But why do certain Babblers obsess on making Cuba have elections right friggin' now?

It seems to me it would be better to work for more freedom of expression within the existing system until U.S. hostility towards Cuba ends. Until such time, any elections would serve little purpose other than to give the gusanos a chance to meddle and to give the Yanqui a chance to try to restore the old order.

Work to reduce internal restrictions on free speech now. Work to restore democracy to the existing Cuban system. These would make good sense. Not "elections" on American terms.

What's the rush?

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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Why do certain Babblers obsess on making Cuba habe elections right friggin' now?

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Fidel Castro's serious illness might be an opportune moment to have a democratic election to replace him.

But the lack of democratic elections are only a symptom. The root cause are provisions of the Cuban Constitution which do not adhere to international human rights norms.

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Recent Elections: By percentages of 88%, 93% and 91% in the last three national elections Cubans have overwhelmingly demonstrated ongoing support for their present government even though opposition forces, including Miami exiles, urged that voters boycott the elections, or leave the ballots blank or spoiled, as a protest. The National Assembly elections of 1993, 1998 and 2003 became, in effect, plebiscites on the Revolution, socialism and the leadership of Fidel Castro. These were secret votes, not compulsory, and were witnessed by foreign observers.

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And as to the role of the Communist Party, it may be a useful caricature to compare the Cuban CP to that of the CPSU but the roles are fundamentally different:

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National Assembly members, including Fidel Castro, are directly elected for five year terms by the citizenry and must get 50% to win. The National Assembly has 609 members. The Communist Party, which is 15% of the population, does not nominate candidates or administer the government. The National Assembly is the only body with legislative powers. It can amend the Constitution. It adopts laws and plans, carries out Constitutional duties, and elects judges to the Supreme Court. It elects, from among its members, the deputies of the Council of State.

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Besides, elections are a competition. They force people to defend their ideas and actions, and keep people from getting lazy and feeling entitled to their positions. It forces leaders to remember that they're performing a public service.

I mean, Fidel will probably be dead in a few months. If you want a less repressive Cuba there are more effective ways, as I see it, to work for that than insisting on them doing something that will be seen as caving to the Yanqui.

And, if you had an election, and the result was like Nicaragua in 1990, wouldn't that basically be a horrible tragedy? Without the Sandinistas, Nicaragua was a hope and life-free zone for sixteen years. No one was working to organize the poor and the workers in those years.
No one who voted against the Sandinistas wanted anything progressive or positive for their country. You couldn't have hope in your heart and vote to end the revolution.
The Sandinistas only got back in by moving so far to the right that virtually nothing will change.

Is this a huge recommendation for bourgeois democracy on American terms?

I'd like to see the project for democratizing Cuba be moved forward on less demeaning and imperialist terms. And I've also come to see that nothing good comes from any country doing what MY country's government wants them to do.

What people should be pushing for, instead of bourgeois elections, is a greater democratization of economic decision-making, along the lines of what Hugo Chavez has been doing in Venezuela. This, in my opinion, is far more important than letting rich people by a majority in the Cuban Legislature.

Why insist on democracy on right-wing Yanqui terms?

And if, as a result, Cuba was reduced to Blairism-Bushism, would the Stockholms and Steppenwolfs apologize for being so sanctimonious about bourgeois democratic purity?

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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But, I can give a two word answer: It's democratic.

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Originally posted by John K:

Fidel Castro's serious illness might be an opportune moment to have a democratic election to replace him.

But the lack of democratic elections are only a symptom. The root cause are provisions of the Cuban Constitution which do not adhere to international human rights norms.

These constitutional provisions include: Article 5 which provides the Communist Party with a monopoly on state power, Article 53 which prohibits independent media, Article 54 which only allows free expression, assembly, and association to be exercised within state sanctioned organizations, and Article 62 which does not allow any freedoms to be exercised contrary to the existence and objectives of the one-party socialist state.
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Cuba

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Sure but just theoretically speaking would having one party having a monopoly on political power be a contravention of democratic norms if that parties membership were generally open, and the processess within the party deomcratic. It seems to me that such could be a form of democratic system.

For instance, in theory at least, it does not seem to me that the Soviet model as inherently undemocratic, if party membership is open, and not selected. There is nothing undemocratic about having local organization vote for the membership of the higher party authorities in the manner of a series of electoral colleges, each electing in turn the higher authority, if you see what I mean.

I mean, even in the USA it is not the case that the people directly elext the president, they in fact elect the electoral college, which then elects the president.

I am making this point more to elucidate the idea that representative deomcracy of the kind we have here, is not the only system which is "democratic," and it to can be made to have built in biases which support the status quo, such as the FPTP system, in Canada, the payment of Government election funding to parties based on thier previous polling results in Canada. This latter obviously favours the incumbent, tending to have a generational bias over time. Even the fact that such funding is paid to parties and not to individuals tends to entrench established (and therefore establishment) political entities, such as the parties themselves that select the candidates from wich people can choose.

This is not to say that our system is totalitarisn, because obvliously it is not, but it does tend to reinforce a certain types of politics at the expense of others. This is esoecially the case when the media is largely in the hands of specific vested interests, and they decide what it is that people are allowed to choose from.

One only has to look at the difficulty the Green party is having establishing its credibility to see this process in action.

I am not saying this because I like them so much, but just to elucidate how the system tends to favour the entrenched elite.

So getting back to Cuba, I agree the system is organized to bias the nature of politics but on the other hand it is not completely undemocratic either, in that it is not monolithic and their are certainly differences of opinion within the system expressed as factions within the party structure.

If this was not the case with Soviet model governing structures there is no way what happened in the 1980's in Russia could have happened at all. Glasnost, was entirely a creation of a specific "liberalizing" faction within the CPSU, and in direct opposition to "coservatives" there.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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Originally posted by Jingles:
Can anyone claim that Canada's system, with its regular elections, is anywhere close to democracy?

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I haven't had a political commisar lay an ounce of led in my skull or sent me off to some camp in Siberia.

I'd say that it is pretty damned close to what I imagine as democracy. You know what? I'll say it IS a democracy. I can vote, I have freedom of speech...wow. I have these in born rights.

I think for instance you would agree that FPTP naturally causes a consolidation of power around broader axis, and this has unaturally biased the process against smaller parties such as the NDP, which are regularly underpresentative in the parliment.

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Originally posted by Papal Bull:
[QB]

I haven't had a political commisar lay an ounce of led in my skull or sent me off to some camp in Siberia.

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Sure but just theoretically speaking would having one party having a monopoly on political power be a contravention of democratic norms if that parties membership were generally open, and the processess within the party deomcratic. It seems to me that such could be a form of democratic system.

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Living as I do in Alberta where the same party has been in power continuously for 35 years, I had to chuckle when reading Cueball's post. The Conservatives here having been making exactly these arguments for years.

If that argument were made, then we could discuss what conditions might be imposed to insure that Cubans, rather than Americans, decide Cuba's future.

Unfortunately, that argument is not the one made by people on Babble for whom Castro is effectively infallible.

Instead, they argue like this:

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For instance, in theory at least, it does not seem to me that the Soviet model as inherently undemocratic,...

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I am willing to hear an argument that says that it is difficult for Cuba to have elections because of the possibility that the US would massively interfere, fund the opposition, etc.

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If the US had such unlimited power to manipulate elections and get people they like elected then how do you explain recent elections in Uruguay, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua??? If those countries were able to go to the polls freely and elect leftwing governments then why can't Cuba???

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Stockholm ]

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am willing to hear an argument that says that it is difficult for Cuba to have elections because of the possibility that the US would massively interfere, fund the opposition, etc.
If that argument were made, then we could discuss what conditions might be imposed to insure that Cubans, rather than Americans, decide Cuba's future.

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Hopefully, the election of progressive and leftist Presidents throughout Latin America, will create those conditions for Cuba. I see these conditions as being necessary:

External factors:
- Greater Latin American integration and economic independence from the US;
- Economic aid to Cuba via Venezuela as well as other Latin American Countries in order to substantially raise the standard of living of Cubans, a sort of Latin American Marhsall plan to offset the devestation of the US Embargo;
- Mercosur;
- Trading pacts between Cuba and the EU, Canada etc.

Internal factors
- Transforming state run enterprises in Cuba to worker run, allowing workers' council and federations of councils to run sectors of the economy in conjuction with the State;
- Allowing democratic consumer councils or coops
- Allowing more cooperatives in general as an economic devellopment strategy;
- Participatory Budgeting;
- Allowing non-commercial free media run by elected community representatives (democratize the media;
- Provide a democratic constituent assemblies, (i.e. neighbourhod councils) throughout Cuba that can elect delegates to higher regional councils that can in turn elect delegates to a National Council, these nested constituent assemblies (i.e. delegates confer with the lower councils) within a predetermined years negotiate a new constitution for Cuba and new participatory political system (usually stuff like that happens when you give people power).

External factors during elections would be:
- To make sure that the N.E.D. which has funded many "democratic revolutions" around the world does not interfere;
- International political monitors and pressure on the US not to interfere will be necessary.

Hence, what can we do:

- Through solidarity networks or poltical activism we can:

Some of your "conditions" make sense. Others, though, have the effect of booting the balldown the road an undetermined number of years.

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Originally posted by Ken Burch:
But why do certain Babblers obsess on making Cuba have elections right friggin' now?

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So if they see someone drop a ballot in a box, they figure that means that person lives in a free and democratic society. It's the George W. Bush theory of freedom: once Iraq held elections, they could be declared to be a free and democratic country.

Some babblers have strange ideas about democracy. They recognize Canada, Israel, Ukraine, India — even ancient Athens — as "democracies," and yet they are incapable of recognizing in Cuba a society where the governors rule with the consent of the governed.

They support using repression and lethal military force against presumed extremists and terrorists — mostly of the Islamic variety — in order to preserve our own rotten, moribund society. But they oppose the Cubans' right to defend their own workers' state against the extremists and terrorists that literally have them under constant siege.

Why are they so blinded to the truth about Cuba? Why have they bought into the imperialists' relentless disinformation campaign?

In the first place, they are ignorant of the institutions and processes of democracy already in place in Cuba — institutions that provide not merely for dropping a ballot in a box every few years, but for actually participating in collective decisions about matters that most directly affect people's lives. Cubans have successfully operated that way for nearly half a century; revolutionary Cuba could not possibly have survived for so long in the face of the hardships it has faced without overwhelming popular support, and without developing its own forms of democracy and social participation.

But the self-appointed Cuban democracy police don't understand that the very point of a revolution is to reorganize society to do things in a whole new way. Or if they do, they are profoundly hostile to the idea. They prefer socialists like Salvador Allende, who having failed to lock the door on the old regime allowed it to return with a vengeance. They are firmly attached to preserving the capitalist system and its phony illusion of democracy, as exemplified by Canada — to them, the most democratic and free society of which they can conceive.

Welcome to terminal political blindness.

The Liberal Party is clearly being infiltrated by US Democratic operatives. Why is everyone so concerned about people having individual political rights to organize, protest, dissent and speak freely?

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Welcome to terminal political blindness.

It's why no one can have a serious discussion of Cuba on Babble; we get pushed off into la-la land.

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I understand the frustration on both sides of this.

Pushing for democracy in Cuba is seen by some as joining the bandwagon of US imperialism, and this is normal because that's what democracy and human rights are used for by the NED and other state dpt. operatives, we see this throughout the world.

But there are people who do not want the US to dominate Cuba, but still think that Cuba should have genuine democracy, where the rulers at all levels are elected by the Cubans themselves.
Of course, it is more important to attack what our part of the world does to people in the poorer countries.

But even though we attack what our part of the world does to the whole world and more specifically what the US does to Cuba, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't criticize the shortcomings of the domestic system and built links of solidarity with indigenous movements.
Yes, of course we may be hypocrites, since we live in Plutocratic democracies (or polyarchies), which have much to do, to become real democracies, but even though we struggle to make our democracies more genuine, does not mean that we shouldn't comment or come up with ways to help others make their more genuine.

Hence, I believe there is a consistent socialist argument for civil libertarianism and popular and genuine participatory democracy for Cuba that is both in defence of the social achievements of the Cuban Revolution and against US imperialism.

I firmly believe that if Cuba does not become democratic in the genuine sense of the word, i.e. that it does not have a polity in which all the positions of government are subject to the choice of the people they serve, then the gains of the Revolution will be lost since people will equate social justice with tyranny and freedom of speech and elections with capitalist neo-liberal economies.

It has been a grave disservice to the cause of socialism to separate it from genuine participatory democracy, workers control, popular control over investment and radical civil libertarianism.

Pointing to the democratic and civil liberty deficit of Cuba does not mean supporting the Embargo, does not mean supporting Imperialism, does not mean rejecting Cuban sovereignty, nor does it mean being anti-socialist. It means to the contrary its opposite.

(To be clear, I do not equate command economies with socialism. Socialism if it means anything means direct democratic control of producers and consumers over economic institutions, but that is not the debate here, I just want to state where I am coming from).

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Tom Vouloumanos ]

Why are you so convinced, Emma, that elections in Cuba have to happen right now? What would be so terrible, for example, about waiting a couple of years, getting a U.S. administration possibly that WASN'T fixated on lowering the place to the old days, and THEN working for elections?

What makes elections so bloody magical?

They haven't made Canada or the U.S. into paradise on Earth.

It's enough to work for more human rights in Cuba and everywhere else by other means.

Ease the relentless pressure all around, then have the vote. That's what I'm saying.

Why is that anathema?

I don't think Fidel is anathema. It's just that we all know that an election in Cuba that produced a right-wing victory(which U.S. pressure would HAVE to cause)would be the death of all hope forever. The people could never recover if the Miami types took power again, and the Bushies will settle for nothing else.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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Some of your "conditions" make sense. Others, though, have the effect of booting the balldown the road an undetermined number of years.

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It may be that Cuba will not undergo any dramatic changes until Fidel's passing. Venezuela has been moving in the direction of workers and consumers councils, participatory democracy, coops etc. maybe Chavez can influence Raoul. Maybe, there can be a second revolution under Raoul and then he can run for the presidency...and campaign on a new Bolivarian Socialist Revolution. Chavez talks of a Socialism of the 21st Century or Participatory Socialism, maybe the Cuban Rulers can take this up.

Alot will depend on how things in Latin America go. This is all hypothetical, but I think progressives and leftists should promote an "exit strategy" for Raoul that can lead Cuba to democracy without it becoming a Nicaragua, an El Salvador or a Colombia.

If not, then I think Cuba will face a takeover with an elite population mostly from Miami running the country and the rest of the population being much worse off.

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Originally posted by Ken Burch:
Emma G's last post could only be made by a middle-class white person.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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I would love to be middle class!

I know this is a shocker, but I work for just above minimum wage, and grew up on a family farm where my parents made less than that. You were correct about my race, although the boatloads of Cubans who risk their lives leaving Fidel's paradise certainly aren't middle-class or white. (Sorry, I mean CIA-paid middle-class caucasians masquerading as desperate poor people fleeing a communist Island)

Anyways, I'm not really sure how my low-income status is relevant to my opinion that Cubans deserve rights now. Compared to most on this planet I'm extremely privileged, and only relatively "low-class".

Tom V. had a great post above, in that those of us who don't support US imperialism and military intervention around the world can still speak out against injustice in Cuba (or Iran, Iraq, etc.) without supporting the US's twisted and misguided foreign policy. The US democratic systems can certainly be criticized, with what happened in FL, the corrupt electronic voting machines etc. Our own system needs PR and STV, and is obviously not perfect.

But the truth is that in the US and Canada you can go on TV and say that Harper is an idiot and Bush is a moron and burn their effigies in the street. You can also rally for political change within different political parties and bring lawsuits against those who you believe have threatened your democratic right to a fair vote in a free election.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: EmmaG ]

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What makes elections so bloody magical?

They haven't made Canada or the U.S. into paradise on Earth.

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Originally posted by EmmaG:
You were correct about my race, although the boatloads of Cubans who risk their lives leaving Fidel's paradise certainly aren't middle-class or white. (Sorry, I mean CIA-paid middle-class caucasians masquerading as desperate poor people fleeing a communist Island)

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I think you'd be disappointed to know that more Cuban's fled the island on average during Batistas's rule. But in all fairness to the dictator Batista and his brutal dictatorship, people who live on islands have a natural tendency to want to leave and explore the world at some point in their lives. This is true of all Carribbean island nations, and especially Haiti and Dominican Republic, two democratic capitalist nations trading freely with the U.S. and other nations. I don't recall reading Emma's thoughts on either of those two democratic nations in any threads.

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Anyways, I'm not really sure how my low-income status is relevant to my opinion that Cubans deserve rights now. Compared to most on this planet I'm extremely privileged, and only relatively "low-class".

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That's ok, Emma, there are tens of thousands of very low income Canadians and subsisting well beneath the standard of living that you've known. parts of Northern Canada have been compared with Kazhakstan wrt rates of mortality and poverty. You should feel free to make comments on any of babble's aboriginal issues threads.

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But the truth is that in the US and Canada you can go on TV and say that Harper is an idiot and Bush is a moron and burn their effigies in the street.

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The truth is, people have been jailed in the deep south and in Britain in recent years for as little as wearing anti-Bush and anti-Blair t-shirts in public. The U.S. has experienced an unprecedented loss of civil rights and freedoms since the focus on "terrorism." The Yanks are so focused on terrorism that they're holding five Cuban anti-terrorists in American jails. BTW Emma, the U.S. owns the largest gulag population in the world. Don't try to kid us about the state of freedom in the USSA.

Six arrested in anti-Bush protest

Anti-Bush protesters assaulted by police

200 Anti-Bush protesters arrested

I was denied my freedom of speech, says Sue Niederer

Nine anti-Bush protesters arrested

SS question student about anti-Bush T-shirt

Protest Bush Go to Jail

Anti-Bush T-shirt banned

U.S. prison population continues to soar

Sweet Carolyn Parrish fired for un-American activities

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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Originally posted by EmmaG:

I would love to be middle class!

I know this is a shocker, but I work for just above minimum wage, and grew up on a family farm where my parents made less than that.

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What I'm saying is, there has to be another way than saying "elections now! elections now! elections now!"

Perhaps we should be pushing for a long-term series of negotiations between the Cuban government and some dissident groups. We can legitimately call for dialogue.

It's just that the "when will Cubans elect their leader" meme is just so strident and arrogant, like when EmmaG threw it in for no reason whatsoever in the thread on Ecuador's election, and inappropriate for Yanks in particular to be speaking of. Canadians have some more latitude, not being historically part of the Yanqui imperialist thing on Latin America, but I do feel that U.S. citizens, due to OUR country's historic arrogance towards Cuba, should put themselves under some constraints.

Democracy yes. Capitalism no.

Also, as I repeated above. The Patriot Act, and the loss of civil liberties in the US does not mean that Cubans shouldn't also have freedom. However, I've never heard of Americans being jailed over an anti-Bush T-shirt, pls provide links. And no, I'm not happy to hear that more Cubans left under Batista. He was also a dictator, whose reign caused a lost of the popular sentiment that led to the revolution you admire so much.

By refuting Ken B's assertion that I'm middle class, I in no way meant to imply that I have it rough. I don't. As you say, the disgusting quality of life that exists on many First Nations reserves in this country cannot be compared to the comfortable living here on PEI (I know, I haven't updated my profile in awhile) that I enjoy. I would enjoy a thread to discuss the causes of the current situation and how the policies of the two leading parties have contributed to that over that past century.

re: Guantanamo: Can you name which jail is the only one on the Island of Cuba that allows the International Red Cross to inspect its facilities?

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It's just that the "when will Cubans elect their leader" meme is just so strident and arrogant,

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I think its far more strident and arrogant to assume that the people of Cuba are a bunch of simple minded imbeciles who cannot be entrusted with choosing their government in a free multi-party election.

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Originally posted by unionist:

Only a middle-class person confuses class with income.

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Originally posted by EmmaG:
Fidel, when have I ever championed the quality of life of people in Haiti or the Dominican Republic. I have never encountered thread about these countries on babble, whereas Cuba is discussed here often.

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And you never make mention of them when focusing on anti-Cuban rhetoric either, as if Haiti, D.R., Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador are situated in another hemisphere and not 50 miles from Cuba or just a few days drive from Texas. Sure they share similarities in terms of the geographic, trade issues and the geopolitical wrt to the largest and most influential and most militant nation in the hemisphere to the north. One can't miss discussing those obvious implications when discussing any Latin American country and U.S. political and economic influence in the region. It would be like discussing the Philippines or Puerto Rico without making mention of their imperial master nation with whom they depend on for trade, military occupation and for crackdowns on freedom of speech and political freedom.

In fact, you can't not mention the U.S.A. in Cuba discussions because the largest incarcerated population on the island of Cuba is there at Guantanamo Bay, a menacing military presence which represents the largest threat to human rights on the island. It's like ignoring an open door on the tiger cage at the zoo.

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Also, as I repeated above. The Patriot Act, and the loss of civil liberties in the US does not mean that Cubans shouldn't also have freedom.

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But that's the problem - over 3400 Cuban nationals have been murdered over the years by U.S.-based terrorists aided and abetted by the FBI & CIA. And the case with the Cuban "dissidents" has been commented on by a former CIA specialist on Latin America, American lawyer for the Cuban Five, Leonard Weinglass, pro-Cuban dissidents in the U.S. and Canada, political commentators as well as babblers here. Sedition is a crime that exists on every countries books. We're still waiting for you to comment on the Cuban's side of the story. And unlike the evidence against the Cuban five closely guarded from outside world scrutiny, the Cubans have offered evidence to the world that the Cuban dissidents were in the hire of the American government and Spanish conservative political party at the time.

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However, I've never heard of Americans being jailed over an anti-Bush T-shirt, pls provide links.

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Links

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I don't know why you always bring up other countries when we're discussing Cuba. I also don't know why I bother, since you're obviously a die hard supporter of the longest-reigning political leader on the planet.

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And I don't know why people like you seem to vanish like cucarachas when discussion turns to gross human rights violations on an island just 50 miles from Cuba and described by Warshington as "the freest trading nation in the Caribbean." That is, unless you're just a die-hard Cuba critic while neglecting every other country surrounding Cuba and the U.S. as if they didn't exist. Suddenly we're all experts on Latin American issues, are we ?. Funny that

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

There's been a lot of discussion about these two shit holes. As usual its only people like Fidel, M Spector, SA, unionist and many others that post.

However, when the subject is the rise of ANY leftist leader, you immediately make a Castro remark or post anti-Cuban spam from the Miami Herald. So spare us the same "I'm progressive" speech that John Kerry, Paul Martin, Tony Blair and other neo-lib imperialists use.

You also always mysteriously disappear when any threads appear about the US releasing terrorists that kill Latin Americans, the US government paying off your beloved Miami Herald journalists to write propoganda you spam with, the Cuban 5 and other threads that show Venezuela or Cuba in any positive light.

There's a great thread on Oaxaca. Why don't you read it and see what real oppression looks like:

Here's the article:

The Dirty War of Oaxaca

Here's the thread:

Post your thoughts here

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

If the US had such unlimited power to manipulate elections and get people they like elected then how do you explain recent elections in Uruguay, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua??? If those countries were able to go to the polls freely and elect leftwing governments then why can't Cuba???

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There's still the issue of contested election results in Maico. Florida and Ohio?. And what about the CIA's abra cadabra of J-B Aristide ?. Or does that one not count like the attempted CIA-Venezuelan military coup against Chavez, who was also democratically elected ?. Democracy in Latin America isn't quite as safe a bet as you seem to want to believe it is. Cuba is a stable country politically.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
last time i checked the per capita income there was about 1/20 what it is in Canada.

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You might also want to reflect on how accurate the per capita income of Canada is as a representation of how most ordinary Canadians live. The enormous discrepancies in income in Canada mean that there are vastly greater numbers living below the "per capita" income level than above.

Why do you seem to think that its IMPOSSIBLE for people to vote for a non-socialist government of their own volition? Its as if you just can't accept the idea that some, perhaps even most Cubans might not think that they live in a workers paradise and might elect a non-socialist government.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
I am not presumptious enough to think that I sitting in Toronto know what is best for Cuba or what the Cuban people want.

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I think the reason some people here argue so vociferously against Cuba having a free election is that they know perfectly well that if Cuba had an election, the Communist Party would suffer the same ignominious fate as the Communist parties of Russian, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Lithuania, the eastern parts of Germany etc...etc...etc...etc...

If you believe in democracy you have to accept that the parties you support won't always win. You can't say that elections are OK as long as the party you like wins, but that otherwise they are illegitimate.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Stockholm ]

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
The only way to know that is to have a free multi-party lecetion and end all press censorship and free all political prisoners.

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Ok, but only if the imperialists leave Gitmo and free the estimated 400 plus political prisoners there at camp x-ray and the other torture gulag with "no name" first. It could be viewed as one of the first gestures of good will by the shadow government since 1959 and the more than 600 attempts by the CIA-mafia to murder Cuba's revolutionary leader. You didn't mention any of that, so we can only assume it's understood, right Stockholmer

ETA: [Columbo] Oh uh, and one more thing I forgot to ask that's been baaawthering me. Why can't approximately 80 percent of Haitian's vote for Jean Bertrand Aristide if they want to ? When you have time, Stockholmer, but don't chip any gear teeth over it.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

It goes without saying that a non-socialist government in Cuba would have to be a tragedy the place could never recover from. Eastern Europe, where the people fought for democratic socialism but were then forced to accept austerity capitalism, as the US will force the Cuban people to accept, illustrates this.

You act as if a right-wing victory, which in Cuba clearly WOULD be the result of U.S. and gusano intereference, would be no big deal. Why can't you see the inevitable reality, Stockholm?
Until U.S. pressure is removed, no election in Cuba would reflect the people's real feelings.

Besides, as I've repeatedly pointed out, Stockholm, Fidel will be dead soon. Why not accept the fact that he'll be in power until he dies and THEN work for democracy? Why be a political vulture?

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Originally posted by Coyote:
Okay, but can't one believe in both, Fidel? Can't one believe that as Haiti deserves free and fair elections, so does Cuba? That the political prisoners should be freed in Haiti and in Cuba?

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So you're saying the dissenting journalists in Cuba were not guilty of a crime that's on every country's books, sedition ?. Personally, I think its very likely the majority of the 75 are guilty. I think that the actual number of political prisoners is quite small in comparison with most of Uncle Sam's friendly third world neighbors. They've got kids sharing adult lockup in El Salvador and neighboring countries. I could go on but few here would be interested because they know more about Cuba and would chastize me for going off topic. That's the part I find astounding, that they know they can't do much about the real shitholes off Uncle Sam's back doorsteps, but by gum, they want to fix what's not broken in Cuba. Because anti-Cuba rhetoric is what they know verbatim from MSM.

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But can't one dedicate onseself to the principle, at least, that free and fair elections are a good unto themselves, and one that overrides partisan concerns?

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I know what you're saying, and it sounds very legit to me at first glance. But I would tend to think about the greater good for too long after the initial appeal of it. Socialism is a dictatorship of the proletariat, I would tell myself.

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
For what it's worth, Amnesty International's take on the prisoners issue raised by Fidel.

I am disturbed by what is considered "sedition" by the Cuban authorities.

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Actually, I'm disturbed that you're disturbed about an AI report on Cuba.

AI never did condemn South African apartheid. Why not ?

AI gave timely reports to the Reagan admin on Nicaragua's Sandinistas in jusjtifying more funding for the killing in Latin America. Why ?

AI fell for the Hill & Knowlton propaganda concerning "Nurse Nayirah's" heart-felt tale about babies pulled from incubators in Kuwait and left to die on "cold cement floors." Apparently this gullible organization never thought to tell us about the imperialist setup in Kuwait where approximately ten percent of Kuwaiti's are actually allowed to vote, and vote for Prince al Sabah they must. One Philippino worker in that country said something like, "The whole country is a prison" wrt to treatment of foreign workers and women in general. I wouldn't be quite as disturbed by the AI report as by what former CIA specialist on Latin America, Philip Agee, had to say about the dissenting "journalists" in Havana. To summarize, Agee tells us it was all about provoking a response from Havana in order to further isolate Cuba from the EU and pro-Cuban support groups within the U.S., but not about promoting democracy in Cuba. Cason betrayed the Cubans by implicating implicating them with known CIA agents based in Miami, Madrid and with an agenda in Havana being funded by a hostile foreign government. Sure it's sedition, and it's against the law in dozens of western nations. For lesser crimes in the U.S. and its third world friendlies, the feds'd put us so far away that they'd have to pump air to us so we could breathe.

[ 04 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by EmmaG:
However, I've never heard of Americans being jailed over an anti-Bush T-shirt, pls provide links.

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Links
=====

This is bizarre, because I've never quoted my own post before. But let's go on the offensive here for just a moment. The U.S.A., a nation that looms large in all geopolitical issues in this hemisphere, is now the most prolific jailer nation of its own citizens in the world when measuring total incarcerated as well as rates of incarceration per hundred thousand people. In fact, the U.S. is said to incarcerate black people, specifically, at six times the rate of the most openly racist nation of the last century, South Africa.

Why haven't any of our weak and ineffective governments in Ottawa approached Washington to discuss why this is happening in a nation they are working so hard to integrate us with economically and culturally ?.

Why is it that our shamefully impotent feds in Ottawa speak so politely to Washington in light of these glaring human rights issues, and never mind the cornucopia of other U.S. policies for imperialism abroad, after which Ottawa can only cow-tow and grovel over instead of uttering one harsh word about the possibility that their actions and behaviour could affect the siphoning off of our natural wealth by their multinationals ?. South Africa was eventually slapped with loosely enforced trade sanctions by the international community. And it's not Cubans who removed one democratically-elected leader in Haiti or failed with another attempt in Venezuela this decade. Mention of democracy together with CIA-fomented military coups against popular leftist leaders within a few hundred mile circle around Cuba in the same decade is such a visual oxymoron for me still. I dunno. Friends don't let friends actually become a two political party dictatorship ruled by shadow government. Not if it's an international relationship built on openess and trust. The U.S. has become one large limited liability corporation powered by world fear and warfiteering. And we're accomplices and enablers to their criminal behavior. Just sayin'

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Why haven't any of our weak and ineffective governments in Ottawa approached Washington to discuss etc. etc.

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quote:

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In case you hadn't noticed, perestroika reforms in Russia didn't go over so well with millions of people who died as a result of the ensuing 3000 percent increase in poverty, Stockholmer.
And they're not doing so well in Poland, Albania, or Latvia where one person who used to live there recently commented that homelessness is now a common problem in that country where it was once unheard of in Soviet times.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

If that's the case the Russian people could have returned the Communist Party to power in an election and tried to recreate the old Soviety system.

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quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
The problem with your perpetual characterization of the Canadian government as impotent puppet rulers of a banana republic beholden to the US empire is that it lets them off the hook. If they are powerless and helpless,...

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How does it let them off the hook, and what does that say about the state of democracy in North America. They have no concept of a hook. It's Canadians who are on the hook for mismanagement of the colony by our two weak and ineffective administratorships handing off power to the other for the last 100 years in a row. I think it's real, and I think we're talking about a setup that is comparable with the former Soviet influence over the republics and Eastern Europe. White cats and black cats, and it shows with our lower voter turnouts in that country and this one. I think we need democracy for one thing. If the right and "centre"-right Liberals are that sure of their support, then why not prove it to the world by giving us advanced democracy?. That would be a start, but I think once their power is threatened by real democracy in this last bastion of political conservatism where power and money is holed-up, the mask would come off at some point.

And I never said our two old line parties are powerless or helpless. They are willfully impotent to act in a sovereign way with their own agenda. Canada is a mid-power banana republic. WE can't help but have a little prosperity given our unparalleled natural wealth being siphoned off 24/7/365. It's all about appearances. Canada should be a real G8 economic powerhouse. We're not and never will be with colonial administratorships in Ottawa and Queen's Parks. Canada is still a hewer of wood and drawer of water nation. Martin admitted as much before the changing of administrative bureaucracies at the start of the year

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

A lot of us would like to see, as I sincerely believe many Eastern Europeans would like to see, a democratic radical politics emerge there.

What has happened in those countries illustrates the problems with and limitations of bourgeois democracy.

The people there have been unable to get the chance to vote for anything but the new evils or an empty protest vote for the old CP's. The bourgois Social Democrats you'd support have been indistuishable from the pro-austerity free market right. They haven't defended workers or the newly poor.

In short, in the old Warsaw Pact, "democracy" as we know it has turned out to be pointless and useless.

Something better, there and here, something genuinely democratic and genuinely radical, needs to be found.

quote:

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AI never did condemn South African apartheid. Why not ?

AI gave timely reports to the Reagan admin on Nicaragua's Sandinistas in jusjtifying more funding for the killing in Latin America. Why ?

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This isn't true at all. I have Amnesty Reports going way back. They certainly did condemn apartheid.

The UN Anti-Apartheid said so, dozens of times. Here's an example:

[/QUOTE]

GA/AP/784, 24 January 1978

The following statement was made today by the Chairman of the Special Committee Against Apartheid, Leslie O. Harriman (Nigeria):

The Special Committee against Apartheid notes with satisfaction that Amnesty International issued a special report on 18 January on "Political Imprisonment in South Africa" and invited all its national sections to launch a world-wide campaign for release of prisoners of conscience, repeal of discriminatory and repressive legislation and an end to torture in South Africa. The report rightly points out that "no reforms in the present structure will be sufficiently far-reaching to remove the causes of political imprisonment unless the whole system of apartheid is dismantled".

http://www.anc.org.za/un/pr/pr0124-78.html

The quote from Amnesty at the end shows that Fidel-babbler is just not telling the truth once again.

As for Nicaragua, Amnesty did discuss human rights abuses there, but generally admitted that the situation was far better than under the previous, Somoza, dictatorship. Amnesty also made it clear that the US-backed contras were far more guilty than were the Sandinistas of human rights abuses.

During the Sandinista years, I visited Nicaragua six times. I was a guest of the National Assembly for a month on one of those occasions. I can tell you that there was nothing improper or biased about Amnesty's reporting from Nicaragua.

quote:

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It has often been said that Amnesty International's agenda tends to fit nicely with the political needs of the United States and Great Britain. Around the world, supporters of the Nicaraguan people's struggle for self-determination were outraged by the timing of a 1986 Amnesty report critical of the Sandinista government, which helped Reagan push another Contra Aid appropriation through a reluctant congress, at exactly the moment when the anti-Contra movement was beginning to get serious political traction. With regard to South Africa's apartheid regime, AI was critical of the human rights record of the South African government. However, as you will see below, AI never condemned apartheid per se.

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Is it a coincidence that various right-wing American governments and Israel also refused to condemn the most openly racist nation of the last century?. We know that the Reaganites absolutely refused to condemn Pol Pot until the world began pointing fingers at the west. And there are many more examples of deliberate ignorance when, in fact, the U.S. and its allies were aiding and abetting the most ruthless right-wing SOB's in history, from Adolf Hitler to Osama bin Laden.

I get the strong feeling that groups like AI helped the west in codemning Serb atrocities while deliberately under-stating Croat massacres and ethnic cleansing for the sake of political expediency. Human rights is an opportunity for politics, Jeff. The hawks don't give a shit about human rights anywhere in the world, especially not in their own backyard.

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Our country has already experienced the model others wish to impose upon us. It has lived the sad experience of the "multi-party" and "representative" system prescribed for it by the United States, which brought it external dependence, corruption, illiteracy, poverty for large sectors of the population, and racism; in sum, the complete denial of the most elemental individual and collective rights, including the right to truly free and democratic elections. This system and the permanent interventionist policy of the United States not only bred crooked and corrupt politicians, but brought tyrannical and murderous dictatorships, promoted and aided directly by Washington. For all these reasons, the Cuban Revolution could not adopt such a system if it truly wished to resolve the ills inherited from it. Thus the country set about designing its own model, for which it searched among its own roots and resorted to the social, humanist, and patriotic philosophies of the most illustrious and eminent Cuban thinkers.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

If that's the case the Russian people could have returned the Communist Party to power in an election and tried to recreate the old Soviety system.

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Could they?

Let's not forget just how "democratic" Yeltsin was:

quote:

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The Russian constitutional crisis of 1993 began on September 21, when Russian President Boris Yeltsin dissolved the country's legislature (Congress of People's Deputies and its Supreme Soviet), which opposed his moves to consolidate power and push forward with unpopular neoliberal reforms. Yeltsin's decree of September 21 contravened the then-functioning constitution; on October 15, after the end of the crisis, he ordered a referendum on a new constitution.
The Congress rejected the decree and voted to remove Yeltsin from presidency through impeachment. His estranged Vice President, Aleksandr Rutskoy, was sworn in in accordance with the existing constitution as Acting President. On September 28, public protests against Yeltsin's government began in earnest on the streets of Moscow where the first blood was shed. The army remained under Yeltsin's control, which determined the outcome of the crisis. The legislators found themselves barricaded inside the White House of Russia parliament building. For the next week, anti-Yeltsin protests grew, until a mass uprising erupted in the city on October 2. Russia was on the brink of civil war. At this point the security and military elites threw their support behind Yeltsin, besieged the parliament building, and through the use of tank artillery nearly destroyed the building and cleared it of the elected legislature. By October 5, armed resistance to Yeltsin had been crushed. The ten-day conflict had seen the most deadly street fighting in Moscow since the Bolshevik Revolution in October 1917. According to government estimates, 187 had been killed and 437 wounded.

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quote:

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Amnesty International refused adamantly to condemn apartheid in South Africa. Despite my best efforts while I was on the board, and other board members, they would not do it. They are the only human rights organization in the entire world to have refused to condemn apartheid in South Africa. Now they can give you some cock-and-bull theory about why they wouldn't do this. But the bottom line was that the biggest supporter, economic and political supporter of the criminal apartheid regime in South Africa was the British government, followed by the United States government. And so no matter how hard we tried, no matter what we did, they would not condemn apartheid in South Africa. Now I just mention that as one among many examples.

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quote:

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Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, along with the US Government, have contributed not only to political confusion about Venezuela. By misusing the words, democracy and human rights, they have created a semantic nightmare. They seem to accept US coups and destabilization campaigns as compatible with democracy, while Chavez's efforts to make majority rule a reality by providing for basic substantive rights become an offense.

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Further reading:

Amnesty International: A False Beacon

Perhaps you found the article I don't have time to look for right now from the ANC in '77 or '78 thanking AI for their stand on apartheid. See, unlike purer-than-thou western lefties, the ANC understood that what AI was doing in exposing the reality of Apartheid was important work.

Unbelievable. Hey, if AI jumps up and down and gives Castro a hug the next time he steps out to deliver a speech - or you know, his democratically selected brother who takes over when he's ill - can we then take a step back on this one?

quote:

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Originally posted by Ken Burch:
What, pray tell, is the "Soviety" system?

Or is "Soviety" Stockholm's answer to "truthiness"?

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quote:

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Originally posted by EmmaG:
I know this is a shocker, but I work for just above minimum wage, and grew up on a family farm where my parents made less than that. You were correct about my race, although the boatloads of Cubans who risk their lives leaving Fidel's paradise certainly aren't middle-class or white. (Sorry, I mean CIA-paid middle-class caucasians masquerading as desperate poor people fleeing a communist Island)

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1) The media likes to pump up stories about people who risk their lives in leaky boats to escape Cuba to end up in the Miamian paradise in order to create a bad impression about Cuba. (Incidentally, I have not heard of any such stroies lately.)

2) As explained here, there are aspects of US immigration policy that prevent Cubans from entering into the US through proper channels.

And yeah. It is pumped up. There was a big write up about how huge the issue is in the port city of Odessa in the economist, quite recently too. But really, it doesn't directly effect North America like cuba does.

quote:

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although the boatloads of Cubans who risk their lives leaving Fidel's paradise

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Versus the millions of Central Americans swimming across the Rio Grande because of capitalist paradises like Mexico, Guatamala, Honduras, El Salvador, etc.

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

If you support democracy it must be 100% unconditional. You can't say you support free elections as long as Communist parties win, but oppose them when Communist parties lose.

I want multi-party democratic elections, where any party with any policies are free to compete. not some bogus "guided democracy" North Korean style.

What is the Communist Party so afraid of in Cuba? If they really are so popular then they ought to be able to win by at least as big a margin as Chavez in Venezuela.

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Stockholm ]

quote:

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If they don't like it then all they have to do is vote for their friendly neighbourhood Communist Party - but they don't. Tough!

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Or they can simply "disappear" as the CIA euthemistically puts it.

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
If you support democracy it must be 100% unconditional. Blah blah blah.

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You take democracy [whatever that means] as a total abstraction, with no connection to any real-world political conditions or historical context. It's a one-size-fits-all world as far as you're concerned.

Ignorance is bliss. Free and fair elections are rare in Latin America. Recent history has proven this. Because Cubans don't want to subject themselves to a CIA-sponsored desaparecido of their leaders and have the country turned upside-down doesn't translate to a point scored for team demockeracy. Some of us on the left have this immovable conservative tendency to want to see things in black and white, like the Berkeley study says about political conservatives of history. They tend to have a low tolerance for ambiguity. Toronto and Havana are popular subjects these days.

So when will Stockholmer be taking in the sights of San Salvador, Santo Domingo or the ruins of Tikal ?. Bring a camera and don't mouth off to the armed soldiers or police.

[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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I actually wish that they had had elections the whole time, but I don't understand why it's a big fixation right now with people like Stockholm and Steppenwolf. EmmaG I understand, she just wants the rich back in power in Cuba by any means necessary. But Stocky and Steppy? Jeeezzz...

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Hey Kenny. You just had to get me involved. Well OK. First off, yep, having read some of EmmaG’s flakey dishonest anti-union garbola, it seems her idea of democracy means we all sacrifice our rights and freedoms to hail the boss or the government. Fine, that’s her.

As for me “fixation” with free elections, I guess that comes from being a grassroots socialist who’s been pushing for greater democracy in this country all my adult life, since we have so little of it in practice.

Cuba has “elections.” The US has “elections.” My “obsession,” as you put it, with free elections comes much more from my experiences in the US than in Cuba, although it comes from there as well.

Cuban federal elections are governed by ridiculously tight rules and laws restricting who can run and on what platforms, and keeping a firm grip by corporatist forces over the one party that’s legally allowed to exist.

US federal elections are governed by ridiculously tight rules and laws restricting who can run and on what platforms, and keeping a firm grip by corporatist forces over the only two parties that are legally allowed to seriously participate in those elections.

SO in Cuba, parties other than the so-called (Stress so-called) “Communist” Party can’t legally exist. In the US, parties other than the Republicans and Democrats can exist but are in most cases defacto shut out of seriously contesting elections by all sorts of prohibitive rules and expenses.

While the latter is more liberal than the former, the end result is pretty much the same—and in some ways the US is worse, since in Cuban elections discussions about socialism exists pretty much only in rhetoric with little if any substance. But in the US elections, even the discussion of socialistic economics on a purely rhetorical or abstract level is banned. Taboo. Heresy.

Sure, in the US you can make fun of the president and won’t get into trouble, whereas in Cuba that can get you in shyte. But that’s not much of a trade-off for not being able to seriously question the US corporate power structure and its oppressive, destructive and largely stupid capitalist economics, is it.

In Cuba, the major media is run by state-owned corporations that largely push the government line and defend its bureaucratic structures. In the US, the major media is run by four stock-held corporations with direct political and financial ties to both parties that largely push the government line and defend its bureaucratic structures.

Many people here say, quite correctly, that if Cuba opens up its electoral process, the US will sneak in and try to rig it so their puppets get in—the way the US tries to do elsewhere. And that’s true—as sure as the sun rises the US government will do that.

There are other ways of working to ease repression in Cuba, other ways of opening up alternatives.

There's a need for creative thinking here, and newer approaches to fit this situation.

quote:

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Originally posted by Steppenwolf Allende:
While the latter is more liberal than the former, the end result is pretty much the same—and in some ways the US is worse, since in Cuban elections discussions about socialism exists pretty much only in rhetoric with little if any substance.

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Cubans have socialized medicine and the lowest infant mortality rates in Latin America. They have workers co-ops, and according the CBC special, Cuban field workers have better incentives to produce than our own Canadian small farmers dealing with marketing board setups.Cubans have free university education and housing.

By comparison, many Salvadoran children don't go to school where multi-party elections are the rule just a few days drive from Texas. Instead, they rummage through landfill sites all, picking through medical waste and excrement looking for something valuable to sell and put food on the table.

quote:

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Sure, in the US you can make fun of the president and won’t get into trouble, whereas in Cuba that can get you in shyte.

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Ah, but you're so full of shit that your eyes must be a deep brown. I've been to Cuba twice over the years, and Cubans complained about the government then as much as they do here in Canada.

quote:

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Yet in every case except Peru and Mexico, they got their asses kicked by the voters who aren’t buying the BS (and Mexico may still turn, if the courts rule the electoral fraud is enough to warrant another vote).

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You forgot to mention the attempted CIA-military coup against Chavez in 2002.

quote:

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Originally posted by Ken Burch:

There are other ways of working to ease repression in Cuba, other ways of opening up alternatives.

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I think the American people have their hands full with repression in their own country. God, why can't they wear an anti-Bush T-shirt if they want to ?. Why do secret service agents harass college kids about a piece of clothing that was likely imported from China ?.

Why can't Americans protest against the Bush Nazis if the want to without being arrested and thrown in jail with the largest gulag population in the world, bar none ?.

quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
It's nothing but rigid absolutes with you, isn't it?

You take democracy [whatever that means] as a total abstraction, with no connection to any real-world political conditions or historical context. It's a one-size-fits-all world as far as you're concerned.

It's not only an apolitical worldview, but one profoundly impoverished by a lack of imagination.

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And yet, when I mentioned Venezuela off the bat, none of you ardent Cuba defenders bothered to address that point.

quote:

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Originally posted by Vansterdam Kid:
If Chavez can do it, why can't Castro?

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Venezuela and Cuba are not comparable, nor are Chavez and Castro. Holding Chavez up as a model for Castro to follow is as ridiculous as saying Stephen Harper ought to govern Canada more like Nasser governed Egypt. Totally different situations.

Venezuela is an industrialized, capitalist country, with vast operating oil reserves. Chavez talks variously about a Bolivarian revolution and socialism, which may mean the same thing, but so far he has accomplished neither. I am not denigrating him; I wish him luck and support his efforts. But Venezuela is not a revolutionary workers state like Cuba. And Cuba is far less rich in resources, and more agriculturally based. More important, and to the point, is that Venezuela has not been squeezed economically by a vicious imperialist blockade for the last 47 years, and has not been under constant threat of invasion and subversion by hostile forces funded by the CIA and the NED for half a century, either.

I'm wondering, if Chavez ever does succeed in creating a revolution in Venezuela and sets up a post-capitalist society, just how many babblers will still support him. Or will they continue to imagine that socialism is some abstract utopia that exists only in their impoverished imaginations, and firmly declare Chavez to be a "dictator," as the State Department has been saying all along?

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

quote:

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Holding Chavez up as a model for Castro to follow is as ridiculous as saying Stephen Harper ought to govern Canada more like Nasser governed Egypt. Totally different situations.

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quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
if Chavez ever does succeed in creating a revolution in Venezuela and sets up a post-capitalist society, just how many babblers will still support him. Or will they continue to imagine that socialism is some abstract utopia that exists only in their impoverished imaginations, and firmly declare Chavez to be a "dictator,"
[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

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quote:

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Why this obsession with making Cuba have elections?

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Please note. Neither I nor anyone else who supports democracy in Cuba even started this thread. it was started by the usual gaggle of apologists for the repressive government of Cuba.

Why their obsession with defending the indefensible? (ie: police state with no freedom of the press and no multi-party democarcy)

quote:

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Originally posted by Papal Bull:
Fidel, I went to some of those links.

There was one that had a big, red "may not contain accurate information" and most of them just link back to this thread.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Papal Bull:
Fidel, I went to some of those links.

There was one that had a big, red "may not contain accurate information" and most of them just link back to this thread.

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They all look legit to me, PB.

As is usual in these threads, people having no knowledge of Cuba other than what they have been fed by the capitalist media try to pass off as fact that which is solely the product of their own imagination; like Stockholm's characterization of Cuba as a "police state," or like Steppenwolf Allende's ludicrous assertion that "in Cuban elections discussions about socialism exists pretty much only in rhetoric with little if any substance," as if Cuban politicians go around giving speeches about the ideology of Marx and Lenin, to polite applause from an indifferent populace. The reality is very different, of course. Cuban political discourse - whether before or after an election - is constantly focused on the specific and practical concerns of the people, and they particpate actively, not as passive spectators.

These people have never bothered to crack open a book about Cuban history, like Isaac Saney's Cuba: A Revolution in Motion, and so know nothing of how the Cuban revolutionary leaders won the admiration and trust of the Cuban population, even before they took power in 1959. They don't know about the recurring battles since 1959 against bureaucratic and Stalinist tendencies within the revolution, or about the bold and highly successful economic reforms that the collective leadership of Cuba introduced after the fall of the Soviet Union, with massive consultation and input from the farmers, workers, and technologists whose unstinting efforts were required to make it work. They don't even bother to read the numerous babble threads and the links to reliable information provided therein.

They assume that because there are no NED-funded, CIA-backed, capitalist restorationist political parties fielding candidates in Cuba's elections, that those elections are not genuine, and that the government is therefore not responsive or accountable to the people. To them, choosing governments is a kind of sport, that has to be played by certain eternally constant rules that they call “democracy”; if half a century of revolutionary progress gets overturned through the ballot box, well, that's the nature of the “game” – you win some, you lose some – but the important thing is that the imperialist exploiters were allowed to appear on a ballot. Closing the door forever on a return to capitalist exploitation is just not cricket, don't you know.

They also labour under the understandable Canadian assumption that the only opportunity ordinary people have to participate in decision-making in their society is on election day. In between Canadian elections it's a dictatorship of the ruling party. They ignore the fact that ordinary Cubans participate continuously in discussions and decisions about how their society is to be run; the many ways in which they do so are discussed in an article entitled "Democracy and dissent in Cuba," starting on p. 12 of the November, 2003 issue of Alliance Voices, a publication of the Australian Socialist Alliance; but of course the babble “dissidents” would prefer not know about that.

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
Yes, well we have heard about 99% voter turn-outs in North Korea as well. If you don't vote you get sent to a forced labour camp for the rest of your life.

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So you're an expert on N Korea as well, Stockholmer ?. Tell us what you know about that country, I've got a minute and half to spare.

ETA: This is a significant break from our narrow focus on the GTA-centric/Havana according to Gob and Pail and CNN. It amazes me how some babblers can sound like their reading from Fox News rag without actually posting source links to anything.

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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As is usual in these threads, people having no knowledge of Cuba other than what they have been fed by the capitalist media try to pass off as fact that which is solely the product of their own imagination.

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Give me a bit of credit, OK. In the past five years at least a dozen of my progressive friends (most of whom speak Spanish) travelled in Cuba, in some cases for as long as several months.

My friends' reactions when they returned ranged from mild to profound dissolutionment with the Cuban "revolution." Not only with the lack of civil liberties we too often take for granted, but also with the depth of poverty and the flourishing sex trade.

Apparently before the Korean War the north was by far the wealthier half of the Korean peninsula.

Are you now going to tell us that this is all imperialist propoaganda and that North Korea is a "workers paradise"???

In fact, you don't even have to imagine, just go to Haiti or the D.R. next door to it and observe the extent of grinding poverty and worst AIDS infection rates in this hemisphere on a Caribbean island and enjoying U.S.-managed "multi-party elections." Ask your Spanish-speaking friends to bring you back a report on those shitholes just 50 miles from Cuba.

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
I know that I'd sure rather live in South Korea where the standard of living is almost as high as Japan's and where they have very competitive multi-party elections and a very vibrant cultural scene, then to live in North Korea where several hundred thousand people have starved to death and where the human rights record is just about the worst in the world.

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Why not live in Burma, a similar size nation and population with S Korea and enjoying multi-party elections, U.S.-backing, and imprisoning Marxists and anyone who sounds left ?. And even with the U.S.-led medieval siege on NK, their infant mortality rates are still better than in the very repressive, brutal right-wing dictatorship of Burma exporting opium to the democratic capitalist third world's slums.

quote:

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Apparently before the Korean War the north was by far the wealthier half of the Korean peninsula.

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I am not saying that pro-democracy activists should give up on democratization in Cuba.

What I'm arguing is that there are probably ways to go out that effort that are more effective and less advantageous to U.S. imperial arrogance than putting the first priority on bourgeois-style elections.

What, I ask again, is so terrible about considering and trying to develop other possible strategies and approaches?

Why are bourgeois-style elections on U.S. terms the only approach you consider valid?

Why not be openminded here?

Fidel will be dead in a matter of months. This is now clear. In a way it would be kind of obscene to try to hound the guy out of office as he lies on his deathbed.

(BTW, the North Korean thing was a cheap shot, and you know it. Nobody here is anywhere CLOSE to being a supporter of Lil' Kim Jong Il. You owe Fidel, Spector and the rest of an apology for that one.)

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]