Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

Archives for May 2015

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Cuba: Willfull blindness

Pres. Obama, in his desperate quest for a legacy while Iraq is lost and the economy grows at 2%/year, turns a blind eye to human rights abuses and seizes the low-hanging fruit.

Hence, the Communist regime gets all it asks for in exchange for nothing.

Here’s a question,
Obama Says Cuba Doesn’t Sponsor Terrorism. So What Are All These Hijackers and Bomb-Makers Doing There?
The White House says that Cuba has nothing to do with terrorism. But Havana is like a Star Wars cantina of Cold War radicals—including some of the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists.

It is not only American terrorists who find safe haven in Cuba. Over a dozen members of the State Department-listed Basque terrorist group ETA reside on the island, though the Cuban government has repatriated several members back to Spain. Last month, however, the Spanish government requested that the United States try to persuade Cuba to extradite two ETA leaders; it’s difficult to see how that will ever happen now that Washington has surrendered even more leverage to Havana by removing it from the State Department list. Cuba also shelters a number of insurgents associated with the FARC, a Marxist-Leninist terrorist organization long at war with the Colombian government. In 2013, the Panama Canal Authority seized a North Korean-flagged ship ferrying undeclared weapons and armaments—including two Soviet-era MiG fighters and surface-to-air missile systems—from Cuba. According to a United Nations report on the seizure, commissioned in respect to Havana’s violation of a Security Council-imposed arms embargo on the North, the shipment “constituted the largest amount of arms and related materiel interdicted to or from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea since the adoption of resolution 1718,” prohibiting the transfer of various weapons.

North Korea is not the only rogue regime aided and abetted by Cuba. A 2014 report by the Washington-based Center for a Secure Free Society alleges that Cuban state security had assisted Venezuelan officials with passport technology information to help provide new identities to nearly 200 individuals from the Middle East.

What’s next? Two things: 1. ceding Gitmo to the Communists. 2. a triumphal visit – his “presidential aspiration“.

As for the members of Congress who did nothing to stop it, where the hell were you?

UPDATE:
Linked to by BitsBlog. Thank you!



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This just in: Cuba off sponsors of terror list

U.S. Takes Cuba off Terror List, Paving the Way for Normal Ties

Removal from the list, announced by the department on Friday in an e-mailed statement, came as a matter of course because Congress made no move to block the action within 45 days after President Barack Obama announced plans to do so on April 14.

Related: Cuba and terrorism.

UPDATE
Linked to by The Universal Spectator. Thank you!

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Latin America: Breitbart news report on Iranian expansion in our hemisphere

Visitors to Fausta’s blog have been reading about it for years, so it’s good to see more on it:


IRAN RISING: TEHRAN USING HEZBOLLAH IN LATIN AMERICAN ‘CULTURAL CENTERS’ TO INFILTRATE WEST

Breitbart News interviewed military and intelligence officials, policy experts, members of Congress, and a former White House official for this report, all of whom warned about the threat posed by Iran’s continuing encroachment into Latin America.Iran is infiltrating Latin America thanks largely to Hezbollah, a Shiite terrorist group that has sworn loyalty to Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, showing overt preference to the Tehran dictator over its host-state Lebanon. Hezbollah, along with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), have provided the on-the-ground support needed for the proliferation of Iran’s Khomeinist ideology.

Read the whole thing.

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Brazil: The WaPo’s evangelical Frank Underwood

It’s not every day that you read “evangelical” and “Frank Underwood” in the same sentence: In an article on Brazilian politics, the Washington Post posits,

An evangelical Christian who plays rock drums and has been likened to Frank Underwood, the ambitious schemer in the Netflix series “House of Cards,” has upended Brazil’s politics since being elected speaker of the country’s lower house four months ago.

They are talking about Chamber of Deputies president Eduardo Cunha of the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB), about whom they conclude,

Brazilian politics is a rough-and-tumble game, and Eduardo Cunha does not mind playing dirty to win it.

Definitely a guy worth watching.

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Is Venezuela dollarizing?

Officially, they won’t, but in practice, yes:

Venezuela Embraces the Dollar—Reluctantly
Increasing dollarization reflects doubt in President Maduro’s ability to boost a sclerotic economy and halt a plummeting currency

From real estate to cars to even some cheaper goods like health-care products, an increasing number of vendors demand dollars—or its black market equivalent in bolivars, now about 350, several times the official rate. That prices out most Venezuelans, who can’t get greenbacks because of complex currency controls the government uses to prevent capital flight.

Those controls have helped exacerbate class divisions between those who hold only bolivars and those with access to dollars, undermining Mr. Chávez’s so-called Bolivarian Revolution, the social movement embraced by his successor, President Nicolás Maduro, which aims to equitably distribute wealth.

Steve Hanke saw it coming.

Worthless bolivar, replaced by hard currency, ought to not surprise anyone, or, as Capt. Louie said, “I’m shocked, shocked, there’s gambling going on in here.”

I wonder what became of my former friend, the liberal, who told me that Chávez had improved the economy. She’ll blame Maduro for not getting Communism straight, unlike Hugo.

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Additionally, just because you have dollars doesn’t mean you can get necessities.

For example, buying car tires: A contrast between a command economy, and a consumer-oriented economy.

At the command economy: Where gasoline is almost free, but two months go by and you can’t get tires for your car.

Gustavo Hernandez Acevedo describes Chavismo on wheels,

In early April, a close relative of mine was looking everywhere for new tires. He hasn’t found anything yet.

. . .

The root of the problem is (as expected) the fall in domestic production and the lack of currency to either reactivate local factories or bring enough imports to satisfy demand. Representatives of three major tire brands have met with government representatives, but they didn’t get any specifics about when they will get the resources to keep working.

But another factor is affecting the vehicle tire market: Proveeduria (Procurement)

What’s that?

It’s a state-led initiative thought up the central government back in 2013 to directly provide spare parts and tires to public and cargo transportation drivers, under the control of the Transportation Ministry. At the beginning, those State procurement stores got their tires from illegal units that were seized by the authorities.

But in March of this year, Land Transportation Minister Haiman El Troudi published an administrative order in which tiremakers are forced to sell 20% of production to proveedurias in order to keep public transportation up and running.

At the consumer-oriented economy: Tires replaced, car serviced, in less than three hours.

The other day I needed tires. I drove to the local service station, talked to the gentleman at the desk, and dropped off my car.
About an hour later, they called me back, we discussed price and what was needed.
Two hours later, the car was ready, I went, paid, and happily drove off.

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According to this official website of the Venezuelan government (link in Spanish), the Tower of David has been evacuated and its squatters placed in government housing. The structure will be used as an Emergency Coordination Center – hopefully after a great deal of refurbishing.

Previous reports mentioned that the Bank of China would be using “La Torre de David” as its South American HQ.

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Argentina: #FIFAarrests in 22 tweets

Eamonn MacDonagh summarizes it perfectly:

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Cuba: Is China rebuilding Cuba’s ports?

Interesting article at Global Post, with the disclaimer,

This article was produced by the Xinhua News Agency, the official press agency of the People’s Republic of China. Xinhua describes itself as the “information organ of the central government.” Given China’s size and importance, GlobalPost publishes Xinhua’s press feed as a resource for its readers and makes no claims as to journalistic accuracy.

Cuban port terminal in transformation with Chinese assistance

Santiago de Cuba’s Guillermon Maoncada port is undergoing a dramatic transformation into a modern multipurpose terminal with involvement of a Chinese company.
China Communications Construction Company Limited (CCCC) is in charge of the port’s rehabilitation and modernization project which is slated to be completed in three years.
. . .
Valued at 120 million U.S. dollars, the future multipurpose terminal will facilitate the arrival of ships weighing up to 40,000 tons and will have high-tech port equipment which will possess better control ability.The transformation will enable the port to handle around 565,000 tons of goods per year, local authority said. Currently the port attracts ships with a general load of 20,000 tons.

Meanwhile, Russia’s planning to expand its permanent military presence outside its borders by placing a military base in Cuba.

What could possibly go wrong?

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