Babalú Blog

From our Annals of Socialist Neocolonialism Bureau

Never mind those sanctions slapped on Venenozuela by the Trumpinator.

Damn the sanctions, full speed ahead…. oil MUST be delivered to the colonial masters in Castrogonia.

Colonies must always do the bidding of the empire to which they belong. And when that empire is starving for fuel, the colony simply can’t refuse to deliver what is needed.

Let’s see what — if anything — the U.S. does about this flagrant challenge to its power and status in Latrine America.

Venenozuela and Castrogonia have been thumbing their noses with impunity at U.S. sanctions ever since they were announced. Apparently, the so-called oil blockade is more of a myth than a reality.

And the fuel shortages in Castrogonia are not due to the so-called blockade but to the fact that Venenozuela’s oil production has slowed to a trickle, thanks to the socialist economic policies dictated by the colonial masters in Havana and to the corruption and inefficiency engendered by these policies.

So it goes…. The one nation on earth that squats on the world’s largest supply of oil simply can’t extract and process that oil as it once did, due to its 21st-century socialism.

But it can most certainly keep sending some of the oil it produces to those who ruined its oil industry, despite sanctions leveled against it by the most powerful nation on earth, which does little or nothing to stop those shipments.

Vamos bien!

From Argus Media

At least three Venezuelan fuel tankers are heading towards Cuba today, part of a flotilla meant to free up domestic storage space while defying a US campaign to cut off Venezuela’s oil supply to its political ally.

Up to 3 million barrels of refined products and heavy crude that Venezuelan state-owned PdV is dispatching to Cuba in the first half of October should help partially alleviate a critical storage deficit that has forced down Venezuelan production toward 500,000 b/d. The storage shortage is a domino effect of US sanctions that are scaring away most buyers, with a few exceptions such as Russia’s state-controlled Rosneft and Spain’s Repsol that takes supply in exchange for its domestic production.

Although Venezuela has long supplied Cuba with oil under preferential terms, the wave of new shipments — equivalent to 200,000 b/d in the first half October — quadruple the volume that PdV had been delivering in recent months. Cuba has about 160,000 b/d of oil demand, with roughly 50,000 b/d covered by domestic production.

Two oil union officials at the 940,000 b/d CRP refining complex in Venezuela’s Falcon state confirmed that tankers Terepaima, Paramaconi and Manuela Saenz are en route to the Cuban terminals of Matanzas and Cienfuegos for state-owned Cupet and state-owned utility UNE.

Argus was unable to reach Cuban officials for comment. The government in Havana has instituted an oil austerity campaign in recent weeks, citing a sharp cutback in Venezuelan supply.

Continue reading HERE

Marcelo Hernandez writes in 14yMedio from Havana via Translating Cuba:

Ingenuity: Salvation for Cuba’s Private Sector

Yoerquis feels he’s in the lead as a collector of raw material. It has been a while since he reached into his imagination to create a tool that allows him to crush aluminum cans all day long without ending up with unbearable back pain.

The young man has an impromptu workshop in Havana’s Cerro municipality, where he does plumbing work and cuts custom tiles, but also collects aluminum. The kilogram of soft drink or beer cans earns 13 CUP (roughly 50¢ US), so Yoerquis needs to crush the material for many hours to get money that allows him to cover the expenses of his search, along with other members of the family, through several neighborhoods of Havana to collect materials.

That is why he manufactured a heavy cylinder by mixing concrete and pouring it into a plastic tank in whose center he had previously placed a two-inch metal tube. After removing the structure from the mold, he introduced another of smaller diameter and concluded his work. Now he spreads the cans out along his patio and passed the crusher over it several times.

“I could have improved the equipment by putting in some good bearings, but I prefer it rustic,” he explains as he takes pushes his invention from the end of his yard to the other, where he has arranged the cans of three full bags.

Of the more than half a million people who have a license to engage in private work in Cuba, it is estimated that more than 5,000 are dedicated to the collection of raw materials that end up being bought by the State in its more than 300 centers. Most of these workers must crush them one by one with a stone or a piece of pipe.

Yoerquis dreams of being able to buy a compactor or crusher that is not his improvised cylinder one day, but he also recognizes that “by the time it is possible” he will no longer be dedicated to this activity and will prefer to develop his other talents in cutting pipes and tiles. He hopes that there will be a construction boom on the Island and with it more “work orders” will arrive.

Dunia and Eric also feed their family thanks to their ingenuity. They met when they were both in high school and, after almost a quarter of a century together, decided to apply for a license to sell sweets and candy for children. Their greatest pride is to have created the machine with which they make cotton candy, the specialty that distinguishes them and that they sell at fairs and in the vicinity of some recreational parks.

To get around, the couple employs the old Lada that her father acquired decades ago thanks to his status as a “prominent worker.” The machine built by Eric with his own hands travels in the trunk of the Lada; it consists of an old metal basin that belonged to his grandmother, with a central motor that runs off a battery.

Without a wholesale market, self-employed workers in Cuba must also overcome the obstacles posed by the lack of machinery, devices and many of the apparatuses that facilitate their work. The shortages in state stores, high prices and the absence of certain types of markets force them to have to create many of the tools with which they make a living.

Read moreReports from Cuba: Ingenuity: Salvation for Cuba’s private sector

Pinilla:

“Which one do I pick?”

This how things work in socialist Cuba. The dictatorship first picks its candidates and who will win, then it holds an “election” to make it official.

Via Martí Noticias (my translation):

Cuba calls for elections without announcing who the candidates are

The Cuban regime has convened an extraordinary session of the National Assembly of Popular Power for October 10 to elect the presidents of the republic and the assembly itself, but the official election announcement does not say who the candidates will be.

After citing the related articles in the constitution, the announcement presents the agenda for the day: “Election of the President, the Vice-President, and the Secretary of the National Assembly of Popular Power along with the rest of the members of the Council of State, the President, and the Vice-President of the republic.”

Reacting to the note published in Granma, Reinaldo Escobar, managing editor of the daily digital news site 14yMedio, addressed the news. Or better said, he put it in perspective. “As if they were just reporting some news….”

“The nearly 9 million citizens with the right to vote in Cuba still don’t know the names that will appear on the list prepared by the National Commission of Candidacy,” he stated. “Not that they really need to because those who will check the box by every name printed on the ballot will be members of parliament.”

Interestingly, they already know for certain who they will vote for although they still haven’t been given the names of the candidates.

“They will have only minutes or at best a couple hours between the moment they are given the ballot and they carry out the solemn act of placing it into the ballot box to make their decision,” wrote the managing editor of 14yMedio. “It is important to note that they won’t have to pick a preferred candidate among various choices, but only approve the ones that appear on the ballot.”

In other words, they are not making a choice from a list of various candidates. They are approving the ones that have been selected. But selected by whom?

After an exhaustive search, we find an article in Granma that states that this Tuesday there will be 68,000 “accountability” meetings where local delegates will meet with voters all over Cuba.

In this article Granma makes it clear: The “ample presence of the people” in the electoral process is demonstrated because the National Commission of Candidacy is nourished “according to the law” by “members selected by the most important and most massive organizations engaged in the struggle by Cubans for social justice.”

It then goes on to mention the names of these “independent” organizations that guarantee the “ample presence of the peoeple”: the official government groups Workers Center of Cuba (CTC), the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR), the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), the National Association of Small Farms (ANAP), the University Students Federation (FEU), and the Middle School Students Federation (FEEM).

But. . . what about those excluded by these organizations?

Continue reading (in Spanish) HERE.

Socialism in action: While Cuba’s Castro dictatorship has plenty of fuel to power its machine of repression, Cubans wait in line for hours for gasoline.

Read moreVideo of the Day: Anger and frustration in socialist Cuba as Cubans wait hours in lines for gasoline

John Suarez in Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter:

70 Years of Communism in China: Nothing to celebrate, but many to mourn and remember

In memory of those who stood up for their rights, lost their lives and for those still unjustly imprisoned today in China.

Today the world observes the results of the Chinese Communist Party in power for 70 years. The founder, Mao Zedong, committed the biggest mass killings in human history. Responsible for the deaths of as many as 70 million Chinese on his watch alone. Mao died in 1976, but the Chinese Communist Party continued its killing spree, but with more sophistication.

On September 26, 1980 The New York Times ran a UPI story reporting that “Chinese Reds Limited To a Child Per Family”  and euphemistically wrote  “China intensified its population-control drive today by ordering the 38 million Communist Party members to have only one child per family” and how the policy would use “painstaking patience and persuasion.”

Time Magazine reported in 2015 that “patience and persuasion” included “forced abortions and sterilization, and a gender imbalance resulting from female infanticide.” Tom Hilditch in the South China Morning Post (Hong Kong) in September of 1995 described it as a “A Holocaust of Little Girls.” In 2015 reports emerged that the one-child policy was replaced with a two-child policy.

Continue reading HERE.

14yMedio reports from Havana via Translating Cuba:

Several Cuban Activists Arrested During “Performance” In Solidarity With Guillermo Del Sol

This Monday, as Guillermo del Sol’s hunger strike reached 50 days, a group of activists, opposition figures, and independent journalists have made public a letter of support in which they intend to express their “solidarity and recognition” to the activist for his “sacrifice to eradicate one of the most lamentable arbitrary actions committed against our people.” The letter is signed by dozens of people from independent civil society, many of whom are affected by prohibitions on leaving the country like the ones Del Sol is denouncing.

The text urges the activist to take care of his health, although the signers respect the decision he has made. “Today marks 50 days since your hunger strike began and we are very worried about the accelerated deterioration of your health, which makes your life more fragile every minute. We want you to protect yourself, we want you alive to achieve along with us our final objective, which is to enjoy a free Cuba like the one our Apostle dreamed of. Without you there, the freedom that we will inevitably win will not have one of its best sons raising its flag; but know that we respect your will and we will continue supporting you.”

Adrian del Sol, Guillermo’s son, told 14ymedio first thing on Monday morning that his father remains in critical condition. “Now it’s 50 days on strike and counting 10 after they gave him serums. On that day he was denied healthcare, State Security practically dragged him out of the bed as he was still hydrating, toward a police car to leave him here at the house. For me it’s a show of force to humiliate. He’s getting weaker and weaker, the doctor comes but she doesn’t take his vital signs.”

The activist’s son indicated that both he and his father know about the letter of support and believe that “it’s good;” his father is grateful, he added, “for the support and concern” of everyone who signed it, but he maintains his decision to continue on the hunger strike.

Yesterday, four activists and two independent journalists were arrested in Havana when they were attempting to meet to carry out a performance in solidarity with Guillermo del Sol. The group had planned to wear paper masks with photos of the face of the opposition figure from Villa Clara and walk in the area around the Coppelia ice cream parlor on the centrally located corner of 23 and L, in El Vedado, to support Del Sol’s protest against the prohibitions on traveling that Cuban authorities impose on dissidents.

Read moreReports from Cuba: Several Cuban activists arrested during ‘performance’ in solidarity with Guillermo del Sol

From our Annals of Putinian Neocolonialism Bureau

Czar Vladimir Putin is rushing to aid the former Soviet colony of Castrogonia in its hour of need, obviously reclaiming the Caribbean island for his new Grand Putinian empire.

King Raul of Castrogonia and puppet “president” Miguel “Trucutu” Diaz-Canel are eagerly embracing their new Russian masters, just as the late Maximum Leader Fifo embraced their predecessors sixty years ago.

Naturally, the world’s news media is blaming this turn of events on the Trumpinator, claiming that if he hadn’t dismantled Obama’s Normalization Circus, this wouldn’t be happening.

One of the largest items in Grand Putinia’s most recent aid package to Castrogonia is the shipment of locomotives and freight rail cars. Grand Putinia has already refurbished the golden dome of Havana’s capitol building — which Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev will inspect this week— and it is also ready to refurbish Cuba’s power stations and electrical grid, and to provide it with all sorts of technical assistance.

One very scary item buried deeply in today’s news is the fact that some unspecified assistance with NUCLEAR technology is part of Czar Vlad’s New Deal with Castrogonia.

So, what, exactly, does this involve? Are the Russians going to build nuclear power stations? Or does this deal involve nuclear missiles?

Aaaaay, Mildred, time to duck and cover. Either way we’re talking about nuclear technology from the folks who brought us Chernobyl and the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.

From The Express

VLADIMIR PUTIN is piling the pressure on US President Donald Trump as the Russian leader agrees new nuclear and trade ties with Cuba, defying Washington sanctions and strengthening Russia’s grip on Latin America.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev arrives in Cuba this Thursday, at a time when the island is going through a new economic crisis while under new pressure from the United States.

Havana has been crippled by US sanctions intended to stop third parties from doing business with the Caribbean island or shipping fuel to the country amid the crisis. However, Trump’s hard-handed approach has seen Moscow swoop in on the crisis stricken countries in Latin America and assert diplomatic control.

Now, with Cuba in a desperate situation, depleted of oil and struggling to power the country, Putin has agreed a nuclear pact and new trade ties with Havana in an effort to further undermine Trump. A statement from the Russian government this week signalled that the countries will sign accords and commercial agreements.

This word is likely one you will most often hear uttered by Cubans. Even more versatile word than the venerated comemierda, “coño” can be used on its own or in combinations with other words. By simply modifying the tone or cadence, coño can clearly convey surprise; anger; elation; frustration; amazement; disappointment; wonder; despair . . . and the list goes on and on.

There is no doubt coño is perhaps the most versatile if not most popular of all Cuban words.

H/T Pin Pan Pun + Co.