Translations 677
Challenges and Priorities for Cuba Today
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Challenges and Priorities for Cuba Today
By Domingo Amuchastegui, April 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Cuba faces its most critical and complex situation today. This is the result of the interaction of three factors. The most recent is the multifaceted impact of the arrival of the coronavirus or COVID-19. Its impact ranges from damage to the health system and the general population to the impact on its economy (see Coronovirus and Cuba). Added to this is the Trump administration’s economic warfare against Cuba, and with no less perjured gravitation, the persistence of a proven ineffective model that resists deepening and widening the path of reform.
In such a context, it is essential to examine the challenges and priorities that in the short and immediate term – and with a level of urgency as never before – the Cuban leadership will have to deal with and find the best, and most lasting, solutions that will ensure its recovery and stabilization.
At the level of INTERNAL SECTOR:
- Minimize and reduce to a minimum the complexities and costs of the effects of the pandemic in the shortest possible time.
- Undertake the redesign of the economic model with the necessary depth and comprehensiveness, which has been lacking in the reform measures adopted so far, which appear as isolated and incomplete patches that fail to energize the entire economy at the levels it requires. No one should be shocked by what I am proposing. Let’s remember Fidel Castro’s words to journalist Jefrrey Goldberg for the important US publication The Atlantic (9/8/2010): “The Cuban Model Doesn’t Even Work for Us Anymore.
- Such a redesign in which the State concentrates on what Cuban economists repeat over and over again: the fundamental means of production (key sectors) of the island (sugar industry, not the agricultural part; nickel/cobalt, bio-pharmaceuticals, tourism industry, exportable medical services, energy, citrus, fishing, rum and tobacco), which must be consistently opened to their association with foreign capital (an aspect that President Díaz-Canel and Minister of Economy, Alejandro Gil, have repeatedly insisted on, but still not translated into actions and projects consistent with such an imperative).
- At the same time, to get rid of the heavy and unproductive burden that has been represented for decades by the very costly and unproductive ownership and management of tens of thousands of small businesses that must be transferred to the cooperative and private sectors, in a broad and sustained project to promote SMEs.
- Recovery and effective revitalization of the key sectors mentioned above in terms of productivity and export capacity. SMEs -private, cooperatives and tenants or farmers- should be exempted from the tax burdens and bureaucratic interference that hinder and assimilate their normal functioning and development, including their more functional and flexible linkage to export/import and financing processes and space in the national banking system. Open these sectors to investment by Cuban emigrants.
- a) To significantly increase productivity levels and reduce production costs, especially in the tourism and bio-pharmaceutical industries; b) To abolish the mechanisms of mandatory hiring by foreign companies through state agencies and the tax burden that this mechanism entails; c) To increase the number of jobs in the tourism and bio-pharmaceutical industries. Guarantee the sale of all supplies and the purchase of miscellaneous equipment to SMEs (otherwise theft, corruption and the so-called underground economy will continue to reign); d. Reduce by no less than 50% the tax on purchases in shops in convertible currency (MLC)
- Last but not least: To make definitive and comprehensive progress in the process of monetary and exchange rate unification in order to stabilize in a real way the income of the population and the exchange and transfer rate of foreign companies operating in Cuba. At the level of the EXTERNAL SECTOR:
- To face and solve with promptness and effectiveness the obligations of the external debt as well as the commercial credits owed.
- In line with the official emphasis on the need to promote foreign investment (FI) as a strategic component, review and update the Investment Law of 2014 in order to make it more attractive and to encourage the arrival of foreign capital, including in particular foreign direct investment (FDI) and other modalities that are more effectively in line with the requirements of the FI. To avoid at all costs, negotiating disasters such as those conducted with GLAXO and the Siemens/Total energy project, among others. Rationalize the Portfolio of Opportunities that is offered every year to foreign business people attending the International Fair of Havana (FIHAV), making it more selective and with greater incentives.
- As a matter of urgency, design a strategy -and an effective practice- to boost the growth of investments in the Mariel Special Development Zone (ZEDM) and its Container Terminal, since so far its income barely covers its operation and maintenance costs. This project – the most important in the Cuban economy so far in the new century – businesses may perish due to starvation or the absence of relevant projects. Attracting important projects with the capacity to re-export to the entire region is no less indispensable.
- It is time for the Cuban leadership to reflect on its pariah status with respect to the international financial system, its institutions and mechanisms, and to consider exploring and advancing in this direction, which could well begin through levels of partnership and cooperation with the World Bank. If the World Bank is successful in this effort, and considering that the OAS sanctions were already lifted several years ago, Havana could manage – without a formal return to that organization – an effort that could be sponsored by CELAC members and that would result in some level of partnership and cooperation with the IDB. Such steps would undoubtedly serve to build confidence and encourage the flow of EI and credit to the Cuban economy.
Retos y prioridades para la Cuba de hoy
Por Domingo Amuchastegui
Avril 2020
Cuba enfrenta hoy su más crítica y compleja situación. Ello es resultado de la interacción de tres factores. El más reciente lo constituye el impacto multifacético de la llegada del coronavirus o COVID-19, que va desde los perjuicios al sistema de salud y a la población en general hasta el impacto a su economía (Ver Coronovirus y Cuba). A esto se suma la guerra económica de la administración Trump contra Cuba, y con una gravitación no menos perjuidical, la persistencia de un modelo probadamente inoperante que se resiste a profundizar y ampliar el camino de las reformas.
En semejante contexto, resulta imprescindible un examen de los desafíos y prioridades que a corto e inmediato plazo -y con un nivel de urgencia como nunca antes- la dirigencia cubana tendrá que lidiar con ello y encontrar las mejores, y más duraderas, soluciones que aseguren su recuperación y estabilización.
A nivel de SECTOR INTERNO:
- Aminorar y reducir al mínimo las complejidades y costos de los efectos de la pandemia en el más breve posible plazo.
- Acometer el rediseño del modelo económico con la integralidad y profundidad necesaria, y de lo cual han carecido las medidas de reformas hasta ahora adoptadas, que aparecen como parches aislados e incompletes que no logran dinamizar la totalidad de la economíaa los niveles que la misma require. Nadie se escandalice por lo que planteo. Recordemos las palabras de Fidel Castro al periodista Jefrrey Goldberg para la importante publicación estadounidense The Atlantic (9/8/2010): “The Cuban Model Doesn’t Even Work for Us Anymore.”
- Un rediseño tal en los cuales el Estado se concentre en lo que los economistas cubanos repiten una y otra vez: los medios fundamentales de producción (sectores claves) de la isla (industria azucarera, no su parte agrícola; níquel/cobalto, biofarmacéuitica, industria turística, servicios médicos exportables, energía, cítricos, pesca, ron y tabaco), que deben abrirse consistemente a su asociación con el capital extranjero (aspecto éste en el que viene insistiendo repeidamente el presidente Díaz-Canel y el Ministro de Economía, Alejandro Gil, pero todavía sin traducirse en acciones y proyectos consistentes con semejante imperativo).
- Paralelamente, desembarazarse de la pesada e improductiva carga que ha venido representando durante décadas la propiedad y administración costosísima e improductiva de decenas de miles de pequeños negocios que deben ser transferidos a los sectores cooperativo y privado, en un Amplio y sostenido proyecto de fomento de las PYMES.
- Recuperación y efectiva dinamización de los sectores claves antes apuntados en términos de productividad y capacidad exportadora. Las PYMES -privadas, cooperativas y arrendatarios o finqueros- deben ser eximidas de las cargas fiscales e injerencias burocráticas que frenan y asifixian hoy su normal funcionamiento y desarrollo, incluyendo su articulación más funcional y flexible a los procesos de exportación/importación y de financiamiento y un espacio en el sistema bancario nacional. Abrir estos sectores a las inversiones de la emigración cubana.
- Cuestiones puntuales de suma importancia son: a) Aumentar sensiblemente los niveles de productividad y reducir costos de producción, en especial en la industria turística y en la biofarmacéutica; b) Suprimir los mecanismos de contratación obligatoria por compañías extranjeras por intermedio de agencias estatales y la sobrecarga impositiva que este mecanismo acompaña; c. Garantizar la venta de todos los suministros y alquier de equipos varios, a las PYMES (de lo contrario seguirán reinando el robo, la corrupción y la llamada economía sumergida); d. Reducir en no menos de un 50% el gravamen sobre las compras en los comercios en moneda convertible (MLC).
- Por ultimo y no por ello de menor importancia: Avanzar definitivamente, y de manera integral, en el proceso de unificación monetaria y cambiaria a fin de estabilizar de manera real los ingresos de la población y de cambios y transferencias de las empresas extranjeras que operan en Cuba.
A nivel de SECTOR EXTERNO:
- Afrontar y solventar con prontitud y eficacia las obligaciones de la deuda externa asi como de los créditos comerciales adeudados.
- En consonancia con el énfasis oficial en la necesidad de promocionar como componente estratégico la inversion extranjera (IE), revisar y actualizar la Ley de Inversiones del 2014 en función de hacer más atractivo e incentivar la llegada del capital del capital extranjero, incluída de manera destacada la inversion extranjera directa (FDI) y otras modalidades que se ajusten más aficazmente a los requerimientos de la IE. Evitar a toda costa, desastres negociadores como las conducidos con GLAXO y el proyecto energético Siemens/Total, entre otros. Racionalizar la Cartera de Oportunidades que cada año se oferta a emporesarios extranjeros asistentes a la Feria Internacional de La Habana (FIHAV), haciéndola más selectiva y con mayores incentivos.
- Con máxima urgencia, diseñar una estrategia -y una práctica efectiva- para dinamizar el crecimiento de las inversiones en la Zona especial de Desarrollo de Mariel (ZEDM) y su Terminal de Contenedores pues hasta ahora sus ingresos apenas cubren sus costos de operaciones y mantenimiento. Este proyecto -el más importante en la economía cubana en lo que va del nuevo siglo- puede perecer por inanición o ausencia de proyectos relevantes. Atraer proyectos de peso y con capacidad reexportadora hacia toda la region, es algo no menos indispensable.
- Es hora ya de que la dirigencia cubana reflexione acerca de su status de paria con respecto al sistema financiero internacional, sus institucones y mecanismos, y considere explorar y avanzar en esta dirección que bien pudiera comenzar por medio de niveles de asociación y cooperación con el Banco Mundial. Caso de tener éxito en esta aporoximación al Banco Mundial, y onsiderando que las sanciones de la OEA ya fueron levantadas hace ya varios años, La Habana pudiera gestionar -sin un regreso formal a dicha organziación- gestion que pudiera ser auspiciada por miembros de la CELAC y que se tradujera en algún nivel de asociación y cooperación con el BID. Semejantes pasos, indudablemente, servirían para dar confianza e incentivar los flujos de IE y créditos parfa la economía cubana.
Coronavirus and a Corrupting Pandemic
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Coronavirus: Cutting the Illicit Will Prevent the Advance of a Corrupting Pandemic
By Jorge Rodríguez Hernández
April 28, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews
“Now more than ever, we must rescue respect for the law and fight a corrupt socialism that masks the dangerous underground economy.
Graziella Pogolotti (La gangrena, Juventud Rebelde, 1 May 2016, p.3)
Thirty or more years ago, as part of my research – still in progress – on the underground economy and its different features, I wrote that speculation constitutes the visible face of the black market, due to the role played by those who plunder the goods of the public treasury, in collusion with drivers, through crime on wheels, and through a sort of symbiosis with citizens who work in state agencies, without ruling out links with marginal subjects. As you will infer, it is a complex skein.
We are in the presence of an issue similar to a hydra, with different tentacles, whose neutralization requires the use of an integral and multidisciplinary approach. The recent dismantling of a clandestine network of 13 members, who were engaged in stealing different equipment and goods from the warehouses of the National Medical Supplies Company (ENSUME), located in Berroa, east of Havana, demonstrates the need and urgency to cut off these illicit activities, in order to prevent the advance of this corrupting pandemic, in the midst of Cuba’s confrontation with another pandemic that is also lethal: COVID-19.
For the Cuban psychiatrist and criminalist, Dr. Fernando Barral, a student of economic crime on the island, the shortage is a “contributing circumstance”, but this expert believes that “one cannot wait for everything to be in place to resolve this phenomenon to some extent”, and whose existence compromises the survival of the Revolution, as has been said repeatedly.
During the crisis of the 1990s, when the country lived through the Special Period in peacetime, the mismatch between supply and demand reinforced the tentacles and space of the black market, and during that time the amount of transactions on the black market grew more than 20 times, according to economists’ calculations.
When I mention speculation and hoarding, criminal figures in the current Penal Code, I am not talking about small-scale operations, nor about a certain number of people who have found a way of life in this illicit act -which should not be underestimated and much less justified-, but I am also referring to the thinking heads of large smuggling operations, who transfer goods and products from state agencies to the black market.
Cuba must take very much into account the circumstances of the failure of the French Revolution, which was not because of the extremist actions of terrorism, but because it did not find ways to consolidate the masses and direct them against both the big and the small parasites.
In the script applied to the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) by the head of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), between 1953 and 1961, Allen W. Dulles, was “actively and constantly encouraging (…) the despotism of officials, bribery, corruption, lack of principle”, and his “main bet” was on “the youth”, which “we will corrupt, demoralize, pervert”.
The causes of the failure of socialism in the former USSR always deserve a critical and instructive look from Cuba, both here and now, and towards the future. To corroborate this last point, there is “the precedent of the mythical “Uncle Basia” (the figure of the clandestine speculator on a large scale who emerged in the Brezhnev era), who with the penguins of profits accumulated in 20 years is today devastating the auctions of state property with constant and resounding money,” as the magazine Bohemia reported in July 1992.
Coronavirus: cortar los ilícitos impedirá avance de pandemia corruptora
por Jorge Rodríguez Hernández
Abril 28, 2020
“Ahora más que nunca, hay que rescatar el respeto a la ley y combatir un socialismo corruptor que enmascara la peligrosa economía sumergida”.
Graziella Pogolotti (La gangrena, Juventud Rebelde, 1 de mayo de 2016, p.3)
Hace 30 o más años, como parte de mi investigación- vigente aún- sobre economía sumergida y sus disímiles rasgos, escribí que la especulación constituye la cara visible del mercado negro, por el papel que desempeñan quienes depredan los bienes de la hacienda pública, en contubernio con choferes, mediante el delito sobre ruedas, y a través de una suerte de simbiosis con ciudadanos que laboran en las dependencias estatales, sin descartar vínculos con sujetos marginales. Como inferirán, se trata de una compleja madeja.
Estamos en presencia de un asunto semejante a una hidra, con disímiles tentáculos, cuya neutralización pasa por el empleo de un enfoque integral y multidisciplinario. La reciente desarticulación de una red clandestina de 13 integrantes, quienes se dedicaban a sustraer disímiles equipos y bienes en almacenes de la Empresa Nacional de Suministros Médicos (ENSUME), ubicados en Berroa, al este de La Habana, demuestra la necesidad y urgencia de cortar estos ilícitos, para impedir el avance de esta pandemia corruptora, en medio del enfrentamiento de Cuba contra otra pandemia también letal: la COVID-19.
Para el psiquiatra y criminalista cubano, doctor Fernando Barral, estudioso de la delincuencia económica en la Isla, la escasez resulta una “circunstancia contribuyente”, pero dicho experto considera que “no puede esperarse a que haya de todo para resolver este fenómeno en cierta medida”, y cuya existencia compromete la supervivencia de la Revolución, como se ha dicho, de forma reiterada.
Durante la crisis de los años 90 del pasado siglo XX, cuando el país vivió el Período Especial en tiempo de paz, el desencuentro entre oferta y demanda, reforzó los tentáculos y espacio del mercado negro, y en el transcurso de esa época el monto de las transacciones en el mismo crecieron más de 20 veces, según cálculos de economistas.
Cuando menciono la especulación y el acaparamiento, figuras delictivas en el Código Penal vigente, no hablo de operaciones de poca monta, ni de una determinada cifra de personas que han encontrado un modo de vida en este ilícito -lo cual no debe se subestimado y mucho menos justificado-, sino me refiero también a las cabezas pensantes de grandes operaciones de contrabando, quienes trasvasan mercancías y productos de las dependencias estatales hacia el mercado negro.
Cuba debe tener muy en cuenta las circunstancias del fracaso de la Revolución Francesa, lo cual no fue a causa de las acciones extremistas del terrorismo, sino por no haber encontrado vías para consolidar a las masas y dirigirlas tanto en contra de los parásitos grandes como de los pequeños.
En el guion aplicado a la ex Unión de Repúblicas Socialistas Soviéticas (URSS) por parte del jefe de la Agencia Central de Inteligencia de Estados Unidos (CIA), entre 1953 y 1961, Allen W. Dulles, se propició de una forma “activa y constante (…) el despotismo de los funcionarios, el soborno, la corrupción, la falta de principios”, y su “principal apuesta” fue “la juventud”, la cual “corromperemos, desmoralizaremos, pervertiremos”.
Las causas del fracaso del socialismo en la ex URSS, merece siempre una mirada crítica y aleccionadora por parte de Cuba, tanto aquí y ahora, como hacia el futuro. Para corroborar esto último, ahí está “el precedente del mítico “tío Basia” (la figura del especulador clandestino a gran escala surgido en la era Brezhnev), quien con los pingües beneficios acumulados en 20 años arrasa hoy con dinero constante y sonante en las subastas de la propiedad estatal”, como reseñó la revista Bohemia en julio de 1992.
Refutation of Religious Fundamentalism
Refutation of Religious Fundamentalism
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
According to the German sociologist, philosopher, economist, jurist, historian and political scientist Max Weber, considered one of the founders of the modern study of sociology and public administration, Protestantism is one of the foundational elements of the origin of capitalism.
Based on this same logic of development, it is evident that the reactionary and traditional neo-Pentecostal church – born in and exported by the United States – is a fundamental part of the current neoliberal phase of capitalism. It promotes the non-intervention of the State in society, is in favor of the cruelest individualism, alien to all social solidarity and which even privileges religious control even over the health of the population.
This is approximately how Jorge Elbaum, doctor of economics, sociologist, researcher, teacher, journalist and poet, sees it in his article “Shepherds of the Virus”.
The model of the charismatic mass pastors was exported by the United States to Latin America in the 1970s to weaken Liberation Theology, a current of the Catholic Church committed to the destiny of the poorest.
Pastor Gerard Glenn, a leader of the New Deliverance Evangelistic congregation in Richmond, challenged recommendations of social isolation by stating that “God is greater than this dreaded virus” and warned that he would not consent to the temporary closure of his church. “I’m essential as a preacher because I talk to God,” he said. Glenn died last March 22 from a coronavirus, but his wife is still fighting the disease.
The same fate befell Landon Spradlin, leader of Virginia’s evangelical community, who became a staunch defender of Donald Trump’s tenets. On March 25, he died at age 65, shortly after claiming that the quarantine was basically aimed at “manipulating the lives of American citizens” and that its communication through the media was producing “unnecessary terror.
In mid-April, Life Way Christian Resources of Tennessee published the results of a survey on pastors’ perceptions of the pandemic: 81 percent of those surveyed said that “the love of many believers is dissipating as a result of social distancing,” which is why their congregations should be kept open.
In South Korea, the Church of Jesus – known as the congregation of Shincheon, which promotes mass assemblies – became the epicentre of the COVID contagion in that country. Its leader, Pastor Lee Man-Hee, urged his followers to oppose the government’s harsh isolation measures. Sixty percent of the total number of infected people in the country belong to this group.
In crisis situations like the present one, religious fundamentalisms (of all denominations) counterpose human regulations to the law of God, demanding obedience to divine mandates that they supposedly interpret and manage. Their open-minded claims are motivated by expectations of losses in the collection of contributions and tithes from parishioners.
Leaders of denominational orthodoxy believe that lack of income can lead to the failure of their business enterprises. The logical fear generated by the pandemic allows fundamentalist leaders to appeal to apocalyptic discourse and to advise sinners of a return to revealed truth.
In Latin America, the neo-Pentecostal tradition was consolidated by spreading the so-called prosperity gospel, which holds that wealth is a divine gift. Billionaires, for that tradition, are subjects who have been rewarded by the deity and lack responsibility for the inequity they create.
According to their references, they cannot be accused of pettiness because by accumulating wealth they subject the rest of humanity to misery. This ideological position defends sexism and patriarchy, and attacks LGBT identities, feminist movements and/or those who promote the voluntary termination of pregnancy.
May 18, 2020.
This article can be reproduced by quoting the newspaper POR ESTO as the source.
If Human Hopes are Dashed
If Human Hopes are Dashed
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
An eventual re-election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the United States would once again frustrate the expectations of many. These are people who, throughout the world, have believed it possible for the American people, on their own, to be able to condemn the policy contrary to international law and the rules of coexistence practiced by the governments of both parties representing the oligarchic interests that alternate in the presidency of that North American country.
The 2020 presidential election will be held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, and will be the fifty-ninth (59th) presidential election in the United States. On November 3, 2020, voters will elect the electors who will in turn choose the new president and vice president through the Electoral College.
Only about half of Americans – because most who are eligible to vote are not interested in or don’t trust the political system that calls itself the most democratic in the world. They will go to the polls to complete the ritual of voting for the man who will govern the most powerful country in the history of our planet for the next four years.
The usual thing is that there is not much difference between the options presented to the voters. They are always two billionaires who identify very little with the interests of the average citizen and much less with the needs of the lower income population, which has never been taken into account in that very rich country.
But what is unusual about these 2020 elections is that the comparison regarding the candidates’ finances has been replaced by ideological approaches, since one of them has broken with the rules that have governed candidates’ speeches.
As Obama’s vice president, Biden was characterized by support for Obama’s policies on international relations and social issues, especially in designing the strategy for troop withdrawals from Iraq and the war in Afghanistan.
His negotiating experience was useful during negotiations with the Republican Party in Congress on tax policy, the economy and budgets, and was vital in the passage of the 2011 Budget Control Act and the 2012 Tax Relief Act.
In addition, there was his role in the Obama administration’s efforts to limit gun sales, fight sexual abuse on college campuses, and seek remedies for the lack of health insurance in the low-income population.
But let no one be fooled. There’s an opulent economic oligarchy that no one has ever elected and that has never been put to the test. It’s a plutocratic oligarchy of big corporations, which is the real core of real power. It will continue to rule the destiny of the great American nation and will remain the determining factor in American national and global political life.
It is well-known that at the head of the empire there would still be that US economic hierarchy that would only formally cede its power to a political leadership that -using the government- would make the oligarchic morality and laws prevail, while taking care of internal order and neutralizing the internal conflicts.
Although this supreme power of the enormous transnational corporations also determines domestic policy, it is in the sphere of foreign policy that its control is most clearly expressed.
It was American businessmen and bankers who determined the transformation of the world into a marketplace. They also wanted the replacement of diplomacy by the system of pressure, threats, blockades, aggressions and occupations of entire countries that currently characterizes US foreign policy.
It was they who introduced the practice of relations between countries under their imperial domination through proconsular ambassadors and puppet presidents.
Unlike politicians – who must face up to electoral contests and exercise administrative tasks in which they show their faces – the economic hierarchs exercise their power without individual commitment, without pre-determined limits and without being subject to ethical or moral standards.
Paradoxically, large corporations tend to be appreciated and respected because they theoretically generate jobs that bring well-being, while politicians, who collect taxes and repress with their police, courts and prisons, wear themselves out, degrade and take the blame.
April 29, 2020.
Can the Left Win an Election?
Can the Left Win an Election Without an Organized People?
By Hugo Moldiz Mercado.
He is a Bolivian lawyer, communicator, university professor, researcher, Master in International Relations and correspondent for international news agencies. He has advised some commissions of the Bolivian Constituent Assembly.
April 28, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Demonstrations in La Paz protesting the coup d’état against Evo Morales. Photo: Reuters.
In what way does the left have a chance of triumphing in representative (bourgeois) democratic elections? Is it an efficient and effective electoral strategy, regardless of the relation of forces between the dominant and subordinate classes, the predominant, even the only one, for a leftist candidate to be able to attract aa high percentage of the population and crown himself as the winning formula?
Is it a general political strategy, with its political-electoral correlate, that builds “from below” a favorable relationship of forces in the social struggle, to then translate it into votes greater than those received by the right-wing candidates, leading to a political-electoral victory?
It is evident that much reflection can be made on each of the questions posed. It is even possible to incorporate other questions in the same direction and make the issue even more complex. However, at the risk of appearing too simple, let us try some criteria.
The first is that the ways of doing electoral politics depend on the general political situation of the time. There is an intimate relationship between the political characteristics of a certain general historical period and the characteristics of a specific electoral situation.
A correct electoral strategy that ignores the political features of the period and the situation, however attractive it may be in the eyes and ears of the people, will not mechanically give the expected result: triumph. On the contrary, an electoral strategy based on the people as a social force with an effective territorial presence will be capable of convincing and attracting various fractions of the petty bourgeoisie and other backward sectors of the popular camp to lean towards a leftist candidate.
Second, it is true that the conditions and tools existing in this second decade of the 21st century are different, even radically different, from the conditions and tools that the left developed and used to conquer electoral victories, first, and install governments of its ideological-political court at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, later.
There is no doubt that the role of the media and social networks – as ideological state apparatuses – has an increasingly greater degree of influence in the configuration of electoral results. Whether or not it is predominant depends on the type of social formation, the nature of the class confrontation at the time, and the nature of the political strategies of the actors.
But neither the first nor the second criteria (forms of electoral participation, on the one hand, and conditions and tools, on the other), modify in substance the main aspect of representative democracy. That system, on the basis of the fetish of “one citizen, one vote”, is generally structured to ensure the reproduction of the type of capitalist state in the long term.
Except for a certain relative autonomy of the State from its dominant classes, in moments of general crisis, the left can take over the government, while previously building from “below” a relationship of favorable social and political forces.
Based on these two considerations, it is good to point out that, as a general rule, the left has been the winner of electoral competitions when its electoral strategy has succeeded in establishing or expressing the trend of social availability of the subordinate classes.
In other words, to build and condense through them a present state of mind and subjectivity of a social majority that is unwilling, for various reasons, with the government of the moment, and that is inclined to change through an option would answer the current state of affairs.
It is when the general crisis or even the indisposition with the government of the moment is made to lean to the side of a popular project. In other words, it is not only the candidate’s attributes that win over most voters but, above all, when that candidate or party synthesizes the “common sense” of what the people want and what they are fighting for at that moment.
However, this “common sense” does not arise spontaneously, even more so when the majority of the state system (repressive apparatus and ideological state apparatus) are against a leftist candidacy. It is rather the result of a patient and skillful construction of relations of forces favorable to change. This requires a conscious leadership. It is when, without abandoning modern techniques of inducing people to vote, the fragmented social tissues are gradually being articulated into a single large, strong and vigorous fabric.
The right-wing options have in an otherwise always expensive election marketing campaign the predominant way to win an election. This is because the whole state apparatus (repressive and ideological) works for their benefit. But the left, even if it is reformist, is obliged to find, in the organized strength of the people, the main source of its strategy, its tactics and its tools of triumph.
Moreover, even if the left obtained an electoral victory as a result of a high level of rejection by the population of the parties of the right, due to an unprecedented generalized crisis (ideological crisis of the classes and fractions of the block in power), its degree of stability and the possibilities of deepening its governmental measures will be very limited to face the medium and long-term challenges if it does not count on the organized people as a social force.
Does that mean that the left should abandon the use of modern techniques, such as social networks, to face an electoral competition? No, it doesn’t mean that. The progressive and leftist forces should use it to the fullest, but they should be convinced and not call themselves “self-deception” that their hypothetical victory was due to other, larger causes.
Only the naive or those who are unfamiliar with the laws of political operations are prone to be deceived by certain technical or tawdry electoral advisors who claim victory for a leftist candidate. In fact, a measurement of the level of impact of the battle on social networks will show that right-wing alternatives are the biggest beneficiaries.
The territorial work, the grassroots work, to organize the people and prepare them for a victorious battle that will translate into a vote will never be replaced by the forms of political incidence “from above”. These techniques complement, yes, but do not replace the consciousness and organization made into a material force.
For that, perhaps it is good to differentiate, as René Zavaleta did, between democracy as a mere aggregation of votes and democracy as self-determination. The sum of votes in a representative democracy can give the government, but not lay the foundations for the construction of a power different from the existing one.
This implies that a triumph within representative democracy for the right is in its condition of possibility. This is because it does not alter in any way the existing power relations. But for the left, it is insufficient since it is supposed to want the construction of power different from the capitalist one.
For the left to triumph in elections of representative democracy, it must first constitute itself as the leader of society, and this is only possible when the people become historical subjects who install their “common sense” as predominant over others.
In synthesis, it is not “from above” that the left wins the elections with the sole use of modern techniques of political incidence, but, above all, with the capacity to constitute itself “from below” as a political reference and as a part of the historical subject.
The left wins elections not only because of the charisma of a candidate, which is important but insufficient but also because of the benefit it derives from that space of representative democracy, which is not its own, to build itself as a power (hegemony translated into political practice) before becoming a government. Those are the lessons of history and that is the challenge of the present hour.
Precedents in Cuba of “Operation Gideon”
Precedents in Cuba of “Operation Gideon”
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
The partial or total crushing of Operation Gideon against Venezuela left a significant number of mercenaries captured, including a self-confessed DEA agent supposedly dedicated to the fight against drug smuggling and abuse.
The DEA, which employs more than 10,000 people to implement its objectives as well as to prosecute money laundering linked to these crimes, also often serves the imperialist purposes of the U.S. government in Latin America and other parts of the world.
This new victory of the Bolivarian Armed Forces and the Venezuelan people has been another defeat for Donald Trump’s neo-colonigializing policy. It has created a focus of violence in various Venezuelan states and in the capital, Caracas. It’s done against a backdrop of systematic campaigns of lies in the hegemonic media aimed at spreading disorder in order to make governance impossible.
The idea is to create a matrix of opinion that shows Venezuela as an ungovernable country by forcing its president, Nicolas Maduro, to ask for support from the OAS and Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (TIAR), first. These would then approve a humanitarian military intervention in his country.
It is not news that President Trump and his officials have denied Washington’s participation in the defeated maritime incursion. They know that it would be contradictory and unacceptable for the U.S. government to appear linked to mercenaries and drug traffickers. Such a scenario is not compatible with the image of representation that they want to project to internal and external public opinion, much less admit this scandalous failure now.
That is why Mr. Mike Pompeo told the press in his defense that “if we had been behind those actions the result would have been different”, omitting any comparison of such a humiliating American defeat what happened in Vietnam.
Something similar was done by the US ambassador to the UN, Adlai Stevenson, on April 15, 1961, when he denied any link of his country with the bombings of mercenary planes against Cuba.
The Cuban Foreign Minister at the time, Raúl Roa, unmasked this when it became known that the mercenaries in the service of Washington had surrendered to the Cuban militia troops barely 64 hours after the invasion landed at Playa Girón (Bahía de Cochinos, aka Bay of Pigs).
Stevenson made an ethical gesture and recognized that this was the greatest humiliation that his government would have received, an ethical gesture that cannot be expected from Trump or Pompeo.
But now the shot has backfired on Trump, who apparently did not know that drug trafficker and DEA agent Jose Alberto Socorro-Hernandez, aka “Pepero,” had been apprehended in Caracas. There, he confessed to the instructions he received to carry out various violent actions in the state of Miranda that were carried out by DEA-oriented drug gangs and common criminals,
According to Pepero, they were intended to divert the attention of Venezuelan security services to entertain them and to guarantee protection for the landing plan, which took place this past May 3 in the town of Macuto, in the state of La Guaira.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that the U.S. government has used the DEA to carry out these actions, as well as to play a façade role in Operation Gideon. If this turned out to be successful, there would be applause, if it went wrong, they would disqualify their agent.
Poreso did not use an American, but rather the Venezuelan drug trafficker-agent Socorro Hernández (aka) Pepero, who is linked to the Colombian cartels operating in Zulia. This is on the border with the Upper Guajiracolombian-Venezuelan region, a territory that was under the control of the powerful leader of the Northern Block of the narco-paramilitaries, Rodrigo Tovar Pupo, extradited by Álvaro Uribe Vélez in 2008, who claims that Uribe betrayed him.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that the U.S. government has used the DEA to carry out these actions, as well as to play a role as a front for Operation Gideon. If it went well, they would applaud it; if it went badly, they would disown their agent, and therefore they did not use an American, but a Venezuelan counter-revolutionary drug trafficker.
The installation of 10 U.S. military bases in Colombia, officially agreed to by the government of Barack Obama, is a humiliation to its people and a regional threat. It will take years for the Colombians to eliminate this Yankee military occupation. Guantánamo is an example, illegally occupied and denounced in all international forums whose agreements are not obeyed and/or blatantly violated.
May 13, 2020
This article can be reproduced quoting the newspaper POR ESTO as the source
Lifting Restrictions is Very Dangerous
Lessons from Hokkaido Island to the World:
Lifting Restrictions is Very Dangerous
The region acted quickly and contained the initial outbreak with a three-week quarantine. But when restrictions were lifted, a second wave hit even harder.
April 30, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Masked passers-by in Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan, on February 26, 2020 Photo: Reuters
The island of Hokkaido in northern Japan is experiencing a second wave of coronavirus infections and deaths, which experts say could have been avoided if the state of emergency had not been lifted too soon. Their experience offers a grim lesson for the next phase of the battle against covid-19, TIME reports.
The region acted quickly and contained the initial SARS-CoV-2 outbreak with a three-week quarantine. But when local authorities lifted restrictions, a second wave of infection hit even harder: less than four weeks later, the island was forced to re-implement the blockade.
Hokkaido reported 38 new cases on Tuesday, bringing its total number of infections to 688, the fifth highest in Japan. Simultaneously, one person died from the virus, bringing the number of deaths on the island to 27.
Chitose Airport, Hokkaido, Japan Photo: Reuters
Success Story
Thus, the island, which was seen as something of a success story for the way it worked to contain, track and isolate the virus, is once again in the spotlight as it struggles to cope with the second wave of contagion.
In late February, Hokkaido became the first place in Japan to declare a state of emergency for covid-19. Schools were closed, large-scale meetings were canceled and people were advised to stay home. The local government pursued the virus with determination, isolating anyone who had had contact with those infected.
The strategy apparently worked, and by mid-March, the number of new cases had been reduced to one or two per day. On 19 March, the state of emergency was lifted and schools were reopened in early April. But only 26 days after the state of emergency was lifted, a new one had to be imposed.
It should be noted that Hokkaido has acted independently of the central Government, which only last week placed Tokyo, Osaka and five other prefectures in a state of emergency.
Lifting the restrictions “is very dangerous”.
“Now I regret that we should not have lifted the first state of emergency,” Kiyoshi Nagase, president of the Hokkaido Medical Association, told TIME. “It really won’t be until next year that we can safely lift these blockades.
Experts say the restrictions on the island were lifted too quickly and too soon because of pressure from local businesses, along with a false sense of security about the declining infection rate.
According to Kazuto Suzuki, a professor at Hokkaido University, the example of the island “shows that what is happening in the U.S.,” where some governors are lifting restrictions, “is very dangerous.
“That’s what we know now: even if you control the first wave, you can’t relax,” Suzuki concluded.
(Source: Russia Today)
No Impunity for Spreading the Epidemic
No Impunity for Those Who Commit the Crime of Spreading the Epidemic or Taking Advantage of the Situation
The current Cuban Penal Code imposes penalties ranging from three months to one year’s imprisonment for the basic offence of spreading an epidemic; from three to eight years for theft; from three months to one year for disobedience, illegal economic activity, speculation and hoarding.
April 3, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Photo: Radio Nuevitas
Camagüey – Jacqueline Ballester Aranda, the chief prosecutor of the Camagüey Provincial Public Prosecutor’s Office’s Criminal Prosecution Department, told Radio Cadena Agramonte that the biggest complaints in that territory were about the crime of spreading an epidemic.
Eight people are involved in this case because of refusals by travelers from abroad to comply with the social isolation required to preserve the health of their families and the community.
Also, four cases are being prosecuted for speculation and hoarding, based on the occupation of large quantities of deficient products, both food and hygiene, which are basic necessities for the population or essential to combat COVID-19.
A citizen was tried for the purchase of 18 liters of chlorine, with the aim of selling it at a higher price, and was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment, while another was charged with a similar amount.
On the other hand, 652 pounds of malanga and 175 pounds of rice have been recovered; in both cases, they were intended for illegal economic activity, and, for example, the defendant was marketing cereal at eight pesos a pound.
There was a robbery with force in a placita (point of sale of agricultural products) in the city of Camagüey, whose authors stole 38 sacks of potatoes and the weights of the unit. Those involved are already in custody and under investigation.
The Chief Prosecutor of the Department of Criminal Procedure of the Provincial Prosecutor’s Office added that demonstrations of contempt for the authorities, including the health and public order authorities, have been made against the request to place the nasobuco on the public highway and the indication of isolation in the centers authorized for such purposes.
The current Cuban Criminal Code imposes penalties ranging from three months to one year’s imprisonment for the basic offense of spreading an epidemic; from three to eight years for theft; from three months to one year for disobedience, illegal economic activity, speculation and hoarding.
Cuba Returns 2000+ Stranded Cubans
Cuba guarantees the return of more than two thousand Cubans stranded in 15 countries
Since the beginning of the spread of the pandemic, Cuban Consulates have provided timely information to Cuban nationals abroad on the evolution of the disease on the island and on consular procedures.
April 27, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Photo: Cubaminrex
Since the announcement of the regulations on travel to and from Cuba, a measure adopted by the Cuban authorities as part of the national plan for the prevention and confrontation of COVID-19 as of March 20, more than 2,000 Cubans have returned to national territory, by air and sea, from more than a dozen countries, among them: Angola, Barbados, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Italy, Nicaragua, Peru, Portugal, Mexico, Panama and Equatorial Guinea, Cubaminrex reported.
These return flights of Cuban citizens and foreigners residing on the island have been organized between the competent Cuban authorities and their counterparts in each of the countries involved, in strict compliance with internationally established standards.
Since the beginning of the spread of the pandemic, Cuban Consulates have provided timely information to Cuban nationals abroad on the evolution of the disease on the Island and on consular procedures. At the same time, the Cuban authorities are permanently monitoring the situation of our nationals stranded in different countries, while efforts are being made, whenever possible, to ensure their return to our country.
Equally commendable has been the action of Cuban residents and members of solidarity organizations with Cuba, who have provided food, medicines and arranged cheap accommodations for Cuban citizens who are waiting to return to our national territory.
Pandemic and Spirituality
Pandemic and Spirituality
The coronavirus forces us to assume a new spirituality and attitude towards reality. Spirituality is the capacity to open oneself lovingly to the other, to nature and to God.
By Frei Betto
April 11, 2020
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Life is full of contingencies. On a personal level, failure, loss of friends, illness, death. On the global level, events that no analyst or futurologist foresees, such as the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Twin Towers in New York. Nor did anyone suspect that in the midst of the 21st century, with all the resources of science, humanity would be threatened by a pandemic.
Who could have imagined that it would come from China, in the form of a contagious disease, the cause of the deepest crisis of capitalism since 2008? According to the Morgan Stanley Composite Index, in a few weeks in the financial market, the shares of the world’s stock exchanges lost $15.5 trillion dollars, more than eight times the GDP of Brazil in 2019!
Will any of those speculators and mega-researchers be affected in their pockets (the most sensitive part of the human body) have become poorer? And yet, before the pandemic, almost all of them refused to make their own contribution to measures to combat hunger and global warming.
That reminds me of the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans in the year 70. There came a time when the rich man offered a pot full of gold in exchange for a piece of bread.
The coronavirus forces us to assume a new spirituality and attitude towards reality. It does not make class distinctions, as does gastroenteritis, which kills thousands of malnourished children. Likewise, it makes no distinctions of sexual orientation, as does AIDS, which affected mostly homosexuals. Now we are all vulnerable, even if the age groups and situations of risk vary.
We are all forced to withdraw into the house and into ourselves, to become detached. This abandonment of routine activities and programmed agendas can uproot or humanize us. Those who are attached to certain habits that, for the moment, are forbidden, such as going to the movies, to the theater, to the club, will rebel. In the case of the elderly, they will not be able to have contact with their grandchildren and will have to stay at home as long as possible.
Air travel has been reduced, national borders have been closed, tourist tours have been canceled. We have no choice but to stay put where we are. Huit-clos [no exit], within four walls. We may discover, like Sartre, why others are hell. And it may be that we rescue family life, dialogue with the family, the care of the house (everything must be sanitized).
It is time to learn to work and study without leaving domestic space. Now we have more time to watch movies on TV, surf the internet, read good books, do research, meditate and pray.
The virus makes everyone equal. But it doesn’t level the playing field. The bourgeois couple, who never took the trouble to go into the kitchen or clean the house, are now forced to roll up their sleeves or risk having one of their employees bring the virus into their home. The recalcitrant does not follow the instructions of the health authorities, and the selfish buy all the alcohol gel and masks in the pharmacy.
I know a young woman who volunteered to do the shopping for the vulnerable neighbors in her building without charging anything for it. Another distributed her phone number so that isolated elderly people would have someone to talk to. A married couple of lawyers go in their car every morning to pick up their cook on the outskirts and take her back in the afternoon, to prevent her from using public transportation. Three neighboring families from a hospital decided to prepare lunches for the nurses and doctors who double their work hours. In Italy, neighbors look out the window in the late afternoon and sing in chorus. Churches, mosques, synagogues open their doors to those who live on the streets and need hygienic care. Finally, there are countless examples of generosity and solidarity in this period when we are all potentially threatened.
These gestures have their source in spirituality, even if it is not of a religious nature. Spirituality is the capacity to open oneself lovingly to others, to nature and to God. And its best teaching is in generosity, the secret of happiness. Rich is not he who has everything, said Buddha, but he who has need of little.
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