9 Jan 2024 8:14 am
Zeets2 » 07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm » wrote: ↑ Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent "enormous social gains" that you think were a "good example" that the US should follow. And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime. Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him.
Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all who have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike.
You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports, AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities. One day I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism, and were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies.
And a good day to you too, sir.
(PART II OF III)
Concerning the kidnapping of Americans and the confiscation of foreign assets, such tactics are hardly unique to the Cuban Revolution. George Washington referred to the kidnapping of Brits as an "honorable" practice, and his forces routinely seized the assets of British loyalists. Moreover, the confiscated foreign assets were produced by Cubans under near-chattel slavery conditions. So please excuse me for not shedding tears for multinational sugar and tobacco interests.
Oh, and about the "torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime." Didn't all of that unfold in a place called Abu Ghraib?
Zeets2: "Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him."
Again, I haven't asserted that the U.S. government, from its viewpoint, wasn't justified in its reaction to the Cuban Revolution's success in seizing power; it was. The U.S. political state only moved to recognize Fidel as Cuba's head of state, not for his legitimacy. And, with all due respect for Zeets2 as a human being, the statement that the U.S. government "gave [Cuba] every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism" is quintessential American arrogance. It is akin to King George III uttering, "I've given the colonists every opportunity to kiss my ring."
Furthermore, like all revolutions, the Cuban revolution intended to break free from the economic relationships that held the Cuban people in bondage and, accordingly, subjected them to the then-second-lowest living standards in the Western hemisphere. But even if Cubans had decided to "follow the path of the free market and capitalism," they (still) would not have been allowed to do so. They would have continued to be subjected to the same imperialist conditions that spurred their revolution because, like in all such situations, the last thing the U.S. capitalist state wanted to allow for was indigenous capitalist development.
(END OF PART II)