Cuba (country, house, show, quote, 2006)

Surell · 04-23-2009, 10:15 PM

So they've lifted the travel ban on Cuba now. I think it's a step forward myself; even if they are communist, we need to try and make sure they don't become a super piece of shit country. Plus we could try to talk to them, although I doubt Raul Castro would care to hear what we have to say, since I'm sure he thinks a lot like his brother. But it's worth a shot.

How do you guys feel about the whole Cuba thing?

Meph1986 · 04-23-2009, 10:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Surell

although I doubt Raul Castro would care to hear what we have to say, since I'm sure he thinks a lot like his brother.

Fidel won't let Raul do anything unless he agrees with it. I wouldn't be surprised if Raul wishes that he just dies already.

Surell · 04-23-2009, 11:03 PM

Yeah, that's true. Although I heard they have cell phones now, right? That was a large step that Fidel wasn't allowing. So Raul is either making his own decisions, or you're right, and Fidel just decided to allow cell phones in the country.

Meph1986 · 04-23-2009, 11:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Surell

Yeah, that's true. Although I heard they have cell phones now, right?

I believe so.

Here's an article regarding possible talks between the two countries:

Quote:

HAVANA (AFP) — The United States Wednesday hailed what it saw as signs of the end of communist Cuba, while Fidel Castro insisted that US President Barack Obama had "misinterpreted" Havana's stance on possible talks on human rights.

Obama and President Raul Castro, Fidel's younger brother, have said they were willing to open talks on such hot-button issues as political prisoners and human rights.

But the longtime leader of the Communist island, 82-year-old Fidel Castro said his brother Raul's words on potential changes for political prisoners and human rights had been misunderstood by Washington.

Raul Castro said last week: "We are open, whenever they want, to discussing everything: human rights, freedom of the press, political prisoners, everything they want to discuss."

Fidel Castro, writing in an article posted on the official website CubaDebate, did not correct his brother but insisted that "without a doubt, the president (Obama) misinterpreted Raul's statement."

Castro, who led Cuba for almost five decades until he stepped aside during an illness, made a detailed, broad public retooling of what his brother, 77, said about potential Cuban-US talks.

Dissidents claim the brothers Castro may not be politically on the same page. Fidel Castro handed the presidency to his brother after a gastrointestinal operation in 2006.

But Fidel Castro did not criticize Raul; indeed he said the Cuban president's words were meant to show "courage and confidence in the principles of the Revolution."

Hours after the published remarks by the former Cuban president, who still serves as the head of the Cuban Communist Party and often writes political commentary in state media, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton bluntly told lawmakers in Washington the regime in Havana was ending.

"You can see there is beginning to be a debate, I mean this is a regime that is ending. It will end at some point," Clinton said in testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Asked about the 47-year US economic embargo on Havana, Clinton noted that "a president cannot lift the embargo. That has to be done by an act of Congress. If the Congress decides that's in America's best interest, obviously, the administration will abide by that.

"But we're going to proceed very carefully in this process," Clinton stressed.

"So this is a difficult calculation," she added. "Our goal is for a free, independent democracy that gives the people of Cuba a chance to have the same opportunities that their sisters and brothers and cousins that they have in our country."

Cuba, the Americas' only communist country, however aims to is project its system into the future. And with one-party rule, central economic planning and government-controlled media the Castros maintain Cuba is more democratic than western democracies.

Obama last week said he wanted to establish "a new beginning" with Cuba, while Clinton had called Raul Castro's remarks "a very welcome overture" and directly acknowledged for the first time that US policy toward Cuba had failed.

But Obama himself cautioned that US policy -- namely the decades-old economic embargo on the communist-run island -- would not be changed soon.

"The issues of political prisoners, freedom of speech and democracy are important, and can't simply be brushed aside," he said at the close of the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago at the weekend.

In his article Wednesday, Fidel Castro said that if Washington wanted to discuss detainees it should first free five Cubans detained in the United States on espionage charges.

And the former president also specifically rejected the idea Obama mentioned about Havana reducing the cut it takes of money Cubans abroad wire home to their relatives.

"Not all Cubans have relatives abroad," he wrote. "Redistributing a small part of (remittances) for the neediest Cubans' food and medicine is absolutely fair."

On Monday in another article on CubaDebate, Fidel Castro urged Obama to end the US economic "blockade" of Cuba. On Wednesday he lamented that Obama expressed support for keeping the embargo in place.

"He did not invent it, but he made it his own just like 10 other presidents of the United States," Castro said.

"You can predict certain failure for him on that road, just as for all his predecessors."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp...Ng11_-0MrqsCGA

*replace **** with fcUK

pourmeanother · 04-23-2009, 11:21 PM

I thought this would be about Cooba Gooding Jr.

Dr_Rez · 04-24-2009, 12:19 AM

It bothers me you still cant get good Cuban cigars here in America very easily.

Freebase Dali · 04-30-2009, 11:30 PM

I hear they have amazing prostitutes in Cuba.

sleepy jack · 05-01-2009, 07:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Surell

So they've lifted the travel ban on Cuba now. I think it's a step forward myself; even if they are communist, we need to try and make sure they don't become a super piece of shit country. Plus we could try to talk to them, although I doubt Raul Castro would care to hear what we have to say, since I'm sure he thinks a lot like his brother. But it's worth a shot.

How do you guys feel about the whole Cuba thing?

Yeah it's pretty bad they're Communists. We don't want to have dealings with those pinko scumbags - except for China! People are stupid.

Anyway your post is kind of...well I don't know where to begin with it. I'll start with saying the United States has already ensured they're a "super piece of shit country" long ago; it's not a something waiting to happen.

Surell · 05-01-2009, 11:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

Yeah it's pretty bad they're Communists. We don't want to have dealings with those pinko scumbags - except for China! People are stupid.

I never agreed with it, I just know that our older administrations didn't like communism (you know, the whole Cold War thing). I don't care about communism in the slightest.

sleepy jack · 05-01-2009, 11:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Surell

I never agreed with it, I just know that our older administrations didn't like communism (you know, the whole Cold War thing). I don't care about communism in the slightest.

Communism has only been used as an excuse to operate and act in a certain way, specifically towards country that the United States would benefit from marginalizing. "Communist countries" are as different from each other as any system of government; Leninism, Maoism, Stalinism, and all the variations of Marxism are not the same ideologies nor are they concrete. I mean come on if we were so anti-Communist we never would have started any sort of a relationship with China.

04-23-2009, 11:21 PM	#5 (permalink)
pourmeanother Saaaad Panda Join Date: Dec 2008 Posts: 852	I thought this would be about Cooba Gooding Jr. __________________ Life is just blah, blah, blah You hope for blah And sometimes you find it, but mostly it's blah And waiting for blah And hoping you were right about the blahs you made And then, just when you think you've got the whole blah'd damn thing figured out And you're surrounded by the ones you blah Death shows up... anddd blah, blah, blah.

04-24-2009, 12:19 AM	#6 (permalink)
Dr_Rez Registered Jimmy Rustler Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: USA Posts: 5,360	It bothers me you still cant get good Cuban cigars here in America very easily. __________________ Best chance of losing virginity is in prison crew Always Checks Credentials Crew nba > nfl crew Shave one of my legs to pretend its a girl in my bed crew

04-30-2009, 11:30 PM	#7 (permalink)
Freebase Dali Partying on the inside Join Date: Mar 2009 Posts: 5,584	I hear they have amazing prostitutes in Cuba. __________________