called Web communication 'the most powerful weapon that has existed' and extolled its power to break a stranglehold on the media by 'the empire' and 'ambitious private groups that have abused it' adding that the Internet 'has put an end to secrets.... We are seeing a high level of investigative journalism, as the New York Times calls it, that is within reach of the whole world.' Well, not the whole world. Cuba has the lowest level of Internet penetration in the Western Hemisphere (lower than Haiti), plus severe government restrictions and censorship affecting those who do have access. In addition Cuban law bans using the Internet to spread information that is against what the government considers to be the social interest, norms of good behavior, the integrity of the people or national security."
There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
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Castro is not an idiot or an ideologue. He is the classic opportunist - and an intelligent one, at that. Seeing the opportunity for power in a top-town socialist regime, he seized it.
Now, he sees the power that 'new media' presents - and refuses it to the residents of his country. Seeing the open horizon of new media and denying it from others are not incompatible for a mega-maniacal dictator.
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Castro is not an idiot or an ideologue. He is the classic opportunist - and an intelligent one, at that.
Perhaps, but that does not excuse the immorality and injustice of his regime. Indeed, it is the height of hubris to hear one such as Castro, who knew exactly what he was really doing during all of those years of communist dictatorship, lecture the United States, as he likes to do from time to time, on morality and issues of social justice. It will be interesting to see whether or not the Cuban people maintain their facade of reverence for his person and policies in subsequent generations. Perhaps some will,
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:4, Insightful)
Can we be honest about something here?
Here's something I'd like to see some statistics on.
I have a feeling you're not going to like the answer. Why is it always that when some "other" guy (maybe someone who pissed off powerful American businessmen in the late 1950s) is a tyrant, a violent thug, and when we do it, we're heroes?
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
If Castro was stupid or unable to adapt he'd never been able to take power, much less keep it against constant attempts of the US to oust him. Most people his age are not former victorious guerillas.
Your problem is confusing ability and character.
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There are few things more annoying than finding something impressive or good about someone I dislike and consider responsible for a lot of people suffering.
Really? I have no problem with it. Few people are one-dimensional. Look through the history of serial killers. You'll find a few in there that were very charismatic, engaging personalities who happened to be complete psychopaths. If these guys were one-dimensional representations of the horrors they enacted on others, they wouldn't be serial killers for long.
It's like the idolization of sports celebrities. I have no problem with people being impressed with someone's ability to play a sport; even want
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Americans have been pumped full of negative propaganda about Castro (& Cuba) for as long as many of them have been alive. The fact is he's done some good, is loved in some parts of the world, and has done bad, and is hated in some places.
In that way he was like many other "leaders" in the world today.
However, he hasn't had to worry about getting votes, so when he made a decision he didn't have to give a shit what anyone thinks of it. That meant less manipulating the public to get their favor and impro
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"There are few things more annoying than finding something impressive or good about someone I dislike and consider responsible for a lot of people suffering."
On the other hand, there are also few things more annoying than somebody in power recognising that something is objectively good while denying that good to those whom they rule.
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Hey! Hes just a dictator that throwed everyone eho disagreed with him into jail(or killed them).How nice!
How good of him to be aging this well and to conserve such an agile mind for such an elderly brain.
I just cant be happier for him. /sarcasm
I mean, besides general oppression and murder what else did he do?
Ah! Yes! Massive censorship.
How can he praise the same freedom he constantly strangled when he was in charge? Does he find no hipocrisy on it?
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There's a reason he was the ruler for so long.
Anyway, take comfort in the fact that Bush still probably refuses to read the newspaper.
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:4, Insightful)
Uh, first of all he is ex-president. What threats of his powers are you talking about? Secondly, the cuban laws are about spreading (ie. writing) information that harms the social norms or national security. Ah, national security. Isn't that why US also wants to take down Wikileaks?
Being a non-american and having lived in many different countries, it's sometimes really weird how US people so often think every other country is the root of evil and only US is good. You know, it's of course impossible that US government might want to paint a worse picture of their enemies than what they actually are! It's not even only Cuba.. It's China, Russia, North Korea, whatever country with different views, culture and society.
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
Being a non-american and having lived in many different countries, it's sometimes really weird how US people so often think every other country is the root of evil and only US is good. You know, it's of course impossible that US government might want to paint a worse picture of their enemies than what they actually are! It's not even only Cuba.. It's China, Russia, North Korea, whatever country with different views, culture and society.
And being an American, it is sometimes really weird how non-Americans have this strange view of Americans that makes us into a monolithic hive mind with views that actual Americans generally don't have. Yes, most Americans probably consider the North Korean government to be evil. That's a government which systematically abuses and starves its residents. Most Europeans probably have similar attitudes about North Korea. And I'm pretty sure that most Americans don't see Russia or China as at all in the same category as North Korea. And the notion that Americans think that there's something deeply wrong with "whatever country with different views, culture and society." I doubt that Americans think that about most European countries or Japan or India or Brazil or many other places.
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
And the notion that Americans think that there's something deeply wrong with "whatever country with different views, culture and society." I doubt that Americans think that about most European countries or Japan or India or Brazil or many other places.
Cultural uniqueness is not an excuse for all behavior. If your culture has unique customs and traditions - please let me study them. If it has unique foods - please share some with me (I enjoy regional food even more). But if your culture is wrapped up in behavior that I find detestable, even within my own country, then I'm going to have a problem with it. And I'm entirely unapologetic for that.
I find one of Cuba's most influential political figures talking about how open the Internet is while having set up a system that limits access to that freedom to his own people entirely hypocritical. I have the same problem with that attitude in the US. A spade is a spade. But I didn't buy in to the "freedom fries" thing when France refused to help deal with Iraq - in fact, I was rather bemused by a lady at a local grocery store who noted that I shouldn't be buying French brei during the time (whether the French were motivated by a desire for peace or fear of losing their investment in arming Iraq is another conversation). If that makes me an Ugly American, then so be it. Although I would consider myself a different breed than those who would, say, demonize Japan because of their sushi or because they don't (as a nation) worship the right god.
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Uh, first of all he is ex-president. What threats of his powers are you talking about?
That doesn't always matter. Stalin was only General Secretary of the Party [mltranslations.org]. On paper, he had no power at all. In reality...
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(I guess you *did* get a 404 error, that's a ridiculously long URL.)
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The US has its flaws. Censorship of information harmful to national security really isn't one of them, no matter how much certain presidents and ex-presidents would like it to be. There is no equivalence between Cuba and the US
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
Rope and tree? Hard to say. Maybe if the government is overthrown by Cuban expats living in the US, but not surprisingly these are the most extreme critics of Castro. Cuban residing in Cuba might be sick of the regime, but it is unlikely they hate it as much as US expats do. The proportion of people who have a positive view of Castro is bound to be higher in Cuba than in US, which is a haven for the regime's most bitter enemies.
In any case, you have to look at the specific nature of the overthrow. If it were a military coup, Castro's fate would depend on what is most useful to the junta: co-opting Castro or castigating him. If the government were to fall apart under popular unrest, chances are Castro would spend the balance of his retirement in Venezuela.
Re:He's a Dictator, not President (Score:5, Informative)
Do a little research on the US CIA backed military overthrow of democratically elected Allende in Chile (1973). Not only did the US "paint a bad picture" but they instigated (CIA) the overthrow of the government and installed a military dictatorship. This was not the first of the last time this happened but it is a good representative example.
Re:He's a Dictator, not President (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:He's a Dictator, not President (Score:4, Informative)
Although the CIA certainly was involved in both cases, it's not correct to say the US caused either of these coups. They did not cause the government to fall, it was already falling in both cases, all the CIA did was to make sure it fell in the direction they wanted.
You have it all wrong. First of all, go read about IRAN CONTRA, that will tell you that they did indeed, along with the brits, engineer that coup from A to Z. It's not a zany conspiracy theory, it's a well documented fact.
Secondly, you list the result of black ops (sabotaging production etc) as things the CIA isn't responsible for, which is just plain blind.
There isn't any proof that the CIA was involved in Chile, no smoking gun besides their exact modus operandi, but Iran was declassified, it's written down, you just have to go read it.
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Go to youtube, search for 'Noam Chomsky'.
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When someone [wikipedia.org] tried that in the US they changed the Constitution [usconstitution.net] to prohibit it.
An incumbent president has too much power and it's too easy for him to hold to the office indefinitely.
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FDR was the greatest and most popular president in USA history and setup more for the EU and Japan than any leader of the last century. He fought the banksters that we recently LOST against (we didn't really put up much of a fight.) The result of all the great things FDR accomplished is we got term limits so nobody as great will be able to do so much good for mankind. He was the opposite of a tyrant and the was very reason we didn't have term limits.
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Interesting)
while most people in his country aren't allowed to do so because it would threaten his power
Actually, the "official" reason is that the US limits who can we get bandwidth from (by owning or threatening those who own the fiber around the island), so we can only get it at ridiculously high prices. I think the total bandwidth for the whole country is about 230Mb/sec download, 100 upload.
I don't believe that is the only reason (clearly, censorship is a big one - I had to censor many things in the name of "lack of bandwithd" even after I proved that it would have a negligible effect). But the "official" reason, by itself, is enough to restrict nearly as much as Cuba does. It's also disgustingly hypocritical that the US gives the Cuban government such a perfect justification for their censorship.
Who knows, maybe with the cable to Venezuela the Cuban government will show the world (and the Cubans) that the US was the only responsible for the lack of internet access in Cuba. I would be very surprised if they did - but I doubt they'll be intelligent enough to see how it would benefit them.
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Re:Revolution (Score:3, Insightful)
Its funny but the cynical side of me can't actually visualize the US wanting the Cuban's to revolt and replace their government with a democracy friendly to the US and its interests. Instead what I see is a lot of corporations wanting to reassert control over Cuba so they can rape its resources and access a source of cheap labor. I no longer believe the US has any interest in promoting democracy I guess, recent decades of foreign policy under Bush I and II seem to have disabused me of that notion. Obama has
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When did the US ever have any interest in promoting democracy? Considering all the democratically elected governments they have overthrown, vilified and/or marginalized it seems much to me that democracy is something they actively work against unless the results please them.
Re:Democratically Elected Governments (Score:2)
Yeah, it seems to me that whether or not a foreign government gets to stay in power or is overthrown depends primarily on whether or not its willing to allow Big US Corporations to sack the country of its resources in exchange for a few well placed bribes. If US business interests are threatened, in go the Marines (i.e. US Sugar in the Dominican Republic). It seems to me that the US military is frequently thrown into conflicts, not to defend US interests or foreign policies, but to defend US corporations an
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Interesting. I'd think that the US would want Cuba to have plenty of bandwidth as it might help foster a revolt against the government. I guess some folks in the US are still hellbent on the whole embargo thing.
I agree. That shows that US intentions with Cuba aren't as... altruistic as they (government, so called "human rights groups", etc) claim.
However, even with a cable to Venezuela, I seriously doubt the Cuban government is going to make everything free and open. That just isn't in their nature. There will be more internet to go around, but it's still going to be the internet that the Party wants them to see.
I also agree. I would be very surprised if they just made internet access more affordable. They don't really have to wait for the US to show some advances (like, "we can't give you internet access because of the US, but here you have a good national network that you could use in the meantime"). But instead, we have 127/07 (here [mic.gov.cu] for those who read spanish).
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
Correct.
Cuba is cut-off from the Internet thanks to the US embargo. They cannot lay down fiber from Florida to Cuba. Currently only Satellite internet is available on the island. Internet is unavailable thanks to the bandwidth limits (hence unaffordable), not because "Cuba is evil". Cell phones were also banned in the past because there were not enough cell towers to provide coverage. Now, more cell towers built, cell prone available.
Anyway, high speed undersea fiber connection from Venezuela is in the works. Yeah, that's another "pinky regime". Funny how it takes socialists/communists to spread information while US can only transmit their propaganda via Radio Free America. Personally, I would have hoped that US would drop the embargo and allow companies to provide fiber internet access from Florida to Cuba. At least then Cuba would no longer be able to hide behind "it's US's fault via embargo" tag line.
Maybe US is still butt-hurt about Bay of Pigs fiasco and some rich dudes losing their playground with Batista. All the embargo is doing is strengthening Cuban resolve against US. But then what do I know.
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Castro blames all the ills of Cuba on the US embargo; that's probably one thing which has kept him
Re:There are few things more annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not decades: the US still keeps it's boot on Cuba's proverbial neck.
Recall Helms-Burton, which was passed a little more than a decade ago. It's one of the reasons why Cuba cannot get so much as a leg up: the US will penalize, quite heavily, any company that does business in Cuba and makes use of pre-revolution assets.
Just for the record, this means just about anything in Cuba: agriculture, technology, people, anything. No corporation can do business in Cuba without risking serious penalties if they also wish to do business in the United States. This means that no one can open a mine, export sugar, fruit or tobacco, operate in a pre-1960 building, etc, etc.
It certainly means that American telcos can't run a pipe from Florida or Texas undersea. As a result, Cuban connectivity, post-Soviet, requires traffic to take backwater paths halfway around the planet via rinky-dink companies who are not and will never operate in the US.
So how, exactly, is Cuba ever supposed to do better if it can't sell so much as a sugar cube to the United States?
Interesting, isn't it, how the US will bend over backwards to do business in China or Russia, or with any number of right-wing despots all over the world, all of whom have far worse human rights records, claiming that "trade will set them free!" but get all "Think of the poor oppressed citizenry" when it comes to Cuba. You'd never think that Florida was a swing state and that both parties fall over themselves to cater to a bunch of noisy expats, the most powerful and noisy of whom were equally nasty people, but under Bautista instead.
Now, all this said, the Cuban government would probably filter and snoop on their citizen's internet traffic (they probably do now, and it's probably easy, considering the bandwidth to the whole country is exceeded by that offered to some condos in New York), but how is this different from bastions of western democracy like, oh, Australia or the UK. Or to use a less extreme example, China.
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Hey, I know you! Email works, btw :D
Its very sad they have a valid official reason, adds to its credibility, but its a fake one.
Fake it isn't. But, as everyone knows... not the only one.
At the prices they are charging for the dialup access (60 CUC/80hrs per month) (72USD per 80h per month) they can afford to resell satellite bandwidth no problem at all.
Oh, it is cheaper now? But only foreigners can buy it still? Anyway, there may be (if we believe the ministry of informatics, there are) restrictions about how much bandwidth they can buy. If that's true, it wouldn't be as easy as just resell it.
However... they actively look for and seize "illegal" satellite dishes that can be used to connect to the net (dishnetwork, directway, etc). While it may not be easy to jus
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Not a damn thing other than the fact you aren't supposed to have them. A classic case in the effects of prohibition of any item. (And yes I've had quite a few)
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Cubans used to grow very strong tobacco, and a great deal of their cigar rollers regarded themselves as artisans-- since they took a great deal of pride in their work, they produced very well-rolled cigars. Combine that with good tobacco with an unusually high nicotine content, and you get a cigar which is widely regarded as being among the best.
It is my understanding, however, that Cuban tobacco is not as strong, now. Also, a great deal of Cuba's foremost cigar-producing families fled Cuba, when Castro too
Posting for Team Stupid (Score:4, Funny)
Is it possible that Fidel is simply not aware of the state of the country he used to run? Is it possible this has been the case for a long time - possibly even longer than he has been publicly seen to be an invalid?
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Re:Posting for Team Stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
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1. I don't drink Bacardi, not because of any Cuban politics, but because I'm not a 16-year-old chav girl in a miniskirt.
2. I know Batistas Cuba wasn't wonderful
3. No I have never been to Cuba.
I am willing to entertain the possibility that Castro might be right about the embargo making Internet access hard to come by in Cuba, and also appreciate that its easy for a regime to start assuming every anti-government blogger is on the CIA payroll when they've had so many genuine covert attacsk from the US governme
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I have never been to Cuba, but I know that getting out of the tourist areas and talking to the locals is not as easy as you think.
A tourist agent once tried to sell me a trip to Cuba. Among several matters we discussed was transportation. He told me tourists are not allowed to drive cars in Cuba, the only way to rent a car is getting one with a Cuban driver.
Re:Posting for Team Stupid (Score:4, Informative)
I have never been to Cuba, but I know that getting out of the tourist areas and talking to the locals is not as easy as you think.
A tourist agent once tried to sell me a trip to Cuba. Among several matters we discussed was transportation. He told me tourists are not allowed to drive cars in Cuba, the only way to rent a car is getting one with a Cuban driver.
There is no problem with a foreign tourist renting a car in Cuba or driving around by themselves. The rental cars have a different coloured plate so the cops know you're tourists and will pretty much leave you alone. There are restrictions on the movement of Cubans throughout the country, I don't know what they are exactly, but white people in a rental car can pretty much pass freely through any checkpoint when crossing state lines or on the outskirts of the cities, usually without stopping. But if you're carrying any Cubans or other Latino people, they should probably duck.
Also, if you are a decent person and willing to stop, it is pretty hard not to have any contact with the locals since hitch-hiking is extremely common on the island, and the locals will not think twice about jumping in the car with you if you let them. Whether they actually talk to you or not depends on the person. My own experience is that soldiers and young women might not say a word to you, not that that stops them from jumping in your car to catch a ride, but guys and older people will talk to you if you engage them and let them know you're just normal people on vacation cruising around their island for fun and to get to know their culture and country. If you're nice and willing to finance it, you can even organize a pig roast or something and party with the villagers. But it helps, of course, if you speak decent Spanish. This is my experience as a Canadian, anyway (we are freely allowed to travel to Cuba). But, in honesty, I found it very hard to communicate in Spanish in the resort areas, where it seems like they have certain people fluent in English who are authorized to mingle with the tourists, and the others are probably under direction to not acknowledge any Spanish coming out of the mouth of a white person beyond the extreme basics, like "una cerveza, por favor!". I had a hard time being understood in the resort areas, but off resort, cruising around, picking up hitch-hikers, miraculously most people seemed to understand me just fine.
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<tinfoil hat>Maybe he was talking to the people, the accident was caused by a government agent, the investigation was about how much he had talked to whom.</tinfoil hat>
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It's not surprising that Castro believes this stuff, because it's stuff he would do if he were capable. And in fact does do.
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Not surprising (Score:4, Interesting)
5...4...3... (Score:3, Insightful)
Just proving out the reality of Communism (Score:4, Insightful)
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Only "communism"?
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Only "communism"?
Capitalism makes no pretense about the equality of results, unlike Communism.
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Of course it does - "the results depend on abilities / capital (also human one)"; which is similar BS in the end.
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That goes for every political system.
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That goes for every political system.
Says the guy who is claiming his political system is the same as Cuba's while he freely criticizes it online without fear of retribution.
Stop bitching. It really only make you look like some kind of emo kid who complains about the misery in his life while he lives in an air conditioned home, has his own room and goes to bed with a full stomach every night. Unless you truly live under a repressive regime, STFU. In reading you post, I'm guess you don't.
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How did you manage to suddenly jump to the s-word? So scary lately?
The idea with mature socialism is about a certain minimum (which is required for abilities & liberties to unfold BTW; it enhances indidvidual autonomy)
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Re:I'm surprised... (Score:5, Informative)
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They actually have a longer life expectancy than Americans or Canadians now, and similar infant mortality rates to Canada (much lower than the US). They're also tied with Iceland as the only two countries in the world with a 100% literacy rate. While you're at it, check out Cuba's environmental record, which is stellar.
Cuba is an example of a revolution that went right. The only people who lost were Batista and his murderous thugs (who incidentally seized power in a coup in 1952, sparking MANY popular upris
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The only way that Cuba could have done better would have been if the Americans hadn't instituted a 50 year blockade.
Or if the Soviet Union hadn't collapsed. For ideological reasons the USSR bought sugar from Cuba at well above the market price, and its fall had serious effects on the economy.
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Fidel, stop reading Slashdot; you're not a ner
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Boy, some people just buy the propaganda, hook, line, and sinker. The Cuban government has the motivation and the means to lie about those statistics. Do you believe everything that comes out of North Korea too?
Pro-tip: Many countries play fast and loose with infant mortality statistics. The US has the strictest standards when it comes to this - babies we try to save here would be written off as late-term miscarriages elsewhere.
Re:I'm surprised... (Score:5, Insightful)
Boy, some people just buy the propaganda, hook, line, and sinker. The Cuban government has the motivation and the means to lie about those statistics.
The Cuban government has the means to make the CIA website say what they want? Wooooooow...
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The US has the strictest standards when it comes to this - babies we try to save here would be written off as late-term miscarriages elsewhere.
Yeah the standards are so strict the US has been widely criticised [cnn.com] for having the "second worst newborn death rate in modern world." Hey at least you beat Latvia. Worse still, U.S. childbirth deaths are still on the rise [amnestyusa.org] bucking a world wide trend. But don't worry, just turn on the TV and put on Glen Beck or some other US propagandist and he'll reassure you're The Greatest Nation On Earth(TM).
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At least they're better off now than they were before communism, and no worse than most of their neighboring countries.
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They, and Costa Rica, are two of the most socially and physically healthy societies in Central America.
Coincidentally, Cuba and Costa Rica are also the two countries that have suffered the least American meddling in the past half-century.
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Yup. People will be as free, wealthy and happy in Cuba as they now are in Haiti. Good times.
Haiti's problems are due to political corruption, much like Cuba's. But why bring up Haiti? Why not bring up the Dominican Republic, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, or Jamaica? Oh, that's right, none of those countries validate the point you are trying to make. As a matter of fact, any one of them will completely disprove your argument. Yeah, it's probably best to ignore them completely.
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Actually, all of those countries do validate his point. As would Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama or Guatemala. Every single one of them has a lower standard of living than Cuba. Every. Single. One.
Hell, so do First Nations people in much of Canada. Or any number of American urban ghettoes.
Cuba isn't perfect by a long shot, but by Central American standards it's a fucking paradise for it's average citizenry.
Haiti isn't free (Score:2)
Haiti is far from free- the USA and France have been screwing them since the beginning and I do not think it will end with reconstruction which they are using to continue to screw them. In many ways Haiti is the freemarket libertarian ideal world of the American "right wing" except most the Haitians don't want what they have and the Americans don't understand what they are professing to want for themselves.
Modern propaganda is so good it can make an informed intellectual question the effectiveness of democr
Wait until he gets his hands on WoW.... (Score:5, Funny)
Wait until he gets his hands on WoW....
So... (Score:2)
how exactly do one "consume" news?
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Through osmosis. I've had this power for years, all my professors said I was the best they'd ever seen at this system.
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how exactly do one "consume" news?
Via Powersauce Bars.
Get sauced with Powersauce!
He should get back to the core cigar compentcies (Score:5, Funny)
Fidel Castro consumes 200 to 300 news items a day on the World Wide Web.
He was much cooler, when he was consuming 200 to 300 cigars a day.
The next report will be that he is living in his mom's basement . . .
meanwhile, in the free capitalist Europe/USA (Score:5, Insightful)
In addition Cuban law bans using the Internet to spread information that is against what the government considers to be the social interest,
Swastikas.
norms of good behavior,
Porn.
the integrity of the people
Terrorism Act 2006.
or national security."
Assange.
Being rich in America is like being rich in Cuba: life's cool. Meanwhile, being poor in America is like being poor in Cuba: life sucks. In the latter case, what differs is the handout you get and who you can get away criticising sufficiently loudly.
Re:meanwhile, in the free capitalist Europe/USA (Score:5, Insightful)
Being rich in America is like being rich in Cuba: life's cool. Meanwhile, being poor in America is like being poor in Cuba: life sucks. In the latter case, what differs is the handout you get and who you can get away criticising sufficiently loudly.
Go to work, send your kids to school.
Follow fashion, act normal.
Walk on the pavements, watch T.V.
Save for your old age, obey the law.
Repeat after me: I am free.
How free&happy&healthy is capitalist Europ (Score:5, Informative)
At least everyone in Cuba have access to medical care.
http://www.hr676.org/ [hr676.org]
On your points:
"Go to work,"
http://www.whywork.org/rethinking/whywork/abolition.html [whywork.org]
http://www.basicincome.org/bien/aboutbasicincome.html [basicincome.org]
"send your kids to school."
http://www.newciv.org/whole/schoolteacher.txt [newciv.org]
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/16a.htm [johntaylorgatto.com]
http://www.holtgws.com/ [holtgws.com]
"Follow fashion,"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-consumerism [wikipedia.org]
http://www.alternativeratreatments.com/eat-to-live.html [alternativ...tments.com]
"act normal."
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/the_war_on_the.html [schneier.com]
http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm [lexrex.com]
"Walk on the pavements,"
http://www.bluezones.com/makeover-about [bluezones.com] (shows how unusual that is)
"watch T.V."
http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/ [turnoffyourtv.com]
http://www.tvturnoff.org/ [tvturnoff.org]
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/treatment.shtml [vitamindcouncil.org]
"Save for your old age,"
http://knol.google.com/k/paul-d-fernhout/beyond-a-jobless-recovery [google.com]
http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2009/02/social-collapse-best-practices.html [blogspot.com]
"obey the law."
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/?q=node/402 [conceptualguerilla.com]
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/?q=node/47 [conceptualguerilla.com]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification [wikipedia.org]
"Repeat after me: I am free."
http://www.amctv.com/videos/the-prisoner-1960s-video/ [amctv.com]
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/199710--.htm [chomsky.info]
Any more? :-)
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Ohh, that looks fun! Let me try:
Swastikas
Bunnies.
Porn.
Rainbows!
Terrorism Act 2006.
Lollipops,
Assange.
Richard Simmons!
Wheee!
Just one question: other than the sheer fun of it, why are throwing around random words?
Re: (Score:2)
Sometimes when you flick a switch near a door, the room gets brighter. What's up with that? Life's full of weird associations, I guess, and sometimes you have to think hard to work out what's going down.
Although my memory's fairly terrible, it's good enough to recall that you've made lots of authoritarian posts implying an affectionate-to-the-point-of-intercourse relationship with your country's government+military+all that stuff people like when they're scared to stand on their own two feet, so I'm going t
Re: (Score:2)
Sometimes when you flick a switch near a door, the room gets brighter
Sometimes when you flick a switch near a door, a person halfway around the world dies. Fools and lunatics insist on "finding" a connection - rational people do not.
Although my memory's fairly terrible
Apparently so. Allow me to refresh your memory: Swastikas and perfectly legal in all but one nation, Porn is completely legal in all first-world nations, the Terrorism Act of 2006 has nothing to do with the US, and assange - despite being an asshat whom I'd personally love to see in a pine box - is alive and well and not facing any sort of san
Re: (Score:2)
In Cuba you will get arrested for complaining about what the government does. If you can't see a difference in the personal freedoms of western democracies and Cuba, then you are blind.
Re: (Score:2)
The difference is in America, and any true Democracy,
America's intentionally and overtly not a "true Democracy". This may not be a bad thing.
if you don't like the government, any of the stuff that you listed, there are ways to change it without a violent revolution.
I see. Which ways? Assume that I consider the Republican and Democratic governments to be effectively the same, and try not to give an answer which comes down to, "Persuade over 100,000,000 people."
In Cuba you will get arrested for complaining about what the government does.
Idle complaining is of no benefit, and Americans essentially get the privilege of time-wasting. Well, they do today, what with the lack of HUAC.
To make a difference, you need substance and medium to your complaints to get peop
Here are some links (Score:2)
Fidel Castro consumes 200 to 300 news items a day (Score:2)
Free WiFi at Havanna University. (Score:4, Informative)
I find it kind of strange that so many claim not to have Internet Access in Cuba.
Last time I was there, I had my laptop with me. I sat outside the physics building at the University of Havanna, and used the free Wifi. No problems connecting to the internet. Tad annoying that everything had to go through proxy-servers, but with the extremely limited bandwidth, not very strange that they want caching.
Didn't find a single censored website. https worked wonderfully well too.
So that means... (Score:4, Funny)
He's probably reading this?
Hi from Canada!
Send some cigars!
Re: (Score:2)
Hola amigo! Que tal?
Espero usted surfe(?) todos articulos con RSS feeds, senor.
Anonymous Coward (Score:2)
Internet penetration and the embargo (Score:5, Insightful)
I am not entirely convinced by this explanation, although maybe someone who knows more about the costs and speed of these types of connections can say whether it makes sense. Ideally, any connection that is available should be accessible to anyone at, for example, libraries. I'm not sure whether this is possible in Cuba right now (anyone that can describe the current situation in Cuba?).
The article also mentions that Cuba is building a submarine connection through Venezuela, which is aimed at solving the "internet shortage".
He does have a point, let's not ad-hominem it... (Score:2)
Internet distribution *does* help punch through the dominant media organizations' control (whether news media or recorded-music media)
Re: (Score:2)
He does have a point... a trivial one.
Big media used to be the 500 pound gorilla. These days it is more and more looking like Clint Eastwood in the movie "San Torino".
What's his handle? (Score:2)
He seemed like a nice guy to me. (Score:4, Interesting)
I met him when i was there in 2000.
He flew down in his Helicopter into this village i was in; out of the blue and did a speech etc.
i was there with a Brit and a Yank and we asked if we could meet him and we did.
Mainly talk about Capitalism being evil etc etc.
small world eh ...
Re:He seemed like a nice guy to me. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
PART III Article 12 Paragraph 3.
The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant.
If you don't like your HOA then don't buy in that neighborhood.