Danilo es libre - Un escrito de David D'Omni

Danilo es libre

He tenido la suerte de ver, respirar y sentir con mi alma y mi carne en suelos de Suramérica, Norteamérica, el Caribe y Europa, compartiendo con disímiles culturas, sistemas políticos y razas; algo me ha quedado claro, no hay paz o libertad si no es sentida y convertida en hecho, no hay cambios sociales si el corazón y la mente no cambian primero, los pueblos soportan, los pueblos se cansan, y todo nace en la mente y el corazón; unos accionan y otros reaccionan, unos mueven los hilos bañando a la sociedad con proyectos innovadores, proponen y siembran en su presente lo que ha de ser realidad futura (Para bien o para mal), otros observan, escuchan y luego dan apoyo o disienten, tomando partido en la realidad.

Lincoln, King, Day, & Merton

"A nation can be considered great, when it defends liberty as Lincoln did, when it fosters a culture which enables people to dream of full rights for all their brothers and sisters as Martin Luther King sought to do, when it strives for justice and the cause of the oppressed as Dorothy Day did by her tireless work, the fruit of a faith which becomes dialogue and sows peace in the contemplative style of Thomas Merton."

http://nyti.ms/1MKAKZ0

John Kerry in Havana

John Kerry in Havana
Secretary of State
U.S. Embassy
Havana, Cuba
Remarks at Flag Raising Ceremony
August 14, 2015

SECRETARY KERRY: Please be seated, everybody. Thank you very, very much. Muchas gracias. Buenos dias. I'm so sorry that we are a little bit late today, but what a beautiful ride in and how wonderful to be here. And I thank you for leaving my future transportation out here in back of me. I love it. (Laughter.)

Distinguished members of the Cuban delegation – Josefina, thank you for your leadership and for all your work of your delegation; excellencies from the diplomatic corps; my colleagues from Washington, past and present; Ambassador DeLaurentis and all of the embassy staff; and friends watching around the world, thank you for joining us at this truly historic moment as we prepare to raise the United States flag here at our embassy in Havana, symbolizing the re-establishment of diplomatic relations after 54 years. This is also the first time that a United States Secretary of State has been to Cuba since 1945. (Applause.)

John Kerry en La Habana

John Kerry en La Habana
Agosto 14, 2015

Por favor, tomen asiento. Muchas, muchas gracias. [En español:] Muchas gracias. Buenos días. Siento que hayamos llegado un poquito tarde, pero que hermoso viaje y que maravilloso estar aquí. Y gracias por dejar mi futuro vehículo aquí, detrás de mí [tres almendrones estacionados en el Malecón]. Me encanta. [Risas.]

Distinguidos miembros de la delegación cubana –Josefina, gracias por su liderazgo y por todo el trabajo de su delegación–; excelencias del cuerpo diplomático; mis colegas del pasado y actuales de Washington; embajador DeLaurentis y todo el personal de la embajada; y amigos que nos están viendo en todo el mundo, gracias por acompañarnos en este momento verdaderamente histórico, mientras nos preparamos para izar la bandera de Estados Unidos en nuestra embajada en La Habana, que simboliza el restablecimiento de las relaciones diplomáticas después de 54 años. Esta es también la primera vez que un Secretario de Estado de los Estados Unidos visita Cuba desde 1945. [Aplausos.]

5 desafíos del acceso público a Internet en Cuba

Cinco desafíos de la extensión del acceso público a Internet en Cuba
Por Elaine Díaz

Prólogo
Hay una muchacha sentada en la otra esquina del muro. Hay un P de los anaranjados que para justo en el semáforo. Hay gente bajándose del P antes de llegar a la parada. Hay también cola para entrar al Dinos Pizza. Hay una extranjera que me pregunta en inglés Where did you get your card. Y de la cola del Dinos Pizza sale un muchacho y abre una ristra de tarjetas prepagadas de acceso a Internet. Le dice a la extranjera que three dollars cada una y a mí se me antoja una trenza interminable de cabezas de ajo, que cuestan three pesos cubanos cada una.

Declaración del OC sobre violencia contra Antonio Rodiles

DECLARACIÓN DEL OBSERVATORIO CRÍTICO CUBANO SOBRE VIOLENCIA CONTRA OPOSITOR

El Observatorio Crítico Cubano deplora la violencia física ejercida el pasado día 5 de julio de 2015 contra el opositor Antonio Rodiles, quien como consecuencia debió ser intervenido quirúrgicamente. Rodiles fue operado de urgencia por una fractura del hueso nasal tras ser detenido y golpeado por agentes de la Seguridad del estado mientras participaba en una marcha de las también opositoras Damas de Blanco.

En principio, nuestro colectivo se coloca en las antípodas de las posturas políticas de Rodiles, pues defendemos un modelo de sociedad emancipada de los poderes globales, y nos oponemos al injerencista bloqueo estadounidense contra Cuba. No obstante, las diferencias políticas nunca serán argumento suficiente para justificar las prácticas violentas e ilegales con que la Seguridad maneja su relación con la disidencia en la isla. 

What "The New #Cuba" means to me

Viva Cuba, Viva Fidel, Viva Obama?

My only comment on yesterday's news item below is that onlookers would have been wiser to chant "Viva Obama" or "Viva la Convivencia" given the political bravery and risk the president has taken in "engaging" the Cuban government while aiming to "empower" the Cuban people.

Still, quite an historic day...

***

As onlookers chanted "Viva Cuba, Viva Fidel," the Cuban flag was hoisted outside of the country's newly established embassy in Washington on Monday.

The gesture marked a symbolic end to more than five decades of hostility and mistrust between the two countries.

The U.S. also opened its embassy in Cuba on Monday, but there was no ceremony. That will take place when Secretary of State John Kerry visits Havana on August 14.

Machado Ventura turns Google down

Seems like Google made Cuba an offer it COULD refuse... You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. 

At the same time, most Cubans I know say that José Ramón Machado Ventura, Second Secretary of the Central Committee of Cuba's Communist Party and Vice President of Cuba's Council of State, 85, represents the hardline past and this may be his Waterloo. Vamos a ver. 

In his brief report of this news, OnCuba's Fernando Ravsberg quipped the following:

"Dicen que cuando la limosna es demasiado grande hasta el pobre desconfía."
[They say that when the donation is too large even the poor become suspicious.]

***

Cuban Vice President Machado Ventura just spoke the following words about the future of the Internet in #Cuba:

"Everyone knows why there's not more Internet in Cuba, because it has a high cost. There are those who want to give it to us for free. However, that's not so the Cuban people can communicate, but instead with the purpose of penetrating us and carrying out an ideological campaign in order to achieve a new conquest. We must have Internet, but in our own way, with full knowledge that it is an intention of imperialism to utilize it as another way of destroying the Revolution."

El vicepresidente cubano Machado Ventura habló sobre el futuro de la Internet en Cuba:

"Todo el mundo sabe por qué en Cuba no hay más Internet, porque ello tiene un alto costo. Existen algunos que nos la quieren dar gratis, pero no lo hacen con el fin de que el pueblo cubano se comunique, sino con el propósito de penetrarnos y hacer trabajo ideológico para lograr una nueva conquista. Tenemos que poseer Internet, pero a nuestra forma, sabiendo que es una intención del imperialismo manejarla como una vía más de destruir a la Revolución".

Fifo in '05: "No one here has become a neo-liberal!"

Up late re-reading the chapter on Cuba's private, home-based "paladar" restaurants from the book "Entrepreneurial Cuba" that I recently published with Arch Ritter, and I came across this GEM from one of Fifo's last marathon speeches on November 17, 2005:

"Referring to U.S. promotion of private enterprise in Cuba, Fidel Castro reminded his listeners that self-employment has no real future in a socialist Cuba. 'The Empire was hoping that Cuba would have many more paladares but it appears that there will be no more of them. What do they think, that we have become neo-liberals? No one here has become a neo-liberal'."

Can someone please tell Raúl?!

Or, perhaps I should say, "What a difference a decade makes" or "This is what change looks like."

Fidel equated self-employment and paladares with neo-liberalism (!).

Raúl sees them as part of a new, still socialist Cuban economic model where the (still euphemistically named) "non-sate sector" plays and complementary role in economic development and the provision of goods, services, and employment, allowing the state to focus on the fundamentals.

Compare the above quote from Fidel, with this one from Raúl from December 2010:

“Self-employment is one more alternative aimed at increasing the supply of goods and services to the population. We should facilitate their work rather than generate stigmas and prejudices against them, much less demonize them. It is fundamental that we modify the existing negative approach that quite a few of us have towards this form of private work.”