No more Fidel Castro

JIZZLORD

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7252109.stm

Castro has officially stepped down. I'm surprised he even lasted this long what with all the cia assination attempts

Riddle101

I love the way Fidel Castro was able to give the two finger salute to the Americans and live to tell the tale. No doubt about it the man has embarrassed America quite a lot without revenge and i'll be happy to see Fidel Castro live the rest of his life with a clean sheet over America.

That being said let's hope America don't use this opportunity to put one of their puppets in power in Cuba

Moriarty

Riddle101 wrote: »

I love the way Fidel Castro was able to give the two finger salute to the Americans and live to tell the tale. No doubt about it the man has embarrassed America quite a lot without revenge and i'll be happy to see Fidel Castro live the rest of his life with a clean sheet over America.

That being said let's hope America don't use this opportunity to put one of their puppets in power in Cuba

Remember kids: communist puppet good, capitalist puppet bad.

duggie-89

yea its good to see the man retire in goodish health ie not being gunned down by the CIA.

he stood up to america and helped impove his country's lot when ever the only power there was the huge american corporations

djpbarry

duggie-89 wrote: »

he stood up to america and helped impove his country's lot ...

Seriously?

I think Martina Devlin summed him up nicely:

I look at Fidel Castro and I see a rock 'n' roll revolutionary, an icon, an idealist. But I also see a dinosaur. Someone who, to safeguard his mythic status, should have died in the 1960s when we could remember him as a liberator instead of a dictator.

Running Bing

djpbarry wrote: »

Seriously?

I think Martina Devlin summed him up nicely:

I think he has.


Personally I feel communism is an inefficient system and would definately be a capitalist but he did a lot of good for the country. Education and health care facilities are excellent. Certainly dont have the material wealth other countries do but the big question is how well does material wealth measure welfare?


Are people in Cuba less happy than they are here?


I have a lot of respect for Castro. I really believe he did what he thought was best for the country and its people.

djpbarry

Babybing wrote: »

Education and health care facilities are excellent.

But they have come at a massive price.

Babybing wrote: »

Are people in Cuba less happy than they are here?

Probably - if not, then why have so many emigrated?

Babybing wrote: »

I really believe he did what he thought was best for the country and its people.

What he THOUGHT he was doing is irrelevant, it's what he ACTUALLY did that's important. Cuba is essentially a great big prison where the individual has little or no personal freedom.

Kaiser_Sma

Cuba is desperatly poor and human rights abuses and appaling politcal freedoms are rife. Theres little doubt that education and hospitals are free, but there has been little external analysis of their quality (hopefully that'll change soon though).

I think castro was quite a narcessist really, while in some respect he cared for his country, he didn't always go the best way about it. Democracy was only ever an illusion as opposition party members and democratic groups where regularly given 20 years in jail for no other reason. You could also be denied access to 3rd level education based on your political beliefs. Equality was also shown to be poor and it is believed that castro often delayed or ignored solvable social issues using the excuse that the americans prevented him from doing so.

During the cuban missle crisis, eyewitnesses have said that he was furious when the russians and the americans came to terms as he expected them to weaken each other in a large nuclear or conventional conflict to the advantage of cuba

sovtek

Moriarty wrote: »

Remember kids: communist puppet good, capitalist puppet bad.

Whose puppet would Castro be? From an American government perspective its more like capitalist oppressive dictator good...democratic communist/socialist bad.

Benedict XVI

Riddle101 wrote: »

I love the way Fidel Castro was able to give the two finger salute to the Americans and live to tell the tale.

Pity many many Cubans who were executed were not live to tell teh tale

djpbarry wrote: »

Seriously?

I think Martina Devlin summed him up nicely:

Read the column, though is was excellent.
There was some ass of the radio a few days back spouting all that was great about Cuba and Castro, it sounded like something a 16 year old idealistic student would say.

sovtek

Kaiser_Sma wrote: »

Democracy was only ever an illusion as opposition party members and democratic groups where regularly given 20 years in jail for no other reason.

Some of those opposition party members were in jail for things like blowing up civilian airliners...and if they weren't in jail it was more than likely because they were being given safe haven in America. It's says something that Jeb Bush is a favorite of the exiled Cuban type.

http://www.chris-floyd.com/images/bushcuba.jpg

Kaiser_Sma

there are some 60 or 70 people in jail for crimes of conscience in cuba at the moment, i doubt they were all terrorists. There were also between 2,000 and 12,000 political executions.

sovtek

Kaiser_Sma wrote: »

there are some 60 or 70 people in jail for crimes of conscience in cuba at the moment, i doubt they were all terrorists.

I'm sure they aren't either nor am I saying that Castro is an angel.

There were also between 2,000 and 12,000 political executions.

How many were there under that bastion of capitalism and democracy, oh and friend of America, Batista?

Sand

How many were there under that bastion of capitalism and democracy, oh and friend of America, Batista?

Okay, so 2-12 thousand political executions are okay. But Batista ****ed up. He went over that magic 12K number. If only he had known, he too could have been known as simply, not "an angel".

Oh right, thats not what you meant. What did you mean then, because the relevance seems lacking to me.

Catsmokinpot

djpbarry wrote: »

Seriously?

I think Martina Devlin summed him up nicely:

I remember a lecture that Dr. Aleida Guevara ("El Che's" daughter) gave at WIT back a few years ago, she seemed really nice, and painted a completely different picture of life in Cuba than the one you hear about from the media (don't like using those two words "the media" but where else do you get your news?)

In the end it's down to the question: who you believe?

I'm not just going to believe some newspaper commentator because she has a view that someone is a "dinosaur", and acts as if the American sanctions and Trade embargo's put on Cuba were a walk in the park compared to Castro, i cannot remember exactly what Dr. Guevara said (it's been about 4 or 5 years now) but what America systematically did to Cuba and anyone who traded with Cuba wasn't pretty and wasn't a walk in the park and was probably the cause of a lot of Cuba's economic ills.

Personally, I felt that she was a very sincere person and wasn't lying when she told us her story.

sovtek

Sand wrote: »

Okay, so 2-12 thousand political executions are okay. But Batista ****ed up. He went over that magic 12K number. If only he had known, he too could have been known as simply, not "an angel".

Oh right, thats not what you meant. What did you mean then, because the relevance seems lacking to me.

Might I add that those numbers are supplied by the Cuban American lobby?

sovtek

Sand wrote: »

Okay, so 2-12 thousand political executions are okay. But Batista ****ed up. He went over that magic 12K number. If only he had known, he too could have been known as simply, not "an angel".

Oh right, thats not what you meant. What did you mean then, because the relevance seems lacking to me.

The relevance, if I must point it out, is that Batista was ok when he racked up 20k...but Castro is an evil dictator for about 600.

duggie-89

djpbarry wrote: »

But they have come at a massive price.
Probably - if not, then why have so many emigrated?
What he THOUGHT he was doing is irrelevant, it's what he ACTUALLY did that's important. Cuba is essentially a great big prison where the individual has little or no personal freedom.

yes and what is that massive price paid for?? standing up to the usa. look at the forced embargo on cuba by america. this has done alot to increase the suffering of the cuba people. and if your reply is simply human rights abuses i ask you to look no further to american and its abuses aswell as the fact that america is the biggest jailer in the world per head.

true and look at the fact that cuba has exported doctors mainly to south america.

but saying that cuba isn't perfect but its not the hole that its made out to be by those who hate socialism.

Kaiser_Sma

That 2 to 12 thousand figure was estimated from a number of sources. They seem to vary alot. 2 thousand was the lowest and 12 was the rational highest (although there was one source that said 70-100 thousand but i did think that was a little rich)

Just because i'm infavour of castro leaving doens't mean i think batista was a prefered alternative. Most the proxy dictators on both sides of the cold war were horrible rulers, and i'm glad to see the last of them trickle off. Castro seemed to get away with alot in terms of foreign public image. Maybe if batista had the same level of merchandise he would have lasted longer.

djpbarry

duggie-89 wrote: »

yes and what is that massive price paid for?? standing up to the usa.

Right…

Cuba does indeed have free health care for all (I'm not sure of how high a quality the service is), but almost everyone lives in dire poverty, living off government rations.

duggie-89 wrote: »

look at the forced embargo on cuba by america. this has done alot to increase the suffering of the cuba people.

Yes, it has. But you must also acknowledge that Castro did an awful lot to increase the suffering of the Cuban people.

duggie-89 wrote: »

...and if your reply is simply human rights abuses i ask you to look no further to american and its abuses aswell as the fact that america is the biggest jailer in the world per head.

We're not talking about America, we're talking about Castro, whose human rights record (seeing as you mention it) is appalling.

duggie-89 wrote: »

...but saying that cuba isn't perfect but its not the hole that its made out to be by those who hate socialism.

I don't know what people you're referring to and the use of the term "hole" is relative, but I think it's safe to say that things in Cuba could be a whole lot better and Castro has to accept responsibility for that.

sovtek

djpbarry wrote: »

I don't know what people you're referring to and the use of the term "hole" is relative, but I think it's safe to say that things in Cuba could be a whole lot better and Castro has to accept responsibility for that.

...along with the American government with it's decades long aggression against Cuba.

Kaiser_Sma

There seems to be a consistant trend of shirking any of cubas responsibilities by diverting attention to the US. As if the countries cannot be judged seperatly.

The trade embargo was harsh but Castro played his own part in bringing it upon his country. Theres little evidence that he didn't take every step to make the US an enemy of cuba. The trade embargo was indelibly linked to the office of Fidel and conditionally to Raul, and if the Castro dynasty had left power then it would have been lifted. Unfortunatly for cuba the political environment was such that they didn't even get a fair choice as to whether they should stick with castro or not.

Standing up to america is no excuse and never will be in my book. Though what it really ment was siding with an equally (or debatably more) detestable super power. Conversly siding with the US could also be viewed as 'standing up to the soviet union'.

The ideological war is now pretty much over and the only thing that sustains the trade embargo is the evidence of human rights abuses. There wouldn't be much excuse otherwise.

duggie-89

djpbarry wrote: »

Cuba does indeed have free health care for all (I'm not sure of how high a quality the service is), but almost everyone lives in dire poverty, living off government rations.

Yes, it has. But you must also acknowledge that Castro did an awful lot to increase the suffering of the Cuban people.

We're not talking about America, we're talking about Castro, whose human rights record (seeing as you mention it) is appalling.

I don't know what people you're referring to and the use of the term "hole" is relative, but I think it's safe to say that things in Cuba could be a whole lot better and Castro has to accept responsibility for that.

and by "did an awful lot to increase the suffering of the cuban people" you mean by not bowing down to a social imperialist like america and by increasing the living standards of the average cuban. remeber under biastia life was alot worse. the problem that castro faced was that because of his actions to improve the cuban lives by regaing the national industries he faced pressure from american which stunted its development.

and yes castro hasn't been an angel but you dont hear people calling other leaders who had to make tough descions an angel. (remeber castro and his revolution was under constant threat and a state of semi war as the CIA were trying to kill him, not to mention the bay of pigs were the cuban people themselves rejected a difference.

but one thing i must say is that its a shame that there wasn't a more democatic nature in cuba in regards to its recent election.

Sand

There seems to be a consistant trend of shirking any of cubas <insert name of leftist dicatorship here> responsibilities by diverting attention to the US.

In fairness, reconcilling Cubas [ and others ] horrific human rights record to their proclaimed leftist views and demand for progressive human rights etc etc could lead to many questioning their own dogma. This would be uncomfortable, so better to shift to discussing other less favoured dictators or the US, United chances in the Premier league this year.....ANYTHING except cubas horrific human rights record.

djpbarry

duggie-89 wrote: »

and by "did an awful lot to increase the suffering of the cuban people" you mean by not bowing down to a social imperialist like america and by increasing the living standards of the average cuban.

Yes, it was all America's fault. The people of Cuba did not go wanting for ANYTHING under Castro and he certainly didn't have any of his political opponents killed or anything like that :rolleyes:.

The fact that America placed an embargo on Cuba didn’t give Castro the right to do whatever the hell he wanted and blame it all on America.

duggie-89 wrote: »

remeber under biastia life was alot worse.

Was it?

duggie-89 wrote: »

the problem that castro faced was that because of his actions to improve the cuban lives by regaing the national industries he faced pressure from american which stunted its development.

No, the problem with Castro was he imposed his ideology on an entire nation and all opposition was violently put down.

duggie-89 wrote: »

...castro hasn't been an angel...

There's an understatement if ever there was one.

duggie-89 wrote: »

but you dont hear people calling other leaders who had to make tough descions an angel.

"Tough decisions"?!? Castro is responsible for the deaths of thousands of non-combatants - comparing him to other people doesn't make him look any better.