Slashdot Mirror
Cuba Getting Internet Upstream Via Venezuela
An anonymous reader writes "Seems like Cuba is working around the US internet embargo by teaming up with Venezuela: A confidential contract released yesterday on Wikileaks reveals Cuba's plan to receive internet upstream via an undersea cable to Venezuela, thus circumventing the enduring embargo of the US, denying Cuba access to nearby American undersea cables and overcoming the current limits of satellite-only connectivity. The connection, to be delivered by CVG Telecom of Venezuela, is to be completed by 2010 and will provide data, video as well as voice service for both the public and governmental services."
No kidding. It is only a couple hundred miles of submarine cable. The only reason that I can think that it wasn't done sooner might be because Cuba's credit is so bad (due to refusal to pay contracts) that nobody was willing to do the job without cash upfront.
Looks like one of our favorite sayings is evolving. The internet recognizes a problem and routes around it. Now also available in undersea cables rather than just software packets. Admittedly, that places US policy as the problem...
> Can anyone tell me why we still have an embargo
> with Cuba?
From what I understand the only people who care about this issue are the former cubans living in South Florida.
Polls show them all strongly in favor of the embargo... since this is a vital voting demographic for most politicians... very few people mess with the embargo.
Did I mention that the main people who break the embargo are those very same former cubans?
Funny, that.
I touch computers in naughty places
Because you can't afford the "bad example" of a small country defying the USA and establishing a successul (would have been if you hadn't spent the last 50 years trying to destroy it) economy which is not free market based.
They must not be allowed to "get away with it".
See, among others, William Blum's Rogue State for details of the US military, biological and chemical war against Cuba.
My wife and I went to a resort in Cuba back in 2003. They did have (albeit slow) internet at the resort.
Some things about Cuba - the locals we met were some of the nicest people we've met anywhere in the world. Everyone in the country gets (at the time) the equivalent of $13 US per *month* to live, and that's it. Still, nobody ever asked anything from us (unlike Jamaica) and they would bend over backwards to do anything to help you. It was more likely for them to give *us* things, like on our first day there, one gentleman was making a grass hopper out of palm leaves on his break, and when his break was over he gave it to my wife and was offended when I reached for my wallet (I was used to the people who approach you in other places, like Peru, France, Mexico, even on our visit to New Orleans in '02, and I suppose in most major cities, doing some kind of performance to try and get some money out of you).
One of the most poignant moments was a long discussion we had with one woman who worked on the resort. She was asking us about some of the places we'd been able to travel (mostly Europe at the time), and she was telling us about her eventual goal to travel the world. It's not particularly easy for Cubans to travel. They have to get a travel permit from the government. It's quite expensive, and I believe it has to be for an officially sanctioned reason. Still she was determined to go, and I hope she eventually gets her wish.
But we were struck by how tragic it was that all these amazing people are practically being held hostage in their own country, cut off from the rest of the world. As far as I'm concerned, the more we can engage the common people in Cuba, through the internet, travel, trade, etc., the less time it will take for their country to reform, and for them to catch up with the rest of the western world. I really think the US embargo is completely counter-productive.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
They didn't need it until recently because until recently very few people were allowed to even have Internet (or cell phones or many types of things that allow people to communicate with the outside world).
Remember this is Cuba we're talking about, not some free Socialist utopia...
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Okay. Depending on who you ask, there were at least 4 distinct waves of migration. Each of these waves was a different generation or a different class.
The article is in pretty sad shape, but here's a wikipedia article.
The generation/class with the greatest support of the embargo is the first, the middle and upper classes (also white, mainly). Understandably so, as this was the generation who had their power and belongings taken from them and had the most to lose.
Later migrations, like the Marielitos, balseros and "dusty feet", came from different classes and generations and have different opinions.
The generation that constituted the first wave is slowly dying off, and opinion in favor of the embargo is eroding in relation to the change.
Disclaimer: I'm anglo. Apologies to any cubanos if I screwed something up.
I'm not trying to endorse either the Cuban lifestyle or Michael Moore here, but that is actually partially true. The Cuban healthcare system runs far more efficiently than the one in the US, at least as far as the numbers are concerned.
For example, the average life expectancy of a Cuban (77.23 years) is roughly on par with the average life expectancy of an American (78.1 years), but the Cuban government spends ~US$5/year/person on healthcare. In comparison, the amount spent in the US on healthcare (by individuals, government, businesses, etc..) is ~US$7200/year/person.
Given that they have embargoes on American medical technology, doctors, etc.. they must be doing something right.
Disclaimer: I'm from a country which has a nationally supported healthcare system alongside a private system, and they seem to work equally well together. I also don't understand why so many Americans hate Cuba so much..
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
Precisely. The US helped overthrow the democratic Allende government and set up the Pinochet dictatorship. Not very consistent with boycotting Cuba because it isn't democratic.
The reps get the reputation of being though and so can use it to keep their backers happy. The dems get the rep that they are really against it and would change it if only they could and so keep their backers happy.
US politics has no left and right anymore as far as the major political events are concerned. The entire trick is to keep your own backers happy enough NOT to go voting for a 3rd party or stay home while taking as much of the center as possible.
Look at the current campaign. What is really going to be changed by either side? Nothing.
You cannot have a two party democratic system because it will by the nature of popularity contests (which is what western style democracy really is) always tend to have both parties come together in the middle because that is where the votes are.
The US is not alone to suffer from this. In france they recently had an election with the slogan. "Elect the crook, not the fascist". The voter could only choose between a known corrupt politician and an openly fascist one. Long live big parties, the best way to kill democracy.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Hardly affects other Americans my ass. Sugar prices are much higher in the states then they would be if free trade were allowed with Cuba. It's partially because of this ban that we get high fructose corn syrup in our drinks. And what about people like me who like to eat my sugar with a little coffee in the morning?
Seems like helping the Cubans get internet access might help further U.S. goals better than the embargo does.
Yeah. That might work. Just because Cubans are clever enough to set up and run samizdat thumb drive networks doesn't mean that they'll find out about the onion net.
And cesnsorship and state control of media worked pretty much flawlessly in the old Soviet bloc. I mean everybody there was pretty well convinced that Soviet communism was the greatest thing ever, Moscow was the center of the universe, and that they had absolutely the highest living standard on earth. That's why it was such a shock to everyone in 1989 when Reagan singlehandedly punched through Berlin Wall and gave everyone a case of Coke and a two-year subscription to Playboy.
We all know how solid China's great firewall is. No way around that puppy, you'd better believe it.
And of course the real goal of the US isn't to prevent companies from doing business in Cuba in contravention of the law (however stupid you think that law may be), but to actually prevent Cubans from getting any information at all. That's probably why there are honking big transmitters in Florida broadcasting news 24-7 towards Cuba.
Castro's done a great job of blocking all that information. Nobody in Cuba has ever heard of El Duque, for example, or Alexei Ramirez. Both of their families still believe the official explanation that they accidentally drowned themselves while shaving.
Indeed we all know that controlling information is much like building a dam: It's very cheap and easy to do, it takes hardly any effort to maintain, and it's virtually indestructible. And the best way to control the flow of water through a dam, much like controlling the flow of information, is to drill a very small hole and use a finger to carefully control how much gets through. Information, like water, tends to stay put and hates to travel.
I cannot possibly see any problems with your plans for CubaNet. Sure, the richest and most ruthless software company on the planet has spent 10 years and billions of dollars trying and utterly failing to come up with something "that look[s] like Google and act[s] like Google". But with a decent project manager Cuba should have the whole thing up and running within about six weeks or so. That'll show those yanqui bastards what's what.
I'm not trying to endorse either the Cuban lifestyle or Michael Moore here, but that is actually partially true. The Cuban healthcare system runs far more efficiently than the one in the US, at least as far as the numbers are concerned.
For example, the average life expectancy of a Cuban (77.23 years) is roughly on par with the average life expectancy of an American (78.1 years), but the Cuban government spends ~US$5/year/person on healthcare. In comparison, the amount spent in the US on healthcare (by individuals, government, businesses, etc..) is ~US$7200/year/person.
Given that they have embargoes on American medical technology, doctors, etc.. they must be doing something right.
Disclaimer: I'm from a country which has a nationally supported healthcare system alongside a private system, and they seem to work equally well together. I also don't understand why so many Americans hate Cuba so much..
Neither do I support the embargo. It was a bad idea that has demonstrated itself as a failure. And I'm not sure that (educated & intelligent) Americans really have a problem with Cuba (they're cool by me) - That doesn't necessarily include our legislators. But, my life expectancy would go up if I could afford neither steak nor beer. Instead, I'm sitting here well-fed, half-drunk, and on an uncensored internet connection (at least as uncensored as most of the world - and I have no objection to most of what people are being arrested for).
I'd still rather pay less for my medical insurance - Especially since the patents I'm paying for are being ignored on both my Canadian and Mexican borders. But socialism and capitalism are both nice ideas in theory. I just think that the US & Cuba are bad examples on either side. I'd love to find a country that's figured out how they should be balanced and needs a MSEE grad with PM experience that can look past a late-night semi-inebriated /. post...
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Considering the Bay of Pigs, the attempts to assassinate Castro, and all the other plots, maybe it's time for the US to formally renounce such stupid behaviour.
You got that right.
Whenever I hear or read about the Cuba embargo, I am instantly reminded of a story Pierre Salinger (Press Secretary to John F Kennedy) used to tell:
One day, Salinger is summoned to the Oval Office, where JFK tells him "Pierre, I want you to go out and buy as many Petite Upmanns as you can" - "Yes, Mr President".
Next day, Salinger goes back into the Oval Office. "Well, Pierre?" JFK asked. "We rounded up (several hundred, can't remember the exact number) through our contacts all over the country, Mr President".
JFK let out a reluctant sigh, opened the top drawer of his desk, pulled out the Cuban embargo document, and signed it right there and then.
That's the executive branch in action for you, hoarding the last legal stash before making it a crime to buy it. And that's how much they believe in the laws they enact in our name.
My guess is that the embargo still exists if only to politically pacify the noisy Batista Cubans that make up a large chunk of the Florida electorate. Remember the Elian Gonzalez incident? I'm pretty damn sure that incident cost Gore the election, made the margin narrow enough to allow Jeb Bush to steal the election. We've all heard about thousands of African-Americans purged from the voting lists. How many Cuban-Americans were? I'd guess the number is disproportionately low.
As for the effectiveness of the embargo where cigars are concerned, I live in Mexico, where tourists from north of the border puff away at heart's content. Then buy them to take home, change the paper rings and boxes, and presto!, a Cuban Cohiba has been transformed into a Mexican Te Amo.
There's a cartoon that made the rounds a few years ago, with Bush Jr jumping up and down in the tip of Florida, yelling "I'm going to bury you, Fidel!" Meanwhile, Fidel quietly stands on Cuban ground, beside a blackboard with a bunch of crossed out names: Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr and Clinton.
Inter-generational, institutionalized stupidity is what I call it.
Lil' Thindime, lilting a lacrimose lament, krashes the kwaint konfines of Kokonino Kounty
The people liked us shortly after the revolution and blue jeans and MTV could have really made for a good relationship, in my arm-chair general opinion.
That's probably true. There were many different groups behind the revolutions in Iran and Cuba. The Fundamentalists and Communists respectively were in the minority for a while afterwards. But then they started killing and torturing the people who held different views. In both cases lots died, more fled into exile, and pretty soon the Fundamentalists and the Communists had complete control.
So the idea that the US unnecessarily soured its relationships with both countries is simply wrong. The groups that murdered their way into power hated the US with a passion and, short of invading to crush those particular groups, there is nothing the US could have done to maintain good relations.
What the general populations in Iran and Cuba thought of the US simply didn't figure. Anyone who continued to voice positive views of the US soon got a bullet in the head.
You probably haven't noticed all the restrictions in place to travel to Cuba, have you?
There's a bit of wisdom that's been passed around, all over Latin America, for the last thirty years: Visit Cuba before the North Americans can get back in, 'cause they're gonna drag along McDonald's, Hard Rock Hotel & Casinos, Starbucks and shopping malls.
Can you imagine a fucking Cinnabon in Havana? You have no idea just how many people, non-US citizens by and large, consider that image to represent a Faustian Pact, because it represents Washington's economic doctrine of neo-liberalism that's screwed over every other country in the continent, as well as Africa, over the last several decades.
You can pontificate about how Cuba's living standards are lower than so-and-so, but just compare to El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Paraguay, etc, all of whom toed the Washington (which is to say, Exxon and DuPont) line, and whose dictators were mostly alumni of the US-sponsored School Of The Americas.
Furthermore, if Cuba had not been embargoed, it would be quite prosperous today. Within the limited means that the embargo created, the Cuban population is managing better than most countries victimized by Washington's neo-liberalism.
So yes, visit Cuba before it's too late, while the population is still relatively innocent, crime levels are extraordinarily low, and an extended vacation can be had for a song (or two).
No offense intended, just food for thought about an absurd situation: Curious that the only people restricted from traveling to Cuba are the citizens of The Land Of The Free. So how Free (as in speech, not beer) are you, really? Think about it, I believe it's really an important question.
Lil' Thindime, lilting a lacrimose lament, krashes the kwaint konfines of Kokonino Kounty
Since you're American it's actually rather important that you understand, so at least go read a few Wikipedia articles about Iran and your conflict with it, please?
But yes, your viewpoint is rather lopsided. Your teacher is quite right about there being a lot of Westernized Iranians. But to say the population "liked us shortly after the revolution" is kinda off. The popular revolution was against a US backed dictator. Also there was more than one group rebelling. There was a student rebellion, which is who did the hostage taking, and were generally West oriented kids, though very pissed with the US backed dictatorship, and thus the US. Also there was a hardline Muslim rebellion against it. Eventually (and naturally) those guys organized a power structure quicker than the students did after the fall of the Shah, and are thus on top today.
But that's just a quickie of a very complex situation. It's just to give you an idea. Please go read at least the relevant Wiki articles to get a start on knowing about the situation.
Why? Well just for starters the current trouble is /because/ Americans were generally ignorant of Iran before, essentially not having a clue or a care that they were directly keeping Iranians under their puppet dictator.
I was in cuba about 3 months ago - see http://havana.360cities.net - The fact that the world discovers this now from Wikileaks is pretty funny, considering this was "known on the street" as a matter of fact in Cuba many months ago.
And yes, computers were banned until recently, but they have been widespread for a long time. It's just been illegal to own a computer. But when you consider that everything in Cuba is illegal, what difference does it make.
Same with an internet connection. You buy a dialup connection and use an SSH tunnel. Your local whizkid can help sort you out with this. Don't worry, there are computer whizkids in Cuba too :-)
And living in gorgeous, wonderful Cuban weather probably has nothing to do with longevity, either. Clean Atlantic ocean air, gentle tropical island weather, fabulous beaches that Florida residents _wish_ they had nearby, etc. probably have no effect on aging joints and keeping fit in old age.
When I get as old as the ex-Cuban cancer surgeon I met visiting an ill friend a decade ago, I want to retire to the house he grew up in, where he could fish in the ocean by walking 100 yards and watch the girls on the beach. The doctor had pictures, on the walls of his office, too. For 40 year old pictures, those were really, really stunning women. I can see why Castro refuses to retire, much less die, as long as he has that kind of scenery to live for.
I'd still rather pay less for my medical insurance - Especially since the patents I'm paying for are being ignored on both my Canadian and Mexican borders. But socialism and capitalism are both nice ideas in theory. I just think that the US & Cuba are bad examples on either side. I'd love to find a country that's figured out how they should be balanced and needs a MSEE grad with PM experience that can look past a late-night semi-inebriated /. post...
Sitting in a Social Democratic nation in the north of Europe, I can say this: Cuba is going in the right direction at the moment, mostly thanks to Raul it seems. US on the other hands is standing still, it has distanced it self from it allies after selecting conservatives** a few years back. Even though the economic race in Kina and India has made us (Europe) less dependent on US economy, it still has a large impact on our lives and culture, and thats why we like to have an opinion on what you select for government.
Some of the flaws in US government, from an outside perspective:
* The patent system (Select someone for office that is less conservative and cooperate founded and a change might happen..)
* The health care system (Again, select someone a tad more social, and they'll do something about it long term)
* The war on everyone, to either "crush" taliban or more preferably invade and give Iraqi oil to one of my friends oil companies (Select someone less aggressive towards the world around you, and the world will most likely be less aggressive back)
* Intelligent design (Select someone that doesn't mix religion with politics that much, and you might get out of the dark ages too(again)..)
* Environment cowards (Select someone that doesn't found scientist to come up with objections to global warming to keep their corporate friends safe from having to do something about their unfiltered pollution)
** this is a bit ironic with all the public spending (war), budget deficit problems and restriction on peoples freedom.
This is a signature..
Time and time again we've seen this happen. Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam was a nationalist. He refashioned his politics in terms favored the only backers available to him and became "communist" when it was clear the US would continue supporting it's puppets in the south, for example.
A large part of the rebel movements that started spouting communist slogans etc. over the last few decades did so first when that was how they got support because the Soviet Union and others saw it as an opportunity. Many of them would have preferred or were open to support from the West, but were ignored or branded terrorists because the dictators they went up against were supported by the West, and turned to whomever were willing to fund them or provide weapons.
So ... Turkey can harbor US nuke missiles pointed to Moscow, but Cuba can't have a few pointed to the US ?
The winner of the Cuban missiles crisis was the USSR who negociated the removal of the plethora of US missiles in Turkey, in exchange of the few missiles in Cuba.
I also don't understand why so many Americans hate Cuba so much..
I thought we were hating the Mexicans and Iraqi/Anyone-Who-Looks-Middle-Eastern. Damn my hate agenda is getting to full now I have to squeeze in Cubans.
But seriously, I'm not sure I agree that "Americans" hate Cuba, more like the "American Government" hates Cuba.
Can I bum a sig?
You are of course ignoring the fact that Cuba wanted to launch missiles tipped with nuclear warheads at the U.S. during Kennedy's presidency.
Maybe the U.S. has had good reason to act the way it has.
I am sure that nobody actually wanted to launch them. The fact that the USSR had submarine-launched nukes slightly after that and never gave any indication that it wanted to unilaterally strike the USA proves that.
In fact for a long time the USSR had a "no first nuclear strike" policy when NATO did not.
I think it was the psychological bargaining power of having missiles so close to the USA that they wanted.
One of the things that seems to have plaid a key role in causing Khrushchev to decide to go ahead with the deployment of missiles to Cuba was a visit to the Black Sea where a Soviet general pointed out to just how close to the Soviet border the USA had stationed it's nuclear missiles in Turkey. It must have seemed to him that if the USA felt able to put nuclear missiles into the USSR's back yard then surely the US would react fairly calmly to the USSR doing the exact same thing. After all it would have been in the best traditions of the MAD arrangement to keep the capability balance in tact. I don't think that Khrushchev fully appreciated the force of the reaction he was going to get. I watched a documentary on the Cuban missile crisis recently and I found it interesting was that one of the American ex-government types they interviewed very candidly admitted that the USA has an incredible inability to realize just how provocative it's actions can potentially be to the opposition. You don't get that kind of an admission very often from politicians. The USA felt terribly provoked by missiles in Cuba and Americans remember that provocation to this day. But that begs the question exactly what was the USA thinking when they deployed those missiles to Turkey so close to the Soviet border? Did they really think the Soviets wouldn't react? A similar thing is currently happening on a smaller scale with GWB's missile shield program. The Bush regime either seem to be oblivious to what effect this missile shield is having in Moscow or they just plain don't care if it sets off another nuclear arms race. Similarly some of the US tactics during the Cuban blockade were also incredibly incautious. Take the low level overflights the Americans did over Cuba. To the Americans they may have been just recce flights born out of an honest need to obtain hard reconnaissance. Nobody seemed to consider how low level flights over Soviet nuclear sites by RF-8 recce aircraft which were essentially indistinguishable from F-8 fighter bombers would look to the Russians and the Cubans. Did Soviet tactical recon aircraft regularly buzz American nuclear weapons installations in Turkey at ultra low level? No they didn't. What would the Americans have done if they had? To this day some of the Cuban and Soviet personnel stationed on Cuba at the time are convinced that those low level flights were a deliberate attempt to provoke a war. That of course wasn't the American's intention but unfortunately real intentions matter a lot less than perceived intentions do in a tense situation like the Cuba crisis was.
Just my two cents...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Especially since the patents I'm paying for are being ignored on both my Canadian and Mexican borders
Actually, you're quite wrong. Canadians respect WIPO patents - what they don't do, is let individual HMO's or people deal directly with drug companies who can then charge maximum rates. Instead, in a sort of collective bargaining arrangement, we buy our drugs in bulk then distribute to hospitals, etc.
In other words the government negotiates with Big Pharma - you want to do business here (and they do), you don't charge out the nose, although there are still exceptions to this. I cannot quite understand why Amercians do not demand this from their government as well - its almost like the politicans want you to pay more.
But that could'nt be, could it?
Maybe you are asking the wrong question. The idea that the US has to prevent any nation from attacking any other nation or the idea that the US should make the world a better place is a totalitarian idea and doomed to failure. The US should mind it's own business, and not be afraid to let it's citizens have the right of free association on a global scale.
Money is the root of all evil?
We (the U.S.) screwed up the same way in Iran.
We did the same in Vietnam. There was a study done in the 50s after the Vietnamese had managed to drive the French out of the country. It suggested that we could pull Ho Chi Minn into our orbit if we had been inclined to engage him instead of isolating him. We opted to let our paranoia rule the day (remember the Reds are coming...) and look what happened -- we wound up fighting a decades long war with a movement that quoted our own Declaration of Independence (while trying to free themselves from French colonial rule) and which had actually been on our side against the Japanese in WW2.
I love my country dearly but it's amazing how many decisions we've allowed ourselves to make out of fear. Fear of Communism. Fear of Socialism. Fear of Terrorism. How did we go from "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself" to being afraid of "isms"? I can at least understand it in the context of the 50s and early 60s -- when it appeared the that Soviet Union was beating us in science and space exploration and the memory of Pearl Harbor was still fresh. What the hell is our excuse now?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
* The patent system (Select someone for office that is less conservative and cooperate founded and a change might happen..)
Agreed.
* The health care system (Again, select someone a tad more social, and they'll do something about it long term)
This is a tough one. Our health care system as it stands stinks for a lot of people but we are still the World leader in pharmaceuticals and we still have the best doctors in the World -- there's a reason why so many foreign leaders/rich businessmen come here for their operations. Personally I think we could improve our health care system far more if we worked to make it less expensive -- and this could be accomplished without nationalizing the system (tort reform and patent reform both come to mind)
* The war on everyone, to either "crush" taliban or more preferably invade and give Iraqi oil to one of my friends oil companies (Select someone less aggressive towards the world around you, and the world will most likely be less aggressive back)
Don't give us grief for the war in Afghanistan. Lest we forget, the Taliban did harbor the man who murdered 3,000 Americans (and others -- people from over 50 countries died that day) and refused to hand him over to face justice. We have a legitimate chance at building a better nation there and the mission in that country is supported by the UN and our NATO allies.
I won't argue with you on Iraq but we are where we are -- so what do you want to do about it? I'd love to see our troops brought home -- but I also don't want to see that country turn into the next failed-state (the next Afghanistan) if it collapses when we leave. Again it would seem that we actually have a chance at building a better nation here -- we owe the Iraqi people something after we knocked off their Government and turned their country into a whirlpool of violence and murder.
* Intelligent design (Select someone that doesn't mix religion with politics that much, and you might get out of the dark ages too(again)..)
This isn't fair. It seems to me that you are only receiving news that portrays us in a bad light. If you looked a little bit beyond GWB or the few heavily Conservative states (Georgia and Kansas come to mind) I think you'd find that most Americans see right through ID for what it really is -- creationism with a fancier name. There's no "debate" about evolution here in the Northeast. There's no debate about it on the West coast. There isn't even a debate about it in most of the Conservative-leaning states (they never tried to teach creationism to me in North Carolina). Please don't judge us by our hicks -- even if one of them managed to become President.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
More or less true story (some minor details may get muddled): American couple visits a couple in USSR that they'd become friends with on a previous visit. Russian couple welcomes them into their meager home, and works very hard to accommodate the American couple. They insist on sleeping on the couch so their guests can have their bed.
On their last full day together, the Russian wife wants to make a spectacular dinner for the American couple. They all go out shopping to get ingredients... they go to the butcher, but the butcher has a very limited range of things to offer; mostly scraps and unpopular cuts of meat, but they buy the best they can and move on. The bakery is similar. Most of the shelves are empty; they look around and find the best they can and move on. It continues like this until they get everything they can to make a decent meal.
Several years after the "fall," the Russian couple visit the American couple, it's their first time out of their native country. Instead of a meager apartment, the American couple have a nice house with a large guest suite. You'd think they were "special" rich Americans, but it turns out most people live in pretty nice houses; their house in particular wasn't anything special, this is just how many people live. The American wife decides, like the Russian one did, to make a special dinner. She takes the Russian wife to a farmer's market. There, under one roof, is a butcher with everything you could possibly want, a huge seafood section, a bakery.. the shelves are completely packed with anything you could possibly need.
The Russian wife stood there and cried.
I swear to you I am not making this up. People in these countries simply don't know how good "western" style living is; we'd been demonized by their governments for so long, they just couldn't believe the reality. Another lesson is that a lot of us don't realize how good we have it.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
I'm not trying to endorse either the Cuban lifestyle or Michael Moore here, but that is actually partially true. The Cuban healthcare system runs far more efficiently than the one in the US, at least as far as the numbers are concerned.
Yes, when you pay doctors less it is amazing how efficient medical care can be! US doctors make about twice the OECD average, for example. Or you can look at how Wal-Mart medical clinics are using cheaper nurses to triage patients and treat simple problems without bringing in an expensive doctor, but of course the AMA is opposing these kinds of clinics.
On the other hand, US Medicare just blocked reducing payments to doctors, so you can imagine that "US Socialized Healthcare" will be more expensive than anyone else's with poor results, just like our socialized education system...
The US also isn't willing to engage in malpractice tort reform which could save nearly 50% of costs due to decreases in "defensive medicine"