BS: Fidel retires

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: fumblefingers
Date: 23 Feb 08 - 11:56 PM

Maybe the old bugger will be considered for sainthood once he finally goes CU.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 08 - 03:48 AM

Anybody who can give the world's greatest ******** (fill in the appropriate) the finger for half a century and transform a country from 'America's open sewer' to the progressive country Cuba has become, despite embargoes, assassination attempts, invasions, and living next door to the world's most anti-social and predatory neighbours gets my support any day.
Nice cartoon in The Irish Times this week showing Bush Baby saying "now we can look forward to democracy in Cuba", then of him leaning over the fence at Guantanamo saying "well.... maybe just some of Cuba"!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 22 Feb 08 - 01:22 PM

LOL Spaw! In Cuba the cars are so old that they run best in bias ply tires. I don't think Michelin makes em.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Feb 08 - 03:57 AM

When Fidel retires, do you think he'll go with Goodyear or Michelin?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Colin Rudd
Date: 22 Feb 08 - 02:53 AM

Try this tribute to the great man....corny but sincere!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GM61LDC0eZk

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 21 Feb 08 - 08:47 AM

..."The counterproductive US embargo policy continues to give the Cuban government a pretext for human rights violations."

What turns "a reason" or "a cause" into "a pretext"?

If someone keeps hitting me on the head I think it's a bit premature to accuse me of using that as a pretext for saying my head hurt, at the very least until he'd stopped hitting me on the head.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Ron Davies
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 10:18 PM

Watching a bit of a Jon Stewart interview on Larry King, they had a clip of somebody else, David Letterman? Anyway, his contribution to this thread was pretty good, I thought--maybe everybody hasn't heard it:

They don't really know who's going to succeed Castro. Either his brother Raul-- or his idiot son Fidel W. Castro.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 10:04 PM

Y'know, things are tough in a lot of other Latin American countries too. How nice do you think the police are in Mexico and Pero and Guatemala? If you want to compare Cuba to someone, compare them to the other Latin American countries. They provide free education and free medical care to their people. They send doctors all over the Third World to other countries where they are needed. What other Latin American countries do that? There are a lot of Latin American countries whose human rights violations and abuses exceed Cuba's by far and whose people are far worse off...but the USA is not embargoing any of them. Why? Why do we not hear about the awful things that happen to people in Latin American countries that are allied WITH the USA?

Simple. The real issue between the USA and Cuba has nothing to do with human rights, liberty, or freedom. It has to do with corporate dollars. Period. They want Castro and his socialist revolution gone so that American businesses can exploit Cuba the way they did when Batista was there. That's all it's about. The rest is a bunch of phony, self-serving rhetoric.

The anti-Castro forces would do nothing with that island if they took it over but hand it back to the multinational corporations, the rich crooks, and another client dictator...or some phony new political party (made in the USA) that bows down to corporate power like a little slave and does exactly what corporate America tells them to do. That's how it works in Latin America, and it's been working that way ever since anyone alive today can remember.

You either play ball with North American corporate power in the western hemisphere...or you are an official enemy, marked for death.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:45 PM

Absolutely Sandy. Meantime, I vote we USians continue to defy the embargo, and go spend US tourist dollars there, if we can.

Like I said, I really, really hope I get to go & soon.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:36 PM

If the USA were to lift the embargo and return control of Guantanamo Bay it would show a lot of good faith to start the healing. I hope that a new administration of American government will do so! Cuba as well must do it's part in extending the hand of friendship and countries such as Canada that are friends to both should be willing to help and Cuba could and should be welcomed into the OAS. Maybe then we can influence how human rights are applied.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:12 PM

I usually go w/the pros in terms of determining where a country/regime is at regarding conditions inside another country.

Indeed, the main event in terms of human rights focus in Cuba right now is Guantanamo. However, this is plucked off Human Rights Watch's website today, and seems to sum things up pretty well:

Cuba: Fidel Castro's Abusive Machinery Remains Intact
Major Obstacles Remain for Human Rights

(Washington, DC, February 19, 2008) – Despite Fidel Castro's resignation today, Cuba's abusive legal and institutional mechanisms continue to deprive Cubans of their basic rights, Human Rights Watch said today. The counterproductive US embargo policy continues to give the Cuban government a pretext for human rights violations.
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"Even if Castro no longer calls the shots, the repressive machinery he constructed over almost half a century remains fully intact," said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. "Until that changes, it's unlikely there will be any real progress on human rights in Cuba."

For almost five decades, Cuba has restricted nearly all avenues of political dissent. Cuban citizens have been systematically deprived of their fundamental rights to free expression, privacy, association, assembly, movement, and due process of law. Tactics for enforcing political conformity have included police warnings, surveillance, short-term detentions, house arrests, travel restrictions, criminal prosecutions, and politically motivated dismissals from employment.

Cuba's legal and institutional structures have been at the root of its rights violations. The rights to freedom of expression, association, assembly, movement, and the press are strictly limited under Cuban law. By criminalizing enemy propaganda, the spreading of "unauthorized news," and insult to patriotic symbols, the government curbs freedom of speech under the guise of protecting state security. The courts are not independent; they undermine the right to fair trial by restricting the right to a defense, and frequently fail to observe the few due process rights available to defendants under domestic law.

"Since Fidel Castro first turned power over to his brother, the Cuban government has occasionally indicated a willingness to reconsider its approach to human rights," said Vivanco. "But so far it hasn't taken any of the steps needed to end its abusive practices."

In December 2007, the Cuban government announced its intention to ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The ratification, if it occurs, would represent an important break from Cuba's longstanding refusal to recognize these core human rights treaties.

However, the Cuban government still needs to take concrete steps to decriminalize political dissent, Human Rights Watch said. Specifically, it should unconditionally release all political dissidents. It should also repeal the provisions of the penal code that provide the basis for gross violations of human rights.

"This would be a good time for the US government to revisit its failed embargo policy," said Vivanco. "By lifting the embargo, Washington could deprive Raúl Castro of the underdog image that his brother exploited so effectively."

For more than four decades, the US government has used Cuba's dismal rights record to justify a sweeping economic embargo aimed at toppling the Castro regime. Yet the policy did nothing to bring change to Cuba. On the contrary, it helped consolidate Castro's hold on power by providing his government with an excuse for its problems and a justification for its abuses. Moreover, because the policy was imposed in such a heavy-handed fashion, it enabled Castro to garner sympathy abroad, neutralizing international pressure rather than increasing it.

"The Bush administration should end the trade and travel bans that hurt both ordinary Cubans and their Cuban-American relatives," Vivanco said. "After a half century of ineffective policies, it's time for the US to adopt a more pragmatic, multilateral approach in pressing Cuba to respect political freedoms."

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:04 PM

Considerably better under Castro than Batista! Unless you were one of the Mafiosi or the rich business people cashing in under Batista.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Peace
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:36 PM

Life has been better under Castro that it was under Batista.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:31 PM

No Doug, life is far from luxury under the Castros but the thing most to blame is the USA embargo. However in spite of that education and health care would shame many richer nations so they must be doing something right.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:14 PM

Yes, Doug, disaster looms. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Peace
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:05 PM

The sky is falling, Doug.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: DougR
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:01 PM

Yep, no doubt about it, the Cubans have a life of luxury with Fidel and now his brother in charge.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 04:20 PM

A google search on Dr. Armando Lago turns up a lot of rhetoric by him that seems lacking in objectivity. He seems to blame Castro for everything since the great flood but credits him for nothing. I would guess that he has an axe to grind.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: pdq
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 01:26 PM

" In the book-in-progress The Human Costs of Social Revolutions:  The Black Book on Cuba by Dr. Armando Lago that will be published in 1999, he is making an attempt to list Castro's deaths since 1959.  With Castro in power, obtaining information is very difficult, but so far the deaths of 97,000 persons have been named, each confirmed by at least two sources.  Some 30,000 executed by firing squad, 2,000 extra-judicial assassinations, 5,000 deaths in prison due to beating by guards and denial of medical care and 60,000 deaths while trying to escape Cuba by sea.

The victims counted so far by Dr. Lago include 21 US citizens.  Of them, only the body of Captain Thomas Willard Ray has been returned to his family in the US.  The rest of the bodies remain unburied and on display at the museums of the revolution and morgues throughout Cuba.  Dr. Lago also found among the deaths 1 British, 1 Dane, 1 Haitian and 6 Spaniards.  Ofelia Garcia Menocal, the International Relations Secretary of the World Federation of Former Cuban Political Prisoners, reported that, some months ago, organizations of Cuban exiles in Spain presented in Madrid to judge overGarzon, a list of Spaniards killed in Cuba by Castro, with supporting documentation provided by their descendents.

Dr. Lago's book does not account for the thousands killed in Central and South America by Castro-sponsored guerrillas, nor the thousands killed by Castro's troops in Africa, nor the deaths due to the drug-trafficking Castro still fosters into the US or those killed in Spain by the separatist organization E.T.A. using terrorist trained by Castro."
                                 


                                     from here

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Peace
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 10:00 AM

I will have you know that not once on the anchovy thread was there a criticism of the USA or USA anchovies. FYI!

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Beer
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:21 AM

Interesting poll being taken by CNN. Of course they don't say how many have called in. The question being asked is: Are you in favor of lifting the embargo on Cuba? Yes: 82% No: 18%

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 09:13 AM

Here is cartoonist Steve Bell's comment on Bush's response, from today's Guardian.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:53 AM

But does anybody know if Fidel is even still alive? asked Mrrzy.

Here's a picture which was taken by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva during their meeting in Havana Jan. 15, 2008.(Xinhua/Reuters Photo) - He looks pretty much alive to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 08:34 AM

Fido, my beau...

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 07:53 AM

I never cease to be amazed at the short sightedness of our so called "free country" governments or the ignorance and propaganda that they sometimes would have us accept. Years ago Trudeau went against the allied grain saying that Castro was not the demon portrayed and extended the hand of friendship (got him on the CIA watch list and the Mafia hit list). Since then Canadian media has been free to visit Cuba and report without interference on life there. Canadians have been free to visit and it is a prime winter vacation destination. What happened 50 years ago was a civil war and one side had to be the loser, and that was the most corrupt one as well. Refugees from that war still live in the USA mostly in Florida and USA policy is still driven by their demands for retribution. Didn't Florida cast enough funny ballots to elect a president with the help of the state governor? Is this what Bush wants as "free elections" for Cuba?
That all being said there is hope that November elections in the USA may see a return of esteem to a country that has done much for the world, but has tarnished its image to that of an international bully.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Kweku
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 04:09 AM

I will also say, "Viva La Revolucion!" because as far my memory serves me right Cuba has done more for countries like my own, by providing medical doctors for very remote ,unmotorable areas where our own doctors would not hesitate to shun.

Yesterday I heard Prez Bush talking about Castro's exit and how Cubans could now look to a bright future, and the question I ask myself is, so you punish millions of people over five decades all because of one man. indeed there is nothing under the sun more fascinating than US foreign policy.

"Viva La Revolucion!"

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,albert
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:32 AM

I always like d the story of the captured right wing mercenaries imprisoned after the US sponsored Bay Of Pigs invasion who were only released after the deal of one tractor for one mercenary.
Albert

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:20 AM

BTW - Cuba is currently having elections... see Little Hawk link of 19 Feb 08 - 10:52 above...

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:17 AM

From the thread list...

BS: Fidel retires         
BS: Not U.S.'s fault

Damn! and after all those years of trying too...

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:14 AM

"The US will help the people of Cuba enjoy the blessings of Liberty."

G. W. Big-Foot-in-Mouth.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:13 AM

Fidel...ma belle...these are words that go together well...my Fidel...

Okay, the word "belle" is the wrong gender, but I still think it has possibilities. ;-)

Fidel means "one who is faithful".

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Feb 08 - 02:07 AM

OK, I've come up with the beginnings of a song...

Fidel- I's Me..

TTO: Why not take all of me....
   or Jealousy (actually a blend works well) :-)

:-P

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Kent Davis
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 11:15 PM

Thanks for trying, Little Hawk. You inspired me to start a separate thread of things that don't call forth criticism of the U.S. By the time I did, using your kind example, it had already been shot down.
But I appreciate the thought.

Kent

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: catspaw49
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 11:04 PM

Linoleum?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 11:03 PM

Hmmm. Okay, cross the Westminster off the list, then.

I'm thinkin'. Boy, this is a tough one. Hmmm.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: catspaw49
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:57 PM

Actually the Westminster Kennel Club as well as the show itself are wholly American in their attitudes displaying the same damned "We're the Greatest and You Can Fuck Off" attitude known so well by our neighbors on the planet. The WKC follows the AKC in this and instead of standing up for the breed and it's world-wide history and influence they tag along with the American Kennel Club.

Here's an example near and dear to me.........Longhair Weimaraners are not recognized for conformation show competition in the United States although they can be registered and are eligible for agility, obedience, and field trial competition. But everywhere else in the world and they are recognized for all competition and even highly sought after in many places including Germany, the ancestral home of the breed (obviously). Longhairs developed right alongside their shorthair brethren but when they came to the U.S.A. they were verboten. The story is too long and too damn silly to tell, but once again, the United States sucks owl dicks!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:52 PM

By the way, they HAVE elections in Cuba.

Here's a link about it:

Cuban elections in 1997

It's a radically different approach to ours in North America, and I frankly think that it is more likely to result in genuine democratic choices than ours is, because it is a process entirely free of lobbyists' money, media hype, and dirty campaign tricks, and it comes straight from the common people. The common people decide who runs in their riding, and they decide who wins when they cast their votes.

I think the Cuban election system is far better than ours is, and it costs very little to do it. You don't need to raise many millions of dollars to elect someone in Cuba. Every candidate gets a totally equal chance, because money is simply not a determining factor. The only determining factor is whether the public likes you and your ideas and your character better than they like the other candidates in that riding.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: bankley
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:44 PM

here's one.... the last time Fidel Castro was in Canada he was sitting right beside former US President Jimmy Carter at Pierre Trudeau's funeral at L'Eglise Notre Dame in Montreal...

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:37 PM

Yes. The Westminster. It's a dog show at Madison Square Gardens.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Kent Davis
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:31 PM

Is there ever an event of any kind, anywhere in the world that, upon being mentioned on Mudcat, does not bring forth criticism of the United States?

Kent

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 10:08 PM

The biggest violation of human rights in Cuba happens at Guatanimo Bay. Hard to blame Castro for that!

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: catspaw49
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 09:50 PM

So I'm watching the report on CBS this AM and there's Dumbya giving a speech in which he discusses Castro and Cuba. He's rambling along butchering the language as well as Castro and then he pledges to help the Cuban people "......have free and fair elections. AND I DO mean FREE and I DO mean FAIR!"

Yeah....right........Like that pissant would know what a "Fair Election" was if one chomped down on his half inch prick! Sadly the limpdick jadrool believes his own rhetoric..............

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Peace
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 08:45 PM

"If you try to govern Russia in the way we are presently governed in North America, it doesn't work. It gets taken over by their mafia and their criminal gangs and it all goes to hell in a few years...as occurred under Yeltsin."

Yeah. They got the mafia and criminal gangs and we got multi-nationals and corporations. Sometimes I just fail to see the difference.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 08:42 PM

I think both Fidel and Che were both social idealists, a study of their lives makes that obvious, but Che was more of a romantic. He was reckless, always ready to take the most phenomenal risks, and Fidel often had to rein him in or he would have been killed long before the revolution was even accomplished.

It's beyond question that Fidel has not run a democratic system in the sense of what we have in North America, but he could not have, given the particular circumstances in Cuba...without the whole thing falling apart. It would have led to the defeat of his entire attempt to do what he has done there, which was to create a socialist society where everyone has a modern education, medical care, and the other progressive measures he brought in. If you read the history of Cuba, and I have, you can see what has happened there every time a multi-party system was attempted. It became unstable very quickly, fragmented, fell apart, and a military dictatorship took over. Not a dictatorship that did anything for the poor people, but one that ruled by the rich for the rich and sold the island out to foreign interests. That's exactly what would have happened had Fidel simply handed things over to a typical multi-party democracy after his victory in '59. The new government would have lasted 1 to 3 years, fallen, and been replaced by another set of military robber barons, the Mafia and the corporations would have been right back in, the poor would have been as poor as they ever were, and it would have been another American-backed dictatorship like Batista.

I believe Fidel did the only thing he could do to hold that place together...and yes, there were excesses and oppressive actions by his government. They were at war. They've been at war ever since 1959, because the USA has never let up. It's been a cold war, but it's a war.

Cuba is not Milwaukee or Toronto. We in North America have a stable tradition of over 200 years of past liberal democracy to build on. They did not. It is unrealistic to think that Fidel or anyone else could have delivered them into a modern liberal democracy in 1959 that would be stable and would endure. Simply no way.

The same is actually true of Russia. If you try to govern Russia in the way we are presently governed in North America, it doesn't work. It gets taken over by their mafia and their criminal gangs and it all goes to hell in a few years...as occurred under Yeltsin. Putin understands that very well, and that's why he is doing what he's doing in Russia too...tightening the government's authority.

What works there doesn't work here. What works here doesn't work in Cuba. We're an apple, they're an orange, and you know what they say about comparing apples and oranges.

Castro's new biography is a very interesting read. It's also about a mile thick. You won't read it in one weekend.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Bob Ryszkiewicz
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 08:16 PM

Found this. Fidel Castro Speaks to Harlem... So many brilliant moments. It's long, so I've chosen Part 3 to begin...The rest is up to you...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7dJ8QbClTs&feature=related
bob

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: Peace
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 07:34 PM

True, Guest. It is unfortunate. I wonder what it would have been like had this man stayed in Cuba. I always had the feeling that for Fidel it was about gaining power, and for Che it was about revolution--in the sense of 'freeing' farmers/workers from oppressive conditions. In my heart of hearts, I think had he stayed in Cuba he'd have met a similar end. But the gun would have been fired by someone closer to him than American special forces-trained Bolivian soldiers. I suppose we'll never know.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Bob Ryszkiewicz
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 07:28 PM

The Dove of Peace...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flXuZL_SJYU
bob

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 07:09 PM

You know, at the time of the revolution, I could still agree that Castro was a pretty good leader. But his administration has been extremely repressive, democratic values have been completely sublimated in lieu of him holding on to power, and the human rights record in Cuba reflects that.

The Castro regime became increasingly brutal over time. God knows, they had plenty to be legitimately paranoid about regarding the US and the revolution's enemies both internal and external (via the exile community). But none of that, IMO, is justification for the way the Castro regime went.

That said, I'm tremendously hopeful about Cuba's future, and I sure hope I get there before the embargo gets lifted.

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: GUEST,Bob Ryszkiewicz
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 06:56 PM

From BBC WORLD NEWS:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwKNWL-BoIo
bob

Subject: RE: BS: Fidel retires
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Feb 08 - 06:50 PM

"Imagine 50 years of Dubyah."

I don't imagine the Cubans would have put up with that!