Re: Cuba Aping the USSR: inevitable?

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Julio Pino wrote:
>
>   I hate to defend May Alice-in-Woderland and her partner in crime , but
>on the issue of Cuba being economically unprepared for the collapse of the
>Soviet Bloc and what that would mean for Cuba's domestic economy, she and
>Barnes are right on target. In the 1970s Cuba grew ever more dependent on
>the Soviet bloc, in part by economic necessity, but also by choice, because
>they had become convinced of the superiority of the Soviet model to theirs,
>especially after the ten-million ton disaster.

Julio, it is difficult to engage you in a discussion around these questions
because you have shown very little interest in the problems of building
socialism, but more in how to construct Islamic republics. It is one thing
to play the list eccentric, it is another to try to have a serious
discussion about what economic policies should have been adopted in Cuba.

To be as succinct as possible, I would say that Cuban socialist
construction has been marked by a large degree of pragmatism just as was
the case in the USSR prior to the rise of Stalin. As far as the presence of
sex workers in Cuba is concerned, I doubt that this is avoidable given the
tourist industry. But that tourist industry is the main supplier of foreign
currency, without which there can be no import of medicine, farm machinery,
spare parts for assembly lines, oil, etc. Perhaps you have some brilliant
idea about how Cuba could resolve these contradictions but I doubt if it
will be found in the Quran.

Louis Proyect
Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/