Rubio: Castro resignation a 'joke'

Marco Rubio, the first Cuban-American to become speaker of the House, does not share the celebratory feeling over the news from Cuba. It only "confirms that Fidel Castro is increasingly senile and out of touch with reality."

"It's a joke. This is a complete joke, guys. He's not the president of Cuba. When was he elected?" Rubio told reporters. "He has nothing to resign because he's a dictator. ... What he's done is he resigns so people can say 'Oh look in Cuba they actually have a legitimate system of government.' "

He continued, "The only news in Cuba that will ever matter is the day that they announce they are having free democratic elections."

Audio here.

Comments

we trade with China. we trade with Vietnam. why can't we have trade with Cuba? Why does the government, who claims to espouse free trade, deny it with a nation only 90 miles away?

Why does our government, which believes in individual freedom and liberty, forbid us from freely traveling to where we choose?

Hmmm...is this Rubio's first campaign speech for President of a free Cuba? Maybe he can take Mel Martinez with him and make him Minister of Immigration.

Because we've been doing it for 50 years and are not going to change it just because you want a suntan.

Amen Speaker Rubio.

Charlie Crist is a moron. For him to say he "joins Cubans...in recognizing the official resignation of Fidel Castro as President of Cuba" demonstrates a shocking lack of understanding and insensitivity.

Cubans, nor anyone else with a brain for that matter, do not recognize "an official resignation" because there is nothing "official" about Castro's regime and he has never "recognized" as the President of Cuba to begin with .

He holds no legitimate claim to power over the Cuban people, which is why he still employs secret police, and neighborhood gestapos to keep order.

Amen, 11:27.

rubio is an idiot

[Flagophile]

The US trades with Cuba. The embargo's continuation is a silly (and failed) attempt to placate the exile community in Miami.

Also, although Castro's resignation can hardly be called "official," for the reasons stated above, it is a step in the right direction.

Was Batista elected everytime he ran things?

Batista was the de facto military leader of Cuba from 1933 to 1940 and the de jure President of Cuba from 1940 to 1944 after having won election. After staging a successful coup in 1952, Batista ran unopposed in an election in 1954, and ruled the nation until handing over power on the last day of 1958, the reason given for that event being the political unrest caused mostly by a multi-faction, mainly-student, opposition insurgency. Fidel Castro's guerrilla movement was one of the groups involved in this Cuban Revolution. It is estimated that over 20,000 people were murdered by the Batista regime in acts of political repression, most of whom were tortured.

If one were to believe the Castroist propaganda, one would have the impression that Cuba was a country with a 40% illiteracy rate, with the greedy hands of multi-national US conglomerates controlling every facet of the national economy; a country without doctors,where workers and farmers were horribly exploited, with a high level of unemployment, and with houses of prostitution and gambling casinos on each corner.

Of course, Cuba was not a fully developed country, nor were its resources distributed equally among all its people -nor have they been equitably distributed during Castroism-, but in 1958 only 14% of the capital invested in the island came from the US, and there were no more than 10 gambling casinos in the country. At the same time, 62% of sugar mills, the principal sites of sugar production -which itself was the most important component of the Cuban economy- were owned by Cubans.

In 1953, Cuba was 22nd among the world's nations in the number of doctors per capita, with 128.6 for each 100 thousand inhabitants.

The mortality rate was 5.8 -third lowest in the world-, while the mortality rate of the United States was 9.5 and that of Canada 7.6.

Towards the end of the 50s, the island had the lowest infant mortality rate of Latin America, with 3.76, followed by Argentina with 6.11, Venezuela with 6.56, and Uruguay with 7.30, as per data provided by the World Health Organization.

Cuba was number 33 among 112 nations in the world as far as the level of daily reading, with 101 newspaper copies published per 1,000 inhabitants, which also contradicts the argument that the country was inhabited by a great number of illiterates.

Even as far as so-called luxury items, in 1959 Cuba had one radio per each five inhabitants, one television set for each 28, one telephone for each 38, and one automobile for each 40 inhabitants, according to the Annual Statistical Report of the United Nations.

As a matter of fact, even the greatest and most world-renowned Cuban writers and artists had already created their most important works before Castro's arrival to power. Among them, their politics notwithstanding, were José Lezama Lima, probably the most outstanding Cuban man of letters of this century; poet and dramatist Virgilio Piñera, who revolutionized Cuban theater with the premiere of Electra Garrigó in 1948, two years before French-Romanian Eugene Ionesco, father of the Theater of the Absurd, premiered The Bald Soprano in Paris; the painters Amelia Pelaez, René Portocarrero, Wilfredo Lam and many others; novelist Alejo Carpentier, author of The Century of Lights, poet Nicolás Guillén; the ballerina Alicia Alonso; and, of course, an extraordinary number of composers and interpreters of Cuban popular music, such as Ernesto Lecuona, Amadeo Roldán, Alejandro García Caturla, the Trío Matamoros, Sindo Garay, Eliseo Grenet, Hubert de Blank, Benny Moré, Dámaso Pérez Prado, and many more.

What follows is some data regarding public health, the labor sector, and education:

PUBLIC HEALTH: In 1958, Cuba had a population of six million, six hundred thirty one thousand inhabitants (6,630,921, to be exact). At that time, there were 35 thousand (35,000) hospital beds in the country, an average of one hospital bed per 190 inhabitants, a number which then exceeded the goal of developed countries, which was 200 inhabitants per hospital bed. In 1960, the United States had one hospital bed per 109 inhabitants.

Also in 1958, the Cuban nation had an average of one doctor per 980 inhabitants, a number that was surpassed in Latin America only by Argentina, with one doctor per 760 inhabitants, and Uruguay, with one per each 860. Cuba had one dentist per 2,978 inhabitants then.

This data is found in the archives of the World Health Organization.

LABOR RELATIONS: In 1958, an industrial worker in Cuba earned an average salary of the equivalent of $6 US dollars per each 8-hour work day, while an agricultural worker earned the equivalent of $3 US dollars. Cuba then ranked number eight (8) in the world as far as salaries paid to industrial workers, outperformed only by the following countries:

the United States ($16.80)

Canada ($11.73)

Sweden ($ 8.10)

Switzerland ($ 8.00)

New Zealand ($ 6.72)

Denmark ($ 6.46)

Norway ($ 6.10)

As far as salaries for agricultural workers, Cuba was number seven (7) in the world, outperformed only by the following countries:

Canada ($7.18)

the United States ($6.80)

New Zealand ($6.72)

Australia ($6.61)

Sweden ($5.47)

Norway ($4.38)

This data was published by the International Labor Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1960. In 1958, Cuba had a labor force of two million two hundred four thousand workers (2,204,000). The rate of unemployment at that time was 7.07%, the lowest in Latin America, as per data from the Cuban Labor Ministry.

EDUCATION: That same year, Cuba had three government financed universities and three others that were privately run. There were twenty thousand (20,000) students enrolled in the government run universities.

There were 900 officially recognized private schools, including the three private universities. The total number of students enrolled at these institutions was over one hundred thousand (100,000).

The public school system employed twenty five thousand (25,000) teachers, and the private school system counted with 3,500.

In the middle of the 1950s, there were 1,206 rural school houses in Cuba, as well as a mobile library system which boasted a total of 179,738 books.

Also in 1958, Cuba had 114 institutions of higher education, below the university level; among them were technical institutes, polytechnic and professional schools, which were financed by the government. Just in 1958, these institutions graduated 38,428 students. In 1958, the island's illiteracy rate was 18%.

This data is found in the archives of Cuba's Ministry of Education.

Cuba was the Latin American country with the highest budget for education in 1958, with 23% of the total budget earmarked for this expense. It was followed by Costa Rica (20%), and Guatemala and Chile, each with 16%. This data comes from America in Statistics, published by the Pan American Union.

11:27...you are only partially correct. Since we believe in freedom and liberty we do not believe that anyone who holds power through any means but open and fair elections holds that power "legitimately"...that being said...Castro has in fact been recognized as the leader of Cuba by the world community (not the "chosen" leader by the people of Cuba..but nonetheless the leader). Your accurate description of how he has maintained order sounds much like the methodology employed to maintain order in the House.

Who is Rubio?

[Castro Fears Rubio!]

(tap tap tap) HELLO...Hello...hello...Is anybody here...here...here? Do you want to hear about my tax ...tax ...tax ...plan ...plan ...plan? I'm gonna be BIG...Big...big... someday. Fidel...joke...joke...joke...