Dear Friends,                                                                              Let’s talk about Cuba

Cuba is governed by a dictatorship. The current dictatorship began in 1959. It replaced dictatorships going back to Cuban independence. One dictatorship after another, plus ça change plus c’est la même chose. Well, up to a point. Is there anything different about the present Cuban dictatorship compared to its Cuban precursors and to all the other dictatorships of Latin America? So, a few things about Cuba under the current dictatorship, and it is a dictatorship:

First, all the normal features of dictatorship shared by, for example, Cuba’s “peer institutions” (as we academics say when comparing ourselves to other universities): I’m not going to make any general assessment of Cuba compared to other dictatorships on killings, arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, human rights violations, censorship and surveillance, and the other “normal” manifestations of dictatorship. My impression is that Cuba’s somewhere in the middle, even if higher, it certainly isn’t wildly out of line.

So what about other distinctive features of social life?

Racial division in Cuba goes back to the Spanish conquest. The division is between whites, of Spanish descent, and Afro-Cubans, descendants of slaves. But the simple division is obscured by constant “racial mixing”. Skin color has been the dominant ground of discrimination. The revolutionary government after 1959 declared the principle of racial equality. The record is mixed, at best. On the whole, the direction is positive. By 1980, life expectancy for whites and blacks was equal – the US isn’t even close.

Cuba is a leader in women’s rights. Women may have up to two years maternity leave; they also have free access to abortion. Woman are just a hair short of equal representation in the Cuban National Assembly (48.9%).

Following the seizure of power in 1959, the Revolutionary government was firmly opposed to LGBTQ+ rights. Discrimination and persecution were more in the form of organized humiliation – during compulsory military service, for example – than penal legislation, the effects were devastating nonetheless. Things changed. In an interview in 2010 Castro condemned his own policies against homosexuals as “a great injustice”. Wikipedia, which is providing me with much of the data displayed here, says that with regard not only to LGBTQ+, but also women’s rights policies, Cuba is one of the most progressive countries in Latin America. Yes, but what about that big blob on the map between Mexico and Canada? How are we doing compared to Cuba?

The Cuban medical system has led to life expectancy very close to that of life expectancy overall in the US: 77-78%, to 79%; it is significantly higher than many demographic groups in the US. Cuba provides more medical personnel to the developing world than all the G8 countries combined.

Cuba has one of the highest literacy rates in the world, with adult literacy estimated at over 99% (US: 79%). The literacy rate in 1953 was 56%. This is a good measure of the quality of the Cuban education system.

Cuba is a dictatorship. How many other dictatorships can claim these things, these achievements of social welfare? How many “democracies”?

Maybe the question should be not how can we regime-change Cuba, but how can we change our own regime so as to achieve these results in a democracy?

Not a question that the Trump regime, especially its boss, could even understand. So, first, why doesn’t the free press of our nation, the 4^th Estate always there to say everything as it is, to speak truth to power! … it does seem to be oddly reticent about Cuban social policy. When did you last see a major news outlet spend time on the Cuban healthcare system?

Pretty much all that I’ve seen, through my newsfeed, and it covers a big range, are reports and commentaries about the possibility, the plans for, the likely results of a US invasion of Cuba. That its character as a dictatorship opens it to such possibilities is pretty much taken for granted.

Ok, so we’ll stick with all that. The US, that is the current executive branch of the US government, does seem to have active plans for some kind of military assault on Cuba. Any such assault would be a violation of International, and, probably, of US law – we’re way beyond that now, the Republican majority in Congress will vote for anything the guy in the White House tells them to.

If the boss attacks Cuba (and then tells his Congressional toadies to rubber-stamp it), what will the attack be? Everything we know from the past, and including events long before Trump, says that it will be aerial bombardment. The only possible (trumped-up) reason for attacking Cuba is regime-change. Regime-change is for the benefit of the Cuban people, to make them free. But listen, guys, all you Cubans, freedom comes at a price, in this case large numbers of you dying from the bombing, absolutely necessary, carried out by your liberators.

And then? Let’s face the nightmare of a “regime change” imposed by US military force. All past experience tells us that the result will not be representative democracy. Since the present US administration does not even want representative democracy in the US or its neo-imperialist possessions, that result is even more certain.

But here are all these things produced by a dictatorship … surely (no Airplane jokes) a wannabe authoritarian would want to emulate such achievements? Wouldn’t he [we are talking about a he] want to preserve them since they are achievements of a dictatorship?

Well, no, he wouldn’t. Just look at what these achievements are: overcoming racial divisions; promoting women’s rights; promoting LGBTQ+ rights; a medical system that has almost achieved parity with the US in life expectancy, and sends out well-trained doctors and nurses around the world; an education system creating almost 99% literacy (just so as not to shame us, Americans, again, I won’t state again the rate in the US).

No, the current regime in Washington, and its current leader is pretty much against all these things: their own ideas are visible in all the policy changes they’ve enacted. Earlier administrations, including the last, have been very far from adequate. This one is transparent at least because its policies are transparent demonstrations of its ideology.

Whatever else a US military regime change in Cuba will bring, it will certainly destroy the extraordinary social policies, a challenge to the whole world, brought about by a Communist dictatorship.

 Love and solidarity,

            Bobby

The Federal government no longer exists.