Brilliant, Sensible, Noteworthy, First-Rate, Truth in Your Face, February 10, 2008
Víctor Huggo Martin
I come to this movie as the son of an oilman, with 30 years spent all over the world, flying around the world at the age of 16 alone, and then moved on to the Marine Corps, the CIA, and other stuff. Over-all, I have spent close to 15 years in Latin America.
Bottom line: Fidel kicks US ass while also being a mixed blessing for the Cuban society.
There are an awful lot of individuals in denial, but the raw facts are these:
1) Castro overthrew a dictator that sold out the Cubans to US companies.
2) The US did everything in its (impotent) power to assassinate him while also imposing a brutal and probably illegal embargo on Cuba.
3) Now that we are all conscicous about both sustainability and health:
++++ SURPRISE: Cuba and the Amish are the TWO–the only two–models for sustainable development; and
++++ SURPRISE: Cuba not only has better health care than the US, but they can afford to send 10,000 doctors to Venezuela.
This is a great movie that Americans should watch, but will no5.
As a fine side note, the Bay of Pigs, an operation that was ill-conceived and badly supported, drove Fidel into Kruschev's arms, and led to the Soviet effort to install nuclar ballistic missiles in Cuba.
I do not believe in socialism and top-down elite control, which both the US and Cuba suffer from, but I do believe there is a third way between the US, Cuba-Venezuela, Costa Rica, and others. We are close to being able to use the Internet for digital deliberative dialog and real-time science as well as real-time decision-support.
If I had the ear of an honorable intelligent President, I would create a special envoy for Cuba and Venezuela, and find a way to create a Western Hemisphere Prosperity & Peace initiative with Venezuelan oil, Cuban health care, and US communications technology brought together.
CRYSTAL CLEAR: The US has been the rogue elephant. ENOUGH.
El Pueblo Avanca!
See also:
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People
Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025
Wilson's Ghost: Reducing the Risk of Conflict, Killing, and Catastrophe in the 21st Century
War Is a Racket: The Anti-War Classic by America's Most Decorated General, Two Other Anti=Interventionist Tracts, and Photographs from the Horror of It
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man
Someone Would Have Talked: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the Conspiracy to Mislead History
Why We Fight
The Fog of War – Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara
Sicko (Special Edition)
