Florida Couple Wrecked In Cuba

No... really. Cuba is a great place to go. Helpful. Friendly. I mean, where else can you shipwreck and barely escape with your life, celebrate that you survived the storm, then watch the military detain you as they tear your boat apart for their own uses? I am not sure who else can boast that... well, maybe Sudan can. After all, Cuba did not hold them for ransom, right? I just do not understand why more Americans do not make it a destination. And if you think that story is incredible, ask the locals in S Florida (refugees), or the kids who survived the trip across the stream, or family of the dead bodies washed up on shore who risk everything (their lives and those of thier kids) to make a 60 mile treck.

Maybe I should make that article a sticky for every dumb posting about Americans travelling to Cuba? Nah. I will just stay out of it.

- CD

cnc33voodoo said:

cubas poverty is highly atributed to their relations with the u.s.

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Gee! Of course! That's it!

Why was I so stupid to think that it had something to do with Marxism, lack of personal and economic freedom, absence of rule of law, dictatorship..............?

Wow! I now feel enlightened! Thanks, Voodo

what happened to them is their own stupidity and poor planning

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You're probably right about this!

were they expecting? for the military to bring them a couple pins coladas and shuttle them to a resort?

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They were probably expecting to be treated as they would have if they'd washed up on a Canadian or US beach.

Funny...

How a nation can spout off about it's sovereignty one minute, then claim the reason they're destitute is because we won't play nice with them the next is a larf to me!

Seriously, Canadians can go there, Europeans can go there, South Americans can go there, I'm assuming most Asians can go there as well. Unless THE REST OF THE WORLD has embargoed Cuba, I don't really see our refusal to deal with them as being the root cause of their poverty. I mean, it's not as if we've got destroyers hanging off their ports, sinking foreign merchants on their way in.

This is not to say that the embargo makes a lot of sense to me at this point. After all, if we can deal with North Korea and China, then Cuba shouldn't be a problem. But let's not kid ourselves here: Cuba's government is the root problem with Cuba's economy. Cuba won't get better until they shed the failed Marxist policies they continue to employ, despite the distinct LACK of empirical evidence to support the theories of Marxist Communism/Socialism.

However, once this happens, I believe Cuba will have a bright future! I'd love to move there, just to get away from the slow-driving snowbirds, and the mentally unstable Florida Crackers!

cnc33voodoo said:

i have been to cuba three times and had a great time.
cubans are great people and very respectful of visitors.
i would have no hesitation going back.
then again im canadian.
cubas poverty is highly atributed to their relations with the u.s.
what happened to them is their own stupidity and poor planning.
were they expecting? for the military to bring them a couple pins coladas and shuttle them to a resort?
maybe if their boat was hydrogen powered this could have been avoided.lol.

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I'm glad you had a great time. There is NOTHING (repeat NOTHING) wrong with the cuban people. They are a great people - period. I got to know many of them.

But before you pass too much judgement on how great things are at Cuba, point your compass a little further north. Stop off at the Dry Tortugas (closer to Cuba than to US Mainland). It shouldn't take too long to have a few refugee boats show up. Ask them how many survived the 60 mile run across. Ask them why anyone would risk their kids and family's lives to leave. Go to Ft Myers or Miami. Talk to the Cubans there. Ask them how many lost everything in Castros regime. Ask them how many family members have gone missing in the middle of the night. Ask them how much property Castro's boys have stolen at a whim. Where is CardiacPaul when I need him???

You blame the US for Cubas woes. What a crock. I blame Canada and the rest of the world who still trades with them. You are the ones that have made our embargo worthless and kept a dictator in power. Do your homework. Don't go to Cuba and ask them how great things are with a political officer listening beside you. GO to the US and ask them. And as a word of warning - don't tell the Cuba refugees in the US about how Cubas problems are the really all because of the US. They take the matter serious.

- CD

You blame the US for Cubas woes. What a crock. I blame Canada and the rest of the world who still trades with them. You are the ones that have made our embargo worthless and kept a dictator in power. Do your homework. Don't go to Cuba and ask them how great things are with a political officer listening beside you. GO to the US and ask them. And as a word of warning - don't tell the Cuba refugees in the US about how Cubas problems are the really all because of the US. They take the matter serious.

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And CD this isn't just YOUR opinion on this, it's actually a fact that the rest of the world certainly is complicit in keeping Marxism going down there.

I know several folks who LEFT Cuba. They are certainly nice folks. But, they left there because of oppression - and guess where they moved? To the United States.

I find the remarks "blaming" the US for everyone's woes to be ridiculous - and worse, it's nothing but propaganda that has been pushed for so long on people they are beginning to BELIEVE it.

By the way -- I forgot to mention when I went to Cuba it was because of an "Airplane Problem".... we nearly wound up in the drink somewhere over the ocean out there when an engine went out. We ended up landing in Guantanamo Bay and I was stuck there for three days while they shipped us an engine on C-141 that was passin' through. haha

And then there were the bloody-hell-big-ugly iguanas that tried to eat my partner (I'll never forget the look on his terrified face as he LEAPED over a 6 foot high boulder to escape the lizards... LOL!)

i just find it strange that these people felt wronged.
i wonder if they would get different treatment if they ran out of gas in afghanistan.
as far as relations between us/cuba i will be the first to admit i dont know enough about the situation to get on that topic.
im sure if they had good relations with the us it wouldnt hurt their situation.
sure, cuba has good relations with my country and thats why i dint get thrown in a jail cell when i was on their beach.
if they didnt i wouldnt be sailing in their waters,thats for sure.
cruising dad,
anyone who has been in a cuban airport and read the posters on the wall knows its common fact that cubans blame americans for their conditions.
this doesnt represent my thoughts at all.a good chunk of my family lives in the u.s.
i dont know where you got me judging or blaming the u.s?
you obviously have strong feelings on the issue but unfortunately you took what i said out of context.

cnc33voodoo said:

i just find it strange that these people felt wronged.
i wonder if they would get different treatment if they ran out of gas in afghanistan.
as far as relations between us/cuba i will be the first to admit i dont know enough about the situation to get on that topic.
im sure if they had good relations with the us it wouldnt hurt their situation.
sure, cuba has good relations with my country and thats why i dint get thrown in a jail cell when i was on their beach.
if they didnt i wouldnt be sailing in their waters,thats for sure.
cruising dad,
anyone who has been in a cuban airport and read the posters on the wall knows its common fact that cubans blame americans for their conditions.
this doesnt represent my thoughts at all.a good chunk of my family lives in the u.s.
i dont know where you got me judging or blaming the u.s?
you obviously have strong feelings on the issue but unfortunately you took what i said out of context.

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Then please accept my apologies as I misread what you wrote. I understood what you wrote to mean that the Cuban problems was the fault of the US. In some respect... I guess you might say that is true. If we opened normal relations with them their lives would likely get better. But... the true culprit cannot be fixed (nor blamed on) the US and its actions. DOnt even bring up the Bay of Pigs.

Yes, I do have VERY VERY strong feelings about this. You will find this is one of the issues I generally avoid altogether on this board as I can easily lose my temper. But I lived amongst them for quite some time and soon will go back. The stories of atrocities are unbelievable.

It just chaps my rear end when people talk about going down there without a full understanding of what that regime has done and still does to its people. We criticize North Korea for what it does - yet is Cuba really all that much better?? I also feel slighted that we made a stand against them and the rest of the world could care less. An embargo is worthless when no one else recognizes it. So you must ask yourself if it was our policies that failed, or that of other countries?

And PLEASE... PLEASE... before you pass judgement on Cuba, the US, Candians, Americans, etc who trade with them (or do not), make sure you have researched both sides of the story fully. Discuss the matter with the refugees in S Florida and elsewhere. See what they have to say. And ask them why they would risk life, imprisonment, and the loss of everything they have to leave their beautiful homeland behind.

- CD

cnc33voodoo said:

nonjy,
can you elaborate on what your taking from those two lines? and how in any way that blames america, or how it isnt the couples poor planning or stupidity?

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Sure, I'll elaborate.

First of all, they are your lines. You said them. In my reading, I don't read INTO what people say, nor do I read OUT of what people say. I read their words. (I've had these problems before where people try to say I said something *I* didn't. In this case, you made a brief statement that says

cubas poverty is highly atributed to their relations with the u.s.

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Essentially you are making a statement of fact with no attribution. I have to ASSUME in this case, this is your opinion/statement, not someone else's.

What this means is "Someone" "somewhere" HIGHLY attributes Cuba's relations with the US to their impoverished conditions.

This might be true, or it might NOT be true.

Basically, this IS a sort of "blame". SOMEONE (since you didn't attribute this particular statement with anyone else) must be YOU in this case.

And since you state, in your sentence "highly attributes", this means that YOU personally feel strongly about this way.

This is where you used to hear the phrase "Words mean things".

If this is NOT what you meant, then why did you say it?

If you are taking someone else's word for this statement, then, perhaps you would tell us WHO it is that believes this, and why?

The next sentence is pretty obviously your statement and we all, I think agree completely with you on this one.

what happened to them is their own stupidity and poor planning.

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Does this help explain why folks might feel a bit miffed at the appearance of "blaming the US" for the Cuban peoples' problems?