“Last year, ... the U.N. Committee on Disarmament and International Security adopted a resolution that called for stronger measures to prevent the militarization of space, and another that reaffirmed the 1925 Geneva Protocol against the use of poisonous gases and bacteriological warfare. Both resolution passed unanimously, with two abstentions: the United States and Israel. In practice, U.S. abstentions amounts to a veto.”
Noam Chomsky
HEGEMONY OR SURVIVAL:
America's Quest for Global Dominance
Metropolitan Books,
Harry Holt and Company, New York, 2003
About Noam Chomsky:
“Judged in terms of the power, range, novelty, and influence of his thought, Noam Chomsky is arguably the most important intellectual alive.”
-- THE NEW YORK TIMES
“For anyone wanting to find out more about the world we live in... there is on simple answer: read Noam Chomsky.”
--THE NEW STATESMAN. “12 Great Thinkers of Our Time.”
“Chomsky's 9-11 was practically the only counter-narrative out there at a time when questions tended to be drowned out by a chorus, led by the entire United States Congress, of “God Bless America.” ... It is possible that, if the U.S. goes the way of nineteenth-century Great Britain, Chomsky's interpretation will be the standard among historians a hundred years from now.
--THE NEW YOURKER
“Reading Chomsky is like standing in a wind tunnel. With relentless logic, he bids us to listen closely to what our leaders tell us—and to discern what they are leaving out. ... Agree with him or not, we lose out by not listening.”
--BUSINESS WEEK
“For nearly thirty years now, Noam Chomsky has parsed the main proposition of American power—what they do is agression, what we do upholds freedom—with encyclopedic attention to detail and an unflagging sense of outrage.”
--THE UTNE READER
“Chomsky ... is a major scholarly resource. Not to have read [him] is to court genuine ignorance.
--THE NATION
Showing posts with label United States. Show all posts
Showing posts with label United States. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Monday, April 2, 2012
U.S.A. doesn't need an embargo on Cuba
Published at: National Catholic Reporter
Original Title: America doesn't need an embargo on Cuba
by Mario T. García on Apr. 02, 2012 - NCR Today
The Pope's visit to Cuba just reminds me of how retrograde U.S. policy toward the island nation remains.
Although the Vatican is critical of socialism in Cuba and of human rights there, it still has full diplomatic relations with the Cuban government. Indeed, because the Vatican has representation there, it has finally succeeded in improving the status of the church in Cuba and developing working relations with the Cuban government to influence human rights and the release of political prisoners.
The Vatican's realistic policy is paying dividends. Not so with the case of the stubborn and unrealistic U.S. policy that continues to refuse to recognize a government that has been in power for more than five decades.
Instead, we continue to have an economic embargo on Cuba that the rest of the world ignores. In fact, the rest of the world, with the exception of the United States and Israel, has diplomatic and economic relations with Cuba. Despite the American effort to isolate Cuba, we have only isolated ourselves on our Cuban policy.
It's time to change this, and it is my hope that whoever wins our presidential election will have the political courage and establish full relations with Cuba. President Richard Nixon in the early 1970s recognized what we used to call "Red China," and so too can a U.S. administration today recognize Cuba.
As I tell my students, how can we have full relations with Vietnam today, a nation that we went to war against and where we lost 60,000 American lives? Today, there are Kentucky Fried Chickens and other American corporations in Vietnam. Why can't this happen with Cuba? Our current Cuban policy does not advance our national interest, and we need to recognize this. We will have more influence on Cuba with full relations than with little or none.
Mario T. García's blog
------
JG: Hear! Hear! Here is a Mario that is 100% sane. The same can not be said about the insane Maria Diaz-Balart, who belongs to the "We Hate Cuba Better Party."
I certainly hope that if Romney beats Big Ears, he will do with Cuba what Nixon did with the People's Republic of China, RECOGNIZE IT! Big Ears neither has the cojones nor the intelligence to do it.
Original Title: America doesn't need an embargo on Cuba
by Mario T. García on Apr. 02, 2012 - NCR Today
The Pope's visit to Cuba just reminds me of how retrograde U.S. policy toward the island nation remains.
Although the Vatican is critical of socialism in Cuba and of human rights there, it still has full diplomatic relations with the Cuban government. Indeed, because the Vatican has representation there, it has finally succeeded in improving the status of the church in Cuba and developing working relations with the Cuban government to influence human rights and the release of political prisoners.
The Vatican's realistic policy is paying dividends. Not so with the case of the stubborn and unrealistic U.S. policy that continues to refuse to recognize a government that has been in power for more than five decades.
Instead, we continue to have an economic embargo on Cuba that the rest of the world ignores. In fact, the rest of the world, with the exception of the United States and Israel, has diplomatic and economic relations with Cuba. Despite the American effort to isolate Cuba, we have only isolated ourselves on our Cuban policy.
It's time to change this, and it is my hope that whoever wins our presidential election will have the political courage and establish full relations with Cuba. President Richard Nixon in the early 1970s recognized what we used to call "Red China," and so too can a U.S. administration today recognize Cuba.
As I tell my students, how can we have full relations with Vietnam today, a nation that we went to war against and where we lost 60,000 American lives? Today, there are Kentucky Fried Chickens and other American corporations in Vietnam. Why can't this happen with Cuba? Our current Cuban policy does not advance our national interest, and we need to recognize this. We will have more influence on Cuba with full relations than with little or none.
Mario T. García's blog
------
JG: Hear! Hear! Here is a Mario that is 100% sane. The same can not be said about the insane Maria Diaz-Balart, who belongs to the "We Hate Cuba Better Party."
I certainly hope that if Romney beats Big Ears, he will do with Cuba what Nixon did with the People's Republic of China, RECOGNIZE IT! Big Ears neither has the cojones nor the intelligence to do it.
An independent and socialist political alternative to the two U.S. capitalist parties
Socialist Equality Party
Candidate for President of the United States
JG: Do not reward the mediocrity of the two branches of The Capitalist Party. Do not give your vote to Tweedledee (Romney) or Tweedledum (Obama).
Thursday, March 22, 2012
An Alternative to Voting for Twedledee (Romney) & Twedledum (Obama)
If you are a member of the working class and you are considering voting for for Obama or Romney, you will be voting against your best self-interests.
Look for alternatives, write-in NOTA or stay home and don't vote. Do not reward ineptitude and mediocrity.
A vote for the two POTUS candidates of the two branches of The Capitalist Party, may make you feel good, but this election is not about selecting the horse that has the best chance of winning the race.
Obama and Romney are part of the problem, not part of the solution. This country is going steadily downhill.
“The key to the future lies in the international unity of the working class”
Jerry White speaks in Canada
By Graham Beverly
22 March 2012
On Tuesday, Jerry White, the Socialist Equality Party candidate for President of the United States, addressed a well-attended meeting of students, workers, and young people in Kingston, Ontario. White emphasized the need to unite the working class internationally against declining wages, austerity, and endless war enforced by the ruling elite of each country.
Those in attendance responded enthusiastically and White’s remarks were followed by a discussion period that covered a wide range of international political issues. Informal discussion continued long after the official end of the meeting, with many attendees expressing interest in the upcoming events.
In addressing a Canadian audience, White made clear that the US SEP’s election program was a direct challenge to the nationalist, pro-capitalist policies of the trade union bureaucracies and the ‘left’ parties of the political establishment.
“First, we insist that the key to the future lies in the international unity of the working class. The interests of the working class cannot be defended on the basis of a national program. In every country, working people are oppressed by transnational corporations that scour the globe for profits. The financial and industrial corporate conglomerates demand the lowering of wages and the elimination of social benefits essential for a decent standard of living. In Europe, the international banks are transforming Greece into a third world country, reducing living standards by as much as 50 percent.
“Regardless of nationality, ethnic background, religion or language, workers and youth throughout the world have the same interests. Therefore, the working class requires an international strategy. Workers in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Canada are the allies of US workers in the global struggle against capitalism.
“In every part of the world, the working class is facing universal demands for austerity and drastic wage-cutting, the erosion of basic democratic rights and the growth of ever more authoritarian forms of political rule, militarism and the threat of world war. At the same time a corporate and financial elite is amassing vast fortunes through the looting of society and the systematic destruction of working class living standards. The SEP sees the forging of the unity of the North American working class as a critical component of an international socialist strategy.”
White pointed to the long history of joint struggle by the working class in Canada and the US, from the struggles led by the Knights of Labor in the 1880s to the revolutionary syndicalism of the Industrial Workers of the World in early 20th Century, to the sit down strikes of the United Auto Workers on both sides of the border in the 1930s and 1940. He highlighted the role of socialists in forging this international unity and leading these mass struggles.
While the ruling classes in both countries, chastened by the Russian Revolution and the powerful upsurge of the working class following WWII responded to the class struggle by making social concessions, in Canada to a far greater extent that the US, the working class movement remained in one form or another under the domination of pro-capitalist trade unions and social democratic parties like the NDP. They insisted that the lessons of the Great Depression and the world war had been learned, that the capitalist system could be reformed and there would never be a repeat of the previous social catastrophe.
The current breakdown of world capitalism and the ongoing assault upon the social gains won in the post-war period has proven this national-reformist perspective to be entirely bankrupt. White pointed to the example of the Caterpillar workers in London, Ontario, for whom the nationalist perspective of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) bureaucracy led to a bitter defeat: “On January 1, the multi-billion dollar transnational corporation locked out 465 workers who build locomotive engines after they rejected the company’s concessions demands, including for a 55 percent wage cut that would have reduced pay from C$35 an hour to C$16.50.
“After three weeks, the company announced it was closing the plant. Despite overwhelming support for a struggle, the CAW accepted the closing. Throughout the six-week struggle, CAW officials, paralleling the nationalism of their counterparts in America, presented the struggle as one of defending the ‘Canadian way of life’ against an American company. This was aimed at blocking any common struggle by Canadian and US workers and bolstering illusions that appeals to the Conservative Harper would protect workers.”
“For the last three decades, the UAW in the US has collaborated with the corporations to sharply reduce labor costs, including at Caterpillar where the union betrayed a 17-month strike at the company’s Illinois plants in 1994-95. Caterpillar is shifting production [from the London, Ontario] to Muncie, Indiana, which pays workers $12 to $14.50 an hour, less than half the pay for most workers at the plant being closed in Ontario.”
“In order to attract investment every government around the world is to cut labor costs, and provide whatever tax cuts and deregulation is demanded by big business. It is the demands of world capitalism, not any claims by the unions or NDP about ‘protecting the Canadian way of life’ that is dictating this race to the bottom.”
Questions and discussion after White’s remarks included the SEP’s attitude towards the ‘humanitarian’ wars and aggressive foreign policy of US imperialism and its allies, the implications of a socially-owned and scientifically planned economy for the environment, and the reception of the SEP’s program among rural workers in the US (popularly portrayed by Canadian nationalists as ignorant and reactionary).
Lee Parsons, a long-time member of the Socialist Equality Party (Canada) pointed to the parallels between the assault on the working class in the US and the policies of the Harper Conservative and the Ontario Liberal government. In response to a question on Quebecois nationalism, Parsons highlighted the role of the Quebec ‘sovereignty’ or independence movement in dividing French and English-speaking workers and harnessing the militancy of the Quebecois working class to a section of the capitalist elite.
For more information on the SEP campaign and to get involved, visit www.socialequality.com.
Look for alternatives, write-in NOTA or stay home and don't vote. Do not reward ineptitude and mediocrity.
A vote for the two POTUS candidates of the two branches of The Capitalist Party, may make you feel good, but this election is not about selecting the horse that has the best chance of winning the race.
Obama and Romney are part of the problem, not part of the solution. This country is going steadily downhill.
“The key to the future lies in the international unity of the working class”
Jerry White speaks in Canada
By Graham Beverly
22 March 2012
On Tuesday, Jerry White, the Socialist Equality Party candidate for President of the United States, addressed a well-attended meeting of students, workers, and young people in Kingston, Ontario. White emphasized the need to unite the working class internationally against declining wages, austerity, and endless war enforced by the ruling elite of each country.
Those in attendance responded enthusiastically and White’s remarks were followed by a discussion period that covered a wide range of international political issues. Informal discussion continued long after the official end of the meeting, with many attendees expressing interest in the upcoming events.
In addressing a Canadian audience, White made clear that the US SEP’s election program was a direct challenge to the nationalist, pro-capitalist policies of the trade union bureaucracies and the ‘left’ parties of the political establishment.
“First, we insist that the key to the future lies in the international unity of the working class. The interests of the working class cannot be defended on the basis of a national program. In every country, working people are oppressed by transnational corporations that scour the globe for profits. The financial and industrial corporate conglomerates demand the lowering of wages and the elimination of social benefits essential for a decent standard of living. In Europe, the international banks are transforming Greece into a third world country, reducing living standards by as much as 50 percent.
“Regardless of nationality, ethnic background, religion or language, workers and youth throughout the world have the same interests. Therefore, the working class requires an international strategy. Workers in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Canada are the allies of US workers in the global struggle against capitalism.
“In every part of the world, the working class is facing universal demands for austerity and drastic wage-cutting, the erosion of basic democratic rights and the growth of ever more authoritarian forms of political rule, militarism and the threat of world war. At the same time a corporate and financial elite is amassing vast fortunes through the looting of society and the systematic destruction of working class living standards. The SEP sees the forging of the unity of the North American working class as a critical component of an international socialist strategy.”
White pointed to the long history of joint struggle by the working class in Canada and the US, from the struggles led by the Knights of Labor in the 1880s to the revolutionary syndicalism of the Industrial Workers of the World in early 20th Century, to the sit down strikes of the United Auto Workers on both sides of the border in the 1930s and 1940. He highlighted the role of socialists in forging this international unity and leading these mass struggles.
While the ruling classes in both countries, chastened by the Russian Revolution and the powerful upsurge of the working class following WWII responded to the class struggle by making social concessions, in Canada to a far greater extent that the US, the working class movement remained in one form or another under the domination of pro-capitalist trade unions and social democratic parties like the NDP. They insisted that the lessons of the Great Depression and the world war had been learned, that the capitalist system could be reformed and there would never be a repeat of the previous social catastrophe.
The current breakdown of world capitalism and the ongoing assault upon the social gains won in the post-war period has proven this national-reformist perspective to be entirely bankrupt. White pointed to the example of the Caterpillar workers in London, Ontario, for whom the nationalist perspective of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) bureaucracy led to a bitter defeat: “On January 1, the multi-billion dollar transnational corporation locked out 465 workers who build locomotive engines after they rejected the company’s concessions demands, including for a 55 percent wage cut that would have reduced pay from C$35 an hour to C$16.50.
“After three weeks, the company announced it was closing the plant. Despite overwhelming support for a struggle, the CAW accepted the closing. Throughout the six-week struggle, CAW officials, paralleling the nationalism of their counterparts in America, presented the struggle as one of defending the ‘Canadian way of life’ against an American company. This was aimed at blocking any common struggle by Canadian and US workers and bolstering illusions that appeals to the Conservative Harper would protect workers.”
“For the last three decades, the UAW in the US has collaborated with the corporations to sharply reduce labor costs, including at Caterpillar where the union betrayed a 17-month strike at the company’s Illinois plants in 1994-95. Caterpillar is shifting production [from the London, Ontario] to Muncie, Indiana, which pays workers $12 to $14.50 an hour, less than half the pay for most workers at the plant being closed in Ontario.”
“In order to attract investment every government around the world is to cut labor costs, and provide whatever tax cuts and deregulation is demanded by big business. It is the demands of world capitalism, not any claims by the unions or NDP about ‘protecting the Canadian way of life’ that is dictating this race to the bottom.”
Questions and discussion after White’s remarks included the SEP’s attitude towards the ‘humanitarian’ wars and aggressive foreign policy of US imperialism and its allies, the implications of a socially-owned and scientifically planned economy for the environment, and the reception of the SEP’s program among rural workers in the US (popularly portrayed by Canadian nationalists as ignorant and reactionary).
Lee Parsons, a long-time member of the Socialist Equality Party (Canada) pointed to the parallels between the assault on the working class in the US and the policies of the Harper Conservative and the Ontario Liberal government. In response to a question on Quebecois nationalism, Parsons highlighted the role of the Quebec ‘sovereignty’ or independence movement in dividing French and English-speaking workers and harnessing the militancy of the Quebecois working class to a section of the capitalist elite.
For more information on the SEP campaign and to get involved, visit www.socialequality.com.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
I Denounce in the Pages of Cuba Journal
I was planning to visit my family in Cuba. But two individuals who can only be described as marketers of FRAUD has made it impossible.
One is a Cuban diplomat who works in the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C. His name is Tito Gelarbert. He steered me to a totally corrupt capitalist businessman in Tampa, Florida. His name is Vicente Amor, a self-described CEO and President of Flor Caribe Inc.
The two of them have stolen $170.00 from me with a FRAUD SCHEME.
I am asking that the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to conduct an investigation and possible prosecution of these two corrupt individuals.
In the case of Mr. Gelarbert, I am asking for his expulsion from the United States.
One is a Cuban diplomat who works in the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C. His name is Tito Gelarbert. He steered me to a totally corrupt capitalist businessman in Tampa, Florida. His name is Vicente Amor, a self-described CEO and President of Flor Caribe Inc.
The two of them have stolen $170.00 from me with a FRAUD SCHEME.
I am asking that the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to conduct an investigation and possible prosecution of these two corrupt individuals.
In the case of Mr. Gelarbert, I am asking for his expulsion from the United States.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Does the western news media think that the people of our planet are stupid?
It never fails! Most of the time when western or capitalist news media publish a report about the largest of the Caribbean islands they do it this way: "Cuba’s communist government is..."
See report by the Washington Post and the Associated Press.
Has anyone noticed that when they publish something about the U.S. government they don't do it this way: "The United States capitalist government is ..."
Hate, envy or bias?
See report by the Washington Post and the Associated Press.
Has anyone noticed that when they publish something about the U.S. government they don't do it this way: "The United States capitalist government is ..."
Hate, envy or bias?
Monday, March 12, 2012
Latest Poll on Obama
Washington Post-ABC News Poll. See Complete poll.
This Washington Post-ABC News poll was conducted by telephone March 7 to 10, 2012, among a random national sample of 1,003 adults, including landline and cell phone-only respondents. The results from the full survey have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by Abt-SRBI of New York.
50% disapprove of the job Barack Obama is doing as president.
46% approve.
Just on the Cuba issue alone, he does not deserve to be re-elected. He has continued the blockade/embargo.
If the nominee is Romney, Obama will lose in November. But Romney will be no better than Obama.
Both Obama and Romney represent the interest of BIG CAPITAL and not the average working-class American.
This Washington Post-ABC News poll was conducted by telephone March 7 to 10, 2012, among a random national sample of 1,003 adults, including landline and cell phone-only respondents. The results from the full survey have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by Abt-SRBI of New York.
50% disapprove of the job Barack Obama is doing as president.
46% approve.
Just on the Cuba issue alone, he does not deserve to be re-elected. He has continued the blockade/embargo.
If the nominee is Romney, Obama will lose in November. But Romney will be no better than Obama.
Both Obama and Romney represent the interest of BIG CAPITAL and not the average working-class American.
Congressman Introduces Bill to Trigger Obama’s Impeachment
By Stephen C. Webster - The Raw Story
Monday, March 12, 2012 9:18 EDT
In a House Resolution introduced last week, Rep. Walter B. Jones (R-NC) put forward use of the military by the executive branch without explicit authorization from Congress as an impeachable offense: one which some conservatives believe President Barack Obama has already committed.
The bill’s author, Rep. Jones, was once a Democrat who switched parties before seeking congressional office in the 90s. He endorsed former Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) for president in 2008, and has been one of the Republican Party’s loudest critics of the presidency’s warmaking powers.
“When you talk about war, political parties don’t matter,” he told The New York Times last year.
While not directly calling for impeachment, the bill would declare “that it is the sense of Congress that, except in response to an actual or imminent attack against the territory of the United States, the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an act of Congress violates Congress’s exclusive power to declare war… and therefore constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution.”
In other words, the bill would, in effect, serve as a trigger mechanism for impeachment proceedings.
Despite the Republican majority in the House, it is not clear if it has a chance at passing. It would have no chance of clearing the Senate, which has remained in bitter partisan gridlock since the 2010 elections.
Following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Congress handed President George W. Bush blanket authority to make war, and the battlefield has since been classified as anywhere in the world, even on U.S. soil. Both the Afghan and Iraq wars were launched under this authority, and President Obama continues to claim the same executive power to carry on theaters of conflict in other regions.
Similarly, Congress committed the U.S. to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. Following the 9/11 attacks, troops were deployed under NATO authority following a United Nations resolution which declared the late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to be in breach of the U.N.’s terms. Congress did not specifically authorize those invasions, but Republicans were adamantly supportive of the president.
It is based upon that authority that U.S. Defense Secretary recently said before the Senate Armed Services Committee the U.S. could attack Syria — but only if the U.N. or NATO decides it appropriate. A similar legal channel was used by President Obama to commit the U.S. military to a supporting role in Libya’s recent civil war, drawing calls for impeachment then, too.
Stephen C. Webster is the senior editor of Raw Story, and is based out of Austin, Texas. He previously worked as the associate editor of The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, Texas, where he covered state politics and the peace movement’s resurgence at the start of the Iraq war. Webster has also contributed to publications such as True/Slant, Austin Monthly, The Dallas Business Journal, The Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Weekly, The News Connection and others. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenCWebster.
Monday, March 12, 2012 9:18 EDT
In a House Resolution introduced last week, Rep. Walter B. Jones (R-NC) put forward use of the military by the executive branch without explicit authorization from Congress as an impeachable offense: one which some conservatives believe President Barack Obama has already committed.
The bill’s author, Rep. Jones, was once a Democrat who switched parties before seeking congressional office in the 90s. He endorsed former Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) for president in 2008, and has been one of the Republican Party’s loudest critics of the presidency’s warmaking powers.
“When you talk about war, political parties don’t matter,” he told The New York Times last year.
While not directly calling for impeachment, the bill would declare “that it is the sense of Congress that, except in response to an actual or imminent attack against the territory of the United States, the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an act of Congress violates Congress’s exclusive power to declare war… and therefore constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution.”
In other words, the bill would, in effect, serve as a trigger mechanism for impeachment proceedings.
Despite the Republican majority in the House, it is not clear if it has a chance at passing. It would have no chance of clearing the Senate, which has remained in bitter partisan gridlock since the 2010 elections.
Following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Congress handed President George W. Bush blanket authority to make war, and the battlefield has since been classified as anywhere in the world, even on U.S. soil. Both the Afghan and Iraq wars were launched under this authority, and President Obama continues to claim the same executive power to carry on theaters of conflict in other regions.
Similarly, Congress committed the U.S. to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. Following the 9/11 attacks, troops were deployed under NATO authority following a United Nations resolution which declared the late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to be in breach of the U.N.’s terms. Congress did not specifically authorize those invasions, but Republicans were adamantly supportive of the president.
It is based upon that authority that U.S. Defense Secretary recently said before the Senate Armed Services Committee the U.S. could attack Syria — but only if the U.N. or NATO decides it appropriate. A similar legal channel was used by President Obama to commit the U.S. military to a supporting role in Libya’s recent civil war, drawing calls for impeachment then, too.
Stephen C. Webster is the senior editor of Raw Story, and is based out of Austin, Texas. He previously worked as the associate editor of The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, Texas, where he covered state politics and the peace movement’s resurgence at the start of the Iraq war. Webster has also contributed to publications such as True/Slant, Austin Monthly, The Dallas Business Journal, The Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Weekly, The News Connection and others. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenCWebster.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Cuba thanks Colombia for support, blames US for exclusion from summit
Colombia Reports
Cuba's foreign minister on Thursday thanked Colombia for its support, while blaming the U.S. for its exclusion from the Sixth Summit of the Americas in Cartagena next month.
"I wish to thank the management of Colombia, for which Cuba wishes and always wants the best," said Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez at a press conference.
Rodriguez added that the U.S. position "offends the dignity" of Latin Americans.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos was in Cuba the day before where he announced that Cuba will not be present at the summit which will take place on April 14 and 15 in the Carribean coastal city of Cartagena.
Cuba has been the only country in the region not present at the Summit of the Americas since they began in 1994, due largely to American opposition. According to the U.S., Cuba does not qualify as a democratic country and should not be included in the summit.
The Countries of the Bolivarian Alliance for Latin America, which includes Ecuador, have threatened to boycott the summit if Cuba is not present though it is not yet clear if they will follow through with this threat.
After speaking with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa said "We would love to be at the Summit of the Americas, but we have to analyze it too deeply."
Santos assured the public that Cuban participation would be a subject of discussion at the summit meeting.
------
JG: When it comes to pure hatred, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton outdo and outperform both John McCain and Adolph Hitler.
------
Conferencia de prensa ofrecida por el canciller cubano Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, el 8 de marzo del 2012.
(Versiones Taquigráficas- Consejo de Estado)
Gustavo Machín (Moderador).-Buenos días a todos los presentes.
El ministro de Relaciones Exteriores Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla dará una conferencia de prensa, para lo cual le cedo la palabra.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Buenos días.
¡Cálidas felicitaciones a todas las periodistas que se encuentran hoy con nosotros!
Es un placer estar aquí con ustedes. Me excuso por haberles avisado con tan poca antelación; pero seguramente ustedes siguieron las noticias del día de ayer y comprenden que estamos encontrándonos lo más temprano posible, una vez que los acontecimientos permiten sostener este intercambio.
Como ustedes conocen, ayer tuvimos el placer de recibir en nuestro país al presidente Santos, de Colombia, acompañado de su Canciller. El Presidente nos ha dicho, de forma muy respetuosa y cordial, que no ha logrado el consenso del hemisferio para invitar a Cuba a la VI Cumbre de las Américas de Cartagena, que será el mes próximo.
Ha explicado que Colombia quiere que esta situación sea discutida en la Cumbre de Cartagena. Expresó respeto por la posición de los países que consideran una necesidad que Cuba haga parte de estas cumbres. Señaló que es un tema que lleva muchos años sin solución e hizo votos para que esta incómoda situación no se repita.
Deseo agradecer la gestión de Colombia, para quien Cuba siempre desea y quiere lo mejor.
No ha habido ninguna sorpresa, ha sido "la crónica de una exclusión anunciada". Con un enorme irrespeto por Colombia y por América Latina y el Caribe, los voceros norteamericanos desde el primer día habían decretado la exclusión de Cuba.
El vicepresidente Biden, la secretaria de Estado Clinton, un subsecretario y otros voceros del Departamento de Estado expresaron su veto antes de que la anunciada consulta ocurriera.
Estados Unidos, con su desprecio y arrogancia, ofende la dignidad de la Patria Grande de Bolívar, de Nuestra América de Martí.
Expreso enérgica denuncia de que la exclusión de Cuba por parte del gobierno de los Estados Unidos de América es inaceptable e injustificable. Es parte de una política de bloqueo económico, político y mediático que es genocida, ilegal, que viola los derechos humanos de los cubanos, y que quedó claro en aquel memorando infame del señor Mallory, de abril de 1960, que fue decretado para causar hambre, desesperación y enajenar el apoyo del pueblo a nuestro gobierno.
El bloqueo es un crimen y un error que dura ya más de 50 años.
Estimados colegas:
Cuba nunca pidió ser invitada a ninguna de las llamadas Cumbres de las Américas, nunca lo hizo en el pasado, a esta tampoco. Se limitó a responder que, de ser invitada en igualdad de condiciones y con plenos e iguales derechos, actuaría con apego a los principios y a la verdad, con todo respeto, como hace siempre.
La posición de los países de la Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de nuestra América (ALBA), es unánime y firme, aunque algunos intriguen al respecto. Es unánime y firme en la exigencia del cese del bloqueo a Cuba y del cese de la exclusión de Cuba de cualquier mecanismo hemisférico, como esta llamada Cumbre de las Américas. Es sólida y unánime en demandar, de manera inequívoca, que cese esta exclusión y que este tema se trate a profundidad durante la VI Cumbre de Cartagena. Es también unánime en la postura de continuar observando, como declaró públicamente en su reunión del 15 de febrero, el Consejo Político o la Reunión de Cancilleres del ALBA, el resultado que se produjo ayer de aquellas consultas entonces en curso.
Corresponde al Consejo Político del ALBA, como enfatizó en solidarias y valientes declaraciones el presidente Chávez, en el día de ayer, que por encargo de la Cumbre de Jefes de Estado del ALBA, los Cancilleres continúen analizando esta situación, coordinen sus acciones y reinicien sus consultas dentro del ALBA y con el resto de los gobiernos de América Latina y el Caribe, sin excepción.
La posición de Cuba es la que expresó el presidente Raúl Castro Ruz el 4 de febrero, en Caracas, en la Cumbre de Presidentes del ALBA. Dijo allí que Cuba jamás lo habría reclamado, pero que apoya el planteamiento del presidente Correa, de Evo y de otros Presidentes de actuar para que cese la exclusión de Cuba, posición que consideramos muy justa.
Dijo él: "Yo quiero agradecer a ustedes, presidente Correa, a Evo y a todos ustedes, estos planteamientos... de vital importancia. Tienen toda la razón. Nosotros jamás hemos reclamado que se tome una medida como esa, pero no por eso vamos a dejar de apoyar esta, que consideramos muy justa".
Estas cumbres, como se conoce, surgieron en Miami, en 1994. Era la plataforma política para el desarrollo del Área de Libre Comercio de las Américas, el ALCA, el proyecto de los Estados Unidos de América para la anexión económica de nuestra Patria Grande.
En el 2005, en Mar del Plata, los presidentes Chávez y Néstor Kirchner, con apoyo de otros y de toda Nuestra América, enterraron el ALCA.
En abril del 2009, en Puerto España, el presidente Obama prometió una nueva política hacia América Latina y el Caribe. Sobre Cuba expresó su deseo de encaminar las relaciones entre Estados Unidos y Cuba en una nueva dirección. ¿Qué dirá el presidente Obama en la próxima reunión de Cartagena?
Estas cumbres, como la Organización de Estados Americanos (OEA), de triste fama, solo sirven para que Estados Unidos ejerza su dominación. Los hechos más recientes lo demuestran.
Conviene, además, precisar que se ha hablado de la posibilidad de que durante la Cumbre de Cartagena los Jefes de Estado, en un segmento supuestamente privado, a puertas cerradas, traten este tema.
Debo decir que no es interés de Cuba. Para Cuba no es aceptable que en una reunión privada entre el gobierno de Estados Unidos y América Latina y el Caribe se trate este tema en su ausencia.
América Latina ya no lo acepta y construye un proyecto de soberanía e integración regional, que Estados Unidos no puede impedir, aunque tratará de hacerlo. La presencia de Cuba en Cartagena, desde la distancia, será inocultable, como ocurrió en el año 2009.
Ya Martí, refiriéndose a la I Conferencia Panamericana de Washington, que concluyó precisamente en 1890, por esos días de abril, el 19 de abril, había escrito: "...después de ver con ojos judiciales los antecedentes, causas y factores del convite, urge decir, porque es la verdad, que ha llegado para la América española la hora de declarar su segunda independencia."
Si esta exclusión sirve para ahondar la conciencia de los pueblos latinoamericanos y caribeños, para la acción firme y concertada de Nuestra América y para avanzar más resueltamente hacia nuestra completa y definitiva independencia, bienvenida sea.
Por esos días, los cubanos estaremos aquí, confiados y serenos, como un símbolo estaremos conmemorando la epopeya de Girón, que no sabemos por qué, los asesores del Presidente de Estados Unidos hacen coincidir otra vez con la "Cumbre de la América Incompleta".
Muchas gracias.
Moderador.-El Ministro accederá a responder algunas preguntas sobre el tema al cual se ha referido. Les pediría a aquellos que quieran preguntar, que utilicen los micrófonos que están a los lados y se identifiquen por el medio que representan.
Andrea Rodríguez (AP).-Buenos días, Ministro.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Buenos días, Andrea. ¡Felicidades!
Andrea Rodríguez.- Gracias.
Señor, se ha hablado del consenso y se ha hablado de que no se llegó al consenso para que Cuba sea invitada, pero lo cierto es que parece demostrarse también que no hay consenso en los países del ALBA. Esto es: ¿Ustedes creen que el caso Cuba y esta situación especial que se ha presentado en Cartagena ha roto el consenso del ALBA, dejando en una posición distanciada al presidente Correa? ¿En qué momento entonces los países del ALBA se encuentran frente a Cartagena?
Gracias.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Yo no he hablado del consenso, yo he citado al Presidente de Colombia explicando su posición con relación a este asunto. Pero he dicho, y reitero, que el ALBA tiene una posición sólida y unitaria en el reclamo del cese inmediato del bloqueo a Cuba, que es lo fundamental; en el reclamo del cese inmediato de la exclusión de Cuba de estos mecanismos, llamados hemisféricos, como la Cumbre de las Américas, y que el ALBA tiene una posición firme y unánime de concertar acciones y, como declaró —es pública la Declaración de la Reunión de Cancilleres del 15 de febrero—, que reanudaría su coordinación de acciones y sus contactos una vez que se conociera el resultado de aquella consulta que estaba en curso.
La postura del presidente Correa es totalmente apoyada por todos los presidentes del ALBA, por toda la Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América, en el reclamo del cese de esta exclusión inaceptable, y en lo que es más importante, en la exigencia de que pare ya, inmediata e incondicionalmente, el bloqueo político, económico y mediático a Cuba. Y los cancilleres del ALBA en estos días continuaremos concertando posiciones en relación con la manera en que estos asuntos se aborden en la VI Cumbre de Cartagena.
Rosa Tania Valdés (REUTER).-Buenos días.
Canciller, lo que quisiéramos saber: Al principio, cuando comenzó toda esta reclamación del ALBA en relación con que Cuba debía participar, algunos países dijeron que hasta estarían dispuestos a ausentarse en caso de que Cuba fuera excluida, como finalmente ha ocurrido.
Lo que quiero saber: ¿Pedirá Cuba a los países del ALBA alguna posición en relación con esto? ¿Irán los países del ALBA a la Cumbre o no irán?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Este tema no es nuevo, ni es nueva la posición de los países del ALBA. Ustedes podrían buscar la Declaración de la Cumbre de Presidentes del ALBA, que se realizó en Cumaná en los días de abril del 2009, en vísperas de aquella V Cumbre que se efectuó en Puerto España. La postura del ALBA de estos momentos es exactamente aquella, es sólida, es firme, es consistente en el tiempo.
Como dijo el Presidente Raúl Castro Ruz, el 4 de febrero, Cuba jamás habría reclamado una medida de esta naturaleza; pero la apoya firmemente porque considera que es justa y legítima la reclamación enérgica del presidente Correa, con apoyo de todos los Presidentes del ALBA, de que cese esta situación.
Néstor Pardiño.-¿Cómo se interpreta este nuevo fenómeno donde un grupo de países de América Latina están enfrentando a Estados Unidos por el tema Cuba? ¿Qué comentarios puede hacer al respecto?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Cuba se expresó ya en el año 2009. Fidel, tan temprano como en los años noventa, alrededor de los anuncios con bombo y platillos de aquella Cumbre de 1994, en Miami, se preguntó para qué servirían estas cumbres. Ya Cuba estaba siendo excluida. Dijo entonces: Si estas cumbres sirvieran para discutir los problemas reales de América Latina y el Caribe, los problemas de la paz, los problemas del desarrollo, los problemas de la deuda, los problemas de una relación justa y equitativa, los problemas del acceso a los mercados, los problemas del subsidio, que destruye las economías caribeñas, por ejemplo; si se discutieran los problemas reales del terrorismo, del narcotráfico; si se discutieran en un plano de igualdad entre Estados Unidos y América Latina y el Caribe, quizás esas Cumbres, aunque hubieran excluido a Cuba, servirían para algo; pero no si lo fueren para expandir la dominación de Estados Unidos, para extender esa presencia intervencionista, injerencista en nuestros Estados; si fueran para extender y profundizar esa relación de expoliación de nuestras economías y de nuestros recursos, habría que resistir. Hoy ya, años después, la realidad está totalmente clara, todo el mundo sabe, nadie tiene dudas después de haber enterrado el ALCA, para qué sirve este tipo de cumbres, y la exclusión de Cuba es, probablemente, el símbolo más notorio, más evidente de que son cumbres hechas a imagen y semejanza del dueño, que es el gobierno de Estados Unidos, y que son su instrumento para ejercer dominación de una manera nada democrática y con mucho irrespeto por países que son iguales, soberanos, y que no aceptan ser tratados como traspatio.
Patrick Hoffman (CNN).-Buenos días, ¿cómo está?
Si Cuba no quiere participar en la cumbre, ¿por qué están luchando algunos países del ALBA, algunos Presidentes para que ustedes estén allá?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Cuba ha dicho desde el año 1994 que su exclusión de estas cumbres es injustificable y que es inaceptable. A Cuba se le ha preguntado si, de ser invitada, asistiría a esta Cumbre; se le preguntó también en el 2009. Cuba siempre ha respondido que, de ser invitada en igualdad de condiciones y pleno derecho, asistiría a la Cumbre desde sus posiciones de principio de política exterior, con apego a la verdad y con todo respeto.
Los países del ALBA están denunciando una exclusión arbitraria e insostenible, propia de la Guerra Fría, impropia de estos tiempos, impropia de la relación que supuestamente el gobierno de Estados Unidos quiere construir ahora con América Latina y el Caribe que es distinta a aquella de los años noventa.
Roberto Hernández (Prensa Latina).-Buenos días, Canciller.
¿Existe fecha y lugar para una próxima reunión de cancilleres del ALBA?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Todavía no, estamos en contacto, de hecho hemos estado ayer en contacto, y en los próximos días continuaremos intercambiando impresiones.
Sarah Rainsford (BBC).-Hola. Quería preguntarle, ¿cuál es la probabilidad, cómo lo ve usted, de que Cuba sea incluida en la próxima Cumbre, de qué depende y cuáles son las condiciones?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Creo que todos comprendemos que una eventual invitación a Cuba, tal como ha explicado el Presidente colombiano, depende del consenso. Todos entendemos qué quiere decir "el consenso". El consenso para este tema quiere decir la autorización de Washington, y esa es una pregunta que podría dirigírsela al gobierno norteamericano. No sé qué hará el gobierno norteamericano. Se ha anunciado qué ha hecho hasta ayer mismo, que es reiterar una vieja política fracasada, que ha durado 50 años, que no funciona y que alguien debería pensar en revisar.
Les agradezco mucho su presencia esta mañana.
Muchas gracias.
Publicado en Granma,
Organo Oficial del Partido Comunista de Cuba
Cuba's foreign minister on Thursday thanked Colombia for its support, while blaming the U.S. for its exclusion from the Sixth Summit of the Americas in Cartagena next month.
"I wish to thank the management of Colombia, for which Cuba wishes and always wants the best," said Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez at a press conference.
Rodriguez added that the U.S. position "offends the dignity" of Latin Americans.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos was in Cuba the day before where he announced that Cuba will not be present at the summit which will take place on April 14 and 15 in the Carribean coastal city of Cartagena.
Cuba has been the only country in the region not present at the Summit of the Americas since they began in 1994, due largely to American opposition. According to the U.S., Cuba does not qualify as a democratic country and should not be included in the summit.
The Countries of the Bolivarian Alliance for Latin America, which includes Ecuador, have threatened to boycott the summit if Cuba is not present though it is not yet clear if they will follow through with this threat.
After speaking with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa said "We would love to be at the Summit of the Americas, but we have to analyze it too deeply."
Santos assured the public that Cuban participation would be a subject of discussion at the summit meeting.
------
JG: When it comes to pure hatred, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton outdo and outperform both John McCain and Adolph Hitler.
------
Conferencia de prensa ofrecida por el canciller cubano Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, el 8 de marzo del 2012.
(Versiones Taquigráficas- Consejo de Estado)
Gustavo Machín (Moderador).-Buenos días a todos los presentes.
El ministro de Relaciones Exteriores Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla dará una conferencia de prensa, para lo cual le cedo la palabra.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Buenos días.
¡Cálidas felicitaciones a todas las periodistas que se encuentran hoy con nosotros!
Es un placer estar aquí con ustedes. Me excuso por haberles avisado con tan poca antelación; pero seguramente ustedes siguieron las noticias del día de ayer y comprenden que estamos encontrándonos lo más temprano posible, una vez que los acontecimientos permiten sostener este intercambio.
Como ustedes conocen, ayer tuvimos el placer de recibir en nuestro país al presidente Santos, de Colombia, acompañado de su Canciller. El Presidente nos ha dicho, de forma muy respetuosa y cordial, que no ha logrado el consenso del hemisferio para invitar a Cuba a la VI Cumbre de las Américas de Cartagena, que será el mes próximo.
Ha explicado que Colombia quiere que esta situación sea discutida en la Cumbre de Cartagena. Expresó respeto por la posición de los países que consideran una necesidad que Cuba haga parte de estas cumbres. Señaló que es un tema que lleva muchos años sin solución e hizo votos para que esta incómoda situación no se repita.
Deseo agradecer la gestión de Colombia, para quien Cuba siempre desea y quiere lo mejor.
No ha habido ninguna sorpresa, ha sido "la crónica de una exclusión anunciada". Con un enorme irrespeto por Colombia y por América Latina y el Caribe, los voceros norteamericanos desde el primer día habían decretado la exclusión de Cuba.
El vicepresidente Biden, la secretaria de Estado Clinton, un subsecretario y otros voceros del Departamento de Estado expresaron su veto antes de que la anunciada consulta ocurriera.
Estados Unidos, con su desprecio y arrogancia, ofende la dignidad de la Patria Grande de Bolívar, de Nuestra América de Martí.
Expreso enérgica denuncia de que la exclusión de Cuba por parte del gobierno de los Estados Unidos de América es inaceptable e injustificable. Es parte de una política de bloqueo económico, político y mediático que es genocida, ilegal, que viola los derechos humanos de los cubanos, y que quedó claro en aquel memorando infame del señor Mallory, de abril de 1960, que fue decretado para causar hambre, desesperación y enajenar el apoyo del pueblo a nuestro gobierno.
El bloqueo es un crimen y un error que dura ya más de 50 años.
Estimados colegas:
Cuba nunca pidió ser invitada a ninguna de las llamadas Cumbres de las Américas, nunca lo hizo en el pasado, a esta tampoco. Se limitó a responder que, de ser invitada en igualdad de condiciones y con plenos e iguales derechos, actuaría con apego a los principios y a la verdad, con todo respeto, como hace siempre.
La posición de los países de la Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de nuestra América (ALBA), es unánime y firme, aunque algunos intriguen al respecto. Es unánime y firme en la exigencia del cese del bloqueo a Cuba y del cese de la exclusión de Cuba de cualquier mecanismo hemisférico, como esta llamada Cumbre de las Américas. Es sólida y unánime en demandar, de manera inequívoca, que cese esta exclusión y que este tema se trate a profundidad durante la VI Cumbre de Cartagena. Es también unánime en la postura de continuar observando, como declaró públicamente en su reunión del 15 de febrero, el Consejo Político o la Reunión de Cancilleres del ALBA, el resultado que se produjo ayer de aquellas consultas entonces en curso.
Corresponde al Consejo Político del ALBA, como enfatizó en solidarias y valientes declaraciones el presidente Chávez, en el día de ayer, que por encargo de la Cumbre de Jefes de Estado del ALBA, los Cancilleres continúen analizando esta situación, coordinen sus acciones y reinicien sus consultas dentro del ALBA y con el resto de los gobiernos de América Latina y el Caribe, sin excepción.
La posición de Cuba es la que expresó el presidente Raúl Castro Ruz el 4 de febrero, en Caracas, en la Cumbre de Presidentes del ALBA. Dijo allí que Cuba jamás lo habría reclamado, pero que apoya el planteamiento del presidente Correa, de Evo y de otros Presidentes de actuar para que cese la exclusión de Cuba, posición que consideramos muy justa.
Dijo él: "Yo quiero agradecer a ustedes, presidente Correa, a Evo y a todos ustedes, estos planteamientos... de vital importancia. Tienen toda la razón. Nosotros jamás hemos reclamado que se tome una medida como esa, pero no por eso vamos a dejar de apoyar esta, que consideramos muy justa".
Estas cumbres, como se conoce, surgieron en Miami, en 1994. Era la plataforma política para el desarrollo del Área de Libre Comercio de las Américas, el ALCA, el proyecto de los Estados Unidos de América para la anexión económica de nuestra Patria Grande.
En el 2005, en Mar del Plata, los presidentes Chávez y Néstor Kirchner, con apoyo de otros y de toda Nuestra América, enterraron el ALCA.
En abril del 2009, en Puerto España, el presidente Obama prometió una nueva política hacia América Latina y el Caribe. Sobre Cuba expresó su deseo de encaminar las relaciones entre Estados Unidos y Cuba en una nueva dirección. ¿Qué dirá el presidente Obama en la próxima reunión de Cartagena?
Estas cumbres, como la Organización de Estados Americanos (OEA), de triste fama, solo sirven para que Estados Unidos ejerza su dominación. Los hechos más recientes lo demuestran.
Conviene, además, precisar que se ha hablado de la posibilidad de que durante la Cumbre de Cartagena los Jefes de Estado, en un segmento supuestamente privado, a puertas cerradas, traten este tema.
Debo decir que no es interés de Cuba. Para Cuba no es aceptable que en una reunión privada entre el gobierno de Estados Unidos y América Latina y el Caribe se trate este tema en su ausencia.
América Latina ya no lo acepta y construye un proyecto de soberanía e integración regional, que Estados Unidos no puede impedir, aunque tratará de hacerlo. La presencia de Cuba en Cartagena, desde la distancia, será inocultable, como ocurrió en el año 2009.
Ya Martí, refiriéndose a la I Conferencia Panamericana de Washington, que concluyó precisamente en 1890, por esos días de abril, el 19 de abril, había escrito: "...después de ver con ojos judiciales los antecedentes, causas y factores del convite, urge decir, porque es la verdad, que ha llegado para la América española la hora de declarar su segunda independencia."
Si esta exclusión sirve para ahondar la conciencia de los pueblos latinoamericanos y caribeños, para la acción firme y concertada de Nuestra América y para avanzar más resueltamente hacia nuestra completa y definitiva independencia, bienvenida sea.
Por esos días, los cubanos estaremos aquí, confiados y serenos, como un símbolo estaremos conmemorando la epopeya de Girón, que no sabemos por qué, los asesores del Presidente de Estados Unidos hacen coincidir otra vez con la "Cumbre de la América Incompleta".
Muchas gracias.
Moderador.-El Ministro accederá a responder algunas preguntas sobre el tema al cual se ha referido. Les pediría a aquellos que quieran preguntar, que utilicen los micrófonos que están a los lados y se identifiquen por el medio que representan.
Andrea Rodríguez (AP).-Buenos días, Ministro.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Buenos días, Andrea. ¡Felicidades!
Andrea Rodríguez.- Gracias.
Señor, se ha hablado del consenso y se ha hablado de que no se llegó al consenso para que Cuba sea invitada, pero lo cierto es que parece demostrarse también que no hay consenso en los países del ALBA. Esto es: ¿Ustedes creen que el caso Cuba y esta situación especial que se ha presentado en Cartagena ha roto el consenso del ALBA, dejando en una posición distanciada al presidente Correa? ¿En qué momento entonces los países del ALBA se encuentran frente a Cartagena?
Gracias.
Bruno Rodríguez.-Yo no he hablado del consenso, yo he citado al Presidente de Colombia explicando su posición con relación a este asunto. Pero he dicho, y reitero, que el ALBA tiene una posición sólida y unitaria en el reclamo del cese inmediato del bloqueo a Cuba, que es lo fundamental; en el reclamo del cese inmediato de la exclusión de Cuba de estos mecanismos, llamados hemisféricos, como la Cumbre de las Américas, y que el ALBA tiene una posición firme y unánime de concertar acciones y, como declaró —es pública la Declaración de la Reunión de Cancilleres del 15 de febrero—, que reanudaría su coordinación de acciones y sus contactos una vez que se conociera el resultado de aquella consulta que estaba en curso.
La postura del presidente Correa es totalmente apoyada por todos los presidentes del ALBA, por toda la Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América, en el reclamo del cese de esta exclusión inaceptable, y en lo que es más importante, en la exigencia de que pare ya, inmediata e incondicionalmente, el bloqueo político, económico y mediático a Cuba. Y los cancilleres del ALBA en estos días continuaremos concertando posiciones en relación con la manera en que estos asuntos se aborden en la VI Cumbre de Cartagena.
Rosa Tania Valdés (REUTER).-Buenos días.
Canciller, lo que quisiéramos saber: Al principio, cuando comenzó toda esta reclamación del ALBA en relación con que Cuba debía participar, algunos países dijeron que hasta estarían dispuestos a ausentarse en caso de que Cuba fuera excluida, como finalmente ha ocurrido.
Lo que quiero saber: ¿Pedirá Cuba a los países del ALBA alguna posición en relación con esto? ¿Irán los países del ALBA a la Cumbre o no irán?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Este tema no es nuevo, ni es nueva la posición de los países del ALBA. Ustedes podrían buscar la Declaración de la Cumbre de Presidentes del ALBA, que se realizó en Cumaná en los días de abril del 2009, en vísperas de aquella V Cumbre que se efectuó en Puerto España. La postura del ALBA de estos momentos es exactamente aquella, es sólida, es firme, es consistente en el tiempo.
Como dijo el Presidente Raúl Castro Ruz, el 4 de febrero, Cuba jamás habría reclamado una medida de esta naturaleza; pero la apoya firmemente porque considera que es justa y legítima la reclamación enérgica del presidente Correa, con apoyo de todos los Presidentes del ALBA, de que cese esta situación.
Néstor Pardiño.-¿Cómo se interpreta este nuevo fenómeno donde un grupo de países de América Latina están enfrentando a Estados Unidos por el tema Cuba? ¿Qué comentarios puede hacer al respecto?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Cuba se expresó ya en el año 2009. Fidel, tan temprano como en los años noventa, alrededor de los anuncios con bombo y platillos de aquella Cumbre de 1994, en Miami, se preguntó para qué servirían estas cumbres. Ya Cuba estaba siendo excluida. Dijo entonces: Si estas cumbres sirvieran para discutir los problemas reales de América Latina y el Caribe, los problemas de la paz, los problemas del desarrollo, los problemas de la deuda, los problemas de una relación justa y equitativa, los problemas del acceso a los mercados, los problemas del subsidio, que destruye las economías caribeñas, por ejemplo; si se discutieran los problemas reales del terrorismo, del narcotráfico; si se discutieran en un plano de igualdad entre Estados Unidos y América Latina y el Caribe, quizás esas Cumbres, aunque hubieran excluido a Cuba, servirían para algo; pero no si lo fueren para expandir la dominación de Estados Unidos, para extender esa presencia intervencionista, injerencista en nuestros Estados; si fueran para extender y profundizar esa relación de expoliación de nuestras economías y de nuestros recursos, habría que resistir. Hoy ya, años después, la realidad está totalmente clara, todo el mundo sabe, nadie tiene dudas después de haber enterrado el ALCA, para qué sirve este tipo de cumbres, y la exclusión de Cuba es, probablemente, el símbolo más notorio, más evidente de que son cumbres hechas a imagen y semejanza del dueño, que es el gobierno de Estados Unidos, y que son su instrumento para ejercer dominación de una manera nada democrática y con mucho irrespeto por países que son iguales, soberanos, y que no aceptan ser tratados como traspatio.
Patrick Hoffman (CNN).-Buenos días, ¿cómo está?
Si Cuba no quiere participar en la cumbre, ¿por qué están luchando algunos países del ALBA, algunos Presidentes para que ustedes estén allá?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Cuba ha dicho desde el año 1994 que su exclusión de estas cumbres es injustificable y que es inaceptable. A Cuba se le ha preguntado si, de ser invitada, asistiría a esta Cumbre; se le preguntó también en el 2009. Cuba siempre ha respondido que, de ser invitada en igualdad de condiciones y pleno derecho, asistiría a la Cumbre desde sus posiciones de principio de política exterior, con apego a la verdad y con todo respeto.
Los países del ALBA están denunciando una exclusión arbitraria e insostenible, propia de la Guerra Fría, impropia de estos tiempos, impropia de la relación que supuestamente el gobierno de Estados Unidos quiere construir ahora con América Latina y el Caribe que es distinta a aquella de los años noventa.
Roberto Hernández (Prensa Latina).-Buenos días, Canciller.
¿Existe fecha y lugar para una próxima reunión de cancilleres del ALBA?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Todavía no, estamos en contacto, de hecho hemos estado ayer en contacto, y en los próximos días continuaremos intercambiando impresiones.
Sarah Rainsford (BBC).-Hola. Quería preguntarle, ¿cuál es la probabilidad, cómo lo ve usted, de que Cuba sea incluida en la próxima Cumbre, de qué depende y cuáles son las condiciones?
Bruno Rodríguez.-Creo que todos comprendemos que una eventual invitación a Cuba, tal como ha explicado el Presidente colombiano, depende del consenso. Todos entendemos qué quiere decir "el consenso". El consenso para este tema quiere decir la autorización de Washington, y esa es una pregunta que podría dirigírsela al gobierno norteamericano. No sé qué hará el gobierno norteamericano. Se ha anunciado qué ha hecho hasta ayer mismo, que es reiterar una vieja política fracasada, que ha durado 50 años, que no funciona y que alguien debería pensar en revisar.
Les agradezco mucho su presencia esta mañana.
Muchas gracias.
Publicado en Granma,
Organo Oficial del Partido Comunista de Cuba
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Barack Obama and Benhamin Netanyahu Have to Be REPUDIATED and stopped
The Democratic Party has always been the Party of War in hyper-capitalist USA. A few days ago, the Israeli Zionist newspaper Haaretz confirmed that the USA and their favorite mercenary forces in Israel will launch a new war against Iran, a country that has not attacked our nation. George W. Bush did the same thing against Iraq. For the capitalists that rule our nation, war is always very profitable. Obama and Hillary will not have to send their daughters to fight. Working-class people, as usual, will do the fighting and the dying, while the U.S. capitalists amass huge war profits.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Haaretz: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta for War Material to Bomb Iran
Netanyahu asked Panetta to approve sale of bunker-busting bombs, U.S. official says
Top administration source says Obama instructed Defense Secretary to work with [Israel's] Defense Minister Barak, to give all due consideration to the request for purchasing GBU-28 bombs, advanced refueling aircraft.
Haaretz
By Barak Ravid
WASHINGTON - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu requested the United States approve the sale of advanced refueling aircraft as well as GBU-28 bunker-piercing bombs to Israel during a recent meeting with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, a top U.S. official said on Tuesday.
The American official said that U.S. President Barack Obama instructed Panetta to work directly with Defense Minister Ehud Barak on the matter, indicating that the U.S. administration was inclined to look favorably upon the request as soon as possible.
During the administration of former U.S. President George Bush, the U.S. refused to sell bunker-penetrating bombs and refueling aircrafts to Israel, as a result of American estimates that Israel would then use them to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.
Following Obama's entrance into the White House, however, the United States approves a string of Israeli requests to purchase advance armament.
Diplomatic cables exposed by the WikiLeaks website exposed discussion concerning advanced weapons shipments. In one cable which surveyed defense discussions between Israel and the United states that took place on November 2009 it was written that "both sides then discussed the upcoming delivery of GBU-28 bunker busting bombs to Israel, noting that the transfer should be handled quietly to avoid any allegations that the USG is helping Israel prepare for a strike against Iran."
Another issue raised during Obama's Monday meeting with Netanyahu was the Syrian crisis. Netanyahu pointed out that Israel feared that chemical and biological weapons from Syrian army stockpiles could end up in the hands of Hezbollah or other terror groups.
A top U.S. official indicated that the United States recently discussed the issue with Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, in an attempt to prepare for the possibility that a collapse of the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad would endanger the country's WMD stockpiles.
At this point the American administration does not possess information that indicates that chemical or biological weapons were passed from Syria to Hezbollah.
Netanyahu and Obama also discussed the ongoing diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey. The United States feels that, amid ongoing unrest, that there [is] existent a supreme interest to rehabilitate Jerusalem-Ankara ties. Obama told Netanyahu at the meeting that an effort should be exerted to reconcile between the two states.
------
“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”
- Sinclair Lewis, It Can’t Happen Here.
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich are making Lewis' prophecy come true in 2012.
Top administration source says Obama instructed Defense Secretary to work with [Israel's] Defense Minister Barak, to give all due consideration to the request for purchasing GBU-28 bombs, advanced refueling aircraft.
Haaretz
By Barak Ravid
WASHINGTON - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu requested the United States approve the sale of advanced refueling aircraft as well as GBU-28 bunker-piercing bombs to Israel during a recent meeting with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, a top U.S. official said on Tuesday.
The American official said that U.S. President Barack Obama instructed Panetta to work directly with Defense Minister Ehud Barak on the matter, indicating that the U.S. administration was inclined to look favorably upon the request as soon as possible.
During the administration of former U.S. President George Bush, the U.S. refused to sell bunker-penetrating bombs and refueling aircrafts to Israel, as a result of American estimates that Israel would then use them to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.
Following Obama's entrance into the White House, however, the United States approves a string of Israeli requests to purchase advance armament.
Diplomatic cables exposed by the WikiLeaks website exposed discussion concerning advanced weapons shipments. In one cable which surveyed defense discussions between Israel and the United states that took place on November 2009 it was written that "both sides then discussed the upcoming delivery of GBU-28 bunker busting bombs to Israel, noting that the transfer should be handled quietly to avoid any allegations that the USG is helping Israel prepare for a strike against Iran."
Another issue raised during Obama's Monday meeting with Netanyahu was the Syrian crisis. Netanyahu pointed out that Israel feared that chemical and biological weapons from Syrian army stockpiles could end up in the hands of Hezbollah or other terror groups.
A top U.S. official indicated that the United States recently discussed the issue with Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, in an attempt to prepare for the possibility that a collapse of the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad would endanger the country's WMD stockpiles.
At this point the American administration does not possess information that indicates that chemical or biological weapons were passed from Syria to Hezbollah.
Netanyahu and Obama also discussed the ongoing diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey. The United States feels that, amid ongoing unrest, that there [is] existent a supreme interest to rehabilitate Jerusalem-Ankara ties. Obama told Netanyahu at the meeting that an effort should be exerted to reconcile between the two states.
------
“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”
- Sinclair Lewis, It Can’t Happen Here.
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich are making Lewis' prophecy come true in 2012.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Psycho Talker of the Year: Rush Limbaugh
AOL suspends Rush Limbaugh radio ads
By Stephen C. Webster - The Raw Story
Monday, March 5, 2012 12:31 EST
The exodus of advertisers from Rush Limbaugh’s radio program continued Monday with Internet publisher AOL announcing that they are suspending further placements on his show following offensive, sexist comments he made about a law student called by members of Congress to testify on contraception access.
“At AOL one of our core values is that we act with integrity,” the company explained on its official Facebook page. “We have monitored the unfolding events and have determined that Mr. Limbaugh’s comments are not in line with our values. As a result we have made the decision to suspend advertising on The Rush Limbaugh Radio show.”
Limbaugh’s latest controversy stems from a segment he broadcast last week in which he called Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke a “prostitute” and a “slut” because she supported universal contraception coverage for every person who holds private health insurance.
Limbaugh, who many regard as the unofficial voice of the modern Republican Party, said that Fluke could not pay for contraceptives because she was “having so much sex.” He followed up on the segment by suggesting that if health insurance policies cover contraceptive services, women using contraceptives should publish sex tapes online.
Fluke’s testimony was actually about a friend who could not afford hormonal birth control and developed severe ovarian cysts after her university refused to help pay for contraceptives, citing moral objections. As a result, the woman had her ovary surgically removed.
AOL’s announcement Monday brings the total number of advertisers fleeing Limbaugh’s program to eight, with the online publisher being by far the largest to quit the show. Flower delivery website ProFlowers said Sunday it would no longer advertise on the Republican commentator’s show, explaining that his recent behavior “went beyond political discourse to a personal attack and do not reflect our values as a company.”
It is not clear if Arianna Huffington, who runs AOL’s online content distribution, played a role in the company’s decision. Her website, The Huffington Post, was acquired by AOL last year for $315 million. Though originally a progressive blog, Huffington has since explained that the site’s editorial policies are no longer “lefty” — a claim that could be undermined if she’s revealed to have played a role in withdrawing ads from Limbaugh’s program.
A media contact at AOL Advertising did not respond to a request for comment at press time.
A similar campaign against former Fox News conspiracy host Glenn Beck succeeded in knocking off hundreds of advertisers after the progressive group Color of Change launched a boycott campaign against him over his frequent use of racially charged, violent political rhetoric. He’s since been dropped by Fox News.
AOL was not the only company to cease advertising on program Monday: Tax Resolution Services, Co., a major contributor to Limbaugh’s profitability, said it too was dropping out.
“Thank you for your concerns,” they announced on the social network Twitter. “We have decided to join other advertisers and suspend our sponsorship of The Rush Limbaugh Show.”
Limbaugh had previously done advertising spots for the company, telling his listeners that they offer top-notch services for dealing with the Internal Revenue Service.
He seemed to back off that sentiment in a segment Monday morning, claiming that companies dropping him were essentially telling his audience that they no longer want their business.
Stephen C. Webster is the senior editor of Raw Story, and is based out of Austin, Texas. He previously worked as the associate editor of The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, Texas, where he covered state politics and the peace movement’s resurgence at the start of the Iraq war. Webster has also contributed to publications such as True/Slant, Austin Monthly, The Dallas Business Journal, The Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Weekly, The News Connection and others. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenCWebster.
------
JG: Do not buy any of the products that advertise in Rush Limbaugh’s program. Has anyone compiled a list of those products? I will be happy to include the list in this post.
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
The Frozen U.S.-Cuba Relationship
Council on Foreign Relations
Interviewee: Julia E. Sweig, Nelson and David Rockefeller Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies and Director for Latin America Studies, Council on Foreign Relations
Interviewer: Brianna Lee, Production Editor, CFR.org
February 28, 2012
Fifty years after the United States enacted an embargo on all trade and commercial transactions with Cuba, relations between the two countries remain at a standstill. Julia E. Sweig, CFR's director of Latin American studies, says the Obama administration has prioritized domestic politics over foreign policy in its relationship with Cuba, even as Cuban President Raul Castro has been "moving in the direction of the kind of reforms that every administration over the last fifty years has called upon Cuba to make." The case of American USAID contractor Alan Gross, currently serving a fifteen-year prison sentence in Cuba on charges of attempting to upend the regime through a U.S.-authorized democracy promotion program, has also heightened tensions, she says. Meanwhile, Sweig adds, Cuba is strengthening ties with global powers like Brazil, as well as the Catholic Church, as the Castro administration seeks to open up new economic and social spaces for its citizens.
We've passed the fifty-year mark of the breakdown of diplomatic ties between Cuba and the United States. Where do we stand now? Is normalizing relations even remotely on the table on either side?
Let me start by talking about three geographical points on the map that are relevant to the answer. In Washington, the Obama administration, consistent with the approach of the Bush administration, has made a political decision to subordinate foreign policy and national interest-based decisions to domestic politics with respect to its Cuba policy. There is a bipartisan group of members of Congress--Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate--who represent Florida, a state where there are many swing votes that deliver the electoral votes for any president. Those individuals not only deliver votes, but they deliver campaign finance, and generally make a lot of noise, and that combination has persuaded the White House that reelection is more of a priority than taking on the heavy lifting to set the United States on the path of normalization with Cuba for now.
The second point is what's happening in Cuba. It's not realistic to expect the United States to undertake a series of unilateral moves toward normalization; it needs a willing partner. I believe we have one in Havana but have failed to read the signals. Raul Castro has now been in office since the beginning of 2008. Raul holds the reins on both foreign policy and domestic policy, and, domestically, the politics of implementing a fairly wide range of economic and political and social reforms are his priority. In a deal that was coordinated with the help of the Cuban Catholic Church and Spain, he released all of the political prisoners in Cuba. He also is taking a number of steps that imply a major rewriting of the social contract in Cuba to shrink the size of the state and give Cuban individuals more freedom--economically, especially, but also in terms of speech--than we've seen in the last fifty years. He has privatized the residential real estate and car market[s], expanded much-needed agrarian reform, lifted caps on salaries, and greatly expanded space for small businesses. He also is moving to deal with corruption and to prepare the groundwork for a great deal more foreign investment. He's moving in the direction of the kind of reforms that every administration over the last fifty years has called upon Cuba to make, albeit under the rubric of a one-party system. There's a broad range of cooperation--neighborhood security in the Gulf of Mexico, as Cuba has just started drilling for oil, counternarcotics, and natural disasters--between the two countries that is still not happening, and that gives me the impression that the United States has been unwilling to take "yes" for an answer and respond positively to steps taken by Cuba.
The third geographic part of the story is south Florida. When they're polled, the majority of Cuban-Americans say that the embargo has failed, and support lifting the travel ban or loosening the embargo or some steps along that continuum of liberalization and normalization. The one most significant step that Obama did take when he took office was to eliminate the restriction on Cuban-American travel and remittances to Cuba. Cuban-Americans are now voting with their feet. If you go to the Miami airport, you will see thirty, forty flights to Cuba a week just out of Miami. Cuban-Americans are now investing in their families' small businesses on the island. The politics of this are strange because we are told by the Obama administration that we can't rock the boat of the Cuban-American vote, but those very voters are in fact demonstrating that they support a radically different set of policies than, in fact, the Obama administration has supported.
The ongoing case of USAID contractor Alan Gross has stoked tensions between the United States and Cuba. At the heart of the matter is the U.S. democracy promotion program that authorized Gross' travel to Cuba. What impact does this case have on U.S.-Cuba relations?
Precisely because we have no overarching framework for diplomacy in place and no political will to establish it for now, the Alan Gross case casts a huge shadow over U.S.-Cuban relations. The heart of the issue is the context in which those [pro-democracy] programs were being implemented. We have a full-blown economic embargo with extra-territorial dimensions that are felt in the banking and finance world--a very comprehensive and well-enforced sanctions program. The democracy programs sound very mom and apple pie--USAID has them around the world, its officials will tell you. But having them in Cuba is an extraordinary provocation. They were inherited from the previous administration's concept of regime change, and under Obama, they remain largely intact. The programs are purposely kept secret from the American public. There is no public information about the private and not-for-profit subcontractors in the United States and around the world, and Cuban institutions and individuals who may be targets of the programs are likewise not told they are part of such U.S. government programs. The democracy promotion programs have been deliberately politicized in order to provoke, and they have succeeded in provoking.
What's key is the context. There's been no real diplomacy; there's no negotiating framework that I've seen for a very long period of time, and again, that has to do with domestic politics. It's very hard to understand otherwise why this guy's still in jail. The United States has repeatedly asked the Cuban government to release Gross unilaterally, with no commitments on our end. Asking for unilateral gestures, having rebuffed or ignored or failed to read the signals from Cuba, has created this impasse. Having said that, there can be a diplomatic, humanitarian solution, and I see no value to keeping Gross in jail and hope he will be released as soon as possible. But we will need real diplomacy and a framework for negotiating a range of issues both countries care about.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff paid a visit to Cuba recently, and it looks like Cuba's trying to formulate ties with an influential, rising Latin American power. How does this burgeoning relationship between Cuba and Brazil affect Cuba's relationship with the United States.?
Brazil is a regional power and a global power; it plays in a number of spaces well beyond Latin America. In the last couple of years it undertook some major investments, and those investments will grow in Cuba--in infrastructure, in agriculture, in perhaps energy as well, and others. Brazil is clearly stepping into a space where the United States should be, and the United States has made a decision to watch as that happens.
How does Cuba's human rights situation complicate the relationship between those two countries?
It doesn't seem to be complicating it at all. Rousseff--given her own history of having spent three years in jail and being tortured in the 1970s and having worked to make human rights more of a domestic and foreign policy--her presidency has quite a bit of standing with respect to talking to any government, including the Cuban government, about human rights. She was criticized by her own public, especially in the media, a great deal for choosing to have those discussions with Cuba privately. But I would suggest that having a public, browbeating, rhetorical approach has almost always backfired for major heads of state when dealing with Cuba, and if you look at the success that the Catholic Church and the Spanish government had around the political prisoner release, that success derived from a basic fundamental degree of respect, cooperation, and engagement as the framework for the relationship.
The Pope is set to make a highly anticipated visit to Cuba in March. What's the significance of this visit?
Pope John Paul II went to Cuba in 1998, and that was very significant because that was just a few years after a new constitution in Cuba had affirmed the right of religious believers to hold senior positions in government. In the decade-plus that's transpired since, the Catholic Church under Archbishop Jaime Ortega has become the most important provider of social services outside of the state. It has started its own business school; it has opened space for itself and for others for publications, opinion, and debate; it has worked in concert with the Cuban government, especially with Raul Castro, on a very nationalist project of building a more open society in Cuba. This Pope is a different person than Pope John Paul, and it's highly anticipated, but he's coming at a time when already there is substantial change under way in that country. The visit will help the Cuban Catholic Church create space for itself and continue to create space for itself, and signal to the Cuban government that it's an institution that can be relied upon to support the kinds of reforms that the government itself wants to make happen.
It's important to note that the Pope's going to Mexico on this trip, and Mexico's population of practicing Catholics is proportionally much bigger than Cuba's. In Cuba, the syncretic religions are widely practiced. The Catholic Church is an incredibly important institution, but it would be a mistake to think of Cuba the way we do Mexico, as a predominantly Catholic society.
Raul Castro held the First National Conference of the Cuban Communist Party last month. What was he hoping to accomplish?
This conference was preceded by a Party congress in April 2011, and you have to think about both in tandem. The biggest take-away from the Party conference was the formalization of term limits for senior officials in the Cuban government, both elected and appointed. That's a very significant step forward in terms of political reform, given that many of the top leaders in the politburo are over sixty-five and have been working in those positions or other senior positions for their entire careers. It's also an important sign to the junior people who are building their political careers that they're not going to be permanent.
The broader consequences of the congress and the conference were for Raul to continue a process that has been pretty slow and difficult of building a consensus among the longtime beneficiaries of the status quo that the status quo needs to change. One key thing for the Communist Party is to get the Communist Party out of day-to-day government. The party is supposed to be a political party, sort of ideological ballast, but it isn't supposed to be running ministries or having the kind of major role bureaucratically and politically that it's had over the last fifty years.
The other piece is to institute accountability and transparency within the institutions of governance themselves. That process means a radical overhaul of the way things have happened for the last fifty years.
How strong is the Cuban society's desire to move beyond the one-party system?
It's very strong. Public opinion is complicated because on the one hand, Cubans want change and they want much more space--economic space, speech space. I would say political party space, like having a multi-party system, that's not the top priority for Cubans. But what is a top priority is having the opportunity to make good for themselves with the wonderful education they have and to run businesses and to have the state get out of the way, while continuing to provide the basic social services that the entire population has benefited from and gotten so accustomed to.
------
JG: On the last question, Julia Sweig is wrong. Cuban society supports both its government and the Partido Comunista de Cuba.
Interviewee: Julia E. Sweig, Nelson and David Rockefeller Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies and Director for Latin America Studies, Council on Foreign Relations
Interviewer: Brianna Lee, Production Editor, CFR.org
February 28, 2012
Fifty years after the United States enacted an embargo on all trade and commercial transactions with Cuba, relations between the two countries remain at a standstill. Julia E. Sweig, CFR's director of Latin American studies, says the Obama administration has prioritized domestic politics over foreign policy in its relationship with Cuba, even as Cuban President Raul Castro has been "moving in the direction of the kind of reforms that every administration over the last fifty years has called upon Cuba to make." The case of American USAID contractor Alan Gross, currently serving a fifteen-year prison sentence in Cuba on charges of attempting to upend the regime through a U.S.-authorized democracy promotion program, has also heightened tensions, she says. Meanwhile, Sweig adds, Cuba is strengthening ties with global powers like Brazil, as well as the Catholic Church, as the Castro administration seeks to open up new economic and social spaces for its citizens.
We've passed the fifty-year mark of the breakdown of diplomatic ties between Cuba and the United States. Where do we stand now? Is normalizing relations even remotely on the table on either side?
Let me start by talking about three geographical points on the map that are relevant to the answer. In Washington, the Obama administration, consistent with the approach of the Bush administration, has made a political decision to subordinate foreign policy and national interest-based decisions to domestic politics with respect to its Cuba policy. There is a bipartisan group of members of Congress--Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate--who represent Florida, a state where there are many swing votes that deliver the electoral votes for any president. Those individuals not only deliver votes, but they deliver campaign finance, and generally make a lot of noise, and that combination has persuaded the White House that reelection is more of a priority than taking on the heavy lifting to set the United States on the path of normalization with Cuba for now.
The second point is what's happening in Cuba. It's not realistic to expect the United States to undertake a series of unilateral moves toward normalization; it needs a willing partner. I believe we have one in Havana but have failed to read the signals. Raul Castro has now been in office since the beginning of 2008. Raul holds the reins on both foreign policy and domestic policy, and, domestically, the politics of implementing a fairly wide range of economic and political and social reforms are his priority. In a deal that was coordinated with the help of the Cuban Catholic Church and Spain, he released all of the political prisoners in Cuba. He also is taking a number of steps that imply a major rewriting of the social contract in Cuba to shrink the size of the state and give Cuban individuals more freedom--economically, especially, but also in terms of speech--than we've seen in the last fifty years. He has privatized the residential real estate and car market[s], expanded much-needed agrarian reform, lifted caps on salaries, and greatly expanded space for small businesses. He also is moving to deal with corruption and to prepare the groundwork for a great deal more foreign investment. He's moving in the direction of the kind of reforms that every administration over the last fifty years has called upon Cuba to make, albeit under the rubric of a one-party system. There's a broad range of cooperation--neighborhood security in the Gulf of Mexico, as Cuba has just started drilling for oil, counternarcotics, and natural disasters--between the two countries that is still not happening, and that gives me the impression that the United States has been unwilling to take "yes" for an answer and respond positively to steps taken by Cuba.
The third geographic part of the story is south Florida. When they're polled, the majority of Cuban-Americans say that the embargo has failed, and support lifting the travel ban or loosening the embargo or some steps along that continuum of liberalization and normalization. The one most significant step that Obama did take when he took office was to eliminate the restriction on Cuban-American travel and remittances to Cuba. Cuban-Americans are now voting with their feet. If you go to the Miami airport, you will see thirty, forty flights to Cuba a week just out of Miami. Cuban-Americans are now investing in their families' small businesses on the island. The politics of this are strange because we are told by the Obama administration that we can't rock the boat of the Cuban-American vote, but those very voters are in fact demonstrating that they support a radically different set of policies than, in fact, the Obama administration has supported.
The ongoing case of USAID contractor Alan Gross has stoked tensions between the United States and Cuba. At the heart of the matter is the U.S. democracy promotion program that authorized Gross' travel to Cuba. What impact does this case have on U.S.-Cuba relations?
Precisely because we have no overarching framework for diplomacy in place and no political will to establish it for now, the Alan Gross case casts a huge shadow over U.S.-Cuban relations. The heart of the issue is the context in which those [pro-democracy] programs were being implemented. We have a full-blown economic embargo with extra-territorial dimensions that are felt in the banking and finance world--a very comprehensive and well-enforced sanctions program. The democracy programs sound very mom and apple pie--USAID has them around the world, its officials will tell you. But having them in Cuba is an extraordinary provocation. They were inherited from the previous administration's concept of regime change, and under Obama, they remain largely intact. The programs are purposely kept secret from the American public. There is no public information about the private and not-for-profit subcontractors in the United States and around the world, and Cuban institutions and individuals who may be targets of the programs are likewise not told they are part of such U.S. government programs. The democracy promotion programs have been deliberately politicized in order to provoke, and they have succeeded in provoking.
What's key is the context. There's been no real diplomacy; there's no negotiating framework that I've seen for a very long period of time, and again, that has to do with domestic politics. It's very hard to understand otherwise why this guy's still in jail. The United States has repeatedly asked the Cuban government to release Gross unilaterally, with no commitments on our end. Asking for unilateral gestures, having rebuffed or ignored or failed to read the signals from Cuba, has created this impasse. Having said that, there can be a diplomatic, humanitarian solution, and I see no value to keeping Gross in jail and hope he will be released as soon as possible. But we will need real diplomacy and a framework for negotiating a range of issues both countries care about.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff paid a visit to Cuba recently, and it looks like Cuba's trying to formulate ties with an influential, rising Latin American power. How does this burgeoning relationship between Cuba and Brazil affect Cuba's relationship with the United States.?
Brazil is a regional power and a global power; it plays in a number of spaces well beyond Latin America. In the last couple of years it undertook some major investments, and those investments will grow in Cuba--in infrastructure, in agriculture, in perhaps energy as well, and others. Brazil is clearly stepping into a space where the United States should be, and the United States has made a decision to watch as that happens.
How does Cuba's human rights situation complicate the relationship between those two countries?
It doesn't seem to be complicating it at all. Rousseff--given her own history of having spent three years in jail and being tortured in the 1970s and having worked to make human rights more of a domestic and foreign policy--her presidency has quite a bit of standing with respect to talking to any government, including the Cuban government, about human rights. She was criticized by her own public, especially in the media, a great deal for choosing to have those discussions with Cuba privately. But I would suggest that having a public, browbeating, rhetorical approach has almost always backfired for major heads of state when dealing with Cuba, and if you look at the success that the Catholic Church and the Spanish government had around the political prisoner release, that success derived from a basic fundamental degree of respect, cooperation, and engagement as the framework for the relationship.
The Pope is set to make a highly anticipated visit to Cuba in March. What's the significance of this visit?
Pope John Paul II went to Cuba in 1998, and that was very significant because that was just a few years after a new constitution in Cuba had affirmed the right of religious believers to hold senior positions in government. In the decade-plus that's transpired since, the Catholic Church under Archbishop Jaime Ortega has become the most important provider of social services outside of the state. It has started its own business school; it has opened space for itself and for others for publications, opinion, and debate; it has worked in concert with the Cuban government, especially with Raul Castro, on a very nationalist project of building a more open society in Cuba. This Pope is a different person than Pope John Paul, and it's highly anticipated, but he's coming at a time when already there is substantial change under way in that country. The visit will help the Cuban Catholic Church create space for itself and continue to create space for itself, and signal to the Cuban government that it's an institution that can be relied upon to support the kinds of reforms that the government itself wants to make happen.
It's important to note that the Pope's going to Mexico on this trip, and Mexico's population of practicing Catholics is proportionally much bigger than Cuba's. In Cuba, the syncretic religions are widely practiced. The Catholic Church is an incredibly important institution, but it would be a mistake to think of Cuba the way we do Mexico, as a predominantly Catholic society.
Raul Castro held the First National Conference of the Cuban Communist Party last month. What was he hoping to accomplish?
This conference was preceded by a Party congress in April 2011, and you have to think about both in tandem. The biggest take-away from the Party conference was the formalization of term limits for senior officials in the Cuban government, both elected and appointed. That's a very significant step forward in terms of political reform, given that many of the top leaders in the politburo are over sixty-five and have been working in those positions or other senior positions for their entire careers. It's also an important sign to the junior people who are building their political careers that they're not going to be permanent.
The broader consequences of the congress and the conference were for Raul to continue a process that has been pretty slow and difficult of building a consensus among the longtime beneficiaries of the status quo that the status quo needs to change. One key thing for the Communist Party is to get the Communist Party out of day-to-day government. The party is supposed to be a political party, sort of ideological ballast, but it isn't supposed to be running ministries or having the kind of major role bureaucratically and politically that it's had over the last fifty years.
The other piece is to institute accountability and transparency within the institutions of governance themselves. That process means a radical overhaul of the way things have happened for the last fifty years.
How strong is the Cuban society's desire to move beyond the one-party system?
It's very strong. Public opinion is complicated because on the one hand, Cubans want change and they want much more space--economic space, speech space. I would say political party space, like having a multi-party system, that's not the top priority for Cubans. But what is a top priority is having the opportunity to make good for themselves with the wonderful education they have and to run businesses and to have the state get out of the way, while continuing to provide the basic social services that the entire population has benefited from and gotten so accustomed to.
------
JG: On the last question, Julia Sweig is wrong. Cuban society supports both its government and the Partido Comunista de Cuba.
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders: Wall Street greed fueling high gas prices
Goldman Sachs experts say it pushes prices up by 40%.
Editor's note: Bernie Sanders is an independent senator from Vermont. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2006 after serving 16 years in the House of Representatives and is the longest-serving independent member of Congress in American history.
(CNN) -- Gas prices approaching $4 a gallon on average are causing severe economic pain for millions of Americans. Pump prices spiked 5% in the past month alone. Crude oil prices stood at $108 on Friday, up from only double digits at the beginning of the month.
What's the cause? Forget what you may have read about the laws of supply and demand. Oil and gas prices have almost nothing to do with economic fundamentals. According to the Energy Information Administration, the supply of oil and gasoline is higher today than it was three years ago, when the national average for a gallon of gasoline was just $1.90. Meanwhile, the demand for oil in the U.S. is at its lowest level since April of 1997.
Is Big Oil to blame? Sure. Partly. Big oil companies have been gouging consumers for years. They have made almost $1 trillion in profits over the past decade, in part thanks to ridiculous federal subsidies and tax loopholes. I have proposed legislation to end those pointless giveaways to some of the biggest and most profitable corporations in the history of the world.
But there's another reason for the wild rise in gas prices. The culprit is Wall Street. Speculators are raking in profits by gambling in the loosely regulated commodity markets for gas and oil.
A decade ago, speculators controlled only about 30% of the oil futures market. Today, Wall Street speculators control nearly 80% of this market. Many of those people buying and selling oil in the commodity markets will never use a drop of this oil. They are not airlines or trucking companies who will use the fuel in the future. The only function of the speculators in this process is to make as much money as they can, as quickly as they can.
I've seen the raw documents that prove the role of speculators. Commodity Futures Trading Commission records showed that in the summer of 2008, when gas prices spiked to more than $4 a gallon, speculators overwhelmingly controlled the crude oil futures market. The commission, which supposedly represents the interests of the American people, had kept the information hidden from the public for nearly three years. That alone is an outrage. The American people had a right to know exactly who caused gas prices to skyrocket in 2008 and who is causing them to spike today.
Even those inside the oil industry have admitted that speculation is driving up the price of gasoline. The CEO of Exxon-Mobil, Rex Tillerson, told a Senate hearing last year that speculation was driving up the price of a barrel of oil by as much as 40%. The general counsel of Delta Airlines, Ben Hirst, and the experts at Goldman Sachs also said excessive speculation is causing oil prices to spike by up to 40%. Even Saudi Arabia, the largest exporter of oil in the world, told the Bush administration back in 2008, during the last major spike in oil prices, that speculation was responsible for about $40 of a barrel of oil.
Just last week, Commissioner Bart Chilton, one of the only Commodity Futures Trading Commission members looking out for consumers, calculated how much extra drivers are being charged as a result of Wall Street speculation. If you drive a relatively fuel-efficient vehicle such as a Honda Civic, you pay an extra $7.30 every time you fill your tank. For larger vehicles, such as a Ford F150, drivers pay an extra $14.56 for each fill-up. That works out to more than $750 a year going directly from your wallet or pocketbook to the Wall Street speculators.
So as speculators gamble, millions of Americans are paying what amounts to a "speculators tax" to feed Wall Street's greed. People who live in rural areas like my home state of Vermont are hit harder than most because they buy gas to drive long distances to their jobs.
It doesn't have to work this way. The current spike in oil and gasoline prices was avoidable. Under the Wall Street reform act that Congress passed in 2010, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission was ordered to impose strict limits on the amount of oil that Wall Street speculators could trade in the energy futures market. The regulators dragged their feet.
Finally, after months and months of law-breaking delays, the commission in October adopted a rule. It was a weak version of a proposal that might have put meaningful limits on the number of futures and swaps contracts a single trader could hold. Even the watered-down regulation adopted by the industry-friendly commission was challenged in court. The Financial Markets Association and the International Swaps and Derivatives Association wanted free rein to continue unregulated gambling in the oil markets.
So today, Wall Street once again is laughing all the way to the bank. Once again, federal regulators should move aggressively to end excessive oil speculation. We must do everything we can to lower gas prices so that they reflect the fundamentals of supply and demand and bring needed relief to the American people.
The time for real action is now.
Monday, February 27, 2012
1898: A Jingoistic and Interventionist U.S. Republican Senator from Vermont: Redfield Proctor
On March 17, 1898, two weeks after the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor, Vermont Republican Redfield Proctor delivered the findings of his investigative trip to Cuba in a speech to his Senate colleagues. Since 1895, Cuban insurrectionists had been waging a protracted guerrilla offensive against Spain’s occupying forces. Proctor understood the horrors of warfare, having served as colonel of the Fifteenth Vermont Volunteers during the Battle of Gettysburg and, later, as secretary of war for two years under President Harrison. But as became evident during his speech, the wartime sufferings of Cuba’s civilian population under Spanish subjugation shocked even this combat-hardened legislator.
Proctor’s remarks to his fellow senators detailed the atrocities Spanish troops inflicted on their colonial subjects. Spanish general Valeriano Weyler’s policy of reconcentración, in which entire Cuban villages found themselves uprooted and relocated to fortified military encampments, had devastated the local population. Proctor described the conquered region outside Havana as rife with “desolation and distress, misery and starvation.” The lack of food had left “little children . . . walking about with arms and chest terribly emaciated, eyes swollen, and abdomen bloated to three times the natural size.” Cuban doctors confirmed Proctor’s worst fears. Their prognosis for the youngest victims of Spain’s inhumane conduct was “hopeless.” “Deaths in the street have not been uncommon,” said Proctor, before estimating that “out of a population of 1,600,000, two hundred thousand had died within these Spanish forts.” Any hope of eventual recovery appeared unlikely to the senator, as “nearly all the sugar mills have been destroyed.” The New York Times praised Proctor for shining “the clear light of truth upon the actual situation” on the war-torn island.
But Proctor endeavored to do more through his speech than merely detail Spanish crimes against Cuban civilians. He presented his oration as a call to arms for the United States to help the Cuban insurrectionists expel their Spanish oppressors. Unless American forces intervened against Spain, Cubans would never be “free from molestation,” unable to “rebuild their homes, reclaim their tillage plots, which quickly run up to brush in that wonderful soil and clime.” In one counterintuitive rhetorical flourish, Proctor downplayed the gravity of both “the barbarity practiced by Weyler” and the sinking of the Maine. Instead, he cited “the entire native population of Cuba, struggling for freedom and deliverance from the worst misgovernment of which I ever had knowledge” as the “strongest appeal” for American intervention. Like countless optimists who have advocated military ventures with unrealistic post-hostility expectations, Proctor dreamed of a “wonderful prosperity that would surely come with peace and good home rule.” After evicting the Spanish colonial masters, “the large influx of American and English immigration and money” would guarantee Cuba’s recovery in Proctor’s estimation.
Source: Click Here
------
JG: In 1898 the nascent American Empire, interfered in the internal affairs of Cuba. They had not been invited by the insurrectionist Independence Fighters. The Yankees did not want a truly independent republic. They wanted and acquired three colonies: Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines.
On May 20, 1902, the Yankee imperialists proclaimed a new Republic of Cuba to serve their intereses mezquinos. The Yankees ruled Cuba through pliant puppets from that day until January First, 1959, Cuba's true Day of National Liberation.
WikiLeaks and Anonymous Score a Big Hit Against a U.S. Private Inteligence-Gathering Company
The whistle-blower organization WikiLeaks has scored an impressive big hit against the internal computer files of a private U.S. company that goes by the name Stratfor, which is short for Strategic Forces. It is not known if this private organization is a front for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, as the U.S. government moves to privatize just about everything, to ensure huge profits for capitalist companies. The question that we can ask ourselves is "Is the U.S. on the road to corporate Fascism?"
To read more about the story click here.
Fox News is reporting the following:
It cites a Dec. 6, 2011, email from CEO George Friedman to Stratfor analyst Reva Bhalla, on how to exploit an Israeli intelligence informant providing information on the medical condition of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
"[Y]ou have to take control of him. Control means financial, sexual or psychological control ... This is intended to start our conversation on your next phase," the email reportedly reads.
To read more about the story click here.
Fox News is reporting the following:
It cites a Dec. 6, 2011, email from CEO George Friedman to Stratfor analyst Reva Bhalla, on how to exploit an Israeli intelligence informant providing information on the medical condition of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
"[Y]ou have to take control of him. Control means financial, sexual or psychological control ... This is intended to start our conversation on your next phase," the email reportedly reads.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Why the U.S. Government Does NOT Understand the Concept of 'Live and Let Live'?
Choose the best answer to the question, in your humble opinion.
1) It wants to be 'Mother In Law' to the World.'
2) It is just another 'Busy Body' sticking its nose where it has not been invited.
3) It wants to make a 'Fast Buck' out of every person of our planet.
4) It is just another 'Failed Empire.'
5) Like the Third Reich, it feels superior to every race.
6) It has not read 'How to win and influence people.'
6) It is an insecure country.
Contribute your answer!
1) It wants to be 'Mother In Law' to the World.'
2) It is just another 'Busy Body' sticking its nose where it has not been invited.
3) It wants to make a 'Fast Buck' out of every person of our planet.
4) It is just another 'Failed Empire.'
5) Like the Third Reich, it feels superior to every race.
6) It has not read 'How to win and influence people.'
6) It is an insecure country.
Contribute your answer!
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
REPSOL acerca a Cuba y EEUU
La petrolera iniciará una exploración en aguas profundas del golfo de México
El proyecto supone un avance en el diálogo entre Washington y La Habana sobre seguridad petrolera
Miércoles, 25 de enero del 2012
HUGO L. SÁNCHEZ
LA HABANA
Cada metro que la española Repsol perfore en breve en zonas cubanas del golfo de México será, sin proponérselo, un punto a favor de resolver medio siglo de malas caras y retóricas envenenadas entre Washington y La Habana. El destino ha querido que estas aguas, escenario de naufragios y traficantes de personas huyendo de la isla y rechazados en Florida, constituyan una especie de mesa de negociaciones en este mundo donde el petróleo parece decidirlo todo.
El diario Granma y todos los espacios noticiosos de la televisión informaron la semana pasada de que Repsol reiniciará, en los próximos días, la exploración petrolera en aguas profundas de la Zona Económica Exclusiva (ZEE) de 112.000 kilómetros cuadrados.
Repsol, esta vez en asociación con la noruega Statoil y la india ONGC-Videsh, realizó un primer intento de hallar hidrocarburos hace ocho años y es una de las nueve empresas extranjeras con lotes contratados en esa zona. Ahora, el pozo se ubicará 22 millas al norte de la costa cubana, en el bloque de Jagüey. Repsol tiene los derechos para seis de los 59 bloques de la ZEE con reservas calculadas de 5.000 a nueve millones de barriles de crudo.
Manuel Marrero, especialista principal de petróleo del Ministerio cubano de Industria Básica, comentó recientemente: «Todos estamos esperanzados, sin falsas esperanzas tontas, de que existen probabilidades de encontrar yacimientos de petróleo y de gas grandes».
La plataforma semisumergible que se utilizará es la Scarabeo 9, indica el periódico del Partido Comunista. Fabricada en China y Singapur, fue verificada por autoridades cubanas de la seguridad marítima y el medioambiente.
El rotativo omitió que, a solicitud de Repsol, la plataforma fue certificada antes por la Oficina de Seguridad y Legalidad Ambiental del Departamento del Interior y el Servicio de Guardacostas de EEUU. El secretario estadounidense del Interior, Ken Salazar, que se entrevistó en Madrid en junio con Nemesio Fernández Cuesta, director de exploración de Repsol, dijo entonces que la petrolera aceptó «voluntariamente cumplir con las regulaciones de EEUU» en el golfo.
La revisión de la plataforma es, de forma indirecta, el punto más avanzado de Washington y La Habana para dialogar sobre seguridad petrolera toda vez que entre ambos países no existe mecanismo bilateral al respecto.
En el fondo de todo, a favor de un entendimiento entre dos gobiernos enemigos, está el fantasma del mayor desastre en el golfo de México, causado por British Petroleum en el 2010.
El proyecto supone un avance en el diálogo entre Washington y La Habana sobre seguridad petrolera
Miércoles, 25 de enero del 2012
HUGO L. SÁNCHEZ
LA HABANA
Cada metro que la española Repsol perfore en breve en zonas cubanas del golfo de México será, sin proponérselo, un punto a favor de resolver medio siglo de malas caras y retóricas envenenadas entre Washington y La Habana. El destino ha querido que estas aguas, escenario de naufragios y traficantes de personas huyendo de la isla y rechazados en Florida, constituyan una especie de mesa de negociaciones en este mundo donde el petróleo parece decidirlo todo.
El diario Granma y todos los espacios noticiosos de la televisión informaron la semana pasada de que Repsol reiniciará, en los próximos días, la exploración petrolera en aguas profundas de la Zona Económica Exclusiva (ZEE) de 112.000 kilómetros cuadrados.
Repsol, esta vez en asociación con la noruega Statoil y la india ONGC-Videsh, realizó un primer intento de hallar hidrocarburos hace ocho años y es una de las nueve empresas extranjeras con lotes contratados en esa zona. Ahora, el pozo se ubicará 22 millas al norte de la costa cubana, en el bloque de Jagüey. Repsol tiene los derechos para seis de los 59 bloques de la ZEE con reservas calculadas de 5.000 a nueve millones de barriles de crudo.
Manuel Marrero, especialista principal de petróleo del Ministerio cubano de Industria Básica, comentó recientemente: «Todos estamos esperanzados, sin falsas esperanzas tontas, de que existen probabilidades de encontrar yacimientos de petróleo y de gas grandes».
La plataforma semisumergible que se utilizará es la Scarabeo 9, indica el periódico del Partido Comunista. Fabricada en China y Singapur, fue verificada por autoridades cubanas de la seguridad marítima y el medioambiente.
El rotativo omitió que, a solicitud de Repsol, la plataforma fue certificada antes por la Oficina de Seguridad y Legalidad Ambiental del Departamento del Interior y el Servicio de Guardacostas de EEUU. El secretario estadounidense del Interior, Ken Salazar, que se entrevistó en Madrid en junio con Nemesio Fernández Cuesta, director de exploración de Repsol, dijo entonces que la petrolera aceptó «voluntariamente cumplir con las regulaciones de EEUU» en el golfo.
La revisión de la plataforma es, de forma indirecta, el punto más avanzado de Washington y La Habana para dialogar sobre seguridad petrolera toda vez que entre ambos países no existe mecanismo bilateral al respecto.
En el fondo de todo, a favor de un entendimiento entre dos gobiernos enemigos, está el fantasma del mayor desastre en el golfo de México, causado por British Petroleum en el 2010.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)