Raul Castro

[The Vegan Marxist]

What is everyone's opinion on the new leader of Cuba, Fidel Castro's brother, Raul Castro?

[Tifosi]

He is no different than his brother, he did create a law where farmers can sell some of their crops for profit. That is the only major thing he has done to date

[The Vegan Marxist]

He is no different than his brother, he did create a law where farmers can sell some of their crops for profit. That is the only major thing he has done to date

I believe Fidel to be far more progressive than his brother, Raul. Fidel was an actual communist. Raul seems a bit revisionist to me with his talks of capitalized reforms.

[RadioRaheem84]

I thought Raul was an ardent Marxist Leninist with revisionist tendencies.

[khad]

I hold that Raul Castro is going to attempt to push Cuba towards Dengism.

[The Vegan Marxist]

I hold that Raul Castro is going to attempt to push Cuba towards Dengism.

Any reason why you feel he would adapt Marxism & Maoism to such a thing?

[khad]

Any reason why you feel he would adapt Marxism & Maoism to such a thing?
The same way Deng adapted Maoism to his turn.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/cuba-abandons-equal-t115094/index.html
http://www.revleft.com/vb/cuba-goes-capitalist-t110435/index.html

I've been pariahed for this, but history will vindicate me. It is already vindicating me.

http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2008/08/14/more-revisionism-raul-castro-redefines-socialism-as-liberal-capitalism/


Cuba’s new president Raúl Castro, in an address to the National Assembly a few weeks ago, announced that “Socialism means social justice and equality, but equality of rights, of opportunities, not of income.” Echoing capitalists, he went on to say that “egalitarianism is in itself a form of exploitation; exploitation of the good workers by those who are less productive and lazy.”

[Crux]

...because it's not like the turn towards market liberalization didn't start almost 20 years ago.

[red cat]

Any reason why you feel he would adapt Marxism & Maoism to such a thing?

What makes you think that Cuba was Maoist ever ? Castro opposed the cultural revolution. Soviet and Cuban troops fought against Maoist revolutionaries in Africa. Today every Maoist party waging revolutionary wars considers Cuba as revisionist. Documents of PCP and CPI(Maoist) mark Cuba as a revisionist country.

[khad]

What makes you think that Cuba was Maoist ever ? Castro opposed the cultural revolution. Soviet and Cuban troops fought against Maoist revolutionaries in Africa. Today every Maoist party waging revolutionary wars considers Cuba as revisionist. Documents of PCP and CPI(Maoist) mark Cuba as a revisionist country.
More like Chinese were helping Apartheid South Africa's auxiliaries kill African revolutionaries and Cuban soldiers. Just like how China sent 400 million dollars of aid and military advisers to kill the Afghan socialists for Amerikkka.

"Maoist" geopolitics is ideologically bankrupt because it was never anything more than the most disgusting opportunism.

Che was warming up to China, and I'm glad Castro let him off to martyr himself, because if he pulled Cuba into the Chinese camp, that would have entailed fighting alongside Apartheid just to get back at the Soviet Union.

[Kléber]

He is no different than his brother, he did create a law where farmers can sell some of their crops for profit. That is the only major thing he has done to date
Actually, the reforms have been much broader. Legal restrictions on purchasing extremely expensive goods, staying in tourist hotels, and visiting tourist beaches have been lifted (even though working and farming Cubans can't afford these things). There was a move toward greater home ownership, and most importantly IMO, the maximum wage was abolished in addition to new bonus payments for managers and officials of up to 30%, while workers have also gotten new bonus payments.. of 5%.

On the reforms:
Al Jazeera video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4j_5G-0amw)
WSWS story (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/apr2008/cuba-a17.shtml)


More like Chinese were helping Apartheid South Africa's auxiliaries kill African revolutionaries and Cuban soldiers.
Eh, MPLA and UNITA were and are both bourgeois nationalist groups with unscrupulous foreign ties.


"Maoist" geopolitics is ideologically bankrupt because it was never anything more than the most disgusting opportunism.
Agreed; Maoist "internationalism" was sectarian in form, and itself social-imperialist in content.

[khad]

Eh, MPLA and UNITA were and are both bourgeois nationalist groups with unscrupulous foreign ties.
For the sake of argument I'll even grant your contention that both groups were bourgeois nationalists. I still wouldn't change my opinion because I care about practiced socialism, and the fact of the matter was that the MPLA was building hospitals and schools and improving the material conditions of the people of Angola, whereas UNITA was more interested in blowing them up.

The equivalency game on the left which writes off any movement that's "imperfect" as bourgeois and nationalist is simply an exercise in evasion, a cop out. It allows the western leftist to hold his/her head above the actual struggles being waged by peoples around the world and to avoid taking any real position on them. Utopianism about the "ideal" revolution gets real-life socialists nowhere.

As such, UNITA were the enemies of the people of Angola, and Chinese support for them was support for Apartheid imperialism and thoroughly unconscionable.

[red cat]

More like Chinese were helping Apartheid South Africa's auxiliaries kill African revolutionaries and Cuban soldiers. Just like how China sent 400 million dollars of aid and military advisers to kill the Afghan socialists for Amerikkka.

"Maoist" geopolitics is ideologically bankrupt because it was never anything more than the most disgusting opportunism.

Che was warming up to China, and I'm glad Castro let him off to martyr himself, because if he pulled Cuba into the Chinese camp, that would have entailed fighting alongside Apartheid just to get back at the Soviet Union.

Historical assertions like those of yours are not always worth being contradicted. But as usual I will stick to the version of history provided by Maoist CPs themselves.

However, what you said does prove that Maoists and whoever are in power in Cuba, are worst enemies of each other. This is the point that I wanted to make.

[khad]

Historical assertions like those of yours are not always worth being contradicted. But as usual I will stick to the version of history provided by Maoist CPs themselves.

Mao in 1960: Fuck Khruschchev for dismissing Stalin's glorious legacy. He has sold out to the Americans with his opportunism of "peaceful coexistence." The Soviets are revisionists!

Mao in 1975: Nixon is my bestest friend in the whole wide world.

I rest my case.

[RadioRaheem84]

Cuba’s new president Raúl Castro, in an address to the National Assembly a few weeks ago, announced that “Socialism means social justice and equality, but equality of rights, of opportunities, not of income.” Echoing capitalists, he went on to say that “egalitarianism is in itself a form of exploitation; exploitation of the good workers by those who are less productive and lazy.”



:confused:

Interesting. I've heard that investors are just waiting to invest in Cuba. It's a only a matter of time.

[The Vegan Marxist]

:confused:

Interesting. I've heard that investors are just waiting to invest in Cuba. It's a only a matter of time.

Raul Castro, I fear, will reverse EVERYTHING that Fidel ever fought for in Cuba.

[RadioRaheem84]

That's a given.

[Crux]

Raul Castro, I fear, will reverse EVERYTHING that Fidel ever fought for in Cuba.
That's they way with bureaucratic dictatorships. With no worker's democracy and no direct accountability of the officials to those they governed this is what eventually happens. Defending the cuban revolution and it's victories can only be achieved by the working class themselves, not this or that bloc of the ruling party.

[cb9's_unity]

If Raul Castro actually does turn to Dengism a lot of Castro-ites are going to have to eat a lot of their words.

And if the people of Cuba aren't conscious enough or democratically organized enough to oppose a capitalist transition, then it should be seen as Fidel's fault just as much as Raul's.

[The Ungovernable Farce]

How has this thread got so many posts without anyone (other than Mayakovsky, props to Mayakovsky), pointing out the utter, epic insanity of a supposed "workers' state" being ruled by what is, in effect, a monarchy? If any openly free-market capitalist state was ruled by the head of state passing power to his brother, you'd all be lining up to point out how disgusting and undemocratic it is, so why do your critical facilities just disappear when you encounter states like Cuba? Do you genuinely believe that, by an amazing coincidence, out of the 11 million people living in Cuba, the person best-qualified to become the new head of state just happened to be born to the same parents as the old one?

[Jia]

The true situation is difficult to assess until Raul and Fidel are gone! Then we can have a leader who is not blood related and perhaps more fair. Raul is not undoing Fidel. He is not touching what Fidel did. If Fidel was dead, he maybe would. Don't think that just because Raul is at the top that Fidel doesn't still whisper in his ear. Fidel is in good health, news reports say. Raul has allowed the internet, 12% of Cubans now have access to the internet. I see nothing wrong with this, he even said he is "Lifting the daily obstacles in Cubans lives", which, sounds good.

[RadioRaheem84]

How has this thread got so many posts without anyone (other than Mayakovsky, props to Mayakovsky), pointing out the utter, epic insanity of a supposed "workers' state" being ruled by what is, in effect, a monarchy? If any openly free-market capitalist state was ruled by the head of state passing power to his brother, you'd all be lining up to point out how disgusting and undemocratic it is, so why do your critical facilities just disappear when you encounter states like Cuba? Do you genuinely believe that, by an amazing coincidence, out of the 11 million people living in Cuba, the person best-qualified to become the new head of state just happened to be born to the same parents as the old one?

Cuba is way more complex than describing it as a mere monarchy. Yes, it's a bit authoritarian and it's ruled by a family but it's not a North Korea.

[Robocommie]

What I'm hoping to see in the future for Cuba, with new Presidents, are an easing of some of the government restrictions, some democratic reforms, without ditching the economic reforms and serious strides that have been made in Cuba since the Revolution. Then Cuba would really be something special.

[red cat]

Mao in 1960: Fuck Khruschchev for dismissing Stalin's glorious legacy. He has sold out to the Americans with his opportunism of "peaceful coexistence." The Soviets are revisionists!

Mao in 1975: Nixon is my bestest friend in the whole wide world.

I rest my case.

USSR was a super power when Khruschev declared that. On the other hand, despite the bitter inner party struggles in the CPC in around 1975, PRC's alliance with the USA was purely tactical in order to break the Soviet-American alliance for encircling PRC. This was natural as to the PRC at that point, American imperialism was the lesser evil of the two. The USSR shared vast borders with China and had increased the number of armed forces there by many times. There was the danger of a Soviet invasion at any moment.

Though China's foreign policy had its faults, but its stand on Angola was correct. The MPLA was just a puppet of the Soviet revisionists. Therefore it was quite logical to help the UNITA, even if it wasn't communist either.

Besides, the PRC's foreign policy was characterized by the training and political as well as technical support it gave to various genuine communist revolutionary groups, like the ones in Peru, India and the Philippines.

Presently the Cuban international line is very typical of its silence regarding the Maoist parties waging PPWs, though in the past few years, Castro has flooded his column in the Granma International with praises for China, as the PRC is slowly entering Latin American market through Cuba.

[Red7]

I was under the opinion that Raul is the more communist. Fidel was always more of a Cuban nationalist. Was it not Raul that convinced Fidel to socialize the country? Besides, these are great men we are talking about. Flawed yes, but at least they're over there defending Cuba against reactionary elements and the UNITED STATES just 90 miles away! They take care of their people, more or less. Its not ideal, but I think it IS amazing...

[The Vegan Marxist]

I was under the opinion that Raul is the more communist. Fidel was always more of a Cuban nationalist. Was it not Raul that convinced Fidel to socialize the country? Besides, these are great men we are talking about. Flawed yes, but at least they're over there defending Cuba against reactionary elements and the UNITED STATES just 90 miles away! They take care of their people, more or less. Its not ideal, but I think it IS amazing...

Yes, Raul helped develop the communist in Fidel, but Raul has changed somewhat & has called for capitalistic policies. We saw what happens when such is taken into action during the Soviet Union when Krushchev was in power.

[turquino]

More like Chinese were helping Apartheid South Africa's auxiliaries kill African revolutionaries and Cuban soldiers. Just like how China sent 400 million dollars of aid and military advisers to kill the Afghan socialists for Amerikkka.

"Maoist" geopolitics is ideologically bankrupt because it was never anything more than the most disgusting opportunism.

Che was warming up to China, and I'm glad Castro let him off to martyr himself, because if he pulled Cuba into the Chinese camp, that would have entailed fighting alongside Apartheid just to get back at the Soviet Union.
That’s simply dishonest. Unlike the USSR, the PRCs orientation in southern African was always toward the national liberation pole. It generally supported all three nationalist factions while the country was under Portuguese colonial rule, with the most military aid going to the FNLA via Zambia and Zaire at the end. They did not support any one faction against the other during the civil war, only denouncing the influence of Soviet social imperialism.

You imply that China colluded with apartheid South Africa against independent Angola and other free African states, but if this is the case why did they continuously support SWAPO and denounce South Africa’s armed aggression?