A Socialist and Capitalist World

EVERY COUNTRY IS SOCIALIST AND EVERY COUNTRY IS CAPITALIST!

POLICY ADVICE NOTE 306-26 Re: GOLDING’s “SOCIALISM TURN” NEED NOT BE TO MANLEY’s

By Professor Gilbert Morris

Socialism and Capitalism are the two Ghosts of political science and economics: people who think they believe in either speak the resolve of ole time religion about the virtues of one and the vices of the other: both of them - as I would tell even PhD students - talk mostly nonsense.

EVERY COUNTRY IS SOCIALIST AND EVERY COUNTRY IS CAPITALIST!

Britain made its money by Elizabeth I sending Sir Francis Drake - her cousin - to steal the resources which were stolen from native peoples by the Dutch, Portuguese and the Spanish.  Colonialism and enslavement is literally theft in a grand scale.  In Britain’s entry into China they became the largest drug dealers in the history of the universe, selling Opium to destabilise China; which succeeded for a time…just as the U.S. did in the Afghanistan invasion; facilitating the Northern Alliance in selling Opium!

In 1898, for no reason the U.S. invaded Philippines and Cuba, stole Puerto Rico and Hawaii…tried to steal Panama.  Controlled much of south and Central America all for a few families.  Senator Mitt Romneys family made their money through Bain Capital in this manner as did the Dulles family etc.  They stopped to invade Haiti and steal its resources.  And since WII - if you think that’s too far in time - Britain wanted Iranian oil.  So it got the U.S. to overthrow a democratic Iran to steal its oil.  The entire Cold War was a psych-op in which it was a hot war for third world resources.  During this time, the US, UK, Canada, Japan, France-Germany all used protectionism to prevent competition and violence against third world nations that sought to advance.

Where is the capitalism there?

Manley’s socialism was half baked nonsense…much as we all loved him.  Utter nonsense.  Mishmash of pan-Africanism, misunderstood Marxism, all run in a plantation colonial economic model, he never bothered to change.  And that’s the difference between those post-colonial nations that thrived and those that didn’t: the ones that thrived changed the system they inherited; just as Boukman Dutty - a Jamaican - told Toussaint L’Ouverture in 1791!

The best countries in the world are social democracies of varying degrees and none of them are in the G7: Switzerland, Singapore, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Nw Zealand (Cayman is amongst their number as a well run country…but less of a social experiment).

In everyone of those countries, you would have a better life than wherever you are now in the Caribbean.  Lee Kuan Yew insisted that he was a Socialist and a limited Social Democrat.  People forget, Malaysia was supposed to be the name of the Malaya-Singapore Federation: SIA added to Malaya was for Singapore: the Malaysia!

The reason Singapore and Malaysia split is because Lee Kuan Yew demanded that all policies must life everyone at the same time and Malaysia wanted dominant ethnic groups to dominate.  Lee Kuan Yew said no!  He insisted that the only for a small nation to become exceptional was for everyone to share in the propensity.  Singapore is not a Christian nation or a religious one.  Yet it adheres to Matthew 25 gospel - feed the hungry, clothed the naked, visit the sick and the poor - more than any Christian nation on earth.  The U.S. tears itself apart over affirmative action, but Lee Kuan Yew built Affirmative Action into its constitution, with the goal that everyone must share in prosperity.

Just yesterday, Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong announced that between birth and 18, every Singapore family will receive $70,000 per child.  Many families in the Caribbean don’t earn that amount in 10 years.  Singapore got its independence about the same time as Jamaica.  Yet Singapore is nearly 40 times richer than all of CARICOM combined…when we take its GDP and its Sovereign Fund together with its national savings GLC and Provident Fund.  This is all from a socialist nation that is clearly capitalist in the best way…as is Netherlands, Denmark, Norway and Sweden all of which are 10 times of more richer than all of CARICOM and has a better quality of life and standard of living better health, education and lower crime than all of Europe, the U.S. and the Caribbean.

So if Hon. Mr. Golding MP is talking about Singapore, Switzerland, Norway, Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands socialism, get the old Soviet Union out of your head.

I challenge my students on this all the time.  I say what make you say China is Communist…what does it mean.  China has better education and healthcare, cleaner better cities, greater technologies, better infrastructure, people own their homes and pay property tax once when they buy it..and live in low crime… areas with parks and increasingly alternative energy…so what is communist.  They say well, it’s the politics.  I say alright.  I grant you that in the Politburo, leaders are appointed, not elected.  But China has more elections than the rest of the world combined and those leaders have to perform.  Every member of XI Jinping’s cabinet has managed a province larger than the U.S. and successfully.

This does not mean we can’t debate the merits of systems.  But in most cases, it’s the mix of systems we are debating without admitting it.

If Hon. Mr. Golding MP is referring to social democracies which are the best managed most prosperous, most democratic nations in the world - with Singapore leading the way - he should say so!

Source / Comment

Hope for a basic shift in US Cuba policy disintegrates into continued polarization

By COHA Research Associate Katya Rodriguez:


Washington severed relations with Cuba on January 3, 1961 and launched its economic embargo against Havana the following year. Its intended target was to transform Cuba’s political system from being sympathetic to Moscow’s brand of Communism to one more harmonious with the Cold War ideology being proselytized by the White House. However, most regional specialists now dealing with the embargo issue, after forty-eight years in operation, agree that it has not been particularly effective in persuading the island leaders to take steps toward the democratization of the country. Instead, it only has served to damage Washington’s economic, diplomatic and national-security interests affecting Cuba as well as the remainder of the region.

During most of the last half century, discussions aimed at normalizing relations with Cuba have been rare and mainly unproductive. Due to Obama’s optimism for political change toward Cuba during his presidential campaign, there was considerable hope that the sterility and selective indignation that had characterized US policy toward Havana would be altered in a more constructive direction. But his election did not by any means serve to initiate a paradigm shift in US-Cuban relations, and after a year, one could say that when it came to change in Latin America, the direction of the new administration was more in reverse than in fast-forward. Once hopeful attitudes and expectations are now disintegrating, and as a result, there is a growing continuum of hostility between the United States and Cuba. Meanwhile, Washington, if anything, is becoming more isolated from much of Latin America than meaningfully connected to it.

This growing animosity was underlined when news surfaced that Cuba had not been eliminated from the State Department’s State Sponsors of Terrorism list, which would be issued in its finalized form in April. Scandalously (given the paucity of incriminating evidence in recent years), Cuba has held a prominent position on that infamous list since 1982, and its ancient tenure in this category represents the second-longest in duration after Syria, despite the Cuban government’s futile protests that it does not in any form deserve to be stigmatized in this manner.

While President Obama acknowledged that the policies made by prior U.S. administrations that were intended to democratize Cuba have come to no avail, he has not put to work a policy aimed at constructive engagement. Although he has been chief of state for over a year now, he has done little to fulfill his campaign promise to meet with Cuban leaders and take necessary steps toward normalizing ties with Cuba. His less-than-significant move to free up remittances allowed to be sent to Cuba as well as lifting travel restrictions against Cuban- Americans visiting Cuba reveal themselves as merely a reversal of nuisance regulations implemented by George W. Bush. If Obama intends to live up to the hype he initiated during his campaign in terms of thawing an otherwise fallow relationship with Cuba, he needs to address a much longer and larger restrictive strategy towards US-Cuban policies than just those put into effect by the previous administration. Furthermore, his executive orders regarding Cuba are not being enforced. On January 21, 2009 he signed orders instructing the CIA to close Guantanamo Bay; a year later, it remains open and Reuters reported that the deadline has been extended to an additional three years.

Obama has ordered that the release of all political prisoners held in Cuba as a reoccurring condition to regain ties. It has been indicated that Raúl Castro is willing to release anyone of importance to the US if the White House sees to it that the Cuban Five are freed. International support against the imprisonment of the Cuban Five remains strong. On January 28, 2010 three Argentinean men climbed Mount Aconcagua, the second tallest mountain in the world, to display a banner that read, “Obama, free the five Cuban heroes now!” The United Nations defended the Cuban Five, stating that the trial was not impartial; it happened in South Florida where anti-Castro sentiments are strong and harsh punishment for Castro supporters is routine. On October 10, 2009 a judge decided that the sentences were excessive and reduced them for three of the five. Antonio Guerrero’s sentence was reduced from a life sentence to a twenty-year term, due to insufficient evidence. The sentence reductions reflect negatively on the US criminal system and raises doubt that their right to a fair and speedy trial was acknowledged. If the United States truly wishes to have better ties to Cuba, the prompt release of prisoners in both countries will stimulate change.

By far the most damaging action taken by an administration supposedly trying to re-establish relations with Cuba was to abrogate the US Practice of almost automatically placing Cuba on the State Department’s State Sponsors of Terrorism list. According to Peter Kornbluh of the National Security Archives, a non-governmental research library located at George Washington University, the reason for Cuba’s inclusion on the list is punishment for not participating in Washington’s global War on Terror. This accusation is far from legitimate since Cuba has laws against terrorism. In addition, being on the list prohibits Cuba from receiving US foreign assistance, permission to export goods to the US, and requiring special licensing requirements for businesses exports to Cuba. But one would hope that the US possessed a justifiable reason for maintaining Cuba on its list rather than an ideological commitment to political values. For twenty-eight years, Cuba has languished on the list with no action toward democratic change or presenting credible evidence of Cuba supporting the War on Terror. Keeping Havana on the list for another year with no concrete evidence that it benefits the United States leads to the conclusion that it only negatively affects Cuba. Recalling Obama’s words on May 23, 2008 concerning US arrogance towards Latin America, it would appear that the US is in need of a pressing review of a hemispheric policy that brings with it vital new ideas.

The Council on Hemispheric Affairs, founded in 1975, is an independent, non-profit, non-partisan, tax-exempt research and information organization. It has been described on the Senate floor as being "one of the nation's most respected bodies of scholars and policy makers." For more information, visit www.coha.org

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