60 years on from the Cuban Revolution, and what might Cuba realistically have become instead?
Well, what was Cuba before? It was the Mafia-controlled brothel and drug den of the American super-rich, as depicted in The Godfather: Part II. The Cuban "exiles" and "dissidents" in Miami are in fact economic migrants from the overthrow of that order. They are moral degenerates and social outcasts, but they are free to go back to Cuba whenever they please.
In Florida, where there was dancing in the streets at the death of Fidel Castro, the anti-sodomy law is still on the Statute Book. But it was repealed in Cuba as long ago as 1979, before its repeal in Scotland or Northern Ireland. The American-backed coup in Honduras has led to an explosion of violence, including murder, against homosexuals.
Well, what was Cuba before? It was the Mafia-controlled brothel and drug den of the American super-rich, as depicted in The Godfather: Part II. The Cuban "exiles" and "dissidents" in Miami are in fact economic migrants from the overthrow of that order. They are moral degenerates and social outcasts, but they are free to go back to Cuba whenever they please.
In Florida, where there was dancing in the streets at the death of Fidel Castro, the anti-sodomy law is still on the Statute Book. But it was repealed in Cuba as long ago as 1979, before its repeal in Scotland or Northern Ireland. The American-backed coup in Honduras has led to an explosion of violence, including murder, against homosexuals.
At least until the referendum on 24th of next month, the Cuban Constitution explicitly prohibits same-sex marriage, whereas the legal position in the United States is now that the Constitution explicitly requires it. There is no practical possibility that that legal position might ever change.
The abortion law in Cuba is no more liberal than that in the United States, and arguably slightly less so. Again, it is effectively impossible to see how the American law might ever now be altered. Reducing abortion there has to be promoted in other ways, ways to which the broader political position of the loudest ostensible pro-lifers is colossally and catastrophically inimical.
More broadly, compare and contrast Cuba and her next door neighbour, the de facto American plantation in Haiti. Haiti has had American-backed governments for almost the whole of the period since the Cuban Revolution, and it has one now. Cuba and Haiti are both guilty of human rights abuses. Both have poverty, although it is Haiti that is the poorest country in the world. Here, however, are the numbers:
Population
Cuba: 11.4 million
Haiti: 10.7 million
So, very much comparable, then.
GDP
Cuba: $77.1 billion - 67th in the world
Haiti: $8.88 billion - 142nd in the world
Infant mortality rate
Cuba: 4 per 1000 live births
Haiti: 52.2 per 1000 live births
Adult literacy
Cuba: 99.7%
Haiti: 60.69%
Food deficit
Cuba: 9 kilocalories per person per day
Haiti: 523 kilocalories per person per day
Life expectancy
Cuba: 79
Haiti: 63
Male survival rate to age 65
Cuba: 83%
Haiti: 57.9%
Female survival rate to age 65
Cuba: 88.3%
Haiti: 65.8%
Percentage of women in seats in Parliament
Cuba: 48.86%
Haiti: 4.21%
AIDS deaths
Cuba: 100
Haiti: 7100
HIV/AIDS adult rate
Cuba: 0.1%
Haiti: 1.9%
Intentional homicides
Cuba: 4.7 per 100,000
Haiti: 10 per 100,000
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