Resting up in a Moab, Utah hotel room, a news item flashed across the TV screen concerning Fidel Castro handing over power, temporarily, to his brother Raul. Coincidentally, the July 31, 2006 New Yorker magazine carries an interesting article on Cuba by Jon Lee Anderson, author of a very interesting biography of Che Guevara. Some interesting items from the article:
- “Castro has a fascination with Alexander the Great” and named three of his sons Alexis, Alexander, and Alejandro (Castro has a whole bunch of kids from at least two wives).
- Raul’s wife, Vilma Espin, is “M.I.T.-educated”.
Castro’s continuing ownership of Cuba is a great example of the limits of American power. We pay taxes to support a vast military force. You’d think that, for all the money we spend, it wouldn’t be possible for a guy to run around talking trash about the U.S. while amassing a personal fortune estimated at around $1 billion (it would be a lot more except that the 11.3 million Cubans don’t produce much that is valuable in our globalized economy). Yet Fidel Castro has done pretty much whatever he wanted since 1959.
I may have missed something, but what’s wrong with talking trash about the US and doing whatever you want? The man is not universally despised in his own country. It’s not all bad, with its high literacy and good healthcare. It appears also that the US embargo is one of the biggest reasons for its lack of connection to the globalized economy. It seems to me that a connection to the globalized economy is one of the best defences against authoritatarian figures, so it appears that the US is more responsible for its failure than it’s willing to admit.
I find it amusing that the US has such a problem with a shitty little commie country like Cuba and places it under embargo to make it come to its capitalist senses. Move over to the otherside of world and we find China; a massive communist “threat” where the US policy seems to be “trade and collaborate with them all you want” as that will turn them into good citizens of the world.
Fortunately, I have a smart American colleague sitting right acros from me to explain it: the swing state of Florida has a lot of Cubans who are not a big fan of Castro and will vote for whichever candidate seems toughest on him.
There is one problem for the president, though; be too tough and remove him, and you also lose him as bargaining chip in the next elections.
I respectfully disagree with you on one point:
I really think that Cuba will be yet another place where we offshore jobs. With their superior education and proximate distance, I think that a non-globaliszed cuba remains in the US Worker’s best interest.
From the Associated Press–Castro denies wealth:
http://www.forbes.com/business/feeds/ap/2006/05/16/ap2748453.html
The story ends: Forbes acknowledged in its article that the estimates for all the leaders are “more art than science.”
Or perhaps more Forbes’ picayune dreams than art.
(“If I had his kinda clout, I’d have wall-to-wall horz and diamond toilet paper”)