Captain’s Quarters Blog has two excellent stories on its front page. First there is this story about the Irish terrorist group, the IRA, and how it may have finally exhausted its support.
I won’t be the first to say it, but it is about time. Long before 9/11 Irish-Americans should have been able to tell that there wasn’t anything romantic or noble or good about the IRA and its struggle. Bush is meeting with the families of those killed in this incident, and is specifically not meeting with Gerry Adams for Saint Patrick’s day. It has long been my belief that the IRA has survived so long on the backs of dupes in other countries (and especially in the US) who support them financially.
The Captain also has a report on the Cuban medical system. It republishes photos from the Gentiuno of Cuba’s premier non-foreigner hospital. Those pictures actually shocked me. Since it is a communist hospital I expected it to be bad, but this is crazy. The hospital would give flea-bag hotels a bad name and would make some 3rd-world hospitals look great. Every time I hear someone laud Castro’s medical miracles I’m going to remember this hospital. He may have great care for foreigners and high-level party members, but his ‘universal’ health care isn’t.
Comment of no value.
Iraq then Iran then the IRA, I heard Bush may be dyslexic, but must he telegraph every move by going alphabetically?
I always have been amused by the story about how, when Brits started getting CNN, were horrified about the support of the IRA in the US openly stated on the news network, and CNN had to explain that IRA meant Individual Retirement Accounts.
I couldn’t google up a reference, so I could be making this all up.
I couldn’t google up a reference, so I could be making this all up.
Yeah, you’re known round these parts as an untrustworthy sort…;)
As I understand it, where Cuba has focussed its health care resources (which are, thanks to the long-term US embargo, the equivalent of a Third World country) is on preventive medicine – the kind of health care that stops you needing to go into hospital. This is a feature of socialist health care, and the net result is both efficient and highly successful in terms of improving general health care.
. . . where Cuba has focussed its health care resources (which are, thanks to the long-term US embargo, the equivalent of a Third World country) . . .
Every other country available trades with Cuba, but the fact that it’s a poverty-stricken shithole is the fault of the US, rather than of Castro and its communist dictatorship. Right.
Every other country available trades with Cuba
And the US embargo is intended to hit those countries, too.
The intention of the US embargo on Cuba is to restrain other countries from trading with Cuba.
If your argument is that the embargo is useless, that countries trade with Cuba anyway and are not penalized by the US for so doing, then make that case: show that it happens.
Meeting with the McCartney family is fair enough and might actually rock the boat a little. I wonder though how the McBride family feels about Bush awarding a 293m $ Iraq contract to the company of Tim Spicer (Aegis), whose thugs shot dead (in the back) their 18 year old son in 1992 in Northern Ireland, and who found no fault with their actions and has since relentlessly campaigned for their release.
Snubbing Gerry Adams and calling Sinn Fein “a terrorist front” is just stupid. Northern Ireland is definitely not “with us or against us” territory.
If your argument is that the embargo is useless, that countries trade with Cuba anyway and are not penalized by the US for so doing, then make that case: show that it happens
See Canada, America’s largest trading partner who we have a free trade agreement with.
Every other country available trades with Cuba, but the fact that it’s a poverty-stricken shithole is the fault of the US, rather than of Castro and its communist dictatorship. Right.
Compare Cuba to it’s Neighboring Carribean Countries (Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica), and you’ll observe that the situation is not half bad.
Every country available trades with Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, but the fact that they are poverty-stricken shithole is the fault of the ?????, rather than of their crappy goverments and their capitalist dictatorships. Right.
It’s an incomplete measure and deceptive in some ways, but life expectancy in the US and Cuba is identical (77 years) and infant mortality is actually lower in Cuba (6 per 1000 in Cuba verus 7 in the US.) This argues that Cuba’s health care system is not the disaster this post implies. I agree that Cuba’s government leaves MUCH to be desired, but it has managed to keep its citizens alive and reasonably healthy.
Oops cites for the above stats:
http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/cuba_statistics.html
http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/usa_statistics.html
Timmy invited me to “see Canada” (a pleasure: it’s one of my favorite countries!).
Yes, despite strong efforts by the US to enforce their Cuba embargo on Canada, (see An Anatomy of a Cuban pyjama crisis: reconsidering blocking legislation in response to extraterritorial trade measures of the United States, Canada : U.S. Embargo Against Cuba – the Canadian Response) Canada has continued to trade with Cuba.
So, Timmy, what’s your feeling about the Canadian law making it illegal for any corporation trading in Canada to obey U.S. extraterritorial trade measures? Does this render the U.S. embargo on Cuba pointless and to be abandoned? Do you have a point to make about it, or did you just want me to “see Canada”?
(Montreal, for choice. I like Montreal.)
You guys are always very generous in your support of other bloggers. Whether we come from the right or the left, whether we are men or women, generosity of spirit is something the world could use more of. The world seems to have enough space for Cat blogging. What about Women Blogger Blogging? Found here.
Thanks for your contribution to my understanding of the broad perspective of ideas out there, all presented in an atmosphere of respect.
Who needs to have a special day for women blogging, she asked?
Who needs to have a special day for women blogging, she asked?
Because otherwise people may not notice we’re female? she said.
Don Q., feel free to argue with the people in your head who are making the argument you think you’re countering. Let me know, because I’m intensely curious.
Jes, instead of playing your usual game, I’m going to ask you, for once, to support your own contention: Please prove, per your own assertion, that poverty and lack of adequate health care resources in Cuba are the fault of the United States’ trade embargo with Cuba rather than a result of the actions of its military dictatorship. (A government type which, IIRC, you are none too fond of.) Should you fail to prove this assertion, I’ll feel comfortable believing that you’re just making stuff up for the sake of blaming the US for something.
I, by the way, do not support the continued embargo on trade with Cuba.
Depressing, but true. She sighed, recalling the striking proportion of the people who linked to her posts who added something like: “He makes a good point.”
It’s spooky when people mistake one’s gender. I once courted this deliberately: I was writing a travel guide to part of Mexico, and despite having happily travelled alone in such feminist paradises as Egypt, the level of harassment was beginning to get to me. One night, when someone tried to grab me, and, when I pushed him away, started screaming “F*cking bitch! F*cking American whore!”, I thought: I have to do something. (Consider: when you write a travel guide you have to spend a lot of time going to restaurants, discos, etc. alone, and not doing this is not an option.)
My first thought was to acquire a nun’s habit, but I had no idea where to get one, and besides, it was Mexico in July. My second was to get a serious crew cut, since (I thought) the split second it took people to wonder about my gender would be the split second I walked by unharassed. So I got my hair cut to less than 1/4 inch long, about the length of velvet, and it worked: my life improved immensely.
A few days later, I was writing in a cafe and someone struck up a conversation with me, and it was completely normal: all about soccer and movies and stuff. And I hadn’t had a normal conversation in Mexico until that point, and it was so pleasant. After about 15 minutes or so someone who knew the guy I was talking to walked up, and he introduced me as “un norteamericano”, masculine, and it was the most complete, horrible shock. Because while I had intended to cause momentary confusion, it had never occurred to me that I might actually be mistaken for a guy for more than a moment. (I am not very guy-like in appearance.) — It absolutely floored me.
Sorry: the preceding was addressed to Jes, not Phil.
Phil: Please prove, per your own assertion, that poverty and lack of adequate health care resources in Cuba are the fault of the United States’ trade embargo with Cuba rather than a result of the actions of its military dictatorship.
*shrug* I am afraid, Phil, that I am guilty of simply taking the US government at face value. The intention of the trade embargo is to create poverty on Cuba, both by stopping the US from trading with Cuba, and – insofar as the US can control what other countries do with regard to Cuba – preventing other countries from trading with Cuba.
Now, you want to argue that the US trade embargo, which has continued for 45 years or so is in fact pointless, and has no effect on the Cuban economy. Fair enough. Robert Torricelli said, when he introduced the Cuban Democracy Bill in 1992, that he wanted it to “wreak havoc on the island”: you think he’s wrong and that it had no effect.
Your government, Phil. Your country’s actions. You say they’re pointless and ineffectual: fine. Show that they are.
People really don’t like to believe that they’ve mis-guessed someone’s gender. Once they make a guess, they really want to stick with it.
I went through a period in college where I had very short hair — not a crewcut, but under an inch long up the back, and only a little longer on top. I’m tallish, and not particularly hippy, and at that time was a jeans&T-shirt/jeans&sweater, depending on the weather, wearing slob. In the winters, when I was wearing heavy enough clothes that my chest wasn’t visible, I used to inadvertently pass as male all the time. Once someone had guessed wrong and said something indicating that they thought I was a man (on one memorable occasion “You can’t go in there, that’s the ladies room”) it was very hard to convince them otherwise.
Phil: Should you fail to prove this assertion, I’ll feel comfortable believing that you’re just making stuff up for the sake of blaming the US for something.
My point here, Phil, is that I am not “making stuff up” for the sake of blaming the US: various American politicians have been proud to claim the blame on this one, for several decades. If they’re all wrong, and in fact these laws and policies have had nil effect, well – as I said, feel free to show this.
I suspect, in fact, that the truth is somewhere between things: that Cuba would most likely be a more prosperous island without the trade embargo, but that (as capitalist measurements reckon) it would still not measure up to purely capitalist nations with the same resources.
As a socialist, I think purely capitalist measurements are flawed, precisely because they ignore such values as universal health care, improved life expectancy, better education for all. As has been pointed out already, Cuba’s health care system matches the US in basic accomplisments such as infant survival and average life-expectancy: an interesting example of what a socialist healthcare system can do with minimal resources matched against a capitalist healthcare system with maximal resources.
The establishment of an illegal oubliette on Cuba for storing political prisoners beyond the reach of justice
made it impossible for George W. Bush to take the high moral ground in any criticism of Fidel Castro’s regime, of course. But I don’t suppose that’s stopped him: that would be a reality-based criticism.
LizardBreath: Once someone had guessed wrong and said something indicating that they thought I was a man (on one memorable occasion “You can’t go in there, that’s the ladies room”) it was very hard to convince them otherwise.
That’s happened to me, a couple of times, for the same reason (tall, short hair, rarely wear any make-up) and my usual solution (when it matters, as when they want to bar me from the ladies’ room) is to step closer, put my arms back a little, and say something. My voice has never been mistaken for a man’s, thank God. 😉
Now, you want to argue that the US trade embargo, which has continued for 45 years or so is in fact pointless . . .
I do?
Your government, Phil. Your country’s actions. You say they’re pointless and ineffectual:
I do?
Here’s a clue for you: Instead of wasting your energy telling me what I think — which is, by the by, incorrect — how about actually showing that the embargo is the major cause of Cuba’s problems. You know — actually proving it instead of asserting it. Or, since you claim the power to read minds, set up a psychic hotline and make some money. Whatever floats your boat.
Show that they are.
Got it. No intention of proving your own assertion, preferring to play the, “I thus assert, prove I’m wrong” game. As usual.
See here for the Europa report on Cuba.
There is no weighting of the factors in this report, but the factors I see are:
EU investor concern about US claims
Private ownership of land is illegal
Private ownership of productive capital is illegal
Tight Price Controls
Extensive Labor Controls
Lack of COMECON trade
Human Rights Problems
Withdrawing from the Lomé Convention
Refusal of EU aid
also mentioned in areas I didn’t quote:
Cuba is the only country in the region that still does not have a co-operation agreement with the Community.
Only one of those problems is attributable to the lack of US trade. Many of those factors are exactly the same factors that caused the collapse of the USSR economy.
Just because the US intends that the trade restrictions do something does not insure that it does in fact do that thing. Cuba trades with the rest of the world and has been for more than a decade. The problem is that communist systems are notoriously bad at creating productive economies.
You can actually have a crappy economy and score well on measures of public health and literacy and so forth. Amartya Sen makes that point, usually pointing to Kerala as an example.
Paul Farmer, the guy Tracy Kidder writes about in “Mountains Beyond Mountains”, is a fan of the Cuban health system. I’d type in what he says to Kidder, but I’m lazy and will content myself with strongly recommending that book. I suspect Farmer knows a teensy bit more about public health in poor countries than anyone here, or everyone here put together and multiplied by a hundred. I might be wrong.
Timmy invited me to “see Canada” (a pleasure: it’s one of my favorite countries!). … Montreal, for choice. I like Montreal.)
Montreal is a wonderful place, but Vancouver has real mountains, not like that little hill in the middle of Montreal that they call a mountain. That photo in the link above is one of my favorite kayaking areas, twenty minutes drive from downtown.
‘Course, the urban culture is pretty impressive in Montreal (I lived there near the McGill ghetto for a while). As long as you’re not poor…
Sebastian: The problem is that communist systems are notoriously bad at creating productive economies.
I actually agree with that, but why not focus on those issues instead of trying to pull down something that they may actually be doing well? Some relatives of mine (quite a few, actually) just got back from a holiday in Cuba, where they were living with families in various parts of the country. Seeing day to day living, they were able to see the pluses and minuses of the system, but education and healthcare were not on the minus side.
I’d be interested in what you would have thought if someone posted images from a run-down Latin American or West Indian clinic, and used those as an indictment of the free market system (“Every time I hear someone laud the free market’s medical miracles I’m going to remember this hospital. They may have great care for tourists and those with wealth, but this ‘universal’ health care isn’t.”)
Me: Now, you want to argue that the US trade embargo, which has continued for 45 years or so is in fact pointless . . .
Phil: I do?
If that wasn’t the point you were trying to make when you said “but the fact that it’s a poverty-stricken shithole is the fault of the US, rather than of Castro and its communist dictatorship” I don’t know what it was. What were you trying to say when you asserted what I have just quoted back at you, if not that the US embargo had no effect on Cuba’s poverty?
Why, I meant exactly what I said! You are a native English speaker, yes? Let me re-arrange the words for you to see if it helps: Cuba’s problem arise more from the fact that it is led by a Communist military dictator (whose ideas of political repression, by the way, would curl the hair of even the most fervent Bush-hater) rather than from any effects the U.S. trade embargo has had. if you can’t understand the sentence, I literally cannot help you.
Once again, before you make up more stuff about what I do and don’t think, I oppose the trade and travel embargoes. Both because an embargo is the least effective way of liberalizing an economy and a body politic from afar; and because it provides cover for people who suddenly find themselves enamored of political leaders they would despise in any nearly other context to critize the US, so long as said political leaders are handing out immunizations and yearly physicals.
“I actually agree with that, but why not focus on those issues instead of trying to pull down something that they may actually be doing well?”
My point, personally, is that the idea that health care is something Cuba does well (at least for non-foreigners and for those not at the very highest levels of Castro’s Party) may be incorrect and/or Cuban propaganda. I’m not pulling the Cuban health care system down. At the very worst I am (if pointing to correct information) pulling down a false perception about how good the Cuban health care system allegedly is.
The Cuban health care system as portrayed by Castro is a big propaganda piece. It is commonly used if defense of Castro along the lines of “Castro might be sortof nasty, but at least he provides good health care”. It is the “trains on time” argument. I think it is a horrible argument since it is possible to have good health care without sending off playwrights and gay people and journalists to prison camps for the rest of their lives. But I can’t always choose what kinds of arguments convince people. Therefore, I thought it might be useful to point out that there exists some evidence that the medical miracle might be a lie.
Sebastian – fair enough, I suppose. I do think that Cuba is a bit of a whipping boy with conservatives, however, and a large amount of effort seems to be expended on examining every niche and crack in Cuba’s system in order to demonstrate the failings of socialism without the corresponding examination of the conditions of free-market systems in the immediate neighborhood.
Me, well, I have both the freedom and inclination to visit Cuba at some point in the future to make up my own mind. And as I grew up in the West Indies under a free-market economy, that may make for an interesting comparison. There are people in the W.I that would slit a throat to obtaiun universal health care, even of the sort those photos show, if accurate.
My point, personally, is that the idea that health care is something Cuba does well (at least for non-foreigners and for those not at the very highest levels of Castro’s Party) may be incorrect and/or Cuban propaganda. I’m not pulling the Cuban health care system down. At the very worst I am (if pointing to correct information) pulling down a false perception about how good the Cuban health care system allegedly is.
I don’t know that showing a run-down hospital provides a lot of information in this regard. What I have heard said in support of the Cuban health care system is that it produces good results despite the very small amount of resources it has available — showing pictures of a badly maintained facility supports the idea that its resources are very limited, but doesn’t speak to the quality of results it gets. On statistical measures of public health, my understanding (and I haven’t looked at the numbers recently) is that Cuba’s results are quite good.
Stats showing that Cuba’s, e.g., life expectancy is lower than was previously thought would go a long way toward “pulling down a false perception about how good the Cuban health care system allegedly is”; pictures showing roaches in a hospital? Not so much.
“I don’t know that showing a run-down hospital provides a lot of information in this regard.”
Not ‘a’ hospital. The crown jewel of the hospitals which the common people are allowed to use.
“On statistical measures of public health, my understanding (and I haven’t looked at the numbers recently) is that Cuba’s results are quite good.”
I’ve always wondered about this. Castro does not allow a free press. Castro does not allow free movement of independent reseachers. Where do these statistical measures come from? Are they even remotely independent from Castro’s government?
I really don’t know much about this, but do you have some reason for calling the hospital pictured the ‘crown jewel’ of the hospitals common people are allowed to use other than the Castro quote from 1989 calling it ‘one of’ the most modern hospitals in the capital? It’s not in the blog you linked, but of course it could be something you know independently.
Well if we aren’t going to take Castro’s word for it, there is the inference you can gain from Clínico Quirúrgico being the only one of the four public hospitals in Havana which is a general hospital, the other three being:
Hospital Ortopedico
Hospital Pediátrico
Hospital Pediatrico Y Cardiocentro Infantil
I think it is generally safe to assume (assumptions being neccessary in a state where the press is subject to constant censorship) that the general public hospitals outside of Havana aren’t likely to be hugely better than those inside Havana. Havana’s population represents almost 20% of the population of Cuba, and it is Cuba’s most advanced population center.
Also note that Quirúrgico means ‘surgical’. So the 4 major public hospitals are the Orthopedic hospital, the Pediatric hosptial, the Infant Cardiovascular Hospital, and the one pictured–the Surgical Hospital. It is pretty clear that the Surgical Hospital is the one most likely to fill the more general needs of what we think of in a hospital.
I want to note again that Cuba does have an excellent hospital in Havana–but it is only for foreigners or high-level Party members. It shouldn’t be counted in the concept of “Universal Health Care in Cuba”.
Therefore, I thought it might be useful to point out that there exists some evidence that the medical miracle might be a lie.
Yes, but those photos are not the kind of evidence that would prove that.
LizardBreath is right – the evidence that would show that Cuba’s good results with minimal resources are not a few photographs of one hospital, but sources showing that the statistics by which Cuba’s healthcare system is judged are not checked by independent observers, but are provided solely by Cuban officialdom.
It is the “trains on time” argument. I think it is a horrible argument since it is possible to have good health care without sending off playwrights and gay people and journalists to prison camps for the rest of their lives.
I agree that it’s a horrible argument. Also, a worthless one, as you can point to countries like France and the Netherlands (and the UK!) that provide good healthcare to all without prison camps. If Cuba’s good healthcare system is an example of anything, it’s the point that you can, if you’re determined, do surprising well on healthcare by internationally-agreed to benchmarks even with minimal resources, providing you target your resources where they will be maximally useful: just as the US’s lousy healthcare system proves the point that you can, if you’re determined, misuse vast resources and end up with healthcare standards equivalent to a Third World country that’s been suffering a US embargo for 45 years or so.
Cuba focusses (I gather) on preventive healthcare. The US tends to focus on reactive healthcare, and the poorer you are the more likely you are to get the reactive healthcare later than you need it. Or not at all.
“A Republican was in the White House when we had to withdraw from Korea….”
Rather sloppy, there, Edward.
But IJWTPO that if y’all are that concerned about Cuban-American relations, possibly you might want to watch tonight’s West Wing. (Hmm, not on for an hour and a half here, but I guess it’s too late for the East Coast; oh, well.)
Do you have a point to make about it
Jes, I thought the point was self evident. I believe if you had the opportunity to speak with companies which want to invest in Cuba, Cuba’s JV parameters would be the largest hinderance.
SH:”Where do these statistical measures come from?”
The following info is from the CIA factbook. Unless you’re proposing an Illuminati style conspiracy, I think you can’t really claim the CIA is propagandizing for Castro or even particularly likely to fall for Castro’s propaganda. (link: life expectancy)
That having been said, according to the CIA factbook, life expectancy in Cuba is 77.23 years, 54th in the world and highest in Latin America. The US is 46th with a life expectancy of 77.71 years. In contrast, US client state El Salvador is number 121, with a life expectancy of 71.22 years. As I said before, I think there are a lot of things wrong with the Cuban government, but I don’t think that their health care policy is one of the worst of them. There are clearly things that could improve–looking at the pictures you linked to, my first impression was “underfunded”–but overall the Cuban health care system could be worse.
I don’t have to believe in crazy conspiracies to think that the CIA factbook is getting its numbers from the same place as everyone else–the Cuban government reports.
Do I think that the Cuban health policy is one of the worst things about the Cuban government? No. Do I think that it is sufficiently good to excuse or partially excuse the other bad things about the Cuban government? Also no. And it is in that context that I raise the issue.
you’re on the wrong thread Gary…
Sebastian: I don’t have to believe in crazy conspiracies to think that the CIA factbook is getting its numbers from the same place as everyone else–the Cuban government reports.
But – and I say this not to attack you, but pointing out how to make this argument more effective – you have not yet shown that the figures used for life expectancy, etc, are false.
To show that they may be false, you need to show that they come exclusively from Cuban bureacracy, and that there is no independent confirmation of those figures; no international humanitarian agencies working there, for example, such as Doctors Without Borders, the Red Cross, or even HRW.
Thus far, I fear, you have merely asserted this as a notion of yours. You have not shown that it could be so. (To show that it is so would be beyond the scope of a private individual: it would require an independent research on the scale and accuracy of the Lancet study showing the Iraqi casualty figures since the US invasion.)