Before 1959 the Cold War had not been a widely held concern in Cuba. Folks assumed that our nation was too insignificant to be targeted by the Russians, and because the United States was our ally since World War II, the notion that American nuclear-tipped missiles could rain down on us was inconceivable. This started …
Category Archives: Cuba
Yunel Escobar’s slur didn’t come from left field
Two or three minutes after I saw the photo of Escobar’s cheeks and read the news stories, I considered writing this. But I decided to wait until things returned to normal so people would read me with cooler heads. It’s important to say I’ve never met the Toronto Blue Jays short-stop and don’t think I …
Corruption in Cuba
News from Cuba concerning a crackdown against entrenched corruption have circled the world in the last few weeks. A former food industries minister, Alejandro Roca, is serving a 15-year sentence. The president of Cubana de Aviacion was fired and 14 executives of that airline and a tourism agency were sentenced to prison terms. Officials from the …
New Book Announcement
Seeing that countless booklovers in different countries, at launches or by email, ask me questions about Cuba, I felt it worthwhile to write a non-fiction book about my country of birth recounting the 20th century’s most important political, economic and social events, and the challenges that I believe Cuba will have to deal with in the future. I strove …
Entertainment and the Internet: Political Weapons?
During the previous century authoritarian regimes used radio, television, cinematography, sports and art forms such as stage plays, music and ballet, to make their subjects forget their tribulations and enslavement. Communist dictatorships excelled at this. Internet-based social media, however, has proved a two-edged sword. On the one hand, it serves as propaganda tool and invaluable source …
Wishful thinking on Cuba
When Rául Castro took over the government of Cuba on July 31, 2006, first-world experts on foreign affairs, Havana-based foreign journalists, and some overseas businessmen in search for new markets started floating the notion that the younger Castro, aged 75, was much more pragmatic than Fidel and could move Cuba towards the current Chinese economic …
The meaning of “Indication” in Communist Cuba
If at some point in the history of mankind someone writes a book on the most appalling euphemisms, he or she may want to consider including one currently employed in Cuba. The “indication” (orientación in Spanish, which literally translates as orientation or guidance) was created by the Communist party in the second half of the 20th …
