Someone i know has had a great big Castro portrait on their back.. and i cant understand why?? I pointed out his oppression of a nation and millions in poverty and mass emigration.. His reply was that my view is all distorted by the western media.. but didnt actually say anything good he had done. Apart from sticking 2 fingers up to the west what has he done??

Just interested in hearing others opinions on the man…

some forgetful lefty will be along shortly to tell you. 🙂

He was a qualified doctor. Helped beat the Bay of Pigs invasion. Sided with the poor and oppressed. Went on long motorbike rides. Scrubbed up well for photos taken for T shirts and students’ posters. Nothing too bad really.

redistributed land rights
brought in a universal health care system (life expectancy in Cuba is similar to ours)

it is obviously complicated

illMC – Member

He was a qualified doctor. Helped beat the Bay of Pigs invasion. Sided with the poor and oppressed. Went on long motorbike rides. Scrubbed up well for photos taken for T shirts and students’ posters. Nothing too bad really.

Fidel Castro or Che Guevara?

He was a qualified doctor. Helped beat the Bay of Pigs invasion. Sided with the poor and oppressed. Went on long motorbike rides. Scrubbed up well for photos taken for T shirts and students’ posters. Nothing too bad really.

you may have got your icons mixed up there…

Is it Castro on his back or his mate, Che Guevara

Castro wasn’t a looker!

Aha! Too early to have head properly in gear. Mixed mythologies!

Wasn’t this fella was it?

Well Cubans under castro had longer life expectancies than their US counterparts and it certainly increased massively compared to the puppet regime the Americans supported before he came along

Their healthcare system is arguably much better than the american system and certainly better than a lot of the carribean in spite of sanctions, they still have a lot of health tourists from the region

He seemed like a bit of a **** to me though

I suppose

He has developed a nation of lazy moaners who don’t know how lucky they are.
His next job should be to import shit loads of white paint and spruce the place up.
While they’ve got the paint out they should probably paint over the 911 murals.
People dieing is never funny whatever side your political view point.

What about the literacy rates, higher than the US and the UK.
I suspect that life span is better because of no access to all the processed s..t that is available in the US.

I’d say his greatest achievement is p..sing off Tricky Dicky. As a kid though it was a bit scary listening to all the missile crisis stuff.

Did wonders for the Cuban amateur boxing programme.

Castro tattoo

Another Castro tattoo (maybe)

Thatcher, Blair, and the ConDems; did they do anything good?

How many Britons would prefer to live in some version of the Cuban system?

You need to go there, given they’ve had an embargo for that many years, they’ve not done badly at all, I have a Che Guevara poster on my office wall and if you visited their Museum and see all the shit things the yanks did to them, hell he is a hero, all Politicians are corrupt and what we have here is no better, they have Castro we have a frigging Monarchy, what’s the difference?

PS it wasn’t tricky dicky it was Kennedy at the time of the missile crisis but that must have been as bad for them as it was us. Given they’d just repulsed a full invasion attempt by the yanks, something we were lead to believe was just a small CIA incursion at the time, yet when you see the illustrations there were battle ships, air support and everything, the yanks were useless as normal when they have no allies, and were repulsed.

This is an excellent book if this thread has provoked an interest. There’s a fair bit about Castro in there, and a lot about the revolution, Bay of Pigs, etc. Great read.

Its very easy to see if a political person or party has had a negative or positive affect on the people they govern by just seeing how people vote…with their feet.
In the case of Castro, I think he has had a great positive affect on Cuba but judging by the number of people fleeing every year, the rules designed to make it harder for people to leave and the number of people living in the west who tell you how good it is but don’t seem to want to commit to living there, I would say that the cons outnumber the pros as far as Fidels rule is concerned.

You have to wonder why so many tens of thousands have risked their life trying to escape, plus the hundred thousand plus who were allowed to?

(edit, I see stewartc was thinking the same as me while I was typing)

the yanks were useless as normal when they have no allies

What a ridiculous statement!

The Americans have more conventional firepower in 1 Carrier group than most Countries have in their complete Navies, the UK included.

Friend of mine, now a consultant epidemiologist, did 5 years in Nicaragua alongside a load of Cuban doctors. He reckoned they were impressive to work with but despite loads of offers/opportunities to leg it the US and elsewhere, they all happily went back to Cuba when they’d done their spell.
I’m never convinced by the headcount of escapees. They won’t have seen films coming out of Hollywood showing the lifestyle, health and life chances of many Latin Americans living in the US.

you seem to be suggesting censorship is a bad thing because it stops Cubans finding out how miserable Latinos in the US are which leads to high emigration rates. that’s a new one.

As an aside, what do you know of Latinos in the US (apart from what you see in movies)?

“How many Britons would prefer to live in some version of the Cuban system?”

I dunno. how many?

Nothing to shout about… http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/02/cuba-chernobyl-health-children

A mere trifle; http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2013/12/11/nelson_mandela_on_how_cuba_destroyed

etc, etc

“How many Britons would prefer to live in some version of the Cuban system?”

I dunno. how many?

Infinitely preferable to living in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, etc.

It gets very hard to judge, because a lot of the problems in Cuba stem from the embargo from the states. But that becomes a bit of a convenient excuse for everything.

You do know the regime that was inplace before Castro took over ?

Given the complete embargo the US imposing – including doing an embargo on any country that trades with Cuba it isi little wonder the country is impoverished by western standards

however the health rates , the literacy rates and various other positive [ non economic] indicators show how well he has done in those areas

as for the migration rates no matter how joyous your country some folk want to leave and I bet as a higher percentage of mexicans flee to the US than cubans

He was a dicatator and as good as you can get from one but he was still a dictator

the people would have faired better without the US embargo though so we cannot fully judge IMHO

Name me a country leader who is not a dictator in some form or other.
They promise the earth during election and deliver possibly 30 percent of the promises once elected.
They manipulate their position and friends while the “lower classes” are trodden on.

as for the migration rates no matter how joyous your country some folk want to leave and I bet as a higher percentage of mexicans flee to the US than cubans

There’s about 1 million immigrants from Cuba in the US and there’s about 11 million Cubans in Cuba.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_American

There’s about 11.5 million immigrants from Mexico in the US and there’s about 121 million Mexicans in Mexico.
http://www.pewhispanic.org/2013/05/01/a-demographic-portrait-of-mexican-origin-hispanics-in-the-united-states/#mexican-origin-hispanics-in-the-united-states

So not a major statistical difference. Of course, unlike Cubans, Mexicans have always been free to piss off any time they like. It’s only been a year and a half since most Cubans were allowed to leave the country: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/15/cuba-relaxes-travel-restrictions

if hes done so well why is everyone wanting to leave? Also we seem to be forgetting the Cuban missile crisis that nearly started WW3

Name me a country leader who is not a dictator in some form or other.

Jose Mujica of Uraguay?

we seem to be forgetting the Cuban missile crisis that nearly started WW3

You mean the Turkish Missile Crisis?

Name me a country leader who is not a dictator in some form or other.

How true.

The greatape, I forgot about him. An inspiration to all.

As an aside, what do you know of Latinos in the US (apart from what you see in movies)?

Not a lot, apart from spending time in NYC, Boston, Cambridge, LA, El Salvador, Guatemala plus what I am told by mates who live there and what I read.

rossatease
“PS it wasn’t tricky dicky it was Kennedy at the time of the missile crisis”

I was not referring to Nixon at the time of the missile crisis.
Castro met Nixon (who was US vice Pres at time?) some time after the revolution, he was the one who made life difficult for Castro and Cuba by talking crap back at Washington, this sent Castro to the open arms of the USSR. Apparently Castro had tried to explain to the US what he was doing and why plus wanting to have assure the larger neighbour, Nixon put a stop to that. Or course this paraphrases history but the general just it right.

The news coverage is what I recall about the missile crisis, all WW3 at any minute. As a youngster it scared me with all the talk nuc’s and missiles.

The thing that has proven Cuba as a great country is how they managed after Russian stopped supporting them, particularly in food production. It’s a model for what could be done here.

Castro was still a git to many people though.

I don’t see any alternative that would have functioned given the most aggressive and corrupt neighbour a country could have, if there had been ‘free’ elections they would have been bought and paid for in the same way US ‘democracy functions to the call of big business and corporate capitalism now.

Even to this day and I don’t want to stray into the realms of anti semitism but witness the Gaza affair and the pursuit of oil and natural gas, which is the normal reason for US incursions and Cuba is rich in oil, the sort better for road building, but oil just the same.

I’ve been there a few times now and with an open mind and believe all in all Castro was a good thing. Someone has to have an alternate to Capitolist Imperialism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per_capita_income_in_the_United_States_by_ancestry

mt – Member
rossatease
“PS it wasn’t tricky dicky it was Kennedy at the time of the missile crisis”

I was not referring to Nixon at the time of the missile crisis.
Castro met Nixon (who was US vice Pres at time?) some time after the revolution, he was the one who made life difficult for Castro and Cuba by talking crap back at Washington, this sent Castro to the open arms of the USSR. Apparently Castro had tried to explain to the US what he was doing and why plus wanting to have assure the larger neighbour, Nixon put a stop to that. Or course this paraphrases history but the general just it right.

The news coverage is what I recall about the missile crisis, all WW3 at any minute. As a youngster it scared me with all the talk nuc’s and missiles.

The thing that has proven Cuba as a great country is how they managed after Russian stopped supporting them, particularly in food production. It’s a model for what could be done here.

Castro was still a git to many people though.

OK my bad, but all in all agree with the rest of what you’re saying.

Mexicans have always been free to piss off any time they like. It’s only been a year and a half since most Cubans were allowed to leave the country

Cheers for the stats there -interesting that their is little difference and folk seem to be happy to flee for economic reasons

It is also worth noting that any cuban who gets there can stay and until the 1980’s any who tried could stay [ ie those found on boats]

Wet foot dry foot as it is now called! So it was easier for them to get in but still no more did. I am not sure that really matters tbh but as you note not a massive difference.
I wonder how many illegals are also there to skew the figure?