Skeptic - I appreciated your well thought out comments, as usual. I didn't actually meet any "communists" in Cuba, nary a one. I guess there are a few in the government, but I didn't meet them. I just met a lot of ordinary people. Some of them like life in Cuba and some don't. Some are patriotic, some want only to get to North America, where they see opportunities for better jobs, more money, and more consumer goods. Cuba's the same as the rest of Latin America in that sense, the only difference being that they are under an embargo...oh, and they do provide much more basic infrastructure to the general population in terms of medical care, education, housing, and so on than is true in many other Latin American countries. Those are real accomplishments of Castro's revolution, and a great improvement over the Batista regime that preceded it.

I was well impressed by Cuba, on the whole, and profoundly impressed by its people.

- LH