Castro's Dead

DeVlaeminck

Moontrane wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

A veritable paradise eh Frank?

https://www.hrw.org/americas/cuba

Hardly, however, the lot of the populous is partly down to the fact the country has had an embargo on it for decades, thus not allowing Cuba to blossom and its economy to be stifled which will of course lead to unrest. Capitalist dictatorships like the US don't want fledgling communist states to thrive.

In the next 30 years the sh1t will hit the fan here.

That's a US embargo. The other 195 nations of the world have been free to trade with Cuba. The US was Fidel's bogeyman.

Yes but the USA is hardly just one amongst 200 odd nations especially when it is on your doorstep.

The pity is the USA turned Castro away when he looked for help rebuilding the country post revolution. That in itself pushed him further towards communism and the soviet union - the revolution was never a communist revolution even if the Communist Party in Cuba did play a part in it. Of course the US has to take a share of the blame for the way Cuba went - it was happy enough with Batista which tells you everything you need to know about how much it really cared about the Cuban people. Once Cuba was on the wrong side of the cold war it's hardly surprising that it became repressive as far as counter revolutionary factions were concerned - it was in effect in a state of siege so whilst Castro shouldn't be painted as some kind of saint neither should the USA.

kingstongraham

DeVlaeminck wrote:

Moontrane wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

A veritable paradise eh Frank?

https://www.hrw.org/americas/cuba

Hardly, however, the lot of the populous is partly down to the fact the country has had an embargo on it for decades, thus not allowing Cuba to blossom and its economy to be stifled which will of course lead to unrest. Capitalist dictatorships like the US don't want fledgling communist states to thrive.

In the next 30 years the sh1t will hit the fan here.

That's a US embargo. The other 195 nations of the world have been free to trade with Cuba. The US was Fidel's bogeyman.

Yes but the USA is hardly just one amongst 200 odd nations especially when it is on your doorstep.

It's almost like it's most important to have good trading relationships with those countries closest to you.

This is another Brexit thread, right?

RideOnTime

Ben6899 wrote:

RideOnTime wrote:

Stevo 666 wrote:

Ben6899 wrote:

We're off to Cuba, next April. Before it goes down hill.

Don't worry, his brother is in charge now. Smooth transition with no need for this pesky voting malarkey.

Been twice, it's a great country to visit, fascinating modern history. Try and explore away from the tourist resorts. These are completely sanitised.

That's exactly our intention. By "down hill", I did mean "further sanitised"... now that the Yanks are allowed in.

Being a large country with relatively poor transport connections I think you've really got the options of an east based holiday or a west based one. West includes Havana but the East is more interesting in my view. Don't be rushing for great food - outside of the hotels it's no treat...
Great country I would love to go again.

ballysmate

Frank the tank wrote:

mamba80 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Surrey Commuter wrote:

Stevo 666 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro's dead? Good riddance! Consigned to the toilet of history along with the other despotic megalomaniacs such as Hitler, Lenin and Stalin. They'll all be sat around in a warm fiery and hot place paying dearly for their crimes..

That seems to be the view of many Cubans who can say what they think (i.e. the ones who live outside Cuba):
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/26/the-old-man-is-dead-fidel-castros-death-sparks-celebrations-on-streets-of-miami

A biased sample?

An interesting discussion would be how different things could have been if the USA had not tried to invade and then repeatedly try to assassinate him.

What would his regime have been like and how might Cuba look today?

Why are you defending this scum? He is in the same sordid club as Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot etc.. IE: low life dictators who held life in very low esteem and who butchered many poor people without any moral scruples.

Castro isnt in the same league as those you mention, certainly no where near as evil as say, Pinochet (who did absolutely nothing for any of his people) who M Thatcher was a good friend too, indeed stopped his prosecution, would you describe MT as scum? judge someone by the company they keep and all that!

Castro did quite a lot of good (and of course a heck of alot of bad thinks too) medics to Africa, helped over through white rule in Angola, which led to the SA releasing Mandela.

Hitler,Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot and Thatcher scum the lot of em.
Anyone who stands up to capitalist regimes and and capitalism et al are obviously vilified by the right wing media and capitalist nations and their intersts.
Castro lead a peoples revolution and obviously the USA and its allies made sure the populous paid the price. Cuba has one of the best health care systems in the world, I believe because private interests have been kept well out of it.

Here you go Frank, a few people that could have done with treatment at one of the best healthcare systems in the world.
Or any healthcare system, come to think of it.

http://www.nytimes.com/1986/06/08/books ... wanted=all

Frank the tank

Ballysmate wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

mamba80 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Surrey Commuter wrote:

Stevo 666 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro's dead? Good riddance! Consigned to the toilet of history along with the other despotic megalomaniacs such as Hitler, Lenin and Stalin. They'll all be sat around in a warm fiery and hot place paying dearly for their crimes..

That seems to be the view of many Cubans who can say what they think (i.e. the ones who live outside Cuba):
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/26/the-old-man-is-dead-fidel-castros-death-sparks-celebrations-on-streets-of-miami

A biased sample?

An interesting discussion would be how different things could have been if the USA had not tried to invade and then repeatedly try to assassinate him.

What would his regime have been like and how might Cuba look today?

Why are you defending this scum? He is in the same sordid club as Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot etc.. IE: low life dictators who held life in very low esteem and who butchered many poor people without any moral scruples.

Castro isnt in the same league as those you mention, certainly no where near as evil as say, Pinochet (who did absolutely nothing for any of his people) who M Thatcher was a good friend too, indeed stopped his prosecution, would you describe MT as scum? judge someone by the company they keep and all that!

Castro did quite a lot of good (and of course a heck of alot of bad thinks too) medics to Africa, helped over through white rule in Angola, which led to the SA releasing Mandela.

Hitler,Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot and Thatcher scum the lot of em.
Anyone who stands up to capitalist regimes and and capitalism et al are obviously vilified by the right wing media and capitalist nations and their intersts.
Castro lead a peoples revolution and obviously the USA and its allies made sure the populous paid the price. Cuba has one of the best health care systems in the world, I believe because private interests have been kept well out of it.

Here you go Frank, a few people that could have done with treatment at one of the best healthcare systems in the world.
Or any healthcare system, come to think of it.

http://www.nytimes.com/1986/06/08/books ... wanted=all

I do not condone persecution or torture of anyone, if that happened in Cuba it's sh!t. I'm sure it has happened in plenty of other places in the world though under political regimes you would approve of.

ballysmate

Of course it happened in Cuba! That's why there has been such amazement at the reaction of some people to Castro's death.

Frank the tank

Ballysmate wrote:

Of course it happened in Cuba! That's why there has been such amazement at the reaction of some people to Castro's death.

There was similar reactions here when Thatcher died.

mamba80

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

Of course it happened in Cuba! That's why there has been such amazement at the reaction of some people to Castro's death.

There was similar reactions here when Thatcher died.

i dont believe that one of Satans disciples is dead at all.

tangled_metal

Does anyone think Castro was already dead as a political figure? That his relevance is only to those of a certain age and politics in the 60s? My parent's generation not mine, I'm 40s BTW.

Cuba has been an irrelevance on the global stage for a long time. Castro has become a figure of leftist myth like Che Guevara. The reality his legacy corrupted by heinous acts of dictatorship.

So the likes of Gerry Adams will represent the highest political ranks from Britain, UK and Ireland. Perhaps Corbyn would have gone if he was still a back bench irrelevance too. But forums and news comments will have fanboys hailing Castro's legacy. Well I for one will still be alive to see his legacy start to be erased and Cuba become capitalist, free marketeers like most of the "free" world. Perhaps unlike the Castro fanboys lamenting his passing but praising his legacy while ignoring his crimes.

Frank the tank

Tangled Metal wrote:

Does anyone think Castro was already dead as a political figure? That his relevance is only to those of a certain age and politics in the 60s? My parent's generation not mine, I'm 40s BTW.

Cuba has been an irrelevance on the global stage for a long time. Castro has become a figure of leftist myth like Che Guevara. The reality his legacy corrupted by heinous acts of dictatorship.

So the likes of Gerry Adams will represent the highest political ranks from Britain, UK and Ireland. Perhaps Corbyn would have gone if he was still a back bench irrelevance too. But forums and news comments will have fanboys hailing Castro's legacy. Well I for one will still be alive to see his legacy start to be erased and Cuba become capitalist, free marketeers like most of the "free" world. Perhaps unlike the Castro fanboys lamenting his passing but praising his legacy while ignoring his crimes.

Got to agree with a lot of that (I'm 55 BTW) He lead a peoples revolution against a corrupt, US backed regime. He was never going to have many friends in the west was he. Like all dictators he ruled with an iron fist, they have to.
We like to think we are free, but we are not really we are so subtly controlled by the powers that be, we think we are free. That is the trick, I haven't fell for it but I don't know how to get out of it. Wiyhin the next 30-40 years the proverial will hit the fan, the we will all see.

Ben6899

ukiboy wrote:

MT as far as I know didn't put people in front of a firing squad. Castro did. Castro is in that same grubby dictatorial club as the afore mentioned people that I mentioned is in.
The far left are every bit as dangerous and reprehensible as the far right.
Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

I'll debate Castro (not now), but grouping Marx with Hitler, Stalin and Lenin. Absolutely incredible.

finchy

Ben6899 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

MT as far as I know didn't put people in front of a firing squad. Castro did. Castro is in that same grubby dictatorial club as the afore mentioned people that I mentioned is in.
The far left are every bit as dangerous and reprehensible as the far right.
Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

I'll debate Castro (not now), but grouping Marx with Hitler, Stalin and Lenin. Absolutely incredible.

Oi! I've already done that one.

rick_chasey

ukiboy wrote:

Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

Are you a moron or just totally illiterate?

Have you even read Marx?

ballysmate

Rick Chasey wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

Are you a moron or just totally illiterate?

Have you even read Marx?

@Ukiboy

Don't be worried about the name calling.
He only does that if he likes you.

Ben6899

finchy wrote:

Ben6899 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

MT as far as I know didn't put people in front of a firing squad. Castro did. Castro is in that same grubby dictatorial club as the afore mentioned people that I mentioned is in.
The far left are every bit as dangerous and reprehensible as the far right.
Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

I'll debate Castro (not now), but grouping Marx with Hitler, Stalin and Lenin. Absolutely incredible.

Oi! I've already done that one.

It needed repeating. Fuck1ng unbelievable.

finchy

Ben6899 wrote:

finchy wrote:

Ben6899 wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

MT as far as I know didn't put people in front of a firing squad. Castro did. Castro is in that same grubby dictatorial club as the afore mentioned people that I mentioned is in.
The far left are every bit as dangerous and reprehensible as the far right.
Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

I'll debate Castro (not now), but grouping Marx with Hitler, Stalin and Lenin. Absolutely incredible.

Oi! I've already done that one.

It needed repeating. Fuck1ng unbelievable.

Well, it's me, you and Rick who have said it now. We need to start a BR philosophy club. Next topic - was it unfair to blame Nietzsche for the Nazis? 1500 word essay due in next Wednesday.

ballysmate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vV3QGagck

finchy

Ballysmate wrote:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vV3QGagck

That was taken from a live show in LA. I wonder how many heads that one flew over.

Moontrane

DeVlaeminck wrote:

Moontrane wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

A veritable paradise eh Frank?

https://www.hrw.org/americas/cuba

Hardly, however, the lot of the populous is partly down to the fact the country has had an embargo on it for decades, thus not allowing Cuba to blossom and its economy to be stifled which will of course lead to unrest. Capitalist dictatorships like the US don't want fledgling communist states to thrive.

In the next 30 years the sh1t will hit the fan here.

That's a US embargo. The other 195 nations of the world have been free to trade with Cuba. The US was Fidel's bogeyman.

Yes but the USA is hardly just one amongst 200 odd nations especially when it is on your doorstep.

The pity is the USA turned Castro away when he looked for help rebuilding the country post revolution. That in itself pushed him further towards communism and the soviet union - the revolution was never a communist revolution even if the Communist Party in Cuba did play a part in it. Of course the US has to take a share of the blame for the way Cuba went - it was happy enough with Batista which tells you everything you need to know about how much it really cared about the Cuban people. Once Cuba was on the wrong side of the cold war it's hardly surprising that it became repressive as far as counter revolutionary factions were concerned - it was in effect in a state of siege so whilst Castro shouldn't be painted as some kind of saint neither should the USA.

Help for rebuilding? Rebuilding what? There was no Tokyo or Dresden destruction of buildings and infrastructure attributable to Fidel's socialist revolution. BTW, the US embargo started in 1958 when Bautista was still in power. But why would the US offer any help after Fidel nationalized (stole) US businesses - businesses that would be worth over a trillion USD today? This is what prompted a tightening of the embargo.

Fidel pursued communism all on his own, with the racist, Marxist butcher Che at his side from the start. Fidel's regime started brutal and repressive, with political executions by the hundreds. Fidel was so awful he locked up more political prisoners per capita than did Stalin. Cuba was on the wrong side of the cold war well before Fidel announced his communist regime in 1965.

The world has sent billions to Haiti, yet it remains a hell-hole in the aftermath of the earthquake, and untold amounts of money have vanished. Castro had a net worth of nearly a billion dollars. Why? Hugo Chavez' daughter is a billionaire. Why? The problem is corruption. Fidel's failed economic system is not because of U.S. foreign policy but because of his own economic policies, using the U.S., again, as his bogeyman. Attempts to blame the US for Cuba's deprivations fail to take into consideration obvious facts.

ukiboy

Rick Chasey wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

Are you a moron or just totally illiterate?

Have you even read Marx?

Yes, I'm obviously a moron and illiterate Rick..
Those above folk are all equal in one thing: an absolute distaste and disregard for basic human rights and simple democracy. Communism has been proved to be an equally shite form of governance to fascism. I have a family history which had suffered greatly under both of those systems of government.
I'm London based mate so give me a PM and we can meet up in a quaint pub, I'll buy you a beer and we can put the world to rights over ale. I bet my argument wins over yours...

rick_chasey

ukiboy wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

Are you a moron or just totally illiterate?

Have you even read Marx?

Yes, I'm obviously a moron and illiterate Rick..

Glad we're agreed on that.

I'm London based mate so give me a PM and we can meet up in a quaint pub, I'll buy you a beer and we can put the world to rights over ale. I bet my argument wins over yours...

No I don't go for drinks with morons.

Waste of everyone's f*cking time.

You'll probably want to report me for not being born in Britain.

rick_chasey

Either that or you'll buy me a drink and claim i'm sponging off hard working brits.

Go read a book or two by Marx and come back to me will ya?

Given it's translated in your own mother tongue and he wrote most of it in London.

Edit: is that why you don't like him? Dirty immigrant?

Stevo_666

Rick Chasey wrote:

No I don't go for drinks with morons.

Waste of everyone's f*cking time.

You'll probably want to report me for not being born in Britain.

Honestly Rick, you are very intolerant of people with different views. And rude. As I've said before

rick_chasey

He can think what he wants.

I think he's a moron and I don't want to drink with someone who wants me and my family out of the country because he thinks we're ruining it.

And he's moronic if he thinks Marx is as bad as Stalin. Very simply.

That's diversity of opinion. And also some facts thrown in.

ukiboy

Rick Chasey wrote:

Either that or you'll buy me a drink and claim i'm sponging off hard working brits.

Go read a book or two by Marx and come back to me will ya?

Given it's translated in your own mother tongue and he wrote most of it in London.

Edit: is that why you don't like him? Dirty immigrant?

I presume you champion Franscisco Franco too seeing as he presided over the Spanish Miracle, the amazing economic miracle in the '60s?
Or perhaps Mussolini? He was great with making the trains run on time. Or Hitler perhaps. He eliminated unemployment and was responsible for the producing the Autobahns as well as other fantastic infrastructure projects. Or is it just left wing dictators (knobs) that you champion and eulogise?

ukiboy

In any case Rick, I think I've got the measure of you..
You're a typical left wing intolerant person.
I'd definitely not stop in the street to help you mend your puncture if you got one.
You sum up the liberal left wing intolerant community beautifully.
I'm just glad that I remember this lovely country the way it was before numpties like you came along...

finchy

ukiboy wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

ukiboy wrote:

Castro=Hitler=Stalin=Lenin=Marx et al...

Are you a moron or just totally illiterate?

Have you even read Marx?

Yes, I'm obviously a moron and illiterate Rick..
Those above folk are all equal in one thing: an absolute distaste and disregard for basic human rights and simple democracy. Communism has been proved to be an equally shite form of governance to fascism. I have a family history which had suffered greatly under both of those systems of government.
I'm London based mate so give me a PM and we can meet up in a quaint pub, I'll buy you a beer and we can put the world to rights over ale. I bet my argument wins over yours...

ukiboy - read my reply to you (I didn't call you a moron, so you can read my post). Karl Marx did not advocate a Soviet-style regime. In fact, he warned against it, and, if I recall correctly, specifically named Russia as the type of country from which a movement intent on concentrating power into their own hands might misuse the label Marxism/communism.

Similarly, Nietzsche is sometimes vilified because the Nazis claimed to be his intellectual heirs, but his idea of the ubermensch (superman) was one who was neither slave nor master, and Nietzsche was not anti-Semitic, despite his sister's attempts to paint him as such following his death.

Seriously, you've got to be very careful when authoritarian governments start claiming to justify their actions by citing philosopher X, Y or Z - 9 times out of 10 they'll be grossly misrepresenting the ideals they claim to be pursuing.

ukiboy

Finchy - extremism of any persuasion is wrong and immoral. My beef is with the left wing arty farty trendy lefty folk who excuse/big up leftism and make out that it's cool or right on.
Left wing dictatorship is every bit as bad as right wing fascism/dictatorship.
Communism has killed lots more people than fascism has..

rick_chasey

ukiboy wrote:

In any case Rick, I think I've got the measure of you..
You're a typical left wing intolerant person.
I'd definitely not stop in the street to help you mend your puncture if you got one.
You sum up the liberal left wing intolerant community beautifully.
I'm just glad that I remember this lovely country the way it was before numpties like you came along...

You're an idiot. I'm not even that left wing.

I'm as capitalist as they come. I just think it needs tinkering. I literally work for execs in my job. I literally help negotiate their pay.

I'm not intolerant. I have strong opinions. I can handle the sh!te people say at me. I just give as good as I get. I'll let you say your piece, and I'll happily call you a knob if I think it's knobbish. You need to get a thicker skin if you can't handle that. If you don't want people to comment on your opinion, don't give it. It's not about respecting the opinion. It's about knowing they can have theirs and you can have yours. That's freedom.

I'm not suggesting you be banned. I just think you're a knob for thinking it. Get over it. I don't doubt the feeling is reciprocal..

FWIW, I happened to have worked with someone who was writing a book on Gulags for a few weeks in an archive, so I'm relatively familiar with the some of the suffering an awful lot of people experienced under the Soviet Union. So don't give me that sh!t.

Ben6899

You two should definitely go for a drink. Let me know which pub and I'll sit at the bar.

Seriously though Ukiboy, you need to read up on Marx.