From: Ron Ridenour ronr@mail.dk
Sent:  Sunday, June 04, 2006 3:54 AM
To:     Joan Malerich; Walter Lippmann
Subject: Re: A "Yankee" Reports

Ms. Joan Malerich,

I start my answer by asking myself out loud why do I answer her at all? I certainly would not have done so earlier in my life when accused of being a CIA agent. Yes, it has happened before. Sometimes it was the CIA which did so, or the FBI, or Los Angeles red squad police in attempting to pit one leftist against another, you know, the COINTELPRO programs. I was, incidentally, on Nixon's list of 4000 subversives on the Priority Security Index no. 1 and targetted to be rounded up, a la Palmer Raids, and incarcerated in concentration camps left over from Japanese-American internment. I know this because I have received 1,000 pages of partially censored dossier files on me from the enemy's national security network. But sometimes, the CIA accusation came from a political leftist "rival" or, perhaps, someone like you. And that is part of the answer as to why I answer you. I have overcome my rash anger at reading you insult me with enemy comments that I am the enemy...right out of a CIA Handbook, certainly a CIA agent, no sense of decency...etc. "Someone like you" means to me that you are most likely a good person, a progressive person, a strong anti-imperialist and friend of the country of my heart. I love Cuba and I feel that you do as well. Therefore, I overcome my anger at you and answer.

Yes, I admit that I can often be and come across as arrogant. I often believe that I know best. Part of that stems from the frustration of being powerless, feeling impotent, being and feeling isolated, meaningless. Part of it stems from actual knowledge about which I speak but impart that knowledge in a way, a tone that seems/feels arrogant to some. I lived for eight years in Cuba within Cuban conditions and working for Cuban book-media institutions--at the invitation of the Ministry of Culture.

I ask leftists, especially those in the US, to tell the truth. I was referring to solidarity-left people not to Cubans to tell the truth in the context you criticised me for. On the other hand, I could certainly ask of the Cuban people, as a rule, to tell the truth too, because they are notorious for lying, about which many will speak. I said, and mean, that, in the long run, leftism/socialism/pro-Cubanism is advanced when those we wish to enlist learn that we tell the whole picture as it actually is--as much as we know of anyway--and not butter it all up, in order to convince someone to join up. When we do that, we often lose those we have recruited when they find out that we lied. Lying is an enemy of truth, and, as such, anti-revolutionary. There are many leaders, some of whom I assume you respect, who have said the same: Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg to mention two.

You are right about the economy being strengthened today. That is a main point in the article series that you could read on the CubaNews or on my website. I think Lippmann has run 12 now and I have 14 or 15 up on my website. There will be 20 or so in all and they will form part of a new book--my fifth--on Cuba. Two of them were printed and published in Cuba. That's quite a production for a CIA agent.

Yes, people are eating more, better. But socialism, per se, may not be strengthened. That is even a topic which, for the first time publically, Fidel is questioning. See speeches November 17 and 24, 2006. Here, Fidel speaks of a new class, not just new rich, but "class"; he speaks also of the possibility that the revolution could be reversed, NOT by the enemy but by Cubans themselves. Is Fidel also a CIA agent?

I know several Cuban communists-revolutionaries who were/are upset and feel repugnant at capitalist advertising in their land, at Disney television shows on their television, at violent-consumer oriented Hollywood films in their theaters. The point is not that all must be perfect for this "dreamer", as you also call me (dreamer and CIA agent as one in the same?), but that decision-making about such matters come from the top, from civil servants working under the party and or Council of State and NOT from grass roots organisations or local government with common people's imput. Most anyone will tell you--if you are there with them and not a passing tourist--that they have no real say in decisions. Careful with Cubans, because they (many, most) will tell foreigners what they think they would like to hear. (Oh, no, here he goes again, arrogant, stereotype casting, national chauvinist--which nation, though).

You say that certainly mistakes have been made, implying that I may have touched on some. People DO grumble? Why then must I refrain from stating what I hear? Why must I refrain from mentioning mistakes made? Is it not the role of social critique? That is, what many writers and intellectuals role is: to observe and make critique of society; that is what sociology is all about; that is part of what Marx and marxism is all about.

Telling the truth is not the same as throwing the revolution out with the dirty water. And some of the dirty water comes long before the harsh Special Period. Part of the problems confronted in 1990+ stem not only from US imperialism or from dependence upon a non-revolutionary SU, which treated Cuba paternalistically and did not help it develop its own manufacturing industry but bought/traded for its natural resources, much like capitalism does qualitatively only with offering greater quanitity. No, some of the critical mistakes are Cuban made: the lack of worker control or key decision-making in the work place, in governing; the lack of public outlets for critique and IDEAS for change or for production methods from the workers.

(Incidentally, I have read Saney--fine--and Blum. Blum knows me personally and has admired and used my own anti-CIA book: "Backfire: The CIA's Biggest Burn", published by Editorial José Martí, in Havana, in 1991. You can find a copy through Amazon books or in some libraries. Strange that the ministries of culture and interior would invite me to work there for them and publish two of my books. Are they also CIA agents? No, you might say, they just made a mistake.)

You may be right, in hindsight, that "temporarily coping with insidious facets of capitalism" helped them survive and grow. I am, however, not sure that these facets are temporary. Some are, some may be, and some may not be. Fidel, himself, has made such an analysis of Soviet capitalism. From Gorbachev's "temporary" facets of capitalism--peristroka--direct over to real capitalism. There is no true model for socialism, says Fidel and media-intellectuals of Cuba today. I bring your attention to the next pieces I am writing and that will be posted on CubaNews and my website throughout June.

I think you are of mixed minds in your comments to my foreward. On the one hand, you sometimes point to what I say as "proof" that "even" I see that the Cuban revolution is not dying as if that is proof of your analysis of Cuba, and yet, in some weird twist of illogic, proof that I am a CIA agent. Surely I know what you say to be the case for enemy propagandists: give readers an iota of reality, of objective facts, and then hit them with enemy subversion. But I wonder how many CIA agents you know who have been jailed--as long as six months--a dozen times for left-wing political activities in the US, Denmark, Costa Rica? How many were in Mississippi in the 1964 Long Hot Summer, jailed and beaten; actively worked with FSLN before and during revolutionary victory inside Nicaragua, worked with FMLN, burned US passport in Cuba before SINA, jailed in Prague at anti-globilisation demo for throwing rocks at warrior police...

OK, I'm masturbating. Perhaps, I want to impress you, or anyone, that I am somebody. Perhaps your snide remarks about me actually hurt me and I feel I must try to reach you. You see, you make good points. Your heart seems to be on the side of humanity. But you do not achieve your mission with me (or anyone with whom you disagree)--if it is your intent to educate me, to get me to be more than you think I am--by condemning me to the enemy. While you devoted a lot of time and energy in leveling a critique, which could be constructive, on the one hand, you attack me as the enemy on the other hand, which can only serve to push me into a quagmire.

From a dreamer, Ron

----- Original Message -----

From: Joan Malerich

To: ronr@mail.dk

Sent: Friday, June 02, 2006 12:05 PM

Subject: Cuba: A "Yankee" Reports (Did Not Send Out Due to some negative remarks)

 

Mr. Ridenour, I appreciated your article on "Health for All."  I also appreciate some of your thoughts and your previous experience.  However, I found the article (forward) below absolutely deplorable.  I have made my remarks in (red) within the article--actually the forward to your 1997 book.  That is very scary to me.  The points you make almost seem to come straight from a CIA handbook.  You understand, I am sure, that effective negative propaganda is backed by a large amount of positive information.  It is that positive and reality oriented information that is used to bait the reader.  Once hooked, the reader tends to believe everything else the speaker states.  Unfortunately, I took your bait and allowed myself to be deceived by your "positive" remarks without looking at where you were going.  I ask:  Were you so desperate in 1997 that you needed to write a book that provided such fodder for the sharks???  Have you no sense of decency?  Have you no ability to go beyond your own perceptions and to search for that truth you talk about? 

The only book I have read that is more arrogant than the introduction to your book is Maria Lopez Vigil's book, Cuba: Neither a Heaven nor a Hell.  I found it very interesting that Maria, a recognized and acclaimed journalist in Nicaragua, has not been able to bring healthcare, living wages, housing for all, free education for all to Nicaragua.  Yet, she appears to feel totally at ease in criticizing Cuba's revolutionary system that does have all that Nicaragua can only dream of having.  At one point, she says, yes, there is poverty and horrible conditions in Nicaragua--but they have lively debate.  Do you think that the children who work in the rock mines and carry rocks on their backs and can't go to school really care about the "debate"?  The list goes on and on with verbiage that is buried in hypocrisy and arrogance--just as much of your account of the Cuban government during the special period does.  And, Maria, also wrote her articles that compose her book from 1993-1997.  Isn't that mature and bold-writing a book that criticizes a government when the government is going through the worst economic crisis of its history???  When I was in Cuba, an economist in Cuba stated that the years 1993-94 were a harder revolution to fight than the revolution won in 1959. 

Well, I would go on and certainly could, but it is almost 5;00 AM; and, I feel that I have spent enough time with your forward as it is.  My biggest regret is that I took your bait and sent it to others.  That is a mistake I made.  We ALL make mistakes--don't we?!

Note:  In the first part of the introduction, I did not intend to send my remarks to you and make them only for my own reference and/or to send to others.  As I read more, I changed to directing most of the remarks directly to you.

 

Socialism or Nothing!

Joan


[Those with long memories may recall that at the beginning of Gulf War I,
Ron Ridenour was at the fence outside the US Interests Section in Havana,
putting Zippo to his Yanqui passport and renouncing his US citizenahip.]

sent by Walter Lippmann (cubanews) - May 24, 2006

This is from a 1997 book which is completely available at Ron Ridenour's
website: http://www.ronridenour.com/index.htm


CUBA: a "Yankee" reports

by RON RIDENOUR

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I thank the many people who have assisted me in this work, in one way
or another. Among them are: Jon Lee Anderson, Anna Artén, Maritza
Barranco, Vilma Boneva, Miriam Clark, Dansk-Cubansk Forening, La
Embajada Cubana en Dinamarca, Sigismund Escalona, Ernesto Fidel
Fürntratt-Kloep, Larry Hampshire, John Haylett (Morning Star chief
editor), Haralaya-Tatiana, Albert Jensen, Lois Meldrum, Jan Petersen,
Grethe Porsgaard, Jean Lois Ridenour, Jimmy Santana, Gitte Schødt,
Juan Tapia, Dr. Sol Inés Tena, Milt Zaslow, Rene Zeyer.

Others aided by accepting me as part of the family: the crews of
Seaweed, Shark, Gold Sand, Giorita and Rose Island, and Prensa
Latina, GIA-2 farm, and Sanguily sugar mill.

This book was inspired by the brave crew of the Cuban freighter
Hermann: Captain Diego Sanchez Serrano, Héctor Maura Díaz, Santiago
Rodríguez Maya, Héctor González Pagés, Jesús Dole Calzadilla, Jacinto
Farnot Camilo, Lino de la Luz Reyes Rosell, Mario Andrés Hidalgo
Olivera, Francisco Montalvo Peñalver, Osvald Santiago Vega, Angel
Bertot Gutiérrez.

Che Guevara has been my main inspiration and midwife to
internationalist philosophy and action. Che and the Cuban people's
revolutionary "project" will always be in my heart as will Che´s
motto:

"The ultimate and most important revolutionary aspiration: to see man
liberated from his alienation."

FOREWORD

Cuba's revolution, its ideology and economy, the society as a whole
is in crisis and transition. Contemporary reality is changing
rapidly, sometimes in confusing directions. This book offers a look
"behind the headlines" of life in Cuba today
. It is aimed to inform
and provoke readers into action against the US's blockade, while
reflecting upon how socialism, or constructing the "new person",
might be achieved. This is not an historical study of the entire
revolution and society, but rather focuses on the years since
Perestroika begun in Russia. Emphasis is on the political economy and
a few areas of civil society in the phase known as the Special
Period, and where might it be heading
.

When I first heard of Cuba, I was an airman in the US Force,
"defending" my country in faraway Japan from Communism
. Cuba was then
undergoing a revolutionary war. Two years after the guerrilla forces
defeated the Batista army and took political power, I was in college
in California reading Fidel Castro speeches and Che Guevara essays,
as were millions of other youths throughout the Americas and Europe.

Liberating spirit, sharing all resources and wealth, eradictating
poverty and hateful racism. Dashing personalities at the helm
delivering inspirational speeches and poetic essays, stimulating
energy and bonding brothers and sisters, lovers and comrades all.
Echoes resounding the world over, tingling millions and millions of
poor people, dreamers yearning for a universe where Don Quixote and
the Little Prince are real and no one goes wanting. I was one of
those impregnated.

I attended my first demonstration during the Bay of Pigs invasion.
The next year, I drove through Central America to find a way into
Cuba to study it first-hand. The October (1962) missile crisis
thwarted that plan when I was jailed in Costa Rica for "subversive"
activities, that is, identifying with Cuba.
It would be 25 years
before I would see the unique island, and become part of the national
work force, living on the peso economy with a ration card.

(Joan's note:  1962 plus 25 years would put him in 1987, right before the fall of the SU)

After 20 years in movement activities, I emigrated from the US. Since
1980 I have lived in Denmark, Iceland, Nicaragua, Mexico, and Cuba
. A
journalist since 1967, I was a staff reporter and editor for several
US daily and weekly newspapers and magazines, and free lanced or
worked as corrrespondent for many mainstream and alternative
publications in the US, Denmark, Mexico, Nicaragua and Cuba. From the
summer of 1993 to the spring of 1996, I was on the staff of Cuba's
foreign wire service, "Prensa Latina," and the "Morning Star" Cuba
correspondent
.
(Note by Joan:  1993--1996 were the worst years of the "Special Period")

I had worked as a "foreign technician"-advisor,
revisor, writer-for Cuba's foreign language publishing house,
Editorial Jose Marti, from 1988 through 1992. I also did volunteer
work with the new farmers, with sugar cane cutters, micro-brigade
constructors, factory workers and merchant marines, in addition to
translating and distributing books. Voluntary work was an end in
itself, but it was also useful for me to know the society from
within, in order to best write about it.

I align myself with the Cuban revolution, with its valiant efforts to
humanize people and be independent of superpowers
. It has
accomplished more in the way of providing the essentials for all
people than any other Third World country, and for many people in the
most advanced capitalist world. Mother Teresa is unemployed in Cuba,
despite the hard times it is undergoing. People do not look down when
spoken to, do not speak in wavering voices; no one goes uncared for
medically or socially; there is no public racism.

Nevertheless, I am critical of some of Cuba's political and economic
methods: its top-down decision-making and paternalism, endemic poor
work habits, passivity and waste, the lack of creative education and
open media, and too sparse civil liberties
.
After years of
experiencing various approaches to political direction, I am now
convinced that the only way to create the new man/woman--to construct
a society based on mutual respect and cooperation, to end the
exploitation of man by man, as well as to motivate workers to produce
well--is that those who intend such must be active participants as
decision-makers, thinkers and producers. They must also be
accountable for their actions and hold their leaders accountable.

(I also like dreaming, but dreaming does not work during a crisis, which the "special period" was a huge crisis--one that no other country could overcome.  In Cuba, the people definitely hold their leaders, especially Fidel, accountable.  And, Fidel holds the leaders accountable.)

I am honored to have shared at least one outlet with Wilfred
Burchett,
the defunct weekly "Guardian" (New York).The deceased
Australian and foreign correspondent wrote about what had guided his
internationalist reporter's outlook. I repeat them here, from The
Memoirs of a Rebel Journalist,
as indicative of my beacon as well
.

"It is not a bad thing to become a journalist because you have
something to say and are burning to say it. There is no substitute
for looking into things on the spot... Make every possible effort to
get the facts across to at least some section of the public. Do not
be tied to a news organization in which you would be required to
write against your own conscience and knowledge."

I have concluded that the best way to convince people to unite in
solidarity is to tell the truth about the countries we wish to help
become or remain sovereign.
(Joan's comment:  Search for truth and reality is what the Cuban Revolution is all about.  Ridenour is very arrogant in his statement--"to tell the truth"--whose perception of truth--"about the countries we wish to help become or remain sovereign"--and why does Ridenour think he is someone who has the right to determine how the people of another country should unite in solidarity (especially when a country, such as Cuba, has shown more solidarity than any other country of which I am aware).  (And, why does Ridenour feel he has the right to implement his personal wish for a country's sovereignty over the people determination of what there sovereignty is or should be?)  

 

At a solidarity conference held in
Havana, December 1993, nearly 300 European delegates and North
American activist guests, representing 147 organizations, decided to
coordinate actions opposed to the US blockade against Cuba, including
caravans led by the US-based Pastors for Peace. Sergio Corrieri,
president of ICAP (Cuba's international friendship organization) and
the conference host, spoke favorably of the heterogeneous beliefs of
those aiding Cuba and he recognized the healthy character of having
"different opinions, criteria, disagreements, which are useful for
profitable interchange, as long as they are based on the
non-negotiable respect for our self-determination as a nation."

I write in this spirit.

(La Habana, February 1997)


PREFACE

Cycling into downtown Havana by the long seafront wall, one
November
day in 1993, I was shocked to a standstill!

(Joan's comment:  Well, Mr. Ridenour, can you imagine how the Cuban people, who enjoyed the benefits of their long revolutionary stuggle, were totally obliterated in 1993, the worst year of the "special period"?)

"Hollywood America Brazilian Blend"


The billboard advertized cigarettes-in dollars-on a main Havana
artery. The fact that it was a billboard advertizement in US money
was even more compounded by the vulgarity of its flashy Hollywood
name.

(Joan's Comment:  Tell me, Mr Ridenour, exactly what would you have done to ensure the rights to people to eat and stay alive during this horrible "special period."  We know what the US did.  They tightened the embargo with the Torricelli Act in 1992. Of course, four years later, during the next US election year, came the draconian Helms-Burton Act.)

This was a first, a symbol, but a symbol of what, the beginning of
the end to socialism?

(Joan's comment:  Well, Mr. Ridenour, we can see today--2006--that socialism did not end but became strengthed.)

In the following days, one noticed several more billboards popping up
in clear view of millions of Cubans, most of whom cannot buy the
products because they have no way of acquiring dollars. Nor are
Cubans interested in the time and temperature flashing on and off on
many of these billboards, a capitalist invention that rapidly ceased
functioning in this tropical, socialist island without parts.

(Joan's comment:  Yes, Mr Ridenour.  This is insidious part of capitalism.  Of course, the Cubans did not like this.  But, they would have disliked even more not even having the bare rations with which to survive.  The only way to get these bare rations was by temporarily coping with insidious facets of capitalism.  Yet, Cuba never sold the air they breathe nor the water they drink to corporations, as have other Latin American countries.  Perhaps you should mention this.)

Soon, Cuban television commenced carrying advertizements for products
and services, only in dollars, on sports programs, beginning with the
Caribbean Sports Games. Cuba's sports stadium now advertize products
in dollars.

(Joan's comments:  And, do they do this in 2006?  For the gods sake, Mr. Ridenour, look at reality--the truth of what Cuba was undergoing.)

Cubans are either curious about this new departure from not
publicizing anything, other than revolutionary politics, or they feel
insulted and question why it is happening.

(Joan's comment:  Mr. Ridenour, was it the Cubans or you who felt so insulted?  Was it the Cubans or you who could not understand that what Cuba was doing was to bring in enough money to allow the Revolution to continue in the future--that a temporary change had to take place, so that Cuba could survive?)

An unusual commentary appeared in the Young Communist Union weekly
"Juventud Rebelde", when the billboards got posted. Unusual, because
the writer, Osvaldo Rodríguez Martínez, took on the incipient
deviating practice. Unusual also, because the article was printed.

Rodríguez concurred with government policy that the society needed
hard currency and that renting space for advertizing was one way, but
he postulated that it would be more thoughtful for the population,
and more profitable, if foreigners could look at such signs in hotels
and dollar shops, not on public streets or sports stadiums.

(Joan's comments:  Yes, of course, that would be much nicer.  But, just, perhaps, not realistic.)

Furthermore, he argued, how is it possible that rather than renting
the space-an estimated $500 a month could be charged-the state, or
whatever organization responsible, allowed these signs as a free
"courtesy" to attract foreign business. Moreover, the state and media
have a rather extensive health publicity campaign in which (no)
smoking is a major target.

(Joan's Comments:  Mr. Ridenour, perhaps you should not be making assumptions and being judgmental, as you were NOT--thank the gods--one of the real leaders of the Revolution that had to be put on hold to make sure the people survived.  Of course, mistakes were made.  But, the mistakes were far less damaging than the complete capitulation to capitalism would have been._

Rodríguez predicted that another taboo would one day be broken:
commercial advertizing in Cuban publications, radio and television.

Is Cuba to become dollarized?

The economy is in shambles.

An aura of crumbling permeates daily life.

Everyone complains, grumbling that nothing functions; that it takes
hours and hours to get anywhere by public transportation; that the
daily diet is reduced to levels of thinness; that power cuts and
unavailable spare parts have caused 150,000 refrigerators,
innumerable television sets and other electric appliances to burn out
and remain idle; that it doesn't pay to work because wages buy so
little and there is even less at legal or fair prices.

(Joan's comment:  And what exactly are you saying?  Are you so naive as to believe that these things would not happen when a country loses 85 percent of its trade overnight and all of its reserves are used up?  Did the Cubans stop hoping?  No, they worked and worked to create their organic farming?  They ordered 1.3 million bicycles, as they had no gas for transportation.  They worked and worked to solve problems.  Of course some mistakes were make.  None on the mistakes were as drastic and unchangeable as you seem to want to believe.)

The average monthly wage is still 200 pesos. A black market bar of
soap, almost the only available, sells for 40 to 80 pesos. A bottle
of cheap rum goes for 60 to 100.

(Joan's comment:  And, what else would any sane and/or rationale person think would happen?  How was Cuba to raise wages during this period?  Could they have done as the US has done--just print more money and invade poor countries to rape them of their natural resources?)

While some walls crumble, others are being constructed or repaired-as
is the case with the houses of a couple of hundred thousand people
made temporarily homeless (relocated in state-provided shelter) by
several devastating storms.

(Joan's Comments:  I find this an amazing feat.  To provide housing for all, while houses crumble because the government has no money to buy the proper tools and materials to fix the houses; and, even if they had the money, the US embargo would prevent them from obtaining these materials from most countries.  Compare this to the US where homeless die every year--over 100 homeless die in just Minneapolis every year.)

Despite all the scarcity and decay, Cuba's infant mortality rate has
continually declined up to this day, in late 1996.Health care and
education remain free of charge for all people. No schools or
hospitals have been closed. None of the combined staff of 600,000 (17
per cent of the workforce utilizing about one-fifth of state
expenditure) have been fired. Instead, thousands of doctors are still
graduated annually, and now number 60,000 or one per 183 inhabitants,
the lowest ratio of patients per doctor in the world.

(Joan's comment:  Yes, isn't this amazing??!!  And, isn't this proof that the Cuban Revolution did not die??!!!)

But Cuba now has haves and have nots. The latter are mainly those who
can acquire dollars, by hook or crook. For the first time since the
US initiated its blockade, Cubans can now possess hard currency
legally (since July 26, 1993). Those with dollars have the slick
side, the fine accommodation and observant services at dollar
locations. It all depends on which side of the dollar you stand. So
it is with the rest of the world. The big difference is, it has now
struck independently maverick and socialist Cuba: the one nation that
said "never" to making concessions to capitalism.

(Joan's Comments:  Of course, haves and have nots came into existence, especially after the dollar was decriminalized and the remittances started to flow.  What "class" and "race" of people in Miami would be sending these remittances to their relatives and friends in Cuba?  I suggest, Mr. Ridenour, that you read Saney's Cuba:  A Revolution in Motion.  Saney realistically and truthfully analyzes the situation.  And, please note that as soon as Cuba started to make a come-back, it focused on all of the inequalities that they could do nothing about while they were so focused on just surviving.)

People feel insecure today.

(Joan's comments:  Of course they did in 1993 and the next few years.  The monster, imperialism, was breathing down their neck.  Cuba's downfall was predicted by the leaders of friendly countries.  The Cuban-American Mafia terrorists were all ready to walk in and take over.)

Crime is common and ever escalating, in spite of increased police
co-ordination and arrests. Aggressive attitudes are on the rise.
Cyclists drive against traffic as if they owned the whole street and
pavements. Bus passengers rarely obey queues and common courtesies.
Bus drivers do nothing to stop kids and adults from hanging onto any
external part of the bus for a free and dangerous ride. Police look
the other way at many infractions, yet make periodic sweeps of
unemployed, out-of-school youths for "dangerousness" deviations.

(Joan's comments:  This is about as petty as one can get.  Yes, of course, the police had to be more alert regarding the youth.  But, you see, in Cuba, youth are priority.  Perhaps, the police were trying to get the youth back on track during a terrible situation where it was hard to see a future.  Did they make some mistakes?  I imagine so.  Did the majority forget the values and principles of the revolution?  I sincerely doubt it.  When I was in Cuba in September of 2003, I certainly felt safer there than I do on the streets of the Twin-Cities.) 

People do not respect laws nor do they know where to turn. They don't
like criminals, "the resolvers of problems", but they offer goods and
services otherwise unavailable. So they buy the stolen goods on the
black market. They don't trust the word of authorities, because they
don't follow through on promises and plans, in which ordinary people
have little or no say, yet they don't want the evils of capitalism,
of phony US-style elections or foreign domination.

(Joan's comment:  Yes, of course, the black market was doing quite well.  It always does during poverty times.  Yet, even with the black market being able to function, as even you admit, the people had not lost sight of the benefits and principles of the revolution.  They had not--as a society--lost track of what was most important, which is keeping imperialism out of their lives.)

These are extremely complicated times for Cuba, for its citizens and
the leaders in the Communist Party and government. The policies that
leaders say they have been forced to take, admittedly lamentable,
cause inequality and class divisions. Leaders say that there is no
other alternative; the realities of the new unipolar world have
imposed these harsh decisions. Party and government leaders talk a
lot these days about paternalism and egalitarianism as negatives
festering in the population, causing them to be indolent, sloppy at
work, shunning work for play or "sickness" absenteeism, and all the
while demanding and acquiring social services without paying in
productive ways.

(Joan's comments:  Very simple:  The leaders were exactly right.)

Lost in this critique is how that rampant paternalism began. Nearly
four decades ago, Cuba's unions urged the new revolutionary
government to establish work relations on the basis of
one-task-one-job-one worker. The political leadership insisted that
unity required only one political party without factions, which
resulted in a most limited "democratic centralism". The government
"gave" social and economic benefits without demanding payment of the
real costs. Cronyism and play habits resulted.

(Joan's comments:  Cronyism and play habits always result to some extent.  It is amazing that during the special period it did not totally take over the Cuban system.  It didn't because the revolutionary principles were ingrained in the people--thank the gods.  Yes, it is ideal and dreamy to have a perfect socialist society.  It is also not realistic when you have the biggest imperialism monster of all times breathing down your neck and just waiting for you to die. Certainly, Mr. Ridenour, you must have some understanding of that.)

With benevolent paternalism comes appeasing social benefits handed
out by an ensconced bureaucracy. The command-run society functioned
with few fiscal mechanisms for the first 16 years of revoutionary
development. The 1976 Constitution established a parliament, which
was elected, indirectly, that year. But the National Assembly has
been weak and ineffective, a rubber-stamp for the Council of
State--28 men and three women (three of the 31 are black or
mulatto)--all members of the Communist party, half of those on the
Politbureau.

(Joan's comment:  Yet, these 28 men and three women (with three black) are doing a much better job leading the government than the 50 US senators and 100s of US reps are doing in the US.  Why?  Could it be because the US government is really run by a council of corporate moneyed interests who could care less about the rights of the people?  Again, I suggest you read Isaac Saney's book--and, if you have read it, reread it.)

Government ministries and state firms were hierarchically managed
with the top boss deciding almost everything under state planning
commissions. The result has been that the ordinary person waits
apathetically for "upstairs" to decide, and to deliver. Individual
initiative has not been encouraged and meaningful incentives for
better performance have, in practice, been scant.

(Joan's comments:  And, the Cuban government leaders continue to learn and correct their mistakes.  Can you say that for the US?  NO!!!!  The only mistakes the US government corrects are the ones that didn't give them enough profit for the wealthy.)

Benevolent paternalism also means that leaders are unchallenged; a
dubious public follows. It is impossible to know if the government
can provide what is says it cannot, for example, because there are no
established channels to important economic information--apparently,
at times, leaders themselves act more on the basis of wishful
thinking than on figures and facts--and a good deal of information is
simply deemed unwise to divulge.

(Joan's comments:  Mr Ridenour, I think you should go back to Cuba NOW--in 2006--and have a discussion with Fidel, Alarcon, Perez-Roque and perhaps learn some truth and reality.  I am not saying there was not some wishful thinking--that always exists, just as mistakes always exist.  Yet, it is vitally important to understand what motivated the decisions the leaders made.  I think you will find that the motivation was always for the welfare of the people, of the revolution, of humanity.)

No real tough, independent investigative reporting takes place, no deep
throats have national outlets to blow the whistle.This is not an abstract
question of the overused terms "democracy," "human rights," "civil
liberties." This is a practical and vital matter of credibility, of whether
or not the people believe their leaders and media. This is a matter of
whether workers can or cannot have meaningful input into decision-making in
order to inspire them to identify with the job, with the final product, with
government policy, so that they will produce sufficiently and with quality.

(Joan's comment:  No, Mr. Rideour, this was a matter of surviving--the people and the revolution--the special period, which was a "hell" on earth for the leaders as well as the public.  A leader cannot dream his way through something like the Special Period.  Fortunately, you, as a dreamer, were not one of the leaders during these impossible times.)

Many people say that the real reason for some shortages or
disappeared products is that government agencies are
over-centralized, do not listen to workers, make unwise decisions and
that the CMEA (Council of Mutual Economic Aid) countries floated a
high standard of living without a productive internal base.

(Joan's comments:  This almost makes me think that you, Mr. Ridenour, are working for the CIA.  Even the most uneducated and not too smart should be able to look at the FACTS, the TRUTH, and see that Cuba did what was almost impossible to do in keeping people alive during this period.)

Waste has long been common in socialist Cuba--waste of resources
through individual negligence and faulty consciousness, as well as
misused management of resources, imports and products of labor due to
the erroneous notion that waste could be compensated for as in the
"First World" through exploitation, called "trade" by some ex- and
neocolonies. Firms and institutions were not made to operate on cost
accountability, not made to pay for their equipment, tools and
supplies, and most people get the same wages regardless of production
and are not educated in the ways of civics. Subsidized paternalism
has been permitted to grow and florish, instead of making use of
workers´ and common people´s initiative and creativity.

(Joan's comments:  Yes, when the SB was aiding Cuba, it was easy to make mistakes and just brush over them.  But, your statement about not "making use of workers' and common people's initiative and creativity" shows that your mind is not very open and lacks creativity.  Remember all of the doctors who continued to help those in other third-world countries, even while Cuba was suffering?  For example, 500 medical personnel, mostly doctors, were in Haiti before, during and after the coup.  Yes, there were some doctors, other professionals and some diplomats who caved in and defected.  So what?  It certainly was not the majority--but a very small minority.)

Nevertheless, people do not revolt nor publicly demonstrate. They
don't because there is no alternative to point to, and the one that
the West tries to impose on them is too obviously unattractive.
Besides, there is no organized opposition, other than some small
groups sponsored by the enmey, that is, the United States, and
hostile not only towards the govenment but also towards almost
everything that people have learned to value. And unapproved
demonstrations are not acceptable by the state. On the few occasions
when people have exerted efforts to demonstrate against policies,
they could be readily identified with those groups. And patriotic
Cubans-the vast majority of inhabitants-do not want to be so
identified.
(Joan's commentExactly!  The vast majority of inhabitants do NOT want to be identified with the "dissident" (truly mercenary) groups.  What does that say?????)


One can gripe at mass organizations and at workers´ assemblies today,
but experience teaches that, although some of the highest leaders
encourage critiques, there is a huge, well established
apparatus--erratically and inefficiently controlled-- that acts on
its own. These bureaucrats resist fresh thinking and changes, to the
effect that things move, if at all, with unperceptible slowness. Most
of the time, people just want to get the meetings over as quickly as
possible.
(Joan's comments:  This is a total exaggeration.  I have spoken with several Cubans and have read several articles and/or books.  The one thing that is very apparent is the community action groups and their educated political discussion.  Now, I agree that during the special period, this deteriorated--because words and arguments would not provide the unity of action needed to get through this period and save the revolution.)


But Cubans would not be Cuban if they did not have their jokes.
Hundreds of jokes about Fidel and the state system circulate and are
told by nearly everyone, by more or less serious critics and even by
party people in a good mood. There is something refreshing about many
of these jokes. They approach irony and self-critique. Some people
who defend Fidel and the system view these jokes as negative
criticism, supplying ammunition to the enemy. I see them, some of
them, as realistic representations of how people feel
. Regardless of
one´s ideological program, people´s true feelings must be taken into
account or ideology fails. Solidarity activists need to understand
reailty and people´s feelings, else they become alienated from the
process of struggle, and often disassociate from participating. That
leaves the door open for any powerful force to determine or dictate
our destiny. If we understand why things go the way they do, it is
easier for us to accept defeats and continue plugging along for
future victories.

(Joan's comments:  Well, Mr. Ridenour, we all feel down and out at times and all look to humor at times.  But, there are also time when one must look beyond their "feelings" and see the importance of fighting a real economic war for the survival of a county--and knowing that the horrible imperialist country will take every hint of dissent and turn it into a major excuse to justify invading a country.  I suggest you read William Blum's Killing Hope.  He gives example after example after example of the US creating propaganda lies to bring down leaders and countries--even without any hints from the people.  Your words should like that which Colbert satirizes with his "truthiness")

One joke has it that the president of the US asks God when the US
will control the whole world. God replies: "In the year 3000." The
Russian president then asks God when Russia will be able to
restructure and fulfill its economic plans. God replies: "In the year
4000." Finally, Fidel asks
when rectification of errors and negative
tendencies policies will win out and the Special Period overcome. God
begins to cry and answers: "I won't live long enough to see it."

(Joan's comment: Well, the Special Period WAS overcome in 2005.  That is a fact.  That is the truth--that you say you want to find.  Please allow the Cubans to educate you--or at least help you on your search for truth and reality.)

But there is also this one: Fidel is gone, and as a leader of a
communist state he comes to Hell. He succeeds in persuading Satan to
ask God for an audience of just two hours. After several attempts,
Satan succeeds, but only ten minutes, no more. Ten minutes, an hour,
two hours go by. Satan approaches the door. He hears God saying, "OK,
Fidel. You are right. Just one condition. Let me be your second in
command."

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