Castro crap/not crap

[Streathamite]

errm, trabaquera, is ANYONE disputing that 'the embargo does NOT explain or excuse everything that's wrong with Cuba .....', here? I haven't seen anyone just goign embargounclesambigbastard.
bit of a straw man, no?

 

[DrRingDing]

Crap - where's the free speech? Great hospitals and education I'm sure but they ain't worth shit if people aren't allowed to express themselves.

Freedom to post daft photoshopped images of themselves on t'interweb?

 

[trabuquera]

Red J: I think posts #42. #45 and #48 were coming pretty close to it.

I'm just oh so very tired of having conversations (real or virtual) which go:
A: cuba is marvellous
B: what about the human rights problems?
A: Well the US is worse
B: what about the economic problems?
A: it's because of the embargo...

Viz the response earlier in this thread, to my laying out the concrete problems which real Cubans I know have to struggle with: "At the heart of the things that you have described lays the US economic embargo..."

... it just goes ROUND AND ROUND AND ROUND. And the less concrete knowledge person A has of what Cuba is actually like, or of what the embargo actually says, the more feisty and aggressive they are likely to be in accusing person B of being 'a closet Republican', 'in the pocket of the Miami mafia', etc etc etc.

My post with the AP clip was in response to JoePolitix's mention of Chomsky's work on the US embargo, to clarify that complaints that "essential food and medicines are denied" (because of the embargo) are simply outdated.

so I honestly don't feel that characterising the debate here in the way that I did, was really all that much of a straw man.

 

[Streathamite]

err, I'm sorry but they were nowt of the sort. one was a perfectly valid point about consumerism, one about the USA, and one was (rightly) slating teejay for his usual blind defence of all things US.
fwiw, i know nino quite well, and he'd agree - as would most sensible folk - thatcuba is far from eprfect, that there s repression and a lack of certain freedoms. however, that's just one side of the story, and the greaster picture DOEAS need the Us factoring in. to me, castro is far preferable to whatever plans the US have had for it over the past 50 years.
and if you HAVE been having those sorta convos - serves yer right for hanging round swappie stoodents, dunnit

 

[trabuquera]

no luv - I don't hang about with swappies at all. (despite your alleging that I was one ffs!). Just with people on u75 who I think are basically sound, but maybe a bit under-informed about the reality of Cuba.

 

[Streathamite]

no luv - I don't hang about with swappies at all. (despite your alleging that I was one ffs!). Just with people on u75 who I think are basically sound, but maybe a bit under-informed about the reality of Cuba.

now come on, i never called you a swappie, them's fighting words just saw the gag and went for it....slating the naive eejits. rest of your post I see yer point.

 

[nino_savatte]

Red J: I think posts #42. #45 and #48 were coming pretty close to it.

I'm just oh so very tired of having conversations (real or virtual) which go:
A: cuba is marvellous
B: what about the human rights problems?
A: Well the US is worse
B: what about the economic problems?
A: it's because of the embargo...

Viz the response earlier in this thread, to my laying out the concrete problems which real Cubans I know have to struggle with: "At the heart of the things that you have described lays the US economic embargo..."

... it just goes ROUND AND ROUND AND ROUND. And the less concrete knowledge person A has of what Cuba is actually like, or of what the embargo actually says, the more feisty and aggressive they are likely to be in accusing person B of being 'a closet Republican', 'in the pocket of the Miami mafia', etc etc etc.

My post with the AP clip was in response to JoePolitix's mention of Chomsky's work on the US embargo, to clarify that complaints that "essential food and medicines are denied" (because of the embargo) are simply outdated.

so I honestly don't feel that characterising the debate here in the way that I did, was really all that much of a straw man.

You say one thing when you actually mean the opposite of what you have said - as this post indicates.

You misrepresented my posts by claiming that I had said food, soap and medicines were "meaningless consumables". On the basis of that, it is not possible to have a proper conversation when the other party isn't being honest.

 

[Orang Utan]

Freedom to post daft photoshopped images of themselves on t'interweb?

That, my friend, is the pinnacle of free speech!

 

[TeeJay]

err, I'm sorry but they were nowt of the sort. one was a perfectly valid point about consumerism, one about the USA, and one was (rightly) slating teejay for his usual blind defence of all things US.

I haven't said anything about America on this thread. Feel free to try and find a quote where I have.

 

[TeeJay]

...it is not possible to have a proper conversation when the other party isn't being honest.

So that rules out any debate with you then.

 

[nino_savatte]

So that rules out any debate with you then.

Pot-kettle-black, Teejay...or do you ever look in the mirror?

People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, friend, you should know that.

Prick.

 

[nino_savatte]

I haven't said anything about America on this thread. Feel free to try and find a quote where I have.

You're just a pointless nitpicker who reckons his shite doesn't stink.

 

[TeeJay]

You're just a pointless nitpicker who reckons his shite doesn't stink.

So that's a "I can't find any posts where you have mentioned America" then is it?

Thanks for that.

 

[nino_savatte]

So that's a "I can't find any posts where you have mentioned America" then is it?

Thanks for that.

You're not making any sense, friend but then I suspect you're the only one who finds your private joke amusing.

 

[TeeJay]

You sound like a school teacher.

 

[nino_savatte]

And you sound like a nitpicking anal retentive.

I'd rather be a teacher.

 

[TeeJay]

I'd rather be a teacher.

Maybe you'd like to be a teacher in Cuba?

 

[nino_savatte]

Maybe you'd like to be a teacher in Cuba?

Maybe you should get a fucking life, you sad, nitpicking cunt.

 

[ZAMB]

Some History

Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II.
by William Blum
http://www.killinghope.org/

One of a number of chapters in this book available online is the one on Cuba [Chapter 30 - scroll down to the link]. Although I knew some of the details of US terrorism in Cuba, I admit that I was shocked by things in this chapter. As the author says

The Cuban exiles in the United States, collectively, may well
constitute the longest lasting and most prolific terrorist group in
the world. It is thus the height of irony, not to mention hypocrisy,
that for many years up to the present time in the 1990s, the State
Department has included Cuba amongst those nations that "sponsor
terrorism", not because of any terrorist acts committed by the Cuban
government, but solely because they "harbor terrorists".

Considering how the US treated Afghanistan for 'harbouring terrorists' this current story would be ironic if it wasn't so disgusting. Note that he has been held up to now for 'immigration violations', despite requests for extradition, and the fact that he is a self-confessed terrorist. Double standards???

Luis Posada Carriles, citizen of Venezuela and Cuba, arrived in Florida last March. He has been detained since May 17 for immigration law violations. Those are the only charges against him, despite his confessed crimes of murder, downing a Cuban airliner, bombing Havana hotels and an attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro.

The longer Posada stays in Florida, the more likely he will be released on parole, according to Pertierra, especially if illness and disability become factors. At 78 years of age, the terrorist may be freed, “little by little,” the lawyer warned.

http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/8955/1/317

 

[kyser_soze]

Sorry, but all the great healthcare and education in the world don't mean shit if the state is locking people up for saying 'Castro and the communists are wankers'.

I'd have to list him as 'crap' - a leader who can't hear criticism is no leader.

 

[ZAMB]

I'd have to list him as 'crap' - a leader who can't hear criticism is no leader.

Bush? Cheney? Blair?

Did you even bother with the link?

 

[TeeJay]

Bush? Cheney? Blair?

Did you even bother with the link?

How many people have been locked up merely for saying "Blair is crap"?

Hysterical, hyperbole-spewing idiots like you would really learn something from spending some time in a *real* dictatorship - if you actually managed to get back out alive that is.

You really don't have a fucking clue, do you?

 

[bi0boy]

Crap for me. Just another dictator.

 

[SpookyFrank]

An authoritarian loon who, by avoiding the most grievous atrocities committed by his fellow travellers Mao, Stalin, Amin etc and by hanging a red flag on his authoritarian lunacy managed to remain popular with swappies and sundry other subspecies of cretin.

 

[butchersapron]

An authoritarian loon who, by avoiding the most grievous atrocities committed by his fellow travellers Mao, Stalin, Amin etc and by hanging a red flag on his authoritarian lunacy managed to remain popular with swappies and sundry other subspecies of cretin.

The SWP have been rightly very critical of him and the regime since almost the start. Not so the US swp who are now nothing but a castro fan-club.

 

[charlie mowbray]

But the American SWP are not the equivalent of the British SWP, it should be pointed out to those who don't know

 

[charlie mowbray]

It should be pointed out too that Castro maintained secret relations with Francoist Spain and that Spain sent ships to Cuba to break the blockade.
When Franco died in November 1975, Castro ordered 3 days of mourning for the Caudillo, a man who had been responsible for the murder of at least 500, 000 anarchists, Communists, socialists and liberals

 

[butchersapron]

It should be pointed out too that Castro maintained secret relations with Francoist Spain and that Spain sent ships to Cuba to break the blockade.
When Franco died in November 1975, Castro ordered 3 days of mourning for the Caudillo, a man who had been responsible for the murder of at least 500, 000 anarchists, Communists, socialists and liberals

Best discussion going on in this thread Mr Mowbray. Nice to see you around here btw.

 

[likesfish]

Castro not actually that murderous consider the US spent years trying to kill him or turning a blind eye to terrorists.
Didnt belive in free speach and locked up people but no mass graves no lists of the disappeared given the starting conditions he did pretty well.

 

[Idris2002]

Castro not actually that murderous consider the US spent years trying to kill him or turning a blind eye to terrorists.
Didnt belive in free speach and locked up people but no mass graves no lists of the disappeared given the starting conditions he did pretty well.

Haven't you got a NAAFI to sweep up?