President's sex-tourism allegation riles Cubans

[Judi Lynn]

Posted on Sun, Jul. 18, 2004

CUBA


President's sex-tourism allegation riles Cubans

Cubans call President Bush's charge that the island nation has a booming sex business a lie, saying crackdowns have ended the trade.

BY TRACEY EATON

The Dallas Morning News


HAVANA -- Cubans blasted President Bush on Saturday after he accused Fidel Castro of turning the island into a major spot for sex tourism and child prostitution.
''I've never heard anything as pig-filthy as that,'' said Marta Rojas, a celebrated Cuban author. ''The nose of Pinocchio'' -- as some Cubans call Bush -- ``is so long it can't get any longer.''
(snip)

Before the 1959 revolution, the flesh trade thrived. Sex shows and porn palaces flourished, and as many as 100,000 prostitutes may have roamed the streets.

On Friday, Bush told a Tampa crowd that Cuba's sex business was again booming, helping prop up Castro's ``corrupt government.''
(snip)

Some Cubans wonder what country Bush is talking about.

''We don't exploit children for sex,'' said Johana Brito, 18, a computer sciences student. ``It's a lie.''
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/9181438.htm
(Free registration required)

Related thread from Friday:

ringmastery (1000+ posts) Fri Jul-16-04 08:20 PM
Bush Says Castro Welcomes Sex Tourism

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=690988

[WI_DEM]

1. Will the press ask Bush to back up his allegations or is he using

his usual faulty intelligence? This is pure and simple a ploy for the votes of Cubans in Florida who hate Fidel Castro. It's also pretty desperate.

[Warpy]

4. Are you kidding?

This is just another lie, and Bush's whole administration and bid for election is based on nothing but lies: lies about his record, lies about his opponent, and now lies about the rest of the world.

God doesn't love a liar. We need to remind people of that.

[teach1st]

6. Bush's claims

From the Miami Herald article:

To back up his claim, Bush cited the Protection Project, a human rights research institute at Johns Hopkins University. In a three-page report posted on its Internet site, the group said that while ''little information is available,'' Cuba is ''increasingly reported to be a major destination for sex tourists.'' That finding was based mostly on newspaper clippings, most from the 1990s, one going back to 1994.

The Protection Project:
http://www.protectionproject.org/main1.htm

On edit: The Protection Project's Report on Cuba
http://www.protectionproject.org/human_rights/countryreport/cuba.htm

[Judi Lynn]

15. Also from the Miami Herald article:

No one disputes that prostitution in Cuba soared after the fall of its chief sponsor, the former Soviet Union. And on Friday nights, thousands of prostitutes lined the Malecon, Havana's seaside highway. Word got around.

In 1996, authorities cracked down, breaking up a crime ring that controlled some 7,000 prostitutes in the resort of Varadero.
(snip)

In October 1998, Cuban authorities clamped down again, netting 6,714 prostitutes and 190 pimps.

The fight against prostitution in the late `90s was "very tough," Castro conceded in 2001. "Some people were coming here with ideas of sexual tourism. ... We began taking adequate measures to combat these outbreaks. And we are still perfecting our methods." Longtime visitors say they've seen the results of the Cuban government's campaign. But U.S. officials continue to criticize the situation.
(snip)

[Scairp]

50. It can't be any worse there than it is here

We have a sex trade in every single city of any significant size and nobody is denouncing this country. Oh, I forgot, we are the "good guys" and can do no wrong.:eyes:

[Mika]

52. Cuba busts the Johns too

Cuba doesn't only bust the prostitutes (mainly female), but the pimps and Johns too (mainly male). IOW, the crackdowns aren't purely sexist.

[The Zanti Regent]

21. What does Neil Bush say?

After all, he is the family expert in pimping!

[nodictators]

27. Neil was the John in Thailand

He claimed that attractive women females came to his hotel room and that he had sex with them. He claimed that he didn't pay them. HA-HA. OK, maybe he put it on his room service tab.

Thailand cracked down on sex-tourism after Neil's visit. Seems that many of the girls, and they are underage girls, are forced into prostitution.

Nevertheless, Neil proudly recounted his sordid story.

[wolfgirl]

2. These

neocons are about sex...they are obsessed :freak:

[asjr]

19. They are obsessed--with sex habits of others.

[louis-t]

36. Yet, I maintain that Republicans

are disgusted with their own bodies and feel shame for their sexual obsessions but can't help themselves. This comes from trying to stifle what is normal and natural, until it becomes uncontrollable.

[Not Me]

3. Thumbing his nose at another contingent of his base.

Way to go Chimpy!!

[truthisfreedom]

11. must have a long thumb.

heh.

[Spinzonner]

5. Let's not get too negative about this

it could be a good opportunity to send Ashcroft there to clean up the situation. And he would have trouble coming back afterward ...

After all, now that he's saved the country from Tommy Chong and is is in the process of protecting us from Bobby Fisher, he doesnt have a lot to do.

[charlyvi]

8. After All

Bobby Fisher was found to be conspiring with kings, queens and knights. What's an attorney general to do?

BWAHAHAHAHAHA

[Spinzonner]

9. Yeah, but

God knows what he's been up to with those Bishops

[charlyvi]

14. He was their patsy....

You know--get ready---their PAWN!!!

(groan)

[Spinzonner]

17. Explanations are so pathetic

I just thought I'd mention En Passant

[the Kelly Gang]

7. Fox will pick it up for sure

[Stephanie]

10. George should ask his brother Neil about sex tourism

If George wants to know where the sex tourists are going, he should just ask his brother. Can't this guy ever check one fact? Neil! Tell him about the girls in Thailand who just spontaneously knock on your door.

[truthisfreedom]

12. somebody tell Kerry this one... that's seriously funny.

i mean it.

[Stephanie]

28. Please do send it to them - in Neil's own words:

Bush: "I had sexual intercourse with perhaps three or four, I don't remember the exact number, women, at different times. In Thailand once, I have a pretty clear recollection that there was one time in Thailand and in Hong Kong."

Brown: "And you were married to Mrs. Bush?"

Bush: "Yes."

Brown: "Is that where you caught the venereal diseases?"

Bush: "No."

Brown: "Where did you catch those?"

Bush: "Diseases plural? I didn't catch..."

Brown: "Well, I'm sorry. How ... how many venereal diseases do you suffer from?"

Bush: "I've had one venereal disease."

Brown: "Which was?"

Bush: "Herpes."

Brown then interrogates Bush's about his various sex partners: "Did you pay them for that sex?"

Bush: "No, I did not."

Brown: "Pick them up in a sushi house?"

Bush: "No. ... My recollection is, where I can recall, they came to my room."

Brown: "Do you know the name of that hotel? I may go to Thailand sometime."

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/gossip/story/150848p-132934c.html

[Judi Lynn]

31. Poor Neil Bush. He's done NOTHING to distinguish himself

other than wreck the Silverado, take flying leaps at various "entrepreneurial" schemes which come his way through his family, and get herpes from his own "sexual tourism," as it would seem.


Sheikh Hamdan with Neil Bush (left) after the inauguration of Gitex 2001. ©Gulf News

_{George Bush} needs something to do in our White House to keep himself busy, so he doesn't have to make such an @$$ of himself.

[MissAnnThrope]

44. Wait A Minute

He HAD herpes? As in the past tense? Hasn't anyone told him herpes is forever, that it can't be cured, only controlled?

[Stephanie]

29. "It was very unusual," Bush said.

The Bush divorce, completed in April after 23 years of marriage, was prompted in part by Bush's relationship with another woman. He admitted in the deposition that he previously had sex with several other women while on trips to Thailand and Hong Kong at least five years ago.

The women, he said, simply knocked on the door of his hotel room, entered and had sex with him. He said he did not know if they were prostitutes because they never asked for money and he did not pay them.

"Mr. Bush, you have to admit it's a pretty remarkable thing for a man just to go to a hotel room door and open it and have a woman standing there and have sex with her," Brown said.

"It was very unusual," Bush said.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/11/25/bush.brother.reut/

[NashVegas]

13. Bush May Have Been Speaking to Exiled Cubans, But

I think the message was really intended for Mexicans and other hispanic immigrants; rumors of child-snatching rings among those countries are rife.

[readmylips]

23. Are you saying Mexicans and other HIspanics are Whores???

And they prostitute their children? I forgot. In America Whores are called Madam....Madam Heidi Flasher...and they get to go on the Larry (9 wives) King show when things are going tough for little bush. (Sarcastic me, I know what you're saying).

Little bush is really picking a fight with the Cubans. They are rich, influential, of the white race, and not the type of minority to take insults from anybody. Don't cross a Cuban, he'll have your head on a platter, especially if you insult their families and their beloved Cuba. They only thing Cubans don't do is to organize and go fight Castro themselves.

Chalabi learned from the Cubans's failures and jumped the gun on them. Chalabi got georgie to invade his country, Iraq, so Chalabi could claim his family's fortunes.

[NashVegas]

32. Are You Trying to Start a Flamefest for No Good Reason?

http://www.libertadlatina.org/Index.htm
http://www.pueblito.org/issues/prostitution.htm
http://www.selfempowermentacademy.com.au/_disc4/00000014.htm

[Judi Lynn]

33. Thanks for these links. Strange we haven't heard more about this!

from the first link:

This multi-million dollar industry exists within the informal economy and 'employs' approximately 1.5 million children in India, 1 million children in Asia, 500 000 children in Latin America and 100 000 children in the United States (Healy, 1995). Other research suggests that 1 million children enter the ring of female prostitution each year throughout the world (Child Prostitution: Crime Against Humanity). Third only to Thailand and India, Brazil has been identified as one of the countries with the most child prostitutes (Child Prostitution: Crime Against Humanity).
(snip)

From the third link:

Child prostitution is the most overlooked form of child abuse in the United Sates and the public attitude towards it needs to change. There are currently no state agencies charged with identifying and investigating juvenile prostitution and recording its existence. It is often treated as a nuisance crime by local law enforcement. There is also the misconception that juvenile prostitutes are willing participants in their own victimization. Having experienced unimaginable abuse, they are truly victims in desperate need of help. Professionals from a variety of diciplines including the court system, law enforcement, and victim service agencies must increase their collective efforts to combat this problem. Adapted from The Report on Child Prostitution as a Form of Forced Labor: A Non-Governmental Organization Perspective by Ladda Saikaew. Reprinted with permission of the Bureau of International Labor Affairs of the U.S. Department of Labor. http://www.labor.gov.
(snip)

Although there may be more children in the commercial sex industry in developing countries, there is no shortage of child prostitutes in relatively prosperous countries such as: USA, Britain, Canada, Japan, France, and Austrailia.
(snip)

Countries with a serious problem in this area include: Korea, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Cambodia, Nepal, The Philippines, and Thailand. The Philippines and Thailand are especially entrenched in widespread child prostitution.
(snip)

Following Thailand, Brazil has the second largest number of prostituted children in the world. UNICEF reports the figure to be at about 500,000. It's probably not a coincidence that Brazil also has the third highest number of AIDS cases globally. Brazil is not alone in Latin America with this devastating problem. There are significant quantities of child prostitutes working in Nicaragua and Venezuela where children are being sexually exploited primarily by miners, migrant workers, and sailors. The prostitution of children is also of increasing concern in: Honduras, El Salvador, Columbia, Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Guatemala, and Argentina. As in Asia, the commercial sexual exploitation of children is a growth industry in all of Latin America. There are organized bands of men in Brazil that traffic girls from urban slums to remote mining sites in the Amazon. There, they are held as sex slaves until they are physically unable to continue servicing men sexually. Many young girls contract AIDS and other sexually- transmitted diseases, are abused or tortured, or even killed when they attempt to escape their conditions. The situation in Columbia is also dismal. A 1994 study by the City of Bogota Chamber of Commerce found that prostitution among 8-13 year olds has increased by 500% between 1986 and 1993. A 1995 UNICEF study in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua discovered that almost half of the girl prostitutes they interviewed entered prostitution between the ages of nine and thirteen. There appears to be a trend towards more and younger prostitutes in most of the Latin American countries for which data is available. The United States has also seen an increase of juvenile prostitutes working on the streets. Although this is still principally a phenomenon of large urban areas such as Los Angeles and New York, it is moving into more mid-sized cities such as Minneapolis, and Seattle. Canada has experienced a similar trend, where it is not uncommon to find underaged prostitutes working the streets of Vancouver and Montreal.
(snip)

I'm NOT seeing Cuba's name popping up in any of these sources. Remarkable.

[NashVegas]

46. Correct

We don't hear about this much because it involves the poorest of the poor. Los invisibles.

It makes little sense to me that there'd be reports about child enslavement in Cuba, it's a very structured environment there, no? For this to subsist, there'd have to be major lawlessness and corruption, and that's one thing no one's accusing the Castro government of.

OTOH, there are people living near the Texas border who want to know, what's up with all the dead bodies?

[Judi Lynn]

48. It's not like there hasn't been enough time to investigate.

Scores of people from all over the U.S. have made trips to Texas to try to draw attention to the problem screaming to be noticed.

How many, many years and deaths will be spent?

Yep, they were "no one," as well. They had no wealth.

[Mika]

49. A structured environment there

"Freedom is messy" - Rummy

I guess that (freedom) is why 10% of American children are sexually exploited IN SCHOOL. <sarcasm off>

[charlyvi]

16. If Cuban Americans are so thick with the home island

Wouldn't you think they'd be insulted about bush* calling their home and families child sex molestors? Oh, I forgot. * doesn't think.

[Jade Fox]

26. He probably thought it would rile them up against Castro and solidfy

traditional Cuban-American support of Republican regimes, specifically
BushCo.

The problem is that Cuban Americans likely know more about what goes
on in Cuba than BushCo, and as you point out, are not likely to appreciate
having their home insulted and lied about.

Arrogance + stupidity = lies. The BushCo formula.

[charlyvi]

30. Not to mention the fact

that he has curtailed many Cuban American's visits to their family with this new nonsense. They can't visit Cuba as often as before. So much for family values.

[jdj]

42. This was a gaffe along the lines of that stupid WMD's act

he did during that speech where he pretended to be looking for them under chairs and stuff. Boy did that ever blow up in his face. All his spinners must be on crystal; they just need to chill out, instead of pulling all this b.s. out of their butts and putting it out there for no conceivable reason whatsoever.

This must be the fourth G behind god, guns and gays: genitalia, or anything having to do with genitalia. When all else fails and you're desperate to inflame the masses, talk about the vagina dentata of liberal women like Hilary Clinton, or about the lascivious libidos of anyone anywhere as long as it's OVER THERE. I think Janet Jackson is the biggest freaking genius on the face of the earth right about now, she read the political tides just right and made the career move of the millienium, she needs to get the Nobel piece prize.

[Mika]

34. Jade, speaking of ignorance..

".. and solidfy traditional Cuban-American support of Republican regimes.. "

And you learned that where?

Here's some facts to substitute the myth..

- charts from opensecrets.org -





Arrogance + stupidity = lost (s)elections. Dems should know this by now.

[Jade Fox]

47. Glad to find out I'm wrong. n/t

[no_hypocrisy]

18. Allegation re. sex tourism can't be true: it involves free market

capitalism. Unless * left out another part of his rant by claiming the prostitutes have to register with the government in order to work and surrender their pay to the same institution. (I think this part would REALLY get the collective panties of the GOP in a bunch.)

Otherwise, child labor can't be anything but good for a nation's economy, right George?

[Jacobin]

20. Are we going to invade Nevada too?

Prostitution is legal in some counties there.

[nolabels]

24. First they drop a lot bombs on the place, invasions by crooks come later

XX-27 CHARLIE a 14 kiloton device was dropped from a B-50 bomber on October 30, 1951 at Yucca Flat. The test, part of the Buster-Jangle series, was the eighth detonation at the Nevada Proving Grounds.

http://www.nv.doe.gov/news&pubs/photos&films/atm.htm

[quaoar]

22. Sure, go ahead and laugh

at our president. Make fun of him. Ridicule the notion of the Cuban sex trade. But he's got solid info on this

What y'all don't know is that for the past year Neil Bush has been conducting an undercover investigation into this filthy business. Neil has personally "interviewed" hundreds of Cuban prostitutes. God only knows the dangers he's faced to expose this shocking filth.

He forced himself to engage in sex acts to gain the trust of these people -- all in the name of patriotism. We all owe our freedom to brave men like Neil who are willing to sacrifice everything to keep us safe.

The man deserves a medal -- or some penicillin or something.

It brings a tear to my eye.

[readmylips]

25. Little bush has personal knowlege of ladies of the night....

across the boarder in Tijuana. That's where he learned his 'street spanish.'

[jdj]

39. And where he took his girlfriend for the illegal abortion.

Viva la Mexico.

[wellstone_democrat]

45. lmao

that was fabulous!

[peekaloo]

51. LOL....Neil "Who's your sugar cane daddy" Boo$h

:bounce:

[Endangered Specie]

35. Oh, and we dont have ANYYY of that stuff here in the US eh?

please :eyes:

[lumpy]

37. Just remember God is

speaking through Bush.

[Elginoid]

38. who are you going to believe-

your President & fearless leader, or some godless communist?

:evilgrin:

[bobthedrummer]

40. Godalmighty-the Cuban people DID have that-UNDER BATISTA!

That's one of the many reasons the Cuban people rose up in revolution AGAINST BATISTA.

Anyone that suggests different is a fucking liar in my book.

[Mika]

41. Our own gov admits 10% of US children sexually exploited AT SCHOOL

The goddamn nerve of dictator Bush to accuse Cuba of such ugly behavior, when our own government admits that 10% of our own kids are sexually exploited at schools in the USA!


-Children face sex risk at US schools-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1263844,00.html

Research claiming that one in 10 American children has been sexually exploited at school - and that almost half the abusers are women - has shocked parents as one of the nation's most notorious pupil abusers is about to be released from prison.

More than 4.5 million school-age children have been subjected to some form of sexual behaviour from teachers or other adults meant to be looking after them, said the first official research commissioned by the US government's education department.

DU thread here
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x693702

[bobthedrummer]

43. There's no sex industry in America involving minors and our kids are

safe in their schools and homes-right?