It is High Time the Us Ended Its Embargo Against Cuba

Since the Cuban revolution took place on New Year's eve of 1959 the United States has had 10 Presidents who have had many of the same ideas while differing on many of which but if there be one consistent it was and still is their repetition of the now ridiculous expression "Castro will soon fall!". Yes, this will eventually happen after all who has not been born who will or has not already died so technically speaking Castro will some day fall but it will not be because of an American embargo which in its 48 years has not produced any certain results in whether bringing an end to Castro's reign or improving the lives in any way shape or form of the citizen of Cuba. I would even say along with many others that this policy has done the perfect opposite which is to strengthen the position of Fidel Castro's regime as the median Cuban citizen has no other selection but to depend on it for everything he or she needs to survive. Furthermore I can add that it would be an act of obstinacy rather then anything else that would lead any to continue this failed foreign policy as it does not require much astuteness on anybody's part to see that if this strategy were going to work it would have done so already and if it has not done so after 48 years then any man or woman who has even some use of coarse sense can see that it is not going to.

Sometimes or rather quit often the truth as to why things are done or not is what we need to look for ourselves specially with regards to politics were it is not always favorable for those in power to narrate it to us. Let us look at Cuba, yes it is true they are not a democratic community and do not even pretend to be one and we are told this is the guess the United States has resorted to an embargo. Of policy one could seriously argue weather an embargo has ever or will ever yield changes everywhere of any kind other then negative ones for the citizen of the country given that those in power always carry on to get by more then nicely. With regards to Cuba's democracy or lack of which to this I would say that it is not every government that can sound the ideas of democracy as well as some of our other trading partners such as China, Saudi Arabia, Chile (under Pinochet), Vietnam and even the Soviet Union. This last country being one whom we never had an embargo (other then the grain embargo which was swiftly drooped) against even while the worst tensions of the cold war. With regards to Vietnam, I can give the example of how an American Vietnam Veteran asked if America does not have an embargo against a country like Vietnam; whom we were once at war with, why does it have one against a country which technically speaking we were never at war with? I might even add it was us who tried to invade Cuba and not the other way around.

This last point brings me to a windup which I feel can not be totally wrong and it being that if we look at what Cuba has. The write back would be nothing of any real value to offer the Us as what it has is sugar which we can yield ourselves or buy somewhere else very cheaply. For instance The Dominican Republican which was even known to use child labor to in its production of the same commodity. Cuba has beautiful beaches which I hope to visit one day even if my country (much to what should be the shame of Americans) does not lift its embargo but then again it is not like Americans do not have beaches in the Us or other colse to Caribbean countries. Cigars is an additional one thing Cuba has to offer; which based upon my knowledge though not taste are reported to be the best in world but again as is the case with sugar; it is not that this a goods which is all that vital to our economy and which we could not get in an additional one country (though maybe not of the same quality) like Jamaica.

Once we eliminate these three items Cuba has little to offer the American economy any way I ask if they had oil as does Saudi Arabia or a huge citizen with costs of labor being dirt cheap as they are in China; would we then be overlooking their human proprietary description or lack of democracy as we comfortably do so with the above mentioned countries? This is a ask which at best can be retorted with an educated guess which would come in the affirmative.

Some would say an additional one guess for the embargo is the "Cuban Missile Crisis" but this lacks as much sense as the embargo does because if we look at the events that lead up to this crisis it was the Soviet Union putting missiles in Cuba that created it. Cuba merely allowed its territory to be used for this purpose. A decision which maybe might have even been forced on Castro as the Soviets were not ones to give their satellites much in the way of options as was the case with countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, the Ddr, Romania and Bulgaria. We may guess weather or not Castro willingly went along with Khrushchev on that one but let us claim that for all arduous purposes, since we have not concrete proof otherwise that he did so on his own free will. If this was the case then why place an embargo on only the country that allowed missiles to be put on their territory aimed at us and not the country that certainly put those missiles there in first place. Of coarse always bearing in mind that we too had missiles of our own aimed at the Soviet Union, also from countries which were close to them such as Turkey and West Germany.

As for the Castro's government many things can be said against it but let us not forget the facts which maybe some want to keep us in the dark about. First; Castro did win the elections in Cuba several years before the revolution which the Batista government chose not to honor so with regards to Castro taking power; this in reality one could say was done with the sustain of the citizen of Cuba. At least back then now weather he still rules with it is an additional one issue though in Cuba there is no sign of revolt against him. Second; I speak not in favor of communism as I have seen the damage it can do specially while my time in Poland and have read about all the atrocities of Stalin and Mao but again let us recall that Batista's Cuba was also a dictatorship with the basic unlikeness being that the American mafia could advantage from it.

Castro on the other hand for all his shortcomings in human proprietary has lead a country which has eliminated illiteracy, has a medical ideas which is amongst the world's best and this despite of the American embargo and having had Soviet founding cut over 15 years ago. As for change; Cuba is tantalizing gently toward a free shop by allowing small inexpressive businesses to emerge much like China. I for my own can not help but think of all the added changes toward a free shop and community that would have come about if the United States had seen Cuba in the same light as they do China or even Vietnam; which in not only my opinion but that of many others are clear examples of what transformations may occur when embargoes are not applied.

In all this it is fortunate for the citizen of Cuba that the European Union does not have to pamper to the wishes of a settle on few as they are taking the steps which they should have done so a long time ago by lifting their embargo of the island. Simply this lifting of sanctions brings along strings that come in the form of requiring the Cuban government to release political prisoners, engage in dialogue with their political opposition and an comprehensive correction of human proprietary that would comprise a freer press. I might go added with this line by claiming that as much as I am against the convention which is the Vatican; I would have to admit though it pleases me not in the least to do so that the late Pope (John Paul Ii) brought about more democratic changes in Cuba with one visit then the American embargo has in 48 years. This being the case with his visit which lead to some political prisoners being released along with churches being allowed to open for the first time since the revolution.

According to polls taken in new years and some even going back as far as the 1992 Presidential elections; most Americans are opposed to the American embargo on Cuba but it is not most Americans that are deciding American policy toward Cuba but a small group of Cuban Americans (some of which have not as much as set foot in Cuba) living mostly in Florida who have been given the undeserved right to dictate American policy toward Cuba Simply because they come from this country. I say undeserved because if we look at history did any other ethnic group ever get to determine American foreign policy toward the nation they came from? Did German Americans get to determine American policy toward Germany while W.W. I or W.W. Ii or did Russian Americans get the same privilege with regards to the Soviet Union or did Vietnamese Americans or those who came from Vietnam get to do likewise with regards to American policy toward the country they had left? They did not and theirs was an opinion that was not even requested so I enquire why should Cuban Americans get to determine the policy of our nation as a whole toward their country of origin when other ethnic groups did not receive the same privilege. Also taking in to account that American foreign policy toward Cuba does not only corollary Cuban Americans but all Americans.

This boils down to the real issue as to the reality of this absurd embargo's raison d'être which is to derive the votes of those Cuban Americans living in Florida that are crucial to any candidate wishing to win this vital state. I for my part claim to be of the opinion that if not for a voting ideas (Electoral College) which is even more antiquated and senseless then the embargo I argue against; the issue would be decided by our nation as a whole who would be allowed to deliberate upon the matter. Instead of a handful of Cuban Americans who from my point of view seem more implicated with being vengeful against their country of origin then in bringing about real change. I any way do not deny that there might be some Cuban Americans who wish well for their country. Therefore it is to those who truly want democracy in Cuba as opposed to those who Simply want a regime change so they might get their hands on some cheap land before the price goes up that I say that history has made it clear that the way to bring about change is not embargoes or sanctions but negotiations which should not be confused with appeasement.

In windup I will say that if one thing I share with those who desire to prolong America's embargo on Cuba; it is that I like they wish to see the end of Castro's communist dictatorship but unlike them I feel the way to go about it is another. Dialog instead of sanctions or embargoes is what not only I but millions through out the United States are calling for and yet our voices are not being heard Simply because we contrary to those who wish to continue the embargo can not vote in Florida.

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The Decline of the Middle Class

--Vietnam Veterans Of America Pick Up of The Decline of the Middle Class--

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In a recent column op-ed columnist Paul Krugman's dealt with what he refers to as a "Crises of Confidence." Citing a study from The eye investigate center of the University of Michigan, Krugman declares that "Americans are more pessimistic about their situation than they have been for more than a quarter century." And while by original measures, the economy doesn't look that bad, Americans haven't been this pessimistic since the early nineties,

The Decline of the Middle Class

What's stunning about this bleak mood is that by the usual measures the economy isn't doing that badly - at least not yet. In particular, the official unemployment rate of 5.1 percent, though rising, is still fairly low by historical standards. Yet economic attitudes are worse now than they were in 1992, when the average unemployment rate was 7.5 percent.

But as Krugman points out, you need to look a wee closer to understand what's behind the unfavorable mood of the country,

Our bleakness partly reflects the fact that most Americans are doing considerably worse than the usual economic measures let on. The official unemployment rate may be relatively low - but the ration of prime-working-age Americans without jobs, which isn't the same thing, is historically high. Gross domestic goods is up, but the inflation-adjusted earnings of the average house is probably lower than it was in 2000. (emphasis added)

This is the real problem, working Americans are producing the wealth but are getting an ever smaller piece of the pie. Problems like the sub-prime crises, the credit crises, as well as corruption in corporate America as evidenced by the Enron and World Com collapses are merely symptoms of a much greater problem, and that qoute is the corporate takeover of America. For about the last three or four decades we've been hammered with the understanding that the talk to our problems is to maximize free enterprise. Fewer regulations and lower taxes would bring prosperity to everyone. But the reality is; that prosperity has been mostly enjoyed by a make your mind up few while most Americans have found their real earnings has stagnated at best or even declined.

The fifties and early sixties are often referred to as "the good old days" by those who lived straight through them (providing you weren't black or some other minority), and many reconsider that period--before the hippies came on the scene--as a very conservative duration in America. But as Stephanie Coontz reveals in her essay, "What We of course Miss About the 1950s", from an economic stand-point, this was probably the most socialistic era in our history. While as Coontz points out, there's more to the nostalgia than just the economics, still, there's no demand that economics has a lot to do with it,

For one thing, it's easy to see why habitancy might look back fondly to a decade when real wages grew more in any singular year than in the whole ten years of the 1980s combined, a time when the average 30-year-old man could buy a median-priced home on only 15-18 percent of his salary.

And though the habitancy who remember the fifties fondly like to think that factors such as morals and values are what defined that generation, when pressed these illusions melt away,

Nostalgia for the 1950s is real and deserves to be taken seriously, but it regularly shouldn't be taken literally. Even habitancy who do pick the 1950s as the best decade generally end up saying, once they start discussing their feelings in depth, that it's not the house arrangements in and of themselves that they want to retrieve. They don't miss the way women used to be treated, they sure wouldn't want to live with most of the fathers they knew in their neighborhoods, and "come to think of it" - I don't know how many times I've recorded these exact words - "I quote with my kids much better than my parents or grandparents did." When Judith Wallerstein recently interviewed 100 spouses in "happy" marriages, she found that only five "wanted a marriage like their parents." The husbands "consciously rejected the role models provided by their fathers. The women said they could never be happy living as their mothers did." (emphasis original)

When it comes right down to it, it's the prosperity that habitancy are of course nostalgic for. But unlike today, and that includes the nineties where we enjoyed unprecedented prosperity, working Americans enjoyed a significantly greater share of the wealth they helped produce,

Contrary to wide belief, the 1950s was not an age of laissez-faire government and free market competition. A major cause of the collective mobility of young families in the 1950s was that federal aid programs were much more kind and wide than they are today.

In the most ambitious and successful affirmative activity agenda ever adopted in America, 40 percent of young men were eligible for veterans' benefits, and these benefits were far more wide than those available to Vietnam-era vets. Financed in part by a federal earnings tax on the rich that went up to 87 percent and a corporate tax rate of 52 percent, such benefits provided quite a jump start for a generation of young families. The Gi bill paid most tuition costs for vets who attended college, doubling the ration of college students from prewar levels. At the other end of the life span, collective protection began to build up a primary protection net for the elderly, once the poorest segment of the population. Beginning in 1950, the federal government regularly mandated raises in the minimum wage to keep pace with inflation. The minimum wage may have been only .40 as late as 1968, but a man who worked for that estimate full-time, year-round, earned 118 percent of the poverty shape for a house of three. By 1995, a full-time minimum-wage worker could earn only 72 percent of the poverty level.

An leading source of the economic expansion of the 1950s was that collective works spending at all levels of government comprised nearly 20 percent of total expenditures in 1950, as compared to less than 7 percent in 1984. Between 1950 and 1960, nonmilitary, nonresidential collective construction rose by 58 percent. construction expenditures for new schools (in dollar amounts adjusted for inflation) rose by 72 percent; funding on sewers and waterworks rose by 46 percent. Government paid 90 percent of the costs of construction the new Interstate Highway System. These programs opened up suburbia to growing numbers of middle-class Americans and created secure, well-paying jobs for blue-collar workers.

Higher taxes, greater redistribution of wealth, increased government spending, these all marked the duration dubbed "the good old days."

We'll never return to the fifties, globalization and free trade are here to stay but the point is this; we need to stop buying into the mantra endlessly repeated by the greedy capitalists who brought us Enron, the sub-prime crises and the normal decline of the middle class, that fewer regulations, lower taxes and smaller government are good for us all, it just isn't true.

However we move forward, we need to understand that this country doesn't belong to the Exxons and Enrons, it doesn't belong to the Bushes and the Cheneys, it belongs to us. The fifties were all about expanding the middle-class, about sharing the prosperity and while we'll never recreate the fifties, we need at least to understand that we don't have to take the crumbs they offer us and be happy about it. By learning from the lessons of the past we can make this country work for all of us.

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Bluethunder (1984) and Airwolf (1984-1987)

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Do you remember the 1980s? Big hair, big shoulder pads, big snoods, and big trousers? It was a strange time to be live through, even as a kid (let's be honest). The world was gripped by the ongoing tensions of the Cold War, Islamic militancy and the response of the United States and its allies was first emerging as the deadly 'clash of civilizations' that we have now come to be so wearily customary with, unregulated free shop capitalism was rampant (and ultimately to be triumphant over its ideological foe in Communism). For some in the Western world anything seemed possible, all the vices as well as the virtues. It was the age of new technologies, when we first truly became tied the electronic world nearby us - and fell in love with it. Home computers were beginning to creep into homes, along with computer game consoles (anyone remember Atari or the Sinclair Zx Spectrum?). Tvs were now all-colour machines - and had infrared remotes to boot. Microwaves were the in-thing and car makers had discovered wind-tunnels and computer-aided design. Television frequently reflected this age of 'the new', especially at the populist end of the scale, and shows based nearby gimmicks and big ideas (especially technological ideas) became de rigueur.

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How is Bluethunder (1984) and Airwolf (1984-1987)

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Into this wild arena of Cold War paranoia and the slow seduction of technology came two very similar Tv series based nearby one single idea - crazy, souped-up super-helicopters. In the blue projection stood 'Bluethunder', from the U.S. Network Abc. In the red (actually slightly bluer) projection stood 'Airwolf' from the rival Cbs network, and the output enterprise of legendary television producer Donald Bellisario, maker of such hits as 'Magnum, P.I.' (1980-1988) and 'Quantum Leap' (1989-1993). Both shows got off to promising starts albeit from very dissimilar angles. 'Bluethunder' was an unexpected Tv spinoff from a modest box office hit of the same name in 1983 starring the legendary Roy Scheider as a police helicopter pilot tasked with evaluating a new high-tech super-helicopter for law enforcement use (in reality a heavily adapted French-built Aérospatiale Gazelle). The movie was fun, if a typically Hollywood Ott affair, largely thanks to Scheider's typically charismatic performance. The 1984 television series followed much of the same formula as its movie predecessor, with relatively customary small screen actor James Farentino taking the lead role and was predominant for the nearnessy of Dana Carvey, then a relative unknown, who played the co-pilot to Farention's pilot, before he found later fame with the long-running American Tv comedy show 'Saturday Night Live' and the succeeding movie 'Wayne's World' (1992). With a fairly formulaic 1980s cop show narrative, interspersed with poor extra effects (mostly interior shots of the helicopter, with repetitious outside scenes of the helicopter in action taken from the customary movie), the show never certainly took off and was soon eclipsed in the ratings war by its arch rival 'Airwolf'. After just one season the show was cancelled by the bosses at Cbs unwilling to see beyond that week's ratings.

Also hitting the small screen in 1984, 'Airwolf' was a decidedly dissimilar vertebrate from the not very believable cop procedural with a novelty factor that 'Bluethunder' rapidly descended into. With a steely-eyed Jan-Michael Vincent in the lead role, and Hollywood veteran Ernest Borgnine as his trusty side-kick, the series could be best described as 'Knightrider' with wings (or chopper blades). The stories frequently turned on Cold War or espionage issues, and those that didn't regularly complicated the team taking on criminal gangs or corrupt politicians and enterprise men nearby the United States. With a decidedly cooler looking helicopter (a slightly adapted Bell 222), and good extra effects (albeit with a stock of repetitive long distant shots of the helicopter in flight - regularly over desert locations), the stories ultimately followed much the same formulaic route of American family-friendly Tv drama in the 1980s, after an initially slightly darker and more nuanced start. There were frequent references to the Vietnam War, and fairly crude anti-Communist propaganda, and Latin America was a favorite locale of many episodes, as were Middle Eastern terrorists, with the evils of socialism, Islam, and narcotics being a frequent target. Despite some liberal flourishes the show was very much of a conservative United States and the Regan White House and in later seasons it became more concerned with purely domestic American affairs, and more straightforwardly a high-octane action series.

Eventually running far longer than its fellow helicopter rival, 'Airwolf' managed to chalk up four seasons, along with a jarring exchange of approximately the entire cast in the fourth, before hitting the skids. It was never exactly noted for its stellar acting, with stilted, unimaginative scripts, and stereotypes in place of real characters for most of its run (including the one-eyed, patch-wearing spy-master who controlled the 'Airwolf' team). At times it seemed to take on the elements of some sort of third-rate superhero pastiche (complete with incommunicable hideaway in the desert), and anything creativity or originality that featured in the first season was soon sacrificed in the desperate pursuance of ratings and advertising revenue.

Both shows are ready on Dvd, a petite Dvd edition for 'Bluethunder' and a larger, boxed-set for 'Airwolf'. Though favorite viewing at the time among kids and young adults, both preserve a vaguely cult following today, generally in the U.S. And from the same fans of 'Knight Rider'. In all certainly time has not been kind to them, and unlike some other quasi-Science Fiction series from the 1980s neither have aged well. The Cold War seems very far away now - though perhaps not quite as far as we like to think.

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America's Stories 2009 - The Courageous population Facing Unemployment and Homelessness

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Unemployment is the top it's been in three decades. The housing mortgage fiasco has contributed to the dramatic growth of homelessness. Tent cities over the United States are growing and are populated not only by the chronically homeless but also with educated and middle class citizens who have lost their jobs and/or lost their homes.

The number of homeless veterans is growing, too, with 200,000 currently "on the streets." As the incidence of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (Ptsd) is growing in recognition, rehabilitation is not retention up with the need. When these walking wounded return home from Iraq and Afghanistan, the stigma related with Ptsd as well as the lack of compassionate and therapeutic care abandons them to find their own way down a hopeless street. Many commit suicide. Others join the chronically homeless.

Vietnam Veterans Of America Address

Reminiscent of the Great Depression and the era following the Vietnam War, the stories of America's middle and working class and its returning veterans are resurfacing as exercises in dissatisfaction and defeat although the heart of America still beats with hope.

America's Stories 2009 - The Courageous population Facing Unemployment and Homelessness

Like John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath and Travels with Charlie, and more recently like the stories of Charles Kerault, there are stories to be told about the American habitancy who are daily struggling to live and re-establish their dreams. They are leading stories to be told, not only to re-ignite compassion and comprehension but, like post 911, to inspire America's heart as a nation to work together in assuring a quick salvage to a state of greater strength, mutual withhold and decreased greed.

Books about the normal idea of homelessness have been written such as the three-volume Homelessness in America, by Robert Hartmann McNamara, published in 2008. However, to my knowledge, no books have yet been published focusing on private stories, especially from 2009. The dramatic growth in homelessness as a corollary of the economic stepping back is still too new.

You-Tube holds a great number of videos about tent cities and the branch of homelessness but does not recap the depth of each private story. Print articles may appear in local papers, any way only the corollary of homelessness is typically covered rather than the private stories. When written with a constructive objective rather than naturally reporting, these stories could help rebuild lives.

With regard to homeless veterans, the agency of Veterans Affairs recognizes the issue but cannot keep up with the influx. According to National Adjutant Arthur H. Wilson, "We saw thousands of Vietnam veterans who ultimately became homeless, and we may be facing a new national emergency with the veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan." In 2006, one in four homeless were veterans. That number has climbed.

As the trend in increased unemployment and homelessness lags the projected economic recovery, there are many stories to be discovered and told in 2009. As this trend continues, the number of habitancy who know or who have a degree of relationship to the issue is dramatically increasing.

The current coverage of the issue of homelessness in relationship with the economy takes national attention. Good Morning America has it AmeriCan series to feature habitancy who are taking action to help others. Each day, snippets of stories are seen in the media. However, few are in depth.

The publication and distribution of a series of books can take an leading step. It can record, in greater depth, these unseen and unheard stories of individuals who have experienced the worst and who survive. It can contribute a written history giving their plight a sense of purpose by calling the nation together to help one another. In the end, hopefully, it will contribute future generations inspiration and pride in their inheritance rather than shame.

As a source of inspiration for future generations as well as a sobering history to ground the nation's leaders in the reality experienced daily by the people, this book series is important. These stories can create a timeless image of our nation by having not only the heart but also the courage to take action by looking and telling these stories.

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