Ace, on this i think the only change will come with a civil war. Almost half of my family is in Cuba and i do not want to see any bloodshed whatsoever, much more so because "I do have family there," but the fact is that there are a small percentage of people that want the Castro regime to survive even after he dies, and they will try everything to do this.

In order for Cuba to have any change for the good of the people, I think the only way to do this will be with a civil war, unfortunately.

I don't know the economic structure in Cuba, but I wouldn't be surprised if those who want the regime to survive are the same people that would stand to lose if the regime were overthrown.

You are right about that jsobecky, those that want the Castro regime to continue have a lot to lose if it is overthrown.

BTW, in Cuba there are real problems. People can't get enough food, the trash is all over the streets and there is no government system that takes care of it, etc, etc. To top it off, whatever you do everyone gets paid exactly the same. You can be a doctor and you get paid the same as a butcher.

Originally posted by Muaddib
You are right about that jsobecky, those that want the Castro regime to continue have a lot to lose if it is overthrown.

BTW, in Cuba there are real problems. People can't get enough food, the trash is all over the streets and there is no government system that takes care of it, etc, etc. To top it off, whatever you do everyone gets paid exactly the same. You can be a doctor and you get paid the same as a butcher.

They supposedly do have very good health care though.
There are people who fly down there to have operations done because it's so cheap.
They also have high levels of literacy.

You make it sound like its a good trade off, but its not.

I have family there and I was there in 2001 for a month.
These are the facts, which I have stated before:

They do have free health care but more often than not they don't have enough supplies of any kind. They do what they can with what they have.

Even thou education is free, not everyone over there is a doctor or have highly specialized professions. For some people the crappy pay is not enough to go through all the studies you have to do for such professions. It is a lot more lucrative to do business in the streets and trade stuff than studying for a profession, which is going to pay you the same as if you didn't study anything at all.

If it is a big family, while some members of the family can study and become doctors, or whatever, the rest of the family have to find ways to bring more food to the table, which is not easy. Because of this, small families more often than not cannot afford to have their children study to be a doctor, and these people have to go to the streets and find some way to get food on the table, and even then we have to send money over there for them to make it through the month many times.

My own family over there is big, and while some are doctors, dentists, biologists, the others that didn't want to go through all the trouble of studying, try to find ways to bring food to their plates everyday.

While i was there one of my fillings fell off, and while one of my cousins took me to replace the filling, she told me she wasn't sure they had amalgam, which is the only type of filling they have. When we got to her office, they did not have any, so i had to wait until i returned to the States to get my tooth fixed.

Now, there are "some" hospitals for rich tourists and most certainly these have everything you need and even more, but the hospitals for the Cuban people are not well supplied, at all.

As for literacy...i believe the government of Cuba, that is Fidel Castro, has...humm....kind of fixed those statistics, he is known to do that. The level of literacy in Cuba is not so high as they make it look like.


[Edited on 7-5-2004 by Muaddib]

I was just pointing out that not everything is bad in Cuba.
I have a lot of hope for Cuba, I think they will do well once the political situation is resolved.

You may be right about the literacy rate being embellished and I'm sure Castro puts a false face on other things in Cuba.

Regarding medical supplies, I did see a special on Cuba a while back where they said there was even a shortage of rubber gloves in the hospitals used by the residents. I think that once sanctions are lifted, all of that will change.

No, when sanctions are lifted Fidel will get richer and the rest of the country will stay at the same level it is now. There needs to be a total change in the political system in Cuba for the benefit of the people.

My questions will illustrate my ignorance of the situation in Cuba, but it is a topic which interests me because I think that Cuba, as well as Venezuela, will be areas which the US will be increasingly involved in the next decade.

What is the situation regarding travel to and from Cuba? Muaddib, you visited in 2001, you said. Can anyone travel freely to or from Cuba these days?

People in Cuba cannot travel outside the country, except under some circumstances which are never humanitarian but only for the benefit of Castro. Only in the past were professionlas able to study in Moscow, or some other communist country, "for a profession or to help these other communist/socialist regimes". Only for those reasons were some of the people able to travel, and always under surveillance.

Some Cuban athletes and others have been able to defect to U.S. Embassies around the world when travelling to events that were sponsored by the Cuban government, but it is harder and harder to do something like this.

The regular people that have no professions at all are not, and were never, able to travel, and only some professionals under surveillance can do that now for the benefit of Castro.

Any legal residents or citizens from almost any part of the world can travel to Cuba, since it will bring revenue to the country. But, there are areas for tourism only, which the Cuban people cannot go to unless they are working for the government.

[Edited on 7-5-2004 by Muaddib]

To me, not allowing the citizens of your country the freedom to leave whenever they want is totally indefensible. I can understand restricting travel to hostile countries, with conditions, but to not allow someone to leave at all is akin to slavery.

I would imagine that those that oppose Castro are imprisoned, and that freedom of speech is nonexistent.

I have heard that there is a very brisk business in used auto parts because so many cars are just falling apart.

Any opposition to Castro's regime is met with jail time or execution. There is no other party that exists in the Cuban government, and until the regime is literally taken out, it will continue to be like this. People that have spoken against Castro dissapear, and their families never hear from them again, it still happens in Cuba to this day.