Fidel's End-of-life Confessions

(there is no advertising anywhere just graffiti honoring the dead leaders of the revolution)

"After I've seen what I've seen, and knowing what I know now, it wasn't worth it all," recently responded Fidel Castro to a question about his own action during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. At the time he urged the Soviet Union to launch nuclear weapons against the US during the Bay of Pigs incident. Apparently the 84 year old retired dictator has had a number of opinion changes in his old age and recently sat down with Jeffrey Goldberg who writes a blog for Atlantic magazine.


(Revolution Museum in Havana has pieces of different US spies planes they shot down during the Bay of Pigs & Cuban Missile Crisis as evidence/trophies of US aggression against them)

This interview jumped out at me because I had the opportunity to go to Havana over last winter break---legally. I got a humanitarian license from the US State Department and travelled to Cuba with a group called Global Exchange from San Francisco. From my viewpoint, there were three things that were working in Cuba:
1) Health care- everybody got really good coverage of everything
2) Free, really good education for all through university!
3) Gender equality- they need all hands on deck to make a living and get things done so there is not much gender discrimination.

What clearly wasn't working was:
1) the economy- the stores were practically empty (below)




2) the economy- our taxi driver was a trained veterinarian, but he could make more money in the tourist industry driving a cab (above)

3) the economy- everybody has a house to live in, but it was kind of based on what your family grabbed at the time of the revolution in 1959 (or if you had a connection to the government office that allocated housing)

Back to the interview, when commenting on the Cuban economic system Castro actually confessed, " The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore." That was pretty amazing to me. My question back would be that I have to believe the US embargo for 50+ years hasn't made it easy. Right now they are mainly sucking in foreign exchange from European tourist to buy and build what they need. Everybody in the rest of the world can travel there freely. Just think how much they would make if Americans could go there. It is only 90 miles off the coast of Florida!

You really get to see how well capitalism distributes goods and services when you go to Cuba-except for maybe health care, education and equal rights--this might be where we need government intervention in our system (and we have it). It was a really interesting trip. I really recommend going before the old system disappears. It was a really great living history lesson.

Anyway, if you want to hear Castro's comments on SNL and Fidel scolding Ahmadinejad over anti-semitism, check it out:

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/09/fidel-castros-doubts-about-cuban-communism-and-iranian-anti-semitism/