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| credit: deAdder |
Washington made political hay out of the demonstrations in Cuba this week. The hypocrisy meter has hit the peg. Secretary of State Blinken had the unmitigated gall to say the sixty-year old blockade of the island had nothing to do with shortages and high prices that were the subjects of the protests. The fact that Cubans cannot get Tylenol at the local store is a direct result of the embargo that includes medicines such as COVID-19 vaccines and syringes. Cuba has produced its own effective vaccines now undergoing trials, and has vaccinated about 20% of the island population--almost as much as the state of Tennessee. The Economist reported that US exports of food to Cuba fell to their lowest levels since 2002. Cuba imports about 70% of its food. The former guy reimposed economic sanctions against Cuba after a brief thaw in relations under Obama. He once again designated Cuba a "state sponsor of terrorism" along with North Korea, Iran, and Syria. About 2,000 of her medical professionals have been set abroad to help fight the pandemic. Perhaps these are the "terrorists" the reactionaries are referring to.
If Joe really wants to help the Cuban people instead of just scoring propaganda points with the exile brigade in Miami who flood the Internet with anti-communist diatribes, he could lift the crippling economic warfare that has depressed the island's economy for the past sixty years. We trade with other communist countries without any objections from the hard right. What makes Cuba so evil that it is singled out for special treatment? Many of the Cuban dissidents enjoying Florida sunshine are on the payroll of the CIA or its front organizations like USAID. USAID funnels some $20 million annually into activities that can be described as "regime change." The CIA does not forget its failures easily.
As Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel put it during a special address to the nation on Sunday:
“If they [the US administration] want to make a gesture toward Cuba, if they really are concerned about the people, if they want to solve Cuba’s problems: lift the blockade and let’s see how we do, why don’t they do that? Why don’t they have the courage to lift the blockade, what legal and moral basis allows a foreign government to implement such a policy against a small country, and in the midst of such adverse conditions? Isn’t this genocide?”
The corporate owned media in the US have depicted the protests as an unprecedented uprising of a people begging for freedom. That cold-war sentiment is hardly an accurate picture of the diverse opinions of 11 million Cubans. Cubans have frequently protested against the communist government founded by Fidel Castro. But many support the revolution to this day. The Cuban constitution has been amended twice since 1959 as part of a democratic process that encouraged participation from ordinary citizens. The changes were confirmed by a 2019 plebiscite in which 10% of the 8 million participants voted no. Raul Castro implemented economic "updates" allowing limited market enterprise. When was the sacrosanct American charter from the 18th century, promulgated by slave-owning white men who believed in limited suffrage, last amended? We are still living with the anti-democratic consequences of the Electoral College and Jim Crow! Another supposed symptom of communism according to CNN--power outages. Power outages happen all over South and Central America, even in capitalist economies like Argentina's.
Any attempt to force the island to bring back corporate capitalism would be futile in the extreme. The Cuban government maintains a strong militia with membership in the millions that would make the Taliban look anemic if the island were invaded. It also has popular support. The fact is that the dream of taking back Cuba from the outside died in the sands of the Bahia del Cerdos. Hardly a "failed state", Joe, but an instructive example of what a revolution can achieve for its people while under the grinding heel of implacable imperial hostility. Afghanistan is your failed state. So, bottom line: give Cuba a break--roll back the former guy's sanctions, and let's go there on vacation.
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