Bidenists and other conservatives are very excited today because there are “anti-dictatorship” protests going on in Cuba. Here’s a paragraph from an AP News article:
Cuba is going through its worst economic crisis in decades, along with a resurgence of coronavirus cases, as it suffers the consequences of U.S. sanctions imposed by the Trump administration. An official in the Biden administration tweeted support for Sunday’s demonstrations.
Demonstrators in Havana protest shortages, rising prices by Andrea Rodriguez, AP News
Let’s break it down. The paragraph clearly states that the main reason for the economic crisis in Cuba is the US sanctions imposed on it by the Trump administration. It also points out that the COVID-19 pandemic has affected Cuba, just as it has affected everyone else. And then an official in the Biden administration tweeted support for Sunday’s demonstrations. Yet, the overall theme of the article is that Cubans are protesting a dictatorial government.
I watched a little bit of CBS News and they’re pretty fucking excited about these protests as well. Yes, at least some of the protesters are protesting the form of government in Cuba, but the main thing appears to be rising consumer prices — which were caused entirely by forces outside of Cuba. Moreover, we are also having a big problem with rising consumer prices here in the US — without having been subjected to economic warfare from a hostile empire.
The article says that a protester — protesting conditions caused directly by economic warfare from the US and a pandemic that was not caused by anyone in Cuba — held up an American flag that was quickly snatched away. I have some questions about that: Did that protester understand that the Cuban government has absolutely no responsibility for the current economic problem in Cuba? Does that protester understand that Cuba has been more or less victimized by the west since throwing off the US-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, and that conditions there are in fact better politically than when Batista and his supporters ruled the small island nation? Is that protester really a US agent?
From Wikipedia:
In the decades following United States’ invasion of Cuba in 1898, and formal independence from the U.S. on 20 May 1902, Cuba experienced a period of significant instability, enduring a number of revolts, coups and a period of U.S. military occupation. Fulgencio Batista, a former soldier who had served as the elected president of Cuba from 1940 to 1944, became president for the second time in 1952, after seizing power in a military coup and canceling the 1952 elections. Although Batista had been relatively progressive during his first term, in the 1950s he proved far more dictatorial and indifferent to popular concerns. While Cuba remained plagued by high unemployment and limited water infrastructure, Batista antagonized the population by forming lucrative links to organized crime and allowing American companies to dominate the Cuban economy, especially sugar-cane plantations and other local resources. Although the US armed and politically supported the Batista dictatorship, later US presidents recognized its corruption and the justifiability of removing it.
The US supports freedom of other countries as long as those other countries vote to lick our boots. When another country votes for freedom (i.e., socialism and democracy), the US declares that country to be naughty and destroys the democratically-elected government, forcing that country to either suffer a dictatorship controlled by foreign capital or have a socialist revolution. If that country succeeds at its socialist revolution, it will be constantly villainized by the US press and both US political parties, who will point out that the socialist government is a dictatorship when it was the US who interfered with their democracy in the first place, forcing that country into a socialist dictatorship rather than a socialist democracy.
If you support the Biden administration, you are supporting US imperialism, and that includes supporting meddling in other countries and actively destabilizing them via economic, social, and military means. This is just one of the many reasons real progressives are deeply disappointed in mainstream Democrats who have proven themselves to be just a different flavor of conservative.