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AT A PUBLIC PRESENTATION OF A BOOK ON the Cuban constitution in Havana in June, a lawyer quipped,'"Too bad this book will be outdated so soon! "Less than a year ago such a remark might have raised eyebrows and perhaps called into question the speaker's loyalty to the revolution. Instead.
On Nicaragua The analysis of your Nicaragua is- sue is a welcome relief from a polarized debate. On few topics has the lack of critical thinking of the U.
VISITORS TO HAVANA ARE INVARIABLY struck by how run-down the city looks: buildings that haven't seen a coat of paint in 30 years, houses in a state of virtual collapse, cars and buses that appear to be on their last legs. The city's relatively quiet streets add to the impression of a system that does not work: There is less motor traffic and few of the raucous sounds of commerce that so characterize urban areas in the United States.
Marifeli Pérez-Stable
"THE FUTURE OF OUR HOMELAND WILL "I be an eternal Baragud!" Radil Castro proclaimed on March 15 in Santiago de Cuba. To announce next year's Communist Party congress, Fidel's younger brother read a text seeped with historical allusion.
The Uncompromising Revolution, a film by Saul Landau (available from IPS, 1601 Connecticut Ave., NW, Washington, DC 20009), 1988, 78 min.
"So I have told you the history of my whole life. Judge me as you will.
ON JUNE 12 OF LAST YEAR, GEN. ARMANDO Ochoa Sdnchez of Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR) was arrested on charges of corruption, mismanage- ment of government funds and immoral acts.
REFERRING TO A FOREIGN VISITOR WHOM he had accompanied for a week on a tour around Cuba, Fidel Castro said: "How that man can talk-he talks even more than I do!" You only have to know Fidel Castro a little to realize this was an exaggeration, and one of the biggest, because it is impossible to conceive of anyone more addicted to the habit of conversation. His devotion to the word is almost magical.
Seven years have passed since a Wells Fargo employee drove off with $7.2 million in Hartford, Connecticut.
ON MY THIRD EVENING IN HAVANA, I HAD dinner with some old friends. They asked me how I perceived the changes since I left in 1983.
THOSE CRITICS OF CUBA WHO RECOGNIZE THE revolution's economic and social accomplishments often dismiss them as products of Soviet largess. Soviet economic aid to Cuba has indeed been massive and crucial to the economy's operation.
ON JANUARY 31, A CUBAN MERCHANT SHIP IN international waters refused a U.S.
DISCONTENT HAS APPEARED IN THEFORM OF bitterly sarcastic underground jokes-something I never heard in the four years I lived in Cuba. One has Fidel, his brother Ratil and a pilot flying over Cuba.
IT WAS WITH GREAT TREPIDATION THAT I accepted NACLA's offer to write for this issue on Cuba. Opinions are more polarized than ever.