Cuba: Maybe We Should Give Them a Chance

Post Reply New Topic

Compared to North Korea or the Saddam-era Iraq, it's not that isolated. It's heavily restricted, though, which prevents growth. Most Cubans recognize American celebrities are well aware of how European cars look like and are familiar with capitalist symbols such as Mickey Mouse and Coca Cola.



And this happened after the farms went private. Farmers with bank accounts worth roughly 200 000 dollars aren't that uncommon in the wealthier countrysides, which is why 90% of the Cuban wealth belongs to 13% of the people.

Thankfully, most Cubans are positive about the new market reforms, though.



North Korea has a very high malnutrition rate today. Although an oil crisis would make no difference in North Korea, I wouldn't call it "survival".

^^^ I would say today's capitalist symbols are iPhones and Facebook.
And of course North Korea won't really be affected by an oil crisis. They are also not affected by the current economic crisis because they take no part in the world economy. When you already hit rock bottom nothing can hurt you.

Is it Cuba or Detroit?

Well, in the same geographical island you have Haiti, that has a different economic system. So you can compare success in both cases. Bad news it that it looks like the experiment failed in Haiti too, since live conditions in Haiti doesn't seem to be better than in Cuba. Indeed, just the opposite.

http://www.nationmaster.com/compare/Cuba/Haiti/Economy

http://www.nationmaster.com/compare/Cuba/Haiti/Health

The economy of Haiti isn't that much more market oriented than the economy of Cuba. Haiti is also struggling with AIDS, which stalls the growth significantly. Baby Doc also stole a tremendous amount of money when he left the country.

If Cuba sank tomorrow just about the only people who would be upset would be the Cuban emigres in the Miami area. Cuba is not a hot topic of interest for most Americans. It is a broke country in the Caribbean which is not terribly important to the well being of the United States. Who gives a damn except the occasional commie loving pinko stinko liberal?

ruveyn

If we ever took a national interest in Cuba we'd probably end up bailing them out (as if we can afford to ).

And? Every country faces corruption and local networks of interests and plagues and all kind of problems. The issue is precissely how they overcome those problems and build a prosperous society. And AIDS is an universal disease, as long as I know viruses don't understand about political boundaries.

Both Haiti and Cuba have failed their 'experiment'. Indeed, Haiti is even worse.

You dont need to mention that, its well known around the world, that many US citizens are cultural ignorants. But still thank you, if a not US citizen had told this, he would have get blamed for prejudices. ^^

And it's well known around the world that many people love communism and want to visit one of the communist countries that still exist.
BTW, calling me culturally ignorant is a compliment.

I used to work with someone who was born in Spain, spent his early years in Cuba where his father was a medical doctor, went back to Spain for high school, and then moved to the US for college.

In about 1981 or 1982, his elderly mother was granted permission to come to the United States for a visit. He said that the biggest culture shock for his mother was when they went to a modern American supermarket and she saw the great amount and variety of food available for the first time. He said that even the best supermarkets in Cuba were basically small stores with mostly empty shelves.

Cuba is hated and such because its a communist country just 50 miles away from Florida, they havent really done anything bad for a while but to USA anything communist is considered evil, stupid in my opinion though.

/\ /\ /\
Well I suppose maybe it has something to do with the communist legacy of tens of millions of people exterminated and more disappearing into gulags that we backward Americans have our reservations about.

Cuba had concentration camps for homosexuals, Jehova's Witnesses and several other minorities until 1968. People are still killed by police boats while trying to escape and there are still plenty of political prisoners there. The man responsible for all of this didn't resign until 2006--and he gave the power to his brother, the man who was vice president when all this happened.

About as relevant as blaming capitalism for the atrocities committed by the Romans, or blaming capitalism for Guantanamo.

Especially since Capitalism didn't even exist in the days of the Romans and it has nothing to do with Guantanamo.