On Patriotism - Why 11 Million Cubans Love Fidel

Originally posted by donwhite
..............................

Finally, if you have time you may watch a number of good scholarly discussions of world affairs on CSpan2 this weekend. You can find the schedule at booktv.org, and may I recommend the following to you:
Saturday, 4 PM, “How Bush43 Rules;” 6 PM, “Mt. Rushmore;” 8 PM, “Temptation of Power;” Sunday, 1 AM, “Unconventional War;” 9 AM, “Bush43 Hubris & the Iraq War;” 10 AM, “America to Rule the World;” 11:30 AM, “Target Iran;” 1 PM, “War Powers in the War on Terror;” and 7 PM, “Thomas Paine.” Try it, Muaddib, you’ll like it.

Actually what you should try instead of believing the lies and exagerations which many "liberal/socialist/leftist/communist professors" are spreading in U.S. Colleges and Universities, and instead of reinforcing those exagerations with more "propaganda" from other "liberal/socialist/leftist/communist professors" through programs on tv, you should be visiting Communist countries like Cuba, and instead of "proclaiming immediately that you are a "leftist/liberal/socialist/communist" or whatever you are, or that you think castro is a good man, you should see with your own eyes what is happening in the country....

Better yet, get a t-shirt that has castro's picture on it saying "terrorist and murderer" and walk around in Cuba with such a t-shirt on and see how the people react, and how the regime reacts.... After doing that maybe you will see the truth about the regime of Cuba and Communism in general...

[edit on 26-10-2006 by Muaddib]

Better yet, get a t-shirt that has castro's picture on it saying "terrorist and murderer" and walk around in Cuba with such a t-shirt on and see how the people react, and how the regime reacts.... After doing that maybe you will see the truth about the regime of Cuba and Communism in general... Muaddib.


Very well put, Muaddib. And the lynching party would be prompt and swift. Those who report back to Fidel's people (so they can eat) would see to it they got a pig to roast out of turning him in.


This man, with all due respect, and i have respect for him, because he's obviously well educated, is an interesting fellow. He inhales books but the proof is going to Cuba and seeing for yourself. Why not travel there, Don? Do yourself a favor, go there and report to us the truth when you come back.

Until then, i'm afraid you are not to be believed. Oh, and take your fishing pole, you'll need it to catch your food for the day. Unless, that is, you go to one of Havana's resorts meant for tourists so they can scam all your
American $$$$$.

[edit on 27-10-2006 by dgtempe]

Cuba is the largest and most populated island in the Caribbean and close to the United States. America became involved in Cuba in 1898. I have learned how cruelly Spain exploited Cuba. With total disregard for the lives of Cubans. Among other things, Cuba had to pay for the entire Spanish armed forces in the Western Hemisphere in part due to the prior Cuban uprisings and mostly due to the fact that sugar was the last remaining cash cow for the Spanish. Cubans were paying the perpetual pension King Ferdinand had bestowed on the Christopher Columbus family. Malaria was rampant in Cuba before the arrival of US Army doctor Captain Walter Reed who discovered the mosquito was conveying the disease. Reed worked under General Leonard Wood who was first the military governor of Eastern Cuba then later, Military Governor of all Cuba.

Gen. Wood was himself a MD, and the only doctor to ever become the Army Chief of Staff. He befriended Theodore Roosevelt during the American campaign in Cuba. Gen. Wood reformed much of the Spanish regime in Cuba, in favor of the indigent personnel. Natives. He established primary education for Cubans and began work to drain the mosquito breeding swamps around the major cities of Cuba. Unfortunately for Cuba, the American Sugar Refining Company prevailed on the folks in Washington DC to “give” them exclusive rights in the production, processing, sale distribution of cane sugar.

At first, Cuban rebels welcomed the Americans as liberators, but as in Iraq, the liberators quickly became the occupiers. Cuba traded one master for another. Many other American companies came to Cuba to take advantage of the cheap labor and naivete of the local population. Like the American Tobacco Co. In the cigar business. And etc. Cuba became an American colony. We had learned from watching the Europeans that it is not necessary to take over the foreign country by military means, after you have destroyed the armed resistence, but you can accomplish you goals of exploiting the country and its people by controlling the economy and the local government. There are always enough selfish and ambitious people in any country to form a cadre of controllers beholden to the larger economic power. So that in a nutshell is the history of Cuba.

The Mafia came into the country mainly in Havana after the 1920s and controlled gambling, drugs and prostitution in and around Havana. The gangsters made easy deals with the native Cuban rulers of Cuba. Cuba's real ruler - America from behind the scene - cared not what the Mafia did as long as the sugar and cigars flowed out of Cuba. Until Castro came along. Cubans have hard choices to make. They will get no help from Washington DC. That is a tragedy that is on-going and covers the Caribbean. And other places in the south of the Rio Grande world. History is out there. You will enjoy learning it.



[edit on 10/27/2006 by donwhite]

The saddest part is the fact that that same story can be applied to at least half the countries in South America, or anything south of the Rio...like you said. The only thing worse is the ignorance surrounding it. Pick up a book folks. It doesn't even have to be by Chomsky.

I actually saw a great documentary on a recent Audioslave (a band) DVD. They played the first ever rock concert in Cuba. I thought it was a pretty cool glimpse into the lives of the average Cuban. I have seen lots of documentaries on Cuba but I have always had my suspicions as to the political motivations. To see one of my favorite new bands film this for no other reason than to expose some of the propaganda for what it really is.

[edit on 27-10-2006 by DaFunk13]

Originally posted by donwhite

posted by dgtempe

Thank you for addressing me. Your ideology is not mine, but you're entitled. Evidently Cubans who left, about 2 million so far, do not agree with you. This is not to say Cubans who left are dumb. You have radical points of view and I can deal with that. No problem. Thank you. [Edited by Don W]

I did not know as many as 2 million Cubans have come to America since 1959. I don’t doubt there are not 2 million people in America who give Cuba as their home of record, or who are descendants of people who left Cuba post 1959. I’m thinking the original out-flow was about 150-200,000. Over the years there have been another equal number, making a total of 300-400,000 who actually came here because of the Communist takeover. Popularly called “refugees” here mainly for domestic political purposes.

I have never said any refugees, whether Hungarian, Cuban, Vietnamese or Haitians, are “dumb.” Our government receives them or excludes them according to our own political objectives. And not their degree of need. I suppose every nation does that but we are hypocrites about it, claiming to have some overriding concern in the humane treatment of people. If it is our mission to export American style democracy, I want to see it in Darfur and quick.

I served in the Air Force during the Korean War and I believe it was fought for the right reason and in the correct manner. I opposed the Vietnam War from the first, because I knew enough of the area’s history to know we were backing the wrong side. I supported the First Gulf War for the same reasons I supported the Korean War, but I opposed this Second Punitive Expedition to Iraq (3/18/03) for the same reasons I opposed the Vietnam War. I opposed the War on Terrorism from the first day. I saw Bush43 co-opt the WTC tragedy to his own and the GOPs political gain. It saved his failing presidency. Without the WOT, Bush43 would have followed his father as a one termer.

Socialism is an economic system. Totalitarianism is a political system. Most of the successful socialist countries have been democratic. I suppose those include all of Europe and some others, too. All the totalitarian socialist systems have collapsed not because of the socialist part but because of the totalitarian part. Cuba is in between. China defies my definitions.

Socialism no longer means state ownership of the means of production as it did up to say, about 1955. Today it means assuring a level playing field in all economic realms and adequate social programs to make the safety net real and not theoretical or political double-speak. The good life, shared. And I thank you, Dgtempe.


[edit on 10/23/2006 by donwhite]

Nice so Bush did this to save his failing presidency. You call a 38% approval rating succeding

And I doubt the one term thing. Bush is way better than Kerry.

And just for the record why do you think we supported the wrong side in the vietnam war

Originally posted by spinstopshere
You call a 38% approval rating succeding

And just for the record why do you think we supported the wrong side in the vietnam war

The success of a president is not measured by popular support, especially in times like these. The public is not capable of knowing and understanding all the facts necessary to prosecute a war.

Of course, the public has the right to vote a president out of office when they are unsatisfied with his policies. The man who will continue in the way he believes is right for the country, regardless of popular support and the political consequences, is what used to be called a statesman.

The United States did not back the wrong side in Vietnam. Communism is never the right side to back. Do a Google Search to see what the consequences were to the people of Indochina relative to the fall of Saigon.

The American Left backed the wrong side in Vietnam and millions of innocents died as a result, but you'll never hear Jane Fonda or John Kerry utter so much as a word regarding that.

posted by spinstopshere

posted by donwhite

I did not know 2 million Cubans come to America . . I opposed the Vietnam War. [edited by donwhite]

And just for the record why do you think we supported the wrong side in the Vietnam war

I thought you’d never ask! During War 2 and the Japanese occupation of French Indo China - without fighting thanks to the Vichy government - the US by its OSS offered independence to Vietnam - Indo China? - if the Vietnamese would wage guerilla war on the Japanese. (Cambodia and Laos pale to insignificance compared to Vietnam.) The Viet Minh did that and it is often credited with keeping 2-3 Japanese divisions pinned down, as Tito had done to the Germans in Yugoslavia. At the end of the war, it was FDR’s plan that the colonies of our allies as well as the Axis powers would be freed of their masters. The pledge that all peoples were by right, entitled to self determination, was one of the 4 Freedoms for which we fought the War.

Charles deGaulle by raw force of character had singlehandedly restored France to its former status with the Allies and demanded its place at the seat of the victors, which he got as you know. I think “deGaulle” can be translated as “The French.” He was.

The first post-war government in France was under Socialist Prime Minister Pierre Mendes-France. He honored the promise to Ho Chi Minh. When the capitalist party under deGaulle won control of the government, he revoked the prior grant and he sent the French Navy to Hanoi to enforce French colonial and financial interests in Indo China, as if the 2nd World War had never happened. DeGaulle justified his position on legal grounds by reminding us the French had not been consulted by the US or the OSS and we had no right or power to give away another’s property.

At this time, France was teetering between capitalism and communism. We decided it was not worth the promises made before and during the Great War to risk losing pro-American sentiment in France (at that time). We let deGaulle undo FDR’s pledge to the world. A criticism easy to make now, with hindsight, but not so easy to make in the late 1940s. The French sent in the Foreign Legion - made up predominantly of former German soldiers - and as you know, the French generals made that classic and fatal error at Dien Bien Phu - failed to control the high ground.

The US was sending medical aid to the French in 1954. When the French withdrew after the Paris Peace Conference, the US was about to fall victim to its own propaganda. The Dulles brothers, John - Ike’s Sec of State - and Allen - Ike’s new CIA director - had grabbed onto the newly conjured “Domino Theory.” If any country in Southeast Asia fell to the Communists, they would all fall because all of them suffered from the same problem - they had been colonies of European powers. That would put the commies next door to Australia. We began the “err on the side of safety” philosophy vis a vis the USSR. “If we don’t know, double the estimate.” Proven when the CIA was caught by total surprise as the USSR collapsed in 1989-1991.

Our leaders have always known the USSR was a paper tiger. We might have ended the Cold War in the 1960s, had that been in America’s interest. Ike warned us of the military industrial complex, but we did not and are not listening to him. Beginning under Ike and the first 700 MAG - Military Advisory Group - troops, we entered Vietnam hesitantly to take the place of the defeated French. By the time of the assassination of the Diem brothers - no one deserved it more - we had over 2,000 troops and they were authorized to initiate firefights.

The Paris Peace Conference divided Vietnam at the 17th parallel. France tried to restore the defunct puppet monarchy in Saigon. The former employees of the French were moving south. They were the people - 5% or less - who had made the French exploitation of Indo China easy and profitable. They were not well liked by the overwhelming majority of Vietnamese who gave not a dam about Karl Marx or Adam Smith.

Ho Chi Minh was a nationalist first, a Communist second. He spoke for the greatest number of Vietnamese. We backed the French lackeys who were a small minority. We lost and I’m glad. I’m sorry 59,000 Americans were KIA and I’m equally sorry that we killed 1,000,000 - 3,000,000 Vietnamese. LBJ in part because of his personality, his hubris, made a series of bad judgments. Robert McNamara was seriously wrong in the advice he gave LBJ, as he later admitted amidst tears which I believe were genuine albeit 30 years late. We owe the Vietnamese people.

Many of the Vietnamese who have come here are either the lackeys or their descendants and so, have no credence with me. They are similar to the Cubans who have come here. They both want the American army to turn back the clock and put them into power in Cuba. And in Vietnam.



[edit on 10/27/2006 by donwhite]

I thought we were talking here about how great Cuba is.

Can we stay on topic?

I find it extremely ironic that someone who obviously doesn't know anything about Cuba, and is trying to change facts in order to back his dellusions about Communism, will proclaim he is "waking up two people that lived in that regime and who still have family living in that regime"... Then when he is proven wrong he tries to change history again to try to give something to support his "twisted facts", and when that fails he tries to change the topic of the thread....

We got ourselves another "armchair general" in our midst....

If anyone has to "wake up", it is obviously you "donwhite"....

Hear Hear!!!!!


A mind is a terrible thing to waste.
An intelligent mind with wrong facts is not a person i'd want information from.

DonWhite, you're an incredible writer- i envy you. But you talk nonsense and know nothing about what it is like in Cuba. It is all dissinformation.

Originally posted by donwhite
...................
Socialism no longer means state ownership of the means of production as it did up to say, about 1955. Today it means assuring a level playing field in all economic realms and adequate social programs to make the safety net real and not theoretical or political double-speak. The good life, shared. And I thank you, Dgtempe.

Why is it that you keep claiming this yet you avoid time and again the fact that the countries that are having the worse "social problems these days" are "socialist/democratic countries?...

Do you actually think people don't watch the news or read newspapers and find out what is happening in Europe?....

[edit on 29-10-2006 by Muaddib]

Originally posted by donwhite
......................
Ho Chi Minh was a nationalist first, a Communist second. He spoke for the greatest number of Vietnamese. We backed the French lackeys who were a small minority. We lost and I’m glad. I’m sorry 59,000 Americans were KIA and I’m equally sorry that we killed 1,000,000 - 3,000,000 Vietnamese.

Humm, right his regime spoke for the greatest number of Vietnamese.. which i guess was the reason why many Vietnamese people were killed by The People's Liberation Armed Forces...better known as the Vietcong... and of course you would claim that every Vietnamese killed was done by the United States Armed Forces... again you are trying to twist facts....

Originally posted by donwhite
Many of the Vietnamese who have come here are either the lackeys or their descendants and so, have no credence with me. They are similar to the Cubans who have come here. They both want the American army to turn back the clock and put them into power in Cuba. And in Vietnam.

If anyone is a "lackey" in here it is obviously you...you claim to speak for the people, yet you speak in favor and in defense of regimes which have only oppressed the people....

The people that have been able to leave such regimes have 1000 times more credence, and better knowledge about those regimes than you will ever have...and my guess is that you are so fond of "dictatorships" because obviously you have some twisted dellusion of being a dictator some day, i mean c'mon...trying to claim that "you are for the people" when you favor dictatorships, and you chose a username which means being above the common people and having power over the common people?....

[edit on 29-10-2006 by Muaddib]

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott

Originally posted by spinstopshere
You call a 38% approval rating succeding

And just for the record why do you think we supported the wrong side in the vietnam war

The success of a president is not measured by popular support, especially in times like these. The public is not capable of knowing and understanding all the facts necessary to prosecute a war.

That is so true. This happens all the time in war look at the civil war. Lincoln ratings where about the same if lower than bush. People get frustrated if you do not win in the first few months. Once you start winning the whole crowd loves you again. The same will apply to bush if we start getting better news.

I posted that because he is saying that bush did this for wide popular support when he has a 38% approval rating. If he did it for popular support he would have at least 60% approval.

posted by dgtempe

A mind is a terrible thing to waste. An intelligent mind with wrong facts is not a person I’d want information from. DonWhite you talk nonsense and know nothing about what it is like in Cuba. It is all disinformation. [Edited by Don W]

Thanks for the good things you said about me. As to the more critical things, may I address them in my way? 1) I “talk nonsense.” I’m telling you the truth that I can name 16 countries that border on the Russian Fed. And one is not Poland. I can name every country in South America except the 3 former colonies on the north eastern coast. I can name every country in Central America. And I know other countries as well. I have a fair amount of knowledge about countries other than my own. So I dispute that what I say is necessarily “nonsense.” It could be, but not necessarily. 2) I have never been to Cuba. I am an avid reader but cannot read anything about Cuba in the American press and barely any books. As an American I am free to go anywhere in the world where I will be received, except I cannot ask permission of my own government to go to Cuba or North Korea. I do not like that. It must violate the Constitution but I cannot hire a lawyer to take it to court. 3) All that I have said about Cuba that is a “fact” is taken from the CIA World Factbook. We see occasional pictures from Cuba taken by BBC or Reuters. Usually they like to show the 1940s and 1950s cars that are still being driven in Havana. We also hear from others that Havana is becoming a more popular tourist site after the fall of the USSR and the end of its subsidy to Cuba. I am not dumb. I have heard it often enough from non-American sources that the current government is what I call “repressive” of dissenters. I excuse that because as I have posted earlier, it is imperative to those in Cuba to protect the July 26 Movement from ultimate defeat by the CIA. That struggle, for better or worse, goes on without end. I expect there is inside the CIA a special bureau that is assigned the task of destroying the Castro regime. But, alas, I’m speculating now. Finally, I would remind you that without real and current information, disinformation is not possible. (And confidentially, if I did not like you, I would not make this reply).

www.cia.gov...

sir...you said it yourself, all you have is some information which you have gathered "from books" and not from real life experience... how do you know whether that information you have is all true?.... The answser is simple....you don't....

A lot of information out there is not even close to the truth of what happens in parts of the world, yet you do not want to believe anything any "dissidents or immigrants from those Communist regimes have to say"... not only that but you degraded "immigrants and dissidents from such countries" and claimed in your own words that we do not have any credence... in fact let me quote in here again what you said.

Originally posted by donwhite
.........................
Many of the Vietnamese who have come here are either the lackeys or their descendants and so, have no credence with me. They are similar to the Cubans who have come here. They both want the American army to turn back the clock and put them into power in Cuba. And in Vietnam.

The first thing that came to my mind, right after some other choice words such as "who the hell does he think he is.." etc, etc and some other words which i can't write in these forums.. Anyways, the point is that i do not buy your explanation, you sir seem to be prejudiced and even bordering in being a racist, I don't care if you want to claim "oh but that's what the books say", it still doesn't change the fact that you sir are degrading all the people who have left regimes which you obviously adore, and would love to live in or have some control over for whatever twisted thoughts keep passing through your mind...

If anyone in this thread has no credence whatsoever is you, and i don't even know how anyone, can post in a forum and keep a straight face insulting millions of people who have left dictatorships, just because "he wants to believe Communism is the best thing in the world", when this person has never seen and experienced what happens in such countries....

Oh and btw, if you don't like not being able to go to Cuba and North Korea, imagine what millions of Cubans must feel when they can't go anywhere in the world because their regime does not allow them to do so, unless you pay a hefty amount to get out which most Cubans can't afford, or if they are lucky enough to win a visa, or they are lucky enough that their homemade boats hold together at sea for whatever long it takes them to reach another country, and if they are allowed to leave, without wining the loterry or marrying someone of another nationality, such as some Cuban doctors who are ordered to go to other "revolutionary countries to help la revolucion", or even Cuban athletes that are competing for "la revolucion", they have thugs from castro following them everywhere to stop them from trying to ask for assylum in other countries... Doctors and other Cuban professionals can't win the lottery or get out, it is very ahrd for them to do so and must do it illegally if they want to leave which most of them don't do because they will have to leave their families behind...

You should be thanking whatever you believe in, or thank your biological parents if you are atheist, for having been born in the United States, which is much better than most people in the world can say...

[edit on 30-10-2006 by Muaddib]

Anyways, here is an article which i just found not so long ago and discusses one of the other problems happening in Cuba.

National

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sahara issue
Sahrawi children inhumanely treated in Cuba, former Cuban official

Morocco TIMES


"Sahrawi children, who are sent to Cuba, followed military training and courses on making explosives,” testified one of the Cuban former officials, who made documentaries on the inhumane conditions of the Sahrawi children in Cuba, reported MAP news agency.

Some former Cuban senior officials confessed that children, who were snatched from their parents in Tindouf camps and deported to Cuban “Youth Island”, endured ill-treatment.

“These children followed military training and courses on the making of explosives,” said former Cuban instructor, Dariel Alarcon.

Dariel Alarcon, known as “Benigno”, testified in a documentary entitled “Cuba and Polisario Front: crime partners” that he was in charge of making Sahrawi children, barely nine years old, undergo a military training.

Alarcon, now exiled in France, recalled boats carrying an "incredibly" high number of Sahrawi children, who later were sent to "Youth island” under military control with no hope of escaping.”

“We taught children how to make home-made explosives with such products as sugar, coffee, sulphur, and nitroglycerine,” he said, revealing that during these courses “several children were killed. Their bodies should still be buried in the island if they were not exhumed,” said Alarcon.

Juan Vives, former agent of Cuban secret services, published a documentary under the title “El Magnifico” in which he described the inhumane condition of children sent from the Polisario-controlled Tindouf camps, South-west Algeria, to the Latin American country.

In the documentary, Vives said that the Moroccan Sahrawi children were sent to schools, which were established especially for them, to follow their politically oriented studies.

“Children were obliged to work in the fields in the morning and go to school in the afternoon. Some did not cease to cry, claiming their parents. It was inhumane. Some arrived so young to Cuba that they hardly remembered from where they came. And it is very inhumane,” said Vives.

www.moroccotimes.com...

Some of what happens in schools which indoctrinate children to be Communists, straight from the horses mouth.

INFOCUBA: EDUCATION


"Study, work, rifle"
Cuba's educational system presses revolutionary message along with ABC's


On page 56 of Cuba's first-grade reading textbook, students are taught through a combination of words and drawings that the letter ``F'' stands for Felito, a child's name, and fusil, a military rifle.

``Felito sharpens the mocha [a short machete],'' read the practice sentences in ¡A Leer!. ``Beside it, he places the fusil.''

Just below the surface of those simple words lies a deeper meaning, a Communist concept that students in the Cuban educational system quickly learn, whether they choose to embrace it or not: ``Estudio, Trabajo, Fusil.'' Study, Work, Rifle.

The phrase is not just the political motto for Cuba's Communist Youth Union. It has also been the center of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's hope for the future of Communism on the island: the interlocking of education and political indoctrination.


Last October, the government made it clear that ideological content in schools is a top priority. In closing the government's second national education workshop -- held in Santiago de Cuba -- Rolando Alfonso Borges, head of the Ideological Department of the Cuban Communist Party's Central Committee, declared:


``The front line of political-ideological work with children is school, and the first soldiers are teachers and other education workers. We have to put our hearts into political-ideological work, and it must be done in a systematic way, where each section of the educational system has specific responsibilities that it must account for and which the party must control.''


'The front line of political-ideological work with children is school, and the first soldiers are teachers.'


-- ROLANDO ALFONSO BORGES,
head of Ideological Department of Cuban Communist Party's Central Committee

This past school year, children were pulled out of school more than ever to attend government-orchestrated rallies demanding the return of Elián González.

And according to Santiago Press, an independent press agency in Cuba, the government has stepped up indoctrination efforts outside school. It has created a junior version of neighborhood spy networks for children ages 4 to 13. The agency reported in January that the first children's committee was formed in Cuevitas, near Santiago de Cuba, under the motto: ``Vigilance, fundamental duty of the child.''


But despite the government's heightened efforts, parents and dissidents say a combination of limited career and job opportunities and the bleak reality of daily life under Communism have conspired to make it harder for Castro to indoctrinate children.


``A lot of young people visit my home and they have many concerns, they ask themselves why Cubans don't have the same rights as others do -- can't go to college, can't rent a hotel room in their own city,'' said one Havana parent, Lázara Brito. ``They say `I'm burning the midnight oil and for what? I can make more money selling pizza from my house.' These kids are different than those of past times.''

Political indoctrination is the part of the Cuban educational system rarely mentioned alongside the praise that the country receives for achieving near-universal literacy, for having one of the best academic performances among Latin American countries according to UNESCO, and for developing top-notch teachers.

As American students head back to school this month for another year of math, science and grammar, children starting school in Cuba will learn songs and poems about Castro and Cuban Revolution heroes such as Che Guevara and Celia Sánchez. Officials will start a dossier on each student, where not only their grades, but their political and religious activities will be recorded. The expediente acumulativo escolar, as the dossier is called, will follow the student to his or her job, where bosses will keep similar tabs.

Elementary school students of both sexes will automatically become Pioneros, or Pioneers, a kind of Communist version of the Boy Scouts with a heavy military and watchdog bent. They'll perform neighborhood watches, in which, generally accompanied by adults, they'll question passersby for identification, and keep an eye on neighbors.

Middle and high-school students will start their school days by singing anthems and reciting speeches about a figure of the Cuban Revolution, or talk about a current or historical event -- from the Communist perspective. Their teachers will start each class with 15 more minutes of similar discussion, as required by law. Students will learn how to clean, assemble and use weapons.

Students with college aspirations must join and remain active in the Communist Youth Union. They must take part in numerous conferences, marches, rallies and more military training. They must spend 45 days of their summer at a country school, working in fields during the morning and attending classes in the afternoon.

``They say education in Cuba is free, but we have it on very hard terms,'' Brito said. ``Education in Cuba has a political foundation. It doesn't make students think. It teaches them that the Cuban way is the right way and everything outside it is wrong.''


Meanwhile, say detractors, teachers are leaving the profession in droves for better-paying work in the tourist sector and the government is hastily filling vacancies with graduate education students.

www.netforcuba.org...

and here is another link as to what happens to the Cuban people for questioning castro's regime.

www.hrw.org...

We see occasional pictures from Cuba taken by BBC or Reuters. Usually they like to show the 1940s and 1950s cars that are still being driven in Havana. We also hear from others that Havana is becoming a more popular tourist site after the fall of the USSR and the end of its subsidy to Cuba. I am not dumb.


______________________________


Those are choice spots in Havana and all the money goes to Castro himself. The purpose is to draw tourists to exploit them. They show 40's and 50's cars because
that's all they really have. I dont get your point. Are you saying this is a lie or that this is a result of Russia being out of there?
Fidel masterminded this to line his pockets. Step outside of one of those beach resorts and you have nothing but pure poverty and a 3rd world country, where it used to be the playground of the world.

Originally posted by dgtempe
Step outside of one of those beach resorts and you have nothing but pure poverty and a 3rd world country, where it used to be the playground of the world.

You got that right.
And in many cases, particularly in areas outside of Havana and further to the East, they seem to only want you leaving and going on guided tours offered through the "Ministerio de Turismo" through the resorts so things are a little bit more controlled. Just look at the system controlling "Casas particulares" which seems to be another way of controlling the access to the reality of Cubano/a's lives for foreigners.