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edblarney

"The western view of Castro is painted with decades of terrible propaganda."

+ Fidel does not allow his people to leave, with the threat of punishment.

+ Fidel does not allow democracy

+ He does not allow any real internet access

+ Fidel puts political dissidents in jail

+ Fidel's private Army own's 85% of the economy

+ Cuban's live in relative poverty

+ Only the US 'embargos' Cuba, they are free to trade with 167 other nations in the world - and even buy American products from wherever they want - just not America.

This is not 'propaganda'.

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Here are some points of propaganda:

> Fidel does not allow his people to leave, with the threat of punishment.

Everybody is (now) free to leave Cuba. But OK, I think that's fairly recent.

> Fidel's private Army own's 85% of the economy

"Fidel's private Army" is just an ugly sound byte. It's the Cuban army and it's not going to be dissolved now that he's dead.

> Cuban's live in relative poverty

While poverty is a problem, it's not a Cuban problem. For instance, Americans also live in poverty (at least 45 millions of them)

On the other side, western propaganda blanks out a lot of facts about Cuba. Among those is the fact that a significant percentage of Cubans approve their government.

I can't help but notice that you skipped over the little details about a lack of democracy, a lack of free access to information, and how dissidents are punished.

> On the other side, western propaganda blanks out a lot of facts about Cuba. Among those is the fact that a significant percentage of Cubans approve their government.

I can't help but notice that you skipped over the little details about a lack of democracy, a lack of free access to information, and how dissidents are punished.

> On the other side, western propaganda blanks out a lot of facts about Cuba. Among those is the fact that a significant percentage of Cubans approve their government.

Weird. Then why the resistance to holding elections?

I was pointing out propaganda and those I skipped well, those look like facts unfortunately.

And it is a dictatorship, so no elections. I wrote significant not majority.

Just wanted to point out that it's hard to get a realistic picture in the middle of all the propaganda. For instance, there's no starving in Cuba and health care for everybody. You cant say that about all countries with elections.

Is American and Cuban poverty the same?

The extreme poverty in the US can honestly be worse than Cuban poverty.

No because the US has the resources and wealth to ensure that its citizens do not have to live in poverty and could provide health care and education to everyone (they just choose not to) . In Cuba they don't have the resources or wealth but they still manage on health care and education but are still struggling with poverty.

I used to live in Buffalo, NY. There are things there I never saw throughout my travels of South America.

You are ignorant of the reality of Cuban society. People have been able to leave Cuba freely since 1980. Cuba is a participatory democracy, with essentially every adult being involved. Internet access was not really a priority with the USSR collapsing and the recovery from that, but it is being quickly broadened. Only those who actively attempt to undermine the Cuban democracy are imprisoned, but people are free to vote for liberal candidates and a minority does. The average Cuban has a better standard of living than the average Oklahoman or Mississippian. Finally, the embargo is not just a ban on trading with Cuba; it's a ban on doing business with anyone who does business with Cuba. That effectively restricts 99% of multinationals from trading with Cuba.

I've been to Havanna 4 times. The electricity always worked. The room we had at somebodys home had windows but they are not needed anyway. Its so hot there, all you need is some iron in front. Since 2013 at least some had internet and this year there were lots of people at the public wifi hot spots. Yes cuba is not rich and laks many goods but in all my time there in literally all parts of the country I saw nobody suffering on the basics. Absolutemly everbody has enough food, a rooftop, free basic healthcare and money for alcohol and basic pleasures. It's not comperable to high european standards but I think it could be easily worse there. Did I mention its secure there? There are no insecure areas to go or bad people to talk to.

> Only those who actively attempt to undermine the Cuban democracy are imprisoned

Did you know that if you try to overthrow the government of the United States you'll be arrested? Crazy stuff.

Did you know that people can overthrow the government of the United States every 4 years? They actually did a couple weeks ago, and noone had to die or go to prison.

They cannot. The US is not a direct democracy Swiss style

They did, and the world is steel reeling from announcement. There is now a huge change in political course following the election results, no matter how one tires to explain that away with nitpicking.

On Cuba, even suggesting change of leadership is enough to put you in prison.

the only thing they can change is the name of the "president" in the government. There is no way Americans can legally overthrow the government. Overthrowing governments by people is called revolution. This is what Castro did with his people in Cuba.

That's not remotely true about Cuba.

None of that is true. I've been to Havana; I've seen the buildings where 3 families are crammed into an apartment meant for one, where the windows are covered with cardboard because there's no glass, the electricity is on a few hours a day, where the concrete is crumbling so badly you could break it off with your fingers.

And I've seen just outside town the gorgeous villas with manicured gardens and water features, where members of the Party live. There's inequality in the West but nothing like there is in the "worker's paradise".

Try working on minimum wage in London.

My first job in London in the 90s was £3/hr. But tell me more about this "minimum wage" - £7.50/hr isn't it?

First tell me more about how much rent you paid in the early 90s.

There are legal, efficient ways out of poverty in the UK. There are none on Cuba.

Cubans do not live in poverty. There are neither rich nor poor. And if you think there's an "efficient" way to escape poverty in the UK, you've never been poor.

Cubans are poor, and even those who are better off (within Cuban legal bounds) still live miserable lives compared to an average UK poor.

Unlike the USA, the UK has efficient universal healthcare and access to quality education, plus working safety net for the citizens. It might not be easy to rise from the poverty, but it is possible and indeed, most Britons are doing OK.

As to your small personal dab, I grew up in a Communist country and am familiar with the package, don't need no lectures from guys in Che t-shirts.

I bet you've spent a lot of time in some of the estates in Tottenham, Harlesden or Haringey.

You went on a tourists' visit of poverty. Try doing the same in London, and let's see how you do there, bruv.

I have and the worst sink estate in London is nothing like as bad as Havana, at least not in terms of the physical infrastructure. Crime is probably worse in London.

And yes I am aware that as a tourist those are the bits I was allowed to see; I'll wager the "real" Cuba is far worse.

"Cuba is a participatory democracy, with essentially every adult being involved. "

Ha ha ... haha hah .... ha

> + Only the US 'embargos' Cuba, they are free to trade with 167 other nations in the world - and even buy American products from wherever they want - just not America.

Except, any company making a deal with Cuba is automatically banned from dealing with the US.

To this date, the US even interfers in Europe regarding that: There is a famous case where a German bought Cuban Cigars from a Dane, and the FBI interfered, and seized the funds from their bank accounts.

If any company ever touches the USD, the US claims to have jurisdiction over them.

> + Cuban's live in relative poverty

The median wealth and income in Cuba is higher than most middle american countries.

Cuba is not a great country to live in, but please don’t distort the facts. That doesn’t make you any better than the North Korean propaganda that claims the US president eats babies.

> Except, any company making a deal with Cuba is automatically banned from dealing with the US.

Can you be more precise by what you mean when you say "making a deal"? Does flying to Cuba constitute "making a deal"? Air Canada has flown there for years and still flies to the US.

Half of those you listed are just normal characteristics of communist state, to argue on those would be to argue on whether communism is "evil" in comparison to capitalism or not. This is very much not self-evident as you seem to assume from your post (I'm not interested in said discussion, just pointing out how biased looking your comment reads to me).

Just to put a concrete point, Per capita GDP of Cuba is 4 times the largest democracy country (India).

> Just to put a concrete point, Per capita GDP of Cuba is 4 times the largest democracy country (India).

I'm seeing it at closer to 3x based on <http://www.tradingeconomics.com/india/gdp-per-capita> and <http://www.tradingeconomics.com/cuba/gdp-per-capita>.

But even granting 4x, notice that it was 5x back in 1970 (which is as early as the Cuba chart in this dataset goes). And if you look at numbers from right before the Cuban revolution, it was about 6x...

Of course the embargo, the Soviet subsidies, the removal of those subsidies, and the sugar price crash in the 90s make it hard to make much practical sense of Cuban GDP per capita and its evolution.

I _would_ like to respond to your "normal characteristics" point, though. The "people aren't allowed to leave" your country _is_ a normal characteristic of communist states, but that doesn't make it OK. And I would argue that it's not necessarily inherent to "communism", and _is_ "evil" in pretty basic terms: it violates the right of freedom of movement. See also UN declaration of human rights, article 13. I understand the practical reasons such a restriction is instituted, and I can even make some moral arguments for it (e.g. owing a debt to the society that provided your education and hence not being allowed to take your skills elsewhere), but I still don't think the outcome is OK.

Fidel does not allow his people to leave, with the threat of punishment

This is the big one. Many countries have restrictions on people coming, for various reasons, but any country/govt that prevents people leaving knows perfectly well that it's doing something that people want to flee.

How much does it cost to stop being an American citizen? How many poor American people can afford that cost?

How is that relevant?

Lots of people in Miami consider themselves Cuban and are just waiting for the opportunity to go home and reclaim their family's birthright. Leaving a particular regime doesn't mean abandoning your heritage.

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