Man, if only Stalin could have thought of the brainstorm that the Castros dreamed up in Cuba this week!
Imagine the money he’d have saved on bullets for firing squads — not to mention one-way train tickets to Siberia.
On Monday, Cuban officials announced the government is laying off half a million workers in its effort to get into the free-market swing and out of the incredible sub-basement mess that Fidel has had them in for the past two generations.
Argus Hamilton — who has more than a little experience finding the lighter side of stuff — commented that comparing us to them is like ships that pass in the night.
To paraphrase Al Capone, “It’s scary because it’s true.”
According to an Associated Press on the Cuban announcement, this is a big deal.
“The shift would mean that one-tenth of the island’s 5.1 million-strong work force will be looking for jobs in the private sector by April 2011, a drastic change that could mean a radically altered economic outlook, especially for Cubans in their 20s and 30s who have known nothing but a paternalistic communist system ushered in by Fidel Castro in his 1959 revolution.
“The changes are the most dramatic yet in a reform program that began when Raul Castro permanently took over the presidency from his brother in 2008 — but which have sputtered in fits and starts since then.”
If you ever watched “The Godfather” trilogy, you know that the mob had a very different future in mind for Cuba.
But seriously, Americans should really pay attention to what we are leaning towards, as we seek to socialize everything from button-hook manufacturing to boil lancing.
The Cubans would probably like to turn back the clock to the days when they might have taken advantage of some of those American investments in the ‘50s.
If we can still learn, we should learn a lesson from their misery — or we can just add to our own.
— Chuck Smith