It's Groundhog Day, and if Punxsutawney Phil is correct, we are in for six more weeks of winter before we can look forward to spring.  Sadly, the weather's temperature is not the only measure of warmth for humans.  As it is, there is no need for a weather predicting rodent in Cuba, because there is no escaping the chill of the repressive winter of the firmly entrenched Castro dictatorship.  We witness those international masses who cheered the so-called Arab Spring, who proclaim concern for universal human rights, justice, and self-determination, apply a different standard when it comes to rights for the Cuban people.  Apparently, the Castro brothers are just too sexy for condemnation, to lovable to be judged by their actions, as were other lesser tyrants long ago confined to the pages of history.  Businessmen from around the globe froth at the mouth over the delights of the island in anticipation of future profits, while turning a blind eye to the public beatings of peacefully protesting women.  The Castro's author the islands narrative; they say there are no political prisoners in Cuba, and Walla!  In lockstep, the international media ignores the reality of Cuban political prisoners, well documented by international human rights organizations, and gleefully disseminate the propaganda.  Not content with that complicity, their white wash often includes an added insult to the victims they say do not exist.  Clergy of all faiths, those representatives of human kind's morality, travel to the island to pay homage to the world's longest reigning tyrants, never minding the history of executions, the atrocities, or the testimony of survivors. 

 There's a price to be paid for this base inhumanity, as the devil always gets his due.  The forces gathering in the Middle East, their infiltration into the Americas, and the erosion of constitutions by radicals elected to power may be the beginning of payback.  If the lights of liberty darken, will that too be called justice?

Friday night thinking about Cuba, these lyrics came to mind.

How many freedoms must Cubans be denied
 before their humanity is recognized?
How many must die at sea
Before they’re allowed to sail free?
Yes, how many times must the executioner prevail
Before they’re forever banned?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

 Yes, how many years can a people remain enslaved
Before humanity heeds their bondage?
Yes, how many years can some people exist
Before they’re allowed to be free?
Yes, how many times can the world turn its back
Pretending they just don’t see?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Yes, how many people must drown at sea
Before they’re allowed to travel free?
Yes, how many ears must humanity have
Before they can hear Cuba’s cry?
Yes, how many deaths will it take till they decide
That too many people have died?
The answer my friend in blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

 Borrowed from Bob Dylan´s Blowin In The Wind, 1963.

While the MSM continues to parrot Cuban state press run by a murderous outlaw dictator, they ignore the brutal violent acts of repression against Cuba's peaceful dissidents. 

The life of Cuban opposition leader Jorge Luis García Pérez (Antúnez) is in danger.

I am pleading with the MSM and international human rights organizations to please speak out on behalf of this peaceful dissident. Look around our world; dissent and protest is universally celebrated, the Arab Spring, the OWS, the European demonstrations. Whether or not if you agree with their agendas, we should all agree that no one should be denied the right of free speech.

The above referenced acts of dissent have enjoyed wide coverage in the media. I ask, I plea and beg, why are the Cuban people excluded from international media? Are they not responsible for exposing the truth about violations of universally accepted rights? Are they no longer the so-called 5th estate? Why are peaceful Cuban dissenters, including women, and the elderly allowed to be subjected to the most agregious violations of their human rights; torture, beatings, intimidation, threats, imprisonment, and murder. Why is that when their stories are presented to international media and human rights organizations in multiple lanugages, the response is for the most part silence.

Please, please speak out in support of human rights for the Cuban people. You may save a life.

From tireless defender of rights and justice for the Cuban people Marc Masferrer at Uncommen Sense:

Antúnez on Nov. 8 was arrested, beaten and thrown into a jail cell at the police station in his hometown of Placetas. His wife, Iris Tamara Pérez Aguilera, a leading activist in her own right, told CubaEncuentro.com that she has been told that Antúnez is in poor health, suffering from chest pains and headaches.

Meanwhile, officials have threatened to hold Antúnez, one of the most forceful activists on the island, in jail indefinitely.

Pedazos de la Isla has a personal appeal from Iris:

Attention! The activist and brother of Jorge Luis Garcia Perez Antunez just arrived to my home. He tells me that officials in the Placetas Police Unit informed him that his brother is in critical condition right now. They said that Antunez is suffering from very low blood pressure and very low sugar levels. I am calling on all those people of goodwill so that they raise their voices for my husband.

A former citizen of the USSR schools the mental giant socialists comfortably tucked inside the USA. He also points out their patron saint Che's accomplishments under the banner of socialism/communism. At one point one of the occupiers claims the man was thrown out of the country (Russia) by the Soviets because he is 'rich' and was 'robbing the people'.

He also tries schooling the brain dead Marxist zombies on the eating habits of those well-paid North Korean people under fabulous communism.

Meanwhile America's OWS (bowel) movement flushes out another coveted endorsement of the highest standards ... This one from David Duke.

HT: MRCTV

Yesterday in a discussion in comments on my previous post I expressed a stark difference between "politeness" and "consideration". Politeness is a means by which civil control can be expected, imposed, or even demanded. Politeness can be used as a protection defense (step on the mean guy's toe and immediately you apologize) or an offensive weapon ("killing with kindness" ... calmly saying "thank you" when you're really saying something else inside your head). Consideration is an individual responsibility involving a private and personal thought process that regards individual human relationships, the quality of interaction and communication, and the end results therein.

Historically, when Communism has taken over a society a politeness has been imposed by the state. No one is to speak out against the government, resist, or even leave without penalty of physical punishment, imprisonment, and even death ... or, at the very least, re-education using the previous three mentioned as tools to remove the personal and private thought process and feelings of the individual. Cuba's repression through street beatings of innocent and unarmed women, and imprisonment and beatings of those who refuse to accept the apartheid. The Killing Fields outside the re-education camps of the Khmer Rouge. North Korea's imprisoning and starvation of its people. And then there is China...

If you saw the 1987 movie "The Last Emperor" you saw the transformation of China into The People's Republic of China, the Communist state. It follows the life of Puyi, the last Emperor of China from opulence and complete accommodation from a staff and country that afforded the imposed politeness to his rule, to Puyi's years-long imprisonment in a Communist re-education facility until he (and the entire country) submitted to their every demand and was released into the coldly and cruelly polite Communist Chinese society. Decades and decades later China has become the perfect definition of all Communism is intended to be.

In the last ten years I have seen raw videos of violent cruelty of terrorist ideologies and Sharia Law punishments. All have been horrific and unacceptable in a civilization, most especially in a 21st century world. However, the video of a two year old Chinese girl wandering into a street and being run over multiple times by two trucks and the following footage leaves me breathless. As she lay broken, smashed, bleeding, and at one point struggling in the street the security camera video shows over a dozen people walking by her, barely giving her a glance as they passed, showing no concern. Humanity reduced to roadkill. Some speculate it is partly the Chinese devaluation of female babies/children in a society/government imposed one child rule added to the polite disregard of a helpless female toddler smashed into the pavement of a public thoroughfare not much wider than an alley where humans were parading through during a normal business day. It is the most perfect Communist de-humanization success I have ever seen. Finally one person sees the motionless baby and drags her out of the middle of the street and walks away. A moment later her mother appears and carries the limp baby away (Full graphic video) ...

But what I find even more disturbing, if possible, is the Chinese government's reaction in the wake of the growing international attention to this:

Civilization office of Foshan’s Nanhai district on Monday presented 10,000 yuan ($1,570) to Chen Xianmei, a rubbish collector who offered aid to Yue Yue after the incident happened, as a reward for her kind deed, China Daily reported.

Meanwhile, a company in Foshan said that they will donate 50,000 yuan to Yue Yue’s family and the rescuer respectively.

“Besides the reward, we would like to offer Chen a job with stable income so as to encourage this kind of activity,” said an anonymous assistant manager at the company.

Got it? The government is not only dictating what is acceptable civilized and human behavior, but rewarding the woman who dragged the dying baby out of the road. Can you imagine?!? The people of China have to be rewarded for doing something that you or I would have instinctually and frantically done ... and MORE?? But why is this a big deal? Once again it goes back to the results of the Communist government's previous actions:

The most popular regional paper The NanFang Daily wrote an editorial about “gathering the scraps of China’s conscience.”

With the introspection comes who or what to blame for the degradation of “Chinese morality” and there seems to be a consensus about the perceived source of the current state of apathy. One netizen wrote, “Don’t blame the passersby; it was a Nanjing judge that killed this little girl.” [...]*

The “Nanjing judge” refers to an infamous 2006 incident where a young man named Peng Yu went to the aid of an elderly woman who had fallen down on the street in the eastern city of Nanjing. At the woman’s request, Peng helped take her to the hospital only to have the woman turn around and accuse him for being the person who knocked her down. A Nanjing judge then ruled that “common sense” suggested that Peng only took the woman to the hospital because he was guilty and ordered him to pay her medical expenses.

* Last I read the toddler was still barely alive in a hospital.

Someone in comments on the ABC News link cautions not to blame the Chinese government for what the individuals did (didn't do). The person making the comment fails to realize there is no individualism in the fearful collective of Communism. No humanity. It is the ultimate success of the previous generations' Communist re-education. Other Communist countries must be envious...

HT and more @ The Blaze

Cross-posted @ CW

But Chavez is not happy with what he perceives as the "horrible repression" of the wonderful protesters ... By whom I'm not sure, because all the abuse and repression appears to be coming down on the heads of innocent New Yorkers by the protes--- squatters (and I mean that literally, folks). This from the same fella that never met a Venezuelan protest he didn't like to sic his police and national guard on to crack skulls and herd-off to jails. And look out if you're in the media and say something against his craptastic dictatorship and repression. Not to mention if you're a judge and old Hugo doesn't like your ruling on something.

CARACAS - Socialist firebrand Hugo Chavez condemned on Saturday the "horrible repression" of anti-Wall Street protesters and termed a Republican presidential candidate "crazy" for his criticism of Cuba and Venezuela.

[...]

Not surprisingly, Chavez expressed solidarity with American activists who have been staging rallies and marches against what they view as corporate greed by Wall Street.

The U.S. protests, which began last month in New York and have spread to Tampa, Florida, Seattle and other cities, have mostly been peaceful but sometimes resulted in confrontations. Dozens were arrested and police used pepper spray in New York earlier this week.

"This movement of popular outrage is expanding to 10 cities and the repression is horrible, I don't know how many are in prison now," Chavez said in comments at a political meeting in his Caracas presidential palace shown on state TV.

Chavez, who runs for re-election in a year's time and traditionally ramps up his anti-capitalist rhetoric to try and rally supporters before a vote, also let rip at Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, who referred to the "malign socialism" of Cuba and Venezuela in a speech on Friday.

"He's been attacking Venezuela and Cuba, and talking about the malign government of Hugo Chavez. And he has the arrogance to say that God created the United States so the United States can rule the world," Chavez said.

"And that crazy man might be the president of the United States, in elections that are just after ours."

Venezuela's presidential vote is in October 2012, before the U.S. vote in November.

more...

Of course, if his strongest supporters are to be an indicator, I'm quite sure Hugo Chavez isn't as supportive of that darned TEA Party movement in the U.S.A.

Berta Antunez, Women's rights activist in Cuba speaks at the Global Summit against Discrimination and Persecution. 

Powerful testimony on the horrors of Castro's Gulag.

En espanol here.

Jane Fonda (warning) likes to fancy herself a righteous activist. We all know Jane from her romantic NVA gun-straddling days during the Vietnam War as those pesky American POWs insisted on being tortured, starved, beaten, and killed. But what you probably don't know is dear Jane is pining for the one she let get away. Who might that be? Well, that heartthrob centerfold for all capitalist-fed and protected leftist/liberal Marxist wannabes ... Che Guevara, of course.

And Bob "I never met a blood-stained Marxist thug I didn't like" Beckel must've wanted to make a Jane Fonda sandwich with old "Don't shoot! I'm Che!" (Or maybe a Che sandwich with dear Jane?)

I want to say, 'They don't know Che' ... but the horrific fact is they do, and it is exactly why they lust after him. He touches their inner vampire. I think what pisses me off about all these Che Guevara necromongers is how they willfully and spitefully look past the death and oppression spawned from the man's bad seed in Cuba. And forget about any support and understanding, let alone outrage, from an alleged "feminist" over the treatment of women activists in Cuba. Sexy, huh?

Seems the only people who pine for and adore Che Guevara are those who never have or never will have to live under the brand of freedom he fathered and bastardized in Cuba.

Frances Martel at Mediaite has written a lengthy article interviewing CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta in Havanna, Cuba. Dr. Gupta is in Cuba to investigate for himself the facts about Cuba's healthcare system that everyone seems determined to hold up as a prime example of a successful government/state-run system. Democrats, Hollywood celebrities such as Michael Moore and Oliver Stone, and the American media have selectively shown only one elitist aspect of CastroCare, deliberately omitting the entire cold harsh facts about the average Cuban who must depend on the government for its every medical need. Here is just a bit of Martel's report, but as I said it's lengthy so read the full article at the link above or in the box-quote:

90 miles and decades removed from the United States, the island of Cuba persists as a stubbornly living relic of the Cold War, excommunicated from the Western world just enough to make everything from its music to policy to its health care system a mystery. It was to explore this latter element that CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta found himself Havana last week, from where he told Mediaite his first impressions and expectations on the island, and worked on an upcoming documentary on swimmer Diana Nyad’s attempt to traverse the stretch of water from Havana to Florida.

Many have argued that the Cuban health care system is somewhat of a marvel compared to the rest of the island’s industries– not the least due to the fact that the government made a very public push to make doctors its greatest export. This has led to both strong criticism from those that perceive it as a distraction from the goings-on otherwise on the island, or see it as a ploy for the nation to ingratiate itself internationally with nation’s that simply cannot afford good medical education. On the other hand, those who praise it cite numbers (mostly from the Cuban government) that show the average life of a Cuban to be, at least on paper, more disease-free than many in the Western world. To this end, Dr. Gupta traveled to the island to take a look himself and try to speak to as many people on the ground there as he could.

Journalistic missions like these, even if explicitly avoiding the political situation on the island, nevertheless touch on an emotional, political wound that hasn’t stopped bleeding for more than half a century. The relationship between Cuba, the Cuban exile community, and the American mainstream media is a tenuous one, and as a member of the Cuban exile community, this topic is particular is personally difficult for me. I grew up with an acute understanding of the systematic physical and psychological destruction the regime is to blame for– it is plain to see every day in the faces of our loved ones, and the former prisoners of conscience in our communities who huddle in cafes to reminisce about the time they served in brutally inhumane conditions for having complimented America once, or written a defiant essay, or even worn their hair long or listened to “yanqui” music. The pain is inked in the headlines of our media that dare publish stories of families of political prisoners being beaten and scorned on the streets.

In this context– and in the context of the mainstream media’s history with the communist dictatorship (from Herbert Matthews to 1990s Lou Dobbs to Michael Moore to Oliver Stone)– justifying a look at the health care system at face value is about as acceptable as an in-depth report on Mussolini-era Italy’s efficient train system. Regime sympathizers have used it as a smokescreen to shield eyes from the atrocities of the regime, and thus the distrust in the community is very high when such analyses come to the fore. But in the post-USSR, post-internet world, in a world where the demand for Happy Meals and iPods has proven a far more powerful political motivator than the temptations of abstract fundamental human rights, opening governments requires shining spotlights and exchanging culture. Even apolitical reports like Dr. Gupta’s force the regime to exhibit a candor with which it is unfamiliar, and serve to remind the world of the inconvenient fact that Cuban people, so many decades later, still live under the yoke of the Revolution’s dilapidated, rabid haughtiness.

With this heavy in mind, I spoke to Dr. Gupta earlier this week from Havana–who, as you will read, came into the experience acutely aware of the nature of the government, no agenda and plenty of curiosity. I found in him a refusal to subscribe to the Oliver Stone/Michael Moore school of willful blindness, admitting there were breathtaking elements to the island while acknowledging the scattering of asterisks and conjectures surrounding the statistics of the health care system, and the inability of journalists to paint a full picture.

Continue...

On YouTube you will find videos of Dr. Gupta's heated interview on CNN with Michael Moore on the heels of his pro-CastroCare movie "Sicko" in 2007 as the U.S. political season geared-up for the 2008 POTUS campaigns and government-run healthcare was a primary focus of the democrats running.

Yves Schladenhaugen is French,  as Havana Club's international marketing director,  he enjoys the elite life in Cuba.  His daughter attends the "very international" French School, and I'm sure his family doesn't live in the kind of crumbling unsafe dwelling without adequate plumbing and electricity that the average Cuban family must endure. More likely, they live in a well-maintained property confiscated from its rightful owner by the Castro regime in a neighborhood a comfortable distance from  Cuban reality.

In his position at Havana Club,  a joint-venture between Pernod Ricard  and Cuba Ron, a Cuban state-owned company, he is complicit in the exploitation of every single Cuban worker they employ.   Only State approved  Cubans are picked for these positions, bartered as slaves; they are paid by the State for far less than the State receives for their services.   They have no bargaining rights, and must maintain the proper revolutionary profile to keep their jobs.

This interview, with Ad Age Global,  is a blueprint of international corporate  collaboration with the brutal Castro dictatorship. Notice how this slimy profiteer artfully weaves the regimes propaganda talking points for tourism into his polite and oh so civilized responses.   Cuba is sultry, the classic cars, the music, the wonderful spontaneous Cuban people with whom you can have a "simple and basic relationship," and the reminder that Cuba is still "unspoilt."

There is no mention of the human rights abuses in Cuba, and no mention of the escalating violent repression against peaceful dissidents.  

How Havana Club Runs International Marketing From Cuba (AdAge)

Internet Access Is Bad and There Are No Ad Agencies, but M&C Saatchi Handles Account From Paris

By: Emma Hall Bio

Yves Schladenhaugen, Havana Club's international marketing director, is a rarity: a senior marketer living and working in communist Cuba. The Frenchman has been based in Havana for the last three years.

Havana Club ad by M&C Saatchi Paris

Pernod Ricard-Owned Drink Uses City's Lively Cultural Scene in Its Marketing

When the Country Opens Its Doors, Companies Will Face Consumers Unfamiliar With Modern Marketing

Havana Club rum is a joint-venture between Pernod Ricard -- the Paris-based owner of brands including Absolut vodka, Jameson whiskey and Jacob's Creek -- and Cuba Ron, a Cuban state-owned company.

Mr. Schladenhaugen draws on Cuba's lively, sultry cultural scene for inspiration for events and a website featuring artists and musicians, and relies on M&C Saatchi's Paris office for ads. M&C Saatchi won the business in 2005 and is behind the current campaign that started last year with the theme "Nothing Compares to Havana." Ads that look like scenes you might see on a Havana street include a beautifully dressed bridal couple on a bicycle, a pair of ballerinas limbering up, and a 1950s era car above the line "When you drink don't drive. This might explain the longevity of our cars."

Agency creatives from Europe spend at least two weeks a year in Havana working on ads that run in 27 countries, excluding the U.S., where the embargo on trade with Cuba continues. M&C Saatchi's latest project, co-financed by Pernod Ricard, is a feature film called "Seven Days in Havana" to be released next summer.

Ad Age: Do you do any marketing or advertising in Cuba?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: We can feature our products at point of sale and in duty free areas -- there are Havana Club ads in the airport -- but on the streets there is no advertising whatsoever. Marketing is about more than just ads, though. We have a local team who work on packaging, on visibility in bars and in stores, and at concerts and events. If you count tourists, Cuba is still a growing market -- every year a million Canadians experience Havana Club when they visit Cuba, and it is no coincidence that Canada is one of our fastest-growing markets.

Ad Age: Are distribution and government price controls big challenges?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: Yes, these are challenges, but there are state monopolies for the distribution of alcohol in Canada and the Nordics, too -- this isn't the only market where managing pricing is not that easy. Price increases have to be submitted to the authorities; sometimes they go through and sometimes they don't.

We have another price leverage, which is encouraging people to trade up by promoting our more premium-quality rums.

We have a Museum of Rum in Havana. It's a proper museum and 140,000 visitors pay to go each year. Inside there is also a small store selling the highest-grade seven-year-old and 15-year-old rums, because when they are in Havana, tourists are keen to discover something special.

Ad Age: How much of your time do you spend in Cuba?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: I spend 50% of my time in Cuba, 25% in Paris, and 25% in the rest of the world. My marketing team is split -- one-third is in Cuba, and the other two-thirds are in Europe, where they can be closer to agencies and markets.

I do live in Cuba. I have a German wife and a 4-year-old daughter there. My daughter goes to the French school in Havana, which is very international. There are about 10 or 15 different nationalities in her class.

As well as being the international marketing director I'm also part of the executive committee of Havana Club, so I'm involved in production, finance and management, which are all based in Cuba. We do a lot of hospitality in Cuba -- trade partners, distributors, bartenders and press all love to come to Cuba.

Ad Age: How do you get reliable internet access?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: It is bad. It's true that it's very slow and very expensive for the company, but there is a light on the horizon -- a new cable connection is joining Cuba to the American continent this summer. We need to have a team in Europe because in Cuba the internet is bad, and because there are no agencies in Cuba, except some partners who do point of sale, and no trade press.

Ad Age: Do other foreigners work at Havana Club in Cuba?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: We have 460 people altogether working at Havana Club International in Cuba. That includes the Havana headquarters, production and all the local offices around the country. There are only 12 non-Cubans. In my team I have two French, one Greek and an Italian. It's difficult to find local people who have experience of marketing because there are no brands in Cuba. The top management is split between Cubans and non-Cubans -- the marketing director and production director are both French, but the communication director and the finance director are Cuban.

Ad Age: Are there any other Cuban brands besides Havana Club?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: We are the only Cuban brand with global reach. There's also Cohiba, but the market for cigars is more niche. Cohiba don't do big ad campaigns, but they are good marketers, with good management, distribution, packaging and new-product development. It's a very good brand.

The other brand is really Cuba itself. There's a good campaign -- Authentica Cuba -- that promotes the authenticity and spontaneity of the country. Cuba is a very attractive destination because it has beaches like the Caribbean, and it has a big city with cultural activities. The people are really great and society is unspoilt. Tourists are glad to leave their stress behind and have a simple, basic relationship with the Cuban people. The spontaneity is something very strong and nourishing.

Ad Age: What kind of government interference and control do you have to deal with?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: Cuba Ron, which owns 50% of Havana Club, is a state-owned company, but we don't feel it as a huge constraint. All countries have their rules in terms of tax, employment and movement of people.

It doesn't feel restrictive here -- we live differently, in a more simple manner. I live much nearer the creative sources and I go to places where I connect with musicians, artists and actors, so when we do events our relationship with them is direct and unspoiled. In Europe you use agencies as a filter to decode and translate creativity into marketing. It doesn't work like that in Cuba and it's not so easy, but it's inspiring.

Ad Age: How much do you export?

Mr. Schladenhaugen: We export 70% by volume and 85% by value. Cuba is still a top 10 market for us.

 

 

When you seek to have the State completely control commerce, production, consumption, and capital this is what it produces. People always find a way to survive, even if it is outside the restrictions of a system, especially communism. And imagine how it will be here when such policies take full command over our healthcare (see: ObamaCare), energy (see: outlawing lightbulbs, the cost of energy/oil-gas), and the push to control what and how much we eat ... Just to name a few.

HAVANA - Want some paprika-infused chorizo sausage? How about a bit of buffalo mozzarella? Or maybe you just need more cooking oil this month, or a homemade soft drink you can afford on paltry wages. Perhaps you are looking for something more precious, such as an imported air conditioner or some hand-rolled cigars at a fraction of the official price.
In a Marxist country where virtually all economic activity is regulated, and where supermarkets and ration shops run out of such basics as sugar, eggs and toilet paper, you can get nearly anything on Cuba's thriving black market—if you have a "friend," or the right telephone number.

A raft of economic changes introduced over the past year by President Raul Castro, including the right to work for oneself in 178 approved jobs, has been billed as a wide new opening for entrepreneurship, on an island of 11 million people where the state employs more than four in five workers and controls virtually all means of production.

In reality, many of the new jobs, everything from food vendor to wedding photographer, manicurist to construction worker, have existed for years in the informal economy, and many of those seeking work licenses were already offering the same services under the table.

And while the black market in developed countries might be dominated by drugs, bootleg DVDs and prostitution, in Cuba it literally can cover anything. One man drives his car into Havana each day with links of handmade sausage stuffed under the passenger seat. A woman sells skintight spandex miniskirts and gaudy, patterned blouses from behind a flowery curtain in her ramshackle apartment.

Economists, and Cubans themselves, say nearly everyone on the island is in on it.

"Everyone with a job robs something," said Marki, a chain-smoking 44-year-old transportation specialist. "The guy who works in the sugar industry steals sugar so he can resell it. The women who work with textiles steal thread so they can make their own clothes."

Marki makes his living as a "mule," ferrying clothes from Europe to Havana for sale at three underground stores, and has spent time in jail for his activities. Like several of the people interviewed for this article, he agreed to speak on condition he not be further identified for fear he could get into trouble.

Merchandise flows into the informal market from overseas, but also from the river of goods that disappear in pockets, backpacks, even trucks from state-owned warehouses, factories, supermarkets and offices.

There are no official government statistics on how much is stolen each year, though petty thievery is routinely denounced in the official news media. On June 21, Communist party newspaper Granma reported that efforts to stop theft at state-run enterprises in the capital had "taken a step back" in recent months. It blamed managers for lax oversight after an initial surge of compliance with Castro's exhortations to stop the pilfering.

"Criminal and corrupt acts have gone up because of a lack of internal control," the paper said.

An extensive study by Canadian economist Archibald Ritter in 2005 examined the myriad ways Cubans augment salaries of just $20 a month through illegal trade—everything from a woman selling stolen spaghetti door-to-door, to a bartender at a tourist hot spot replacing high-quality rum with his own moonshine, to a bicycle repairman selling spare parts out the back door. He and several others who study the Cuban economy said it was impossible to estimate the dollar value of the black market.

"You could probably say that 95 percent or more of the population participates in the underground economy in one way or another. It's tremendously widespread," Ritter, a professor at Carlton University in Ottawa, told AP. "Stealing from the state, for Cubans, is like taking firewood from the forest, or picking blueberries in the wild. It's considered public property that wouldn't otherwise be used productively, so one helps oneself."

Cubans even have a term for obtaining the things they need, legally or illegally: "resolver," which loosely translates as solving a problem. Over the decades it has lost its negative connotations and is now taken as a necessity of survival.

"Turning to the black market and informal sector for nearly everything is so common that it has become the norm, with little or no thought of legality or morality," said Ted Henken, a professor at New York's Baruch College who has spent years studying Cuba's economy. "When legal options are limited or nonexistent, then everyone breaks the law, and when everyone breaks the law, the law loses its legitimacy and essentially ceases to exist."

Continue...

You know, I distinctly recall hearing, for years, those who support liberal/leftist/democrat politicians, like Obama, griping about how the U.S. has always done business with and/or catered to the world's dictators, and that was/is the core of our problems around the world. But with Obama he's sorta kinda like Cyrus from that 1970s cult movie "The Warriors". He claims to unify, but is picking and choosing which dictators are worthy of remaining under his king-of-the-world watch, and which he will bow to or bump fists with ...

President Obama this month opened the White House and, with it, the stature of a presidential photo-op to one of the worst dictators in Africa: Gabon’s Ali Bongo Ondimba.

The Bongo family (his father ruled the oil-rich nation for over 40 years) has stolen a big chunk of the impoverished nation’s gross domestic product, press reports say. The riches have allowed the Bongos to live a life of ostentatious luxury. They buy million-dollar homes in Hollywood and France and spend gobs of money on around-the-world shopping trips.

Even the mainstream media noted the oddity of an American President on June 9 putting down the red carpet for such an unsavory despot. [...]

One dictator on one day at the White House might be excused as playing diplomacy with the hand you’re dealt.

But there seems to be a pattern with this President of reaching out to the worst, while snubbing the best.

A year before Bongo came to town, the leader of a staunch ally visited the White House. There was no red carpet. No photo-op. No dinner. Obama treated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu like a troublesome kid he had to scare straight.

Netanyahu was shuffled off to an office where the President abruptly left the meeting with the words “let me know if there is anything new,” according to The Times of London, after he failed to get the prime minister to give in to the Palestinians.

When Netanyahu returned this spring, he did get a photo-op. But Obama dissed him once again. He laid the framework for the visit by delivering a speech that said Israel had to shrink its borders, putting Netanyahu in the awkward position of having to publicly reject the suicidal plan.

Obama’s tortured outreach to the Muslim world has found Secretary of State Hillary Clinton referring to Syrian henchmen Bashar Assad as a “reformer.”

When they met, Obama bowed before the Saudi Arabian king. That country’s money and ideology have done more to fuel radical Islam than any other’s.

Obama often criticizes Jerusalem, but rarely mentions Hamas, the U.S.-designated terrorist organization that vows to destroy Israel.

It was Obama’s outreach to the renegade regime in Iran that started his troublesome tilt away from Israel. Obama believed the magic of his presence would convince Iran’s hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the one fueling deadly insurgents in Iraq and a nuclear weapons program at home, to sit down and talk.

Read the whole thing...

Two sayings come to mind:

1.) Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.

2.) A man is known by the company he keeps.

Now then, given Obama's background that the MSM has toiled to either ignore, cover-up, or lie about, and given what we have witnessed the last two and a half years, which of the above sayings do you think Obama's fondness of dictators falls into?

Did he share it with those journalists and reporters he has locked-up in his jail?

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – Hugo Chavez is getting a journalism award in Argentina.

The Venezuelan leader regularly threatens opposition media, but the University of La Plata is giving him an award for what it describes as his work giving people without a voice access to the airwaves and newspapers.

Chavez's government has bankrolled the growth of the Telesur network, providing a state-funded alternative to privately financed broadcast stations across Latin America.

He met Tuesday with his ally President Cristina Fernandez. She is trying to transform Argentina's communications industry through a law that would break up media monopolies and force cable TV providers to include channels run by unions, Indians and activist groups.

Slavery still exists. Of that there isn’t much dispute, if any. But how widespread is what many experts call modern-day slavery?

Estimates range from about 10 million to 30 million, according to policymakers, activists, journalists and scholars.

The International Labour Organization, an agency of the United Nations that focuses on, among other things, labor rights, put the number at a “minimum estimate” of 12.3 million in a 2005 report.

Kevin Bales, a sociologist who serves as a consultant to the United Nations and has authored several books about modern-day slavery, estimated the number was 27 million people in his book “Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy.” The book was published in 1999.

There is yet another estimate. Siddharth Kara, a fellow on trafficking at Harvard University and also an author, recently told CNN that his calculations put the range between 24 million and 32 million. That number was current as of the end of 2006, he said.

There are several reasons behind the variance in numbers, said Ben Skinner, who published a book about modern-day slavery – “A Crime So Monstrous: Face-to-Face with Modern-day Slavery.”

“There are two big problems with the count,” Skinner, a Senior Fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis University, said during a telephone interview. “The first is that the people we are counting are, by definition, a hidden population.

“The second problem is more of a theoretical one where the definitions are not in place. We don’t have a common definition still as to what slavery is.”

Continue reading ...

(Bold emphasis mine)

Sure ... Okay, if you say so. Just a pointer to the U.N. 'counters', Cuba's slaves are NOT hidden ... just ignored.

One-legged Afghan Red Cross worker set to be hanged after converting to Christianity

Indonesia: Mobs destroy three churches in Central Java

Militants Kill Christian Teenagers For Reading Bible

Indonesia: Muslims Massacre Other Muslims Because They Are The Wrong Kind

Pakistan: Undaunted Christians still go to church despite Islamist threats

Moderate NY Muslim Convicted of Beheading Wife…

Shabaab Cuts Off Kid's Hand for Stealing

And so, you see, it's a 'good thing' a Texas school system is forcing their students to learn the Arabic language and culture, right? I mean, making the kids learn Spanish wouldn't be as frugal ... Or how about this advice:

JIM ROGERS, ROGERS INTERNATIONAL COMMODITY INDEX: The best advice I can give anybody. Make your children and grand children learn Mandarin.

Which do you really believe our children have a more realistic chance of needing?

Then there's this:

Most Muslims and even many Islamists may eventually embrace, or at least reconcile themselves to, "Freedom of speech. Freedom of worship. Democracy. The rule of law. Equal rights regardless of race, sex or sexuality." But the theological and political totality of Islam as revealed by the Prophet Mohammed is difficult to reconcile with these Western institutions and ideals. Discussing this inescapable fact is a step too far for Mr. Cameron, and rightly so. At most, he hinted strongly at it when he stated bluntly that Islamic terrorism would still exist even in a climate of total accommodation. He recognizes, rightly, that we must marginalize the fanatics, and you don't do so by saying that they are the only ones who take the religion seriously -- that everyone else is biting off only what they are comfortable chewing.

David Cameron said more about Islam on Saturday, and he said it with greater insight, sensitivity, and realism than you'll find in virtually all of the platitudinous speeches on the subject delivered by all other Western leaders since 2001 combined. And he did so while defending our culture, our integrity, and our basic goodness. Pandora's Box is open -- the West may not be dessicated after all. People all over the world should take notice: A Western leader has finally emerged.

Geert Wilders: The Lights Are Going Out All Over Europe

From Bridget Johnson @ The Hill:

A key House Republican is quickly pressing forward with her goals to scale back U.S. funding for the United Nations.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told The Hill that oversight would be a key function of the panel, particularly funding to the U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) that is "a waste of taxpayer dollars."

"I'd like to make sure that we once and for all kill all U.S. funding for that beast," she said last month. "Because I don't think that it advances U.S. interests, I don't think that that's a pro-democracy group, it's a rogue's gallery, pariah states, they belong there because they don't want to be sanctioned."

Supporters of continued U.S. support of and participation on the HRC say that it's essential that Washington have leverage on the panel, renowned for including countries that have their own records of human-rights violations.

On Tuesday, Ros-Lehtinen will host a panel of U.N. critics and advocates that was originally scheduled for the week that the House suspended most activity in the wake of the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).

The 10 a.m. briefing before the full committee is titled, "The United Nations: Urgent Problems that Need Congressional Action."

One of those scheduled to testify, Peter Yeo, represents the United Nations Foundation/Better World Campaign, which at the start of President Obama's term urged the commander in chief to "mount a campaign" to secure a place on the HRC, which the Bush administration had boycotted.

U.N. critics set to appear include Claudia Rosett, who unveiled the oil-for-food scandal in 2004 and 2005 in The Wall Street Journal; Brett Schaefer, who regularly takes on the U.N. at the conservative Heritage Foundation; and Hillel Neuer, executive director of Geneva-based UN Watch, which monitors the controversial HRC.

Neuer told The Hill that UN Watch is going to release new data at the briefing on how the HRC has been run since then-U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan dissolved the Human Rights Commission in 2006. Annan called the commission "politicized" at the time, but the commission's replacement, the HRC, has attracted many critics as well.

[...]

Ros-Lehtinen, one of many lawmakers critical of Obama for that 2009 decision, led the charge against the United Nations in the 111th Congress, introducing bills urging transparency and accountability as well as the withholding of funding.

But the first bill in this Congress taking on the U.N., introduced on the first day the House was in session, came from a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, not from Ros-Lehtinen's panel.

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) introduced a measure to ensure that no federal funds may be used for the "design, renovation, construction, or rental of any headquarters for the United Nations in any location in the United States" unless Obama "transmits to Congress a certification that the United Nations has adopted internationally recognized best practices in contracting and procurement."

“During the Bush administration, it was learned from internal U.N. auditors that 43 percent of $1.4 billion in procurement contracts investigated involved fraud," Stearns said in a statement to The Hill.

"In addition, U.N. peacekeeping operations are plagued with numerous cases of abuse and sexual exploitation," he added. "The U.N. is in desperate need of reform from top to bottom, and my bill is designed to have the world body take the simple step of adopting internationally recognized best practices in contracting and procurement, which includes taking the bid representing the best value.”

The U.N. is also included in a broad-reaching budget-slashing bill by Ways and Means Committee member Kevin Brady (R-Texas).

The Cut Unsustainable and Top-Heavy Spending Act of 2011, introduced Jan. 7, calls for a 10 percent reduction in voluntary contributions to the United Nations -- monies the U.S. is not required to give by law -- for fiscal year 2011.

Total U.S. contributions to the U.N. system were more than $6.347 billion in FY 2009, an all-time high. Brady said his bill targets $3.5 billion in voluntary funds, slashing that in line with the recommendation of the president's deficit-reduction commission.

[...]

Ros-Lehtinen sounded another warning shot at the U.N. on Friday, criticizing the "irony" of the director of the investigations division of the U.N.’s internal oversight office, Michael Dudley, being investigated for retaliating against whistleblowers.

"The fact that the U.S. continues to contribute billions of taxpayer dollars every year to an unaccountable, unreformed U.N. is no laughing matter," she said in a statement. “These allegations reinforce the need for expanded and effective oversight of the U.N. Next week, our committee will lead the way by holding the first of several briefings and hearings on UN reform."

Also addressing the committee at the briefing will be former federal prosecutor Robert Appleton, who headed the U.N.’s Procurement Task Force and whose nomination to the position currently held by Dudley in an acting capacity was blocked by the U.N. Secretariat.

Neuer said he'll be advocating at the briefing that the U.S. use its position on the U.N. Human Rights Council to take advantage of the tools at its disposal to call out offenders.

[...]

The mega A-List at last night's White House State Dinner for China's President Hu:

Celebrity star power arrived in the form of singer Barbra Streisand, her hubby-actor James Brolin and action film star Jackie Chan. Big business turned out in force, too, including Microsoft's Steven Ballmer and JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon, among others. Among the big names: fashion's Vera Wang, Vogue's Anna Wintour, artist Maya Lin, Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan, and Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer to add some gravitas. Former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter made the cut, too. [...]

The dinner's all-star jazz lineup included trumpeter Chris Botti, two-time Grammy Award-winning vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater, jazz icon Herbie Hancock, rising pianist Lang Lang and four-time Grammy-winning vocalist Dianne Reeves.

Jazz pianist Peter Martin, part of the entertainment lineup, prepped for his appearance by springing for a tux.

New this state dinner: The 225 guests were spread out among three rooms: the State Dining Room, Blue Room and Red Room, then all shuttle to the East Room for the entertainment. Big video monitors were set up in the Blue and Red rooms for the outcasts to catch the dinner toasts. [...]

Asked for a thought on why she had been invited, she (Streisand) quipped: "I worked in a Chinese restaurant."

Wintour said she hoped to talk to Hu about -- what else? -- fashion, specifically investing in Chinese fashion. [...]

Not honored with an "Invite" to last night's White House State Dinner ...

The moral code, the moral compass of the State-Controlled Media is something to behold. Now, some of you may not know the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize Winner hosted a state dinner last night for Hu Jintao of China. Hu Jintao is holding the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize Winner in prison in China. Not making it up. The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize Winner hosted a dinner for the guy holding the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize Winner in prison, and the media does not get the irony of this at all. They're too busy running around chasing Sarah Palin and radio talk show hosts over "civility." Our media is so fraudulent. No talk about the political prisoners. No talk about the gulags.

A question about human rights, the ChiCom leader is allowed to slither out of the answer by saying, "I did not hear the question. I thought President Obama was going to answer that." There's no talk about how they harvest organs from prisoners in China -- and there's Obama, telling the head of this depraved society that we're all pleased with his country's progress. Meanwhile, the very same media is attacking innocent American citizens who have nothing to do with a horrible crime. The moral compass of our media is just stunning -- and, by the way, the media laughed when Hu Jintao side-stepped the question about human rights. Jimmy Carter has won a Nobel Peace Prize as well, and Jimmy Carter also attended Hu's dinner.

So you had two American Nobel Peace Prize Winners effectively honoring the head of a country who's holding 2010's Peace Prize Winner in prison -- and we had to listen to our fearless leader talk about aaaaall the great progress the ChiComs are making and how pleased we are with all that progress.

Bold emphasis mine ... No reports on what Liu Xiaobo had for dinner back in the comfort of the Chinese prison, or the entertainment he enjoyed.

Meanwhile this American singer is lamenting over should she or shouldn't she hold concerts in that 'disgusting' human rights violating land known as Israel.

Cross-Posted @ Chandler's Watch

We are led to believe violence and hatred against Muslims has grown since the 9-11 attacks ... and both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. But according to a recent FBI report it has not. In fact hate crimes against Muslims in the USA are "rare". On the other hand, another recent report has Islamic countries dominating the 2011 world watch list in persecution of Christians:

Of the top 10 countries on the 2011 WWL, eight have Islamic majorities. Persecution has increased in seven of them. They are Iran, which clamps down on a growing house church movement; Afghanistan, where thousands of believers cluster deep underground; and Saudi Arabia, which still refuses to allow any Saudi person to convert to Christianity. Others are lawless Somalia, ruled by bloodthirsty terrorists threatening to kill Christian aid workers who feed Somalia’s starving, impoverished people; tiny Maldives, which mistakenly boasts it is 100 percent Islamic; Yemen with its determination to expel all Christian workers; and Iraq, which saw extremists massacre 58 Christians in a Baghdad cathedral on Oct. 31. Of the top 30 countries, only seven have a source other than Islamic extremists as the main persecutors of Christians.

The most recent was a bloody attack on a Coptic Christian Church in Egypt during a New Year's Eve service. Some living within the Muslim community are coming forward saying Christians are a target of genocide in the Muslim world.

We are told there are 'moderate' Muslims ... That those who carry-out and condone the violence in the name of Islam are a small percentage of Muslims worldwide. Claims of "religion of peace" is often scoffed at by those who witness the death and destruction. Many demand these 'moderate' Muslims come forward and oppose the violence done in their religion's name.

Well, the world may have seen somewhat of a start last night ...

Egypt’s majority Muslim population stuck to its word Thursday night. What had been a promise of solidarity to the weary Coptic community, was honoured, when thousands of Muslims showed up at Coptic Christmas eve mass services in churches around the country and at candle light vigils held outside.

From the well-known to the unknown, Muslims had offered their bodies as “human shields” for last night’s mass, making a pledge to collectively fight the threat of Islamic militants and towards an Egypt free from sectarian strife.

“We either live together, or we die together,” was the sloganeering genius of Mohamed El-Sawy, a Muslim arts tycoon whose cultural centre distributed flyers at churches in Cairo Thursday night, and who has been credited with first floating the “human shield” idea.

[...]

“This is not about us and them,” said Dalia Mustafa, a student who attended mass at Virgin Mary Church on Maraashly. “We are one. This was an attack on Egypt as a whole, and I am standing with the Copts because the only way things will change in this country is if we come together.”

In the days following the brutal attack on Saints Church in Alexandria, which left 21 dead on New Year’ eve, solidarity between Muslims and Copts has seen an unprecedented peak. Millions of Egyptians changed their Facebook profile pictures to the image of a cross within a crescent – the symbol of an “Egypt for All”. Around the city, banners went up calling for unity, and depicting mosques and churches, crosses and crescents, together as one.

[...]

The terror attack that struck the country on New Year’s eve is in many ways a final straw – a breaking point, not just for the Coptic community, but for Muslims as well, who too feel marginalized, persecuted, and overlooked, by a government that fails to address their needs. On this Coptic Christmas eve, the solidarity was not just one of religion, but of a desperate and collective plea for a better life and a government with accountability.

It's not getting a whole lot of media attention around the world ... But it should.

Isn't he just the sweet little rat-Commie-bastard gift that keeps on giving? ... Well, taking.

And as usual, it's HIS concept of what is and isn't "fair" when he's forced to make such "Acts of Justice" on the people and businesses of Venezuela.

CARACAS, Venezuela — Facing a wave of criticism from business leaders, President Hugo Chavez is defending his order for government officials to seize control of residential complexes.

Chavez promised Sunday to crack down on construction and real estate companies that he accused of unjustly boosting prices, which he labeled "housing fraud."

The president, a self-proclaimed revolutionary who idolizes Cuba's Fidel Castro and is currently on a visit to Havana, called his decision last week to order the expropriation of six residential complexes and "the temporary occupation" of eight gated communities in Caracas and other cities "an act of justice."

'Organized crime'
Venezuela's consumer protection agency and state prosecutors are investigating complaints that construction companies and real estate firms are illegally charging buyers high interest on unfinished apartments, even though the buyers settled on a price years ago and made down payments.

"We have decided to put an end to this type of organized crime," Chavez wrote in his weekly newspaper column.

Companies accused of violating consumer-protection regulations deny any wrongdoing.

Apartment owners affected by the measures have had mixed reactions.

Some don't like having soldiers posted near their homes or fear the measure could encourage pro-Chavez squatters to invade buildings still under construction. Others applaud the measure, saying it has protected them from unscrupulous business practices.

In some mostly middle-class residential complexes, groups of neighbors have implemented security measures aimed at keeping squatters out, such as organizing around-the-clock surveillance teams and putting a siren at entrances to be sounded in case of emergency.

Apartment owners from one of the expropriated complexes — El Encantado Humboldt — issued a statement over the weekend criticizing the state takeover and throwing their support behind the company responsible for building the gated community, saying it never stopped construction as government inspectors have alleged. [...]

Since the February murder of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, his grieving  mother, Reina Luisa Tamayo, has wanted nothing more than to go to Mass on Sunday, and then to visit the grave of her son.  For this, she has been terrorized by the Castro regime.  She has been held prisoner in her home, surrounded by violent mobs, she's been beaten, harassed, arrested, and threatened, as have her family, friends and followers.

Why are the Castro brothers so afraid of this elderly woman?  Can their hold on power be so fragile that it is threatened by the honest actions of a mother demanding her right to grieve, to keep the memory of her son alive?  Apparently so.

Today, Reina Luisa Tamayo has again been arrested and threatened with Law 88,  for the Protection of the National Independence and Economy of Cuba, which among other offenses, allows for prosecution of any Cuban sending information abroad complaining about problems in Cuba.   Since there is no rule of law in Cuba which protects the rights of individuals, in Reina Luisa's position where else can she seek help but from those outside the country?  The law carries prison sentences of from five to twenty years.