News Fidel Castro Resigns: Tuesday Marks Historic Moment

[Jimmy Snyder]

You asked for it, dude. I put a direct question to you about whether Cuba should be allowed to remain communist and you ignored it.

Do you think that because you asked me a question, I am forced to answer it? I am not.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Do you think that because you asked me a question, I am forced to answer it? I am not.

Then sorry, you're going to have to accept that people will speculate on your opinion based upon the other things you've said. Welcome to the internet. And life in general. People will always react this way when you dodge material questions you have no legitimate reason not to answer.

It's not like you couldn't have just said “no, that's not what I think about Cuba and communism.” But instead of saying that you thought you could turn it into some way to bash me, just because you want to dodge a question. Another little note about life here: people won't react positively when you pull manipulative stuff like that, either.

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[Jimmy Snyder]

Then sorry, you're going to have to accept that people will speculate on your opinion based upon the other things you've said. Welcome to the internet. And life in general. People will always react this way when you dodge material questions you have no legitimate reason not to answer.

They they are wrong. Internet, welcome to me.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

They they are wrong. Internet, welcome to me.

Forcing your opinion of freedom on Cuba... not allowing people to ask questions you don't want asked... You should've been given a post in the Bush administration!

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[Jimmy Snyder]

Forcing your opinion of freedom on Cuba... not allowing people to ask questions you don't want asked

I would be pleased to have you quote me on either of these. Perhaps the Clinton administration for you.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I would be pleased to have you quote me on either of these.

Well, if you don't think that capitalism should be forced on Cuba in the interests of freedom - when you've explicitly stated that commercial competition is freedom - go ahead and say so. I have given you ample opportunity to.

As far as not allowing people to ask questions, you just said that if people on the Internet want to speculate about your opinion on something when you've been asked a question and refuse to answer, they're wrong to. Are you saying that the point I made about your opinion on communism in Cuba would have been okay if I'd put a question mark at the end of the sentence?

Oops, I phrased that as a question, and you don't have to answer those if it would expose any contradiction between what you say and what you think.

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[CaptainQuasar]

Perhaps the Clinton administration for you.

Clinton did a fair amount of forcing the will of the U.S. on small countries too. And he worked to get China admitted to the WTO despite all of the crap they've pulled with human rights and literally raping Tibet. (But China let Burger King and McDonalds in!) I appreciate the fact that he didn't do things like invading Iraq but I don't really like him either.

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[Jimmy Snyder]

I would be pleased to have you quote me on either of these. Perhaps the Clinton administration for you.

Yep, Clinton administration for sure.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Yep, Clinton administration for sure.

If you say so. I voted Republican in 2000 and 2004 (albeit not for Bush - but I voted Republican in the general election, not the primaries.) But go ahead and fantasize about me being a pinko commie hippie liberal if that makes you able to swallow your own placement of commerce and Burger King and McDonalds in the Shrine of Liberty.

By the way, starting to quote and respond to yourself is a great way of showing that you're at a complete loss for words.

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[Jimmy Snyder]

By the way, starting to quote and respond to yourself is a great way of showing that you're at a complete loss for words.

I have to quote myself bucko, you won't. You can pretend that you don't know what aspect of the Clinton administration I speak of, but we both know that that is another reason I tie you with it.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I have to quote myself bucko, you won't.

I'm the one not responding to you? Is this a justification for the font theatrics earlier? I'm confident enough to let the readers of the thread decide who is honestly responding and who is throwing up chaff and dodging questions.

You can pretend that you don't know what aspect of the Clinton administration I speak of, but we both know that that is another reason I tie you with it.

Actually, I don't. You're being too oblique again and I'm not going to go read a whole bunch of stuff about the Clinton administration to try to figure out what you're talking about. Was there an ex-Cuban or an ex-communist member of the Clinton administration?

Wait - is it because I think corporations often do bad things?

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[Yonoz]

You know what question everyone in Cuba is asking now: so how 'bout them Yankees?

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

You know what question everyone in Cuba is asking now: so how 'bout them Yankees?

Do you think they are confused by the noise that freedom entails. Why would that be?

 

[CaptainQuasar]

You know what question everyone in Cuba is asking now: so how 'bout them Yankees?

LOL Yonoz, great - both a defusion of tension and reference to the fact that Cubans love baseball too.

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[Yonoz]

Thankyou, I do Bar-Mitzvahs and circumcisions (male only).

 

[vanesch]

Freedom for me is something totally different than the way of organizing economical relationships. For me, freedom is in the first place, the ability to speak freely, to walk freely (so one should limit private property somehow, to keep enough of it public) etc...

There's of course a DIFFERENT question, which is: is freedom the highest good ? If you live in total economic misery, maybe freedom comes after food on your list of priorities.

As to capitalism, for sure in certain areas it has shown to be a very efficient economical organisational process, but I fail to see the link with freedom. After all, the biggest dictatorship in the world (China, but take Russia in too) are ultra-capitalistic at this moment. Of course there is a limited form of "freedom" involved in a capitalist organisation: the freedom to set up your own way of trying to make money. But most people, even in capitalist countries, don't seem to take that freedom at heart, given that they work as employees (so they don't use their "freedom" to set up a business). So although the capitalistic principles can be *efficient* (mainly by eliminating very BAD practices, not so much by only keeping the best), I don't know in how much we should think of them as the ultimate pinnacle of *freedom*.

That said, on poor people's priority list might be in the first place some economic improvement (which can maybe be brought in by some form of capitalism) over genuine freedom, which only means something once you've got filled your stomach.

To the Burger King/Mc Donald dispute, I'd say: the real form of economic freedom here would be to be able to open your *OWN* traditional restaurant and undergo fair competition with the hamburger conglomerates, so that you don't suffer unfair competition because of their financial muscle and publicity.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

To the Burger King/Mc Donald dispute, I'd say: the real form of economic freedom here would be to be able to open your *OWN* traditional restaurant and undergo fair competition with the hamburger conglomerates, so that you don't suffer unfair competition because of their financial muscle and publicity.

Would you be willing to hobble your *OWN* traditional restaurant if it were moderately successful, but a smaller restaurant wanted to open in the same town? How much financial muscle is OK with you. Where does that muscle come from? What about the freedom of the customers? Must they eat at restaurants that they don't like in the name of fairness?

I don't know how it is in the real world, but here in the People's Republic of Northern South Jersey, most restaurants are NOT chains. For instance, we have a lot of diners. They compete with the chains, the fancy restaurants, the greasy spoons, and each other and do quite well. People here enjoy the food and the atmosphere. Do they fly under your radar?

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Does anyone here know how many McDonalds restaurants there are in China?

http://www.lifeintheusa.com/food/chinese.htm" .

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Does anyone here know how many McDonalds restaurants there are in China?

That's an interesting question, I am curious too. Per this http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=528311" shows China with the least expensive Big Mac worldwide in dollars.

McDonalds is also http://www.mcdonalds.com/corp/news/corppr/2007/la_announcement.html", listing almost 1600 restaurants there in April 2007.

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[Jimmy Snyder]

639

Compared to 41000 Chinese restaurants in the US. Who is forcing what on whom?

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Compared to 41000 Chinese restaurants in the US. Who is forcing what on whom?

You're right. We've been invaded! Run for the hills! Or better yet, gather up the torches and pitchforks and we'll burn down all the Chinese restaurants.

The reason why we have many personal freedoms here in the U.S. (as U.S. citizens, at least) is not because there are lots of Chinese restauraunts. And call China free if you wish https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2196.html", no matter how many McDonalds are there and whether or not they go out of business.

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[vanesch]

The reason why we have many personal freedoms here in the U.S. (as U.S. citizens, at least) is not because there are lots of Chinese restauraunts.

Yes, that was my point. It seemed that the benchmark for ultimate freedom was the competition between two chains of fast food restaurants, which I objected to, for two reasons:
1) they are not really a sign of fully running economic freedom, because they are just a battle of big corporations, where publicity and so on are probably more important than genuine product/price quality

2) I don't consider economic freedom as the pinnacle of freedom by itself (and most people don't, as most people don't start a business).

The proof is indeed that both conditions are entirely satisfied in countries where genuine freedom is very low on the list of priorities, China on top.

That doesn't mean I have anything against McDonalds (I sometimes eat there too), or that I have anything against economic freedom (call it capitalism if you want). But it is not what I would take as a benchmark for freedom, at all.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

You thought that I mean freedom entailed allowing these two particular chains to operate and no other other restaurants? How could anyone take that meaning?

1)they (I'm not sure what 'they' refers to) are not really a sign of fully running economic freedom, because they are just a battle of big corporations, where publicity and so on are probably more important than genuine product/price quality.

Hershey's didn't advertise for most of their history. And their chocolate rots too. Yet they are big.
I never meant that only big corporations should be allowed to compete. You must realize though that if a small entity competes and wins, it will become big. I don't think you can define genuine quality (you didn't mean that you would dictate what was genuine quality did you?) except by allowing companies to compete and allowing customers to decide what they want. Allow, not force.

2) I don't consider economic freedom as the pinnacle of freedom by itself (and most people don't, as most people don't start a business).

Will you increase my freedom by preventing me from listening to the music of my choice (I don't play), preventing me from living in the house of my choice (I don't build houses), going to the restaurant of my choice (I don't own a restaurant)? Perhaps what you really mean is that most people wouldn't fight for other people's freedoms.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Will you increase my freedom by preventing me from listening to the music of my choice (I don't play), preventing me from living in the house of my choice (I don't build houses), going to the restaurant of my choice (I don't own a restaurant)? Perhaps what you really mean is that most people wouldn't fight for other people's freedoms.

If you're saying this in the context of communism, it seems to me that you're implying that the object of socialism and communism is to prevent people from doing things. It's not, any more than the object of capitalism is slavering oppressive greed. Most of the communist societies have been lead by totalitarian states that liked to prevent people from doing things, yes - but as vanesch points out they're just as enthusiastic about preventing people from doing things now that they're capitalist.

The basic tenet of communism is: no matter how smart or ingenious the person providing the capital for an operation is, the workers who actually do the work are the ones who should primarily benefit from the enterprise. Not that you can't have the music or the house you want or can't go to a particular restaurant - just that the workers in those restaurants or who make the music and CD's or who build the houses should be the ones receiving the benefits of doing a good job, rather than some owner who bankrolled the operation. So communists think that the state should be the one to bankroll every commercial operation.

Now I personally think that this philosophy is ignoring much of the real, tangible dynamism and momentum that entrepreneurship infuses into an enterprise. And I think that in practical terms the wealth-generation benefits of modern capitalism over the implementations of communism which have been tried so far pretty clearly outweigh the down side of putting power and a bigger cut of wealth in the hands of banks and industrialists.

But since I don't think that these economic arrangements have anything in particular to do with freedom, I don't think it's kosher for the U.S. at this point to be saying to Cubans, “You guys are just so wrong about that whole communism thing, so we're just going to fix that for ya. We're going to apply political pressure until you go capitalist and let all our big businesses back in.”

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[russ_watters]

...

[edit] Letting that last one go.

 

[russ_watters]

Basically, everything I've seen about Cubans from music stuff to doctors and scientists to a couple Cubans I've known has shown me that they're really great people and they've got a rich and vibrant culture on their own. I think they ought to get free elections and more freedom of the press and other things. But I think that they ought to be able to remain communist if they want to, or shift to capitalism if they choose to.

Yes! Now you're getting it!

That said, I do have two small quibbles with your understanding of the concept of freedom:

1. Commercial freedom is a kind of freedom (yes, that's redundant), so they cannot truly be said to be free unless they get it.

2. Freedom is an individual thing. You cannot vote on it. You cannot vote to remain Communist because in so doing, you are infringing on peoples' individual rights. Even if only 1 person in the country wants to start his own business, saying you have a free society requires that you let him do it.

 

[russ_watters]

Two different ways of saying the exact same thing. I think you've been playing us.

He hasn't been playing us - sometimes people just get caught up in their dislike for American and run off on tangents. That's what happened here.

 

[russ_watters]

I would still say that the United States has proved through many of its actions that we are far from the paramount authority on or champion of freedom. Saying that Cuba ought to have more freedom of the press or more internal political activity is not the same thing as saying it needs to be taught some lessons about freedom and democracy by the United States.

The United States is particularly bad about teaching lessons of freedom and democracy to 3^rd world countries, it always seems like somehow in the course of the lesson whoops! all of the wealth and natural resources of the 3^rd world nation somehow ended up in the hands of U.S. corporations and banks, or the corporations and banks of other 1^st world nations.

You'r'e sliding off on that tangent again. The only thing Cuba needs to do to learn from us is crack open a history book. None of that other stuff has any relevance here whatsoever. (and btw, since when would learning not include learning what we did wrong?)

 

[russ_watters]

My, spare on the words, aren't we? I get the feeling you're still expecting something someone else has said to make your arguments for you.

Since you didn't bother to elaborate further despite my request that you do so, I will take the liberty to do it for you. You're saying that capitalism has to be forced on Cuba regardless of what the Cuban people might decide collectively, and that's freedom.

If you want to live with the fantasy that the U.S. invading and intervening in other countries and deciding for them how they ought to be governed somehow makes us champions of freedom, be my guest. But somehow I don't think that the people whose affairs we go mucking around in would have such high praise for it.

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There's that tangent again, CaptainQuasar. No one has suggested that the US invade Cuba and impose a Constitution on them. Indeed, the US has never done that and shouldn't ever do that. Change has to come from within to be real.

Jimmy is simply pointing out that without economic freedom they aren't free. He's not suggesting that we force it on them. You're jumping to that conclusion because you assume an imperialistic intent from America and Americans.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

You cannot vote to remain Communist because in so doing, you are infringing on peoples' individual rights.

This exact thought had crossed my mind. If you want to become (or remain) Communist, join a commune. All it takes is one other like-minded person. Voting for Communism means that you want other people to live in communes. If you can't find even one other person that wants to join you in a commune, then I extend my sympathy to you, but look on the bright side. You live in a particularly free society.