Little immediate change coming to Cuba (Castro formerly resigns)

[Viva_La_Revolution]

Source: UPI

HAVANA, April 19 (UPI) -- Delegates to Cuba's 6th Communist Party Congress are prepared to elect Raul Castro to replace his ailing brother Fidel, political observers said.

Raul Castro, 79, will officially take over as the party's first secretary presiding over Cuba's shift from a Soviet-style economy toward private enterprise, the Spanish-language newspaper El Nuevo Herald reported Tuesday .
What really interests Cubans, observers said, is who will follow Raul Castro in the party's No. 2 position.

There's been no word on the names of the candidates for the party's Central Committee, a leadership group of about 100, or the more elite Political Bureau with 19 current members.



Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2011/04/19/Little-immediate-change-coming-to-Cuba/UPI-50741303223289/

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Winner! Least Informative Headline of the Day

[Richardo]

1. "formally"?

It's past time, Fidel:

Fidel Castro, 84, wrote to delegates Monday "to overcome the system of capitalist production is undoubtedly a hard challenge in a barbaric time of consumerist societies that fuels and promotes the egotistical instincts of the human being."

He's working those Karl Marx "Mad-Libs" again.

[EFerrari]

7. Mad libs? He's describing tea baggers and spot on.

lol

[Richardo]

8. :^D

"...to overcome the system of (adjective) (noun) is undoubtedly a hard challenge in a (adjective) time of (adjective) societies that fuels and promotes the (adjective) (noun) of the (noun)."


Adjectives:
Barbaric
Bourgeois
Capitalist
Communist
Consumerist
Egotistical
Peaceful
Populist
Socialist

Nouns:
Bourgeoisie
Consumption
Exploitation
Human Being
Instincts
Machine
Paradise
Production
Proletariat
Revolution
Worker

[EFerrari]

9. Here is the whole column in English.

http://www.granma.cu/ingles/reflections-i/reflections-april17.html

I was surprised, when I started reading them, at how well he writes.

[harmonicon]

17. Thanks for the link.

Not much substance, but an interesting read none-the-less.

[harmonicon]

10. Well, they're truthful madlibs then.

The guy has gone from witnessing massive class disparity and government corruption and collusion with criminals to bringing his country to a state with no illiteracy, unemployment, and universal healthcare and education. He seems to be far more on top of things than those who have said otherwise for 50 years.

[Richardo]

13. It's a paradise, alright.

I understand there are hundreds of flimsy rafts - loaded with refugees - floating into Havana harbor every day.

[Judi Lynn]

15. Hundreds of rafts? Really? Do you have a link for that? n/t

[harmonicon]

16. Did I say it was a paradise?

No. I just said that the country, with help of Castro's leadership, has made tremendous progress in the last 50 years, and in many ways is rightfully the envy of much of the world. Sure, some people want to leave Cuba because they've been lied to about a glorious land of opportunity to the north, but others leave temporarily to work in the US for Doctor's Without Borders, treating those our government and society has abandoned.

[Judi Lynn]

18. People always refuse to acknowledge there is constant Caribbean migration,

with people moving throughout the islands, or to the U.S., and Haitians moving to Cuba, having established a large community there, already, with its own radio station in their own language, and newspapers, etc. They even have a world-famous a capella singing group, Les Desandann.

They appear to avoid discussing the HUNDREDS of people who DIE annually in the attempt to cross into the US from California to Texas, many never having been reported. From whom are they fleeing, Felipe Calderon in Mexico, or the Central American Presidents, or even the South American Presidents?

Sad situation.

Those people come here despite the fact that once they get here they will be deported if the government learns about them.

In the case of Cubans, once they make it to the U.S., they are awarded a full array of perks, from instant legal status, freedom from ANY harrassment from immigration, given an instant work visa, social security, welfare, food stamps, and US taxpayer-financed Section 8 Housing, not to mention medical treatment and financial assistance for education. All at the expense of the U.S. taxpayers.

If these benefits were offered other nationalities, we would be so crowded here we wouldn't be able to move.

In effect, the Cuban Adjustment Act struggles to offer Cubans a package as close to what they left behind as possible. Housing, food, medical treatment, education, etc. Cute. No IMS agents.

You're right, they ARE lied to about what they can expect here, and there ARE Cubans who either move back, or work it out so they come and go. It's well covered in former New York Times' jouornalist Ann Louise Bardach's book, Cuba Confidential: Love and Vengeance in Miami and Havana.

No one ever mentions the hundreds and hundreds of people who never make it across the desert, the mountains, the water, and perish in the effort between Mexico and the US border. They're not "fleeing" from "commies."

[BOG PERSON]

2. didn't this already happen a few years ago?

i coudl have sworn fidel was already retired.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

3. On paper he was still in charge.. until today.

[EFerrari]

6. From the government, not from theparty. n/t

[harmonicon]

11. That was as president.

This is as the leader of the party. Just like here, they're different things.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

4. update: Jose Ramon Machado Ventura will beNo. 2. ..

"Raul Castro has been named first secretary of Cuba's Communist Party, with his aging brother Fidel not included in the party's leadership for the first time since its creation more than four decades ago," The Associated Press writes from Havana.

And, "despite raising hopes during the gathering that a new generation of leaders was poised to take up important positions, Raul announced Tuesday that 80-year-old longtime confidante Jose Ramon Machado Ventura would be his No. 2. The 78-year-old vice president Ramiro Valdes was named to the No. 3 spot."

According to the Miami Herald, Fidel Castro "was in attendance at the Communist Party's Central Committee Tuesday morning." And, "there were tears in the eyes of most of the delegates who were expecting an emotional speech" from him — which as of 11 a.m. ET had not happened.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/04/19/135540445/though-fidel-castro-has-stepped-aside-cubas-old-guard-remains-in-charge?ft=1&f=1001&sc=tw&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

[Richardo]

5. Wait, the *young* guy is 78? Not exactly what they mean by 'succession planning'

[harmonicon]

12. ...because it's not. nt.

[Judi Lynn]

14. The Cuban citizens who physically fought in the war against Batista are well respected

in Cuba, as people instrumental in the new government established anywhere, after a brutal, powerful dictator was driven away, would be. Here's a Wiki. on Machado:

José Ramón Machado Ventura, M.D. (born 26 October 1930) is the First Vice-President of the Council of State and Council of Ministers in Cuba. With the election of Raúl Castro as President of Cuba on 24 February 2008, Machado was elected to succeed him as First Vice President.<1>

José Ramón Machado was born in San Antonio de las Vueltas, in the former province of Las Villas, and was schooled in Camajuaní and Remedios.<2> He is a medical doctor by profession, graduating from the University of Havana in 1953. Machado joined the revolutionary movement immediately following Fulgencio Batista's coup d'état of 10 March 1952, while still a medical student, and was an early member of the 26th of July Movement opposing the dictatorship. Later, under the command first of Ernesto "Che" Guevara and subsequently of Fidel Castro, he was one the original revolutionaries who fought the guerrilla war in the Sierra Maestra. In 1958, promoted to the rank of captain, he was sent to the province of Oriente under the command of Raúl Castro as part of the rebels' bid to open up a second front. There he was placed in charge of the guerrillas' medical service, establishing a network of hospitals and dispensaries, and was promoted to the rank of major "comandante" (top rank on Castro's rebel army).<1><3>

Following the revolutionaries' victory on 1 January 1959, he was appointed the director of medical services in Havana and later served as the national Minister of Health from 1960 to 1967, during which time he was responsible for the development of the country's health sector.<2> In January 1968, reportedly in the aftermath of a personal conflict with Fidel Castro over the running of the health sector,<2> he was appointed to serve as the Politburo's delegate in the province of Matanzas. He remained in Matanzas until mid-1971; his administration of the province's economy and health sector was successful, particularly in terms of crop outputs, public transport and reduced infant mortality.<2> Upon leaving Matanzas in 1971, he was appointed first secretary of the Cuban Communist Party in the province of Havana and was elected to the Politburo in December 1975.

He is a member of the National Assembly of People's Power, representing the municipality of Guantánamo. Since 2006, he has been responsible for overseeing Cuba's international education programs.<1>

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/José_Ramón_Machado_Ventura