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Cuba Sanctions

Craig

Senator
Supporting Member
I am with you on the selling arms to Saudi's or Qatar but the only thing we have done in Cuba is help the Castro's carry on.
So? I find the House of Saud to be far worse, perhaps the worst nation on earth.

But yes...our embargo helped the Castro's.
 
Fourth, if we're going to try to justify sanctions against Cuba not by the way the Cuban government treats its people, but by the way it interacts with the rest of the world, there's even less justification there. Cuba isn't a state sponsor of terrorism -- neither in the official designation, nor in the de facto way that some "friendly" nations like Saudi Arabia are
And then there's the hypocrisy:

http://www.newsweek.com/2016/10/14/donald-trump-cuban-embargo-castro-violated-florida-504059.html

"Documents show that the Trump company spent a minimum of $68,000 for its 1998 foray into Cuba at a time when the corporate expenditure of even a penny in the Caribbean country was prohibited without U.S. government approval.

"But the company did not spend the money directly.

"Instead, with Trump’s knowledge, executives funneled the cash for the Cuba trip through an American consulting firm called Seven Arrows Investment and Development Corp.

"Once the business consultants traveled to the island and incurred the expenses for the venture, Seven Arrows instructed senior officers with Trump’s company—then called Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts—how to make it appear legal by linking it after the fact to a charitable effort."

Donald was making his first bid for the White House about this time and publicly said he had been offered deals in Cuba but he turned them down.

If his lips are moving, he is lying.
 

Days

Commentator
I think this is in large part because he had no actual political beliefs. He simply said whatever he thought the audience in front of him wanted to hear at the moment. When the audience changes from the yahoo masses, to the Republican establishment, his beliefs change with it.

I don't think that's inevitable. For example, consider Bill Clinton. He took many positions that were contrary to mainstream Democratic thinking at the time, for good and ill. His DLC-style triangulation was a real break with most recent Democratic presidential candidates and a real affront to the Democratic establishment at the time (which is why he got bashed pretty hard from the left as well as the right). Yet that posiitoning definitely survived once he came to office. He didn't suddenly turn into southern-fried Dukakis once he was in office, the way Trump has basically turned into a dumber, more racist, and more corrupt Romney.
I'm not sure much has changed, Trump is an old man, I doubt he has changed as much as what they write about him keeps changing. And, like you said, he wanders all over the board with his tweets, it is hard to stake out an actual position from that... hard to say if he has any solid positions. But Trump was not a career politician the way Clinton was. I'm still curious to see what his administration will produce. He hasn't even put through his first budget yet, and it should be interesting to see if that $40 billion dollar partnership between our banks and Saudi banks results in an uptick in employment... I think it is more of a general, steady the stock exchanges, type effort, but that should produce jobs also, so I'm curious to see what comes of it.
 
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Arkady

President
I'm still curious to see what his administration will produce.
I suppose I could say the same, albeit in the same sense as I'd say "I'm curious what would happen if there really were a zombie plague."

He hasn't even put through his first budget yet
True. But he's offered his outline for it, and it's a friggin' nightmare. It takes the most bloated area of the federal government --the military-- and increases its over-funding still more. Meanwhile, it takes the one group of Americans who have been doing well --the very rich-- and cuts their taxes vastly. And it takes various areas of our budget that are already bone-thin relative to other wealthy nations (nearly everything other than the military), and cuts still further into the bone. And it does so with wildly dishonest math, which counts the same trillions of dollars repeatedly to try to hide the fiscal damage that will happen.[/QUOTE]
 

Days

Commentator
I suppose I could say the same, albeit in the same sense as I'd say "I'm curious what would happen if there really were a zombie plague."



True. But he's offered his outline for it, and it's a friggin' nightmare. It takes the most bloated area of the federal government --the military-- and increases its over-funding still more. Meanwhile, it takes the one group of Americans who have been doing well --the very rich-- and cuts their taxes vastly. And it takes various areas of our budget that are already bone-thin relative to other wealthy nations (nearly everything other than the military), and cuts still further into the bone. And it does so with wildly dishonest math, which counts the same trillions of dollars repeatedly to try to hide the fiscal damage that will happen.
[/QUOTE]
The budget is one part of the overall plan... if Trump gets the cooperation he has sought, investing billions into our infrastructure, the tax plan is supposed to pair the decreased need in welfare. The idea is to put everyone to work and lower taxes while building the military... of course if the capitalization never materializes, then it turns into a humanitarian disaster. But the economic climate is ripe for this to succeed, if the capitalization comes through. That's why I'm curious to see how this plays out; it has the potential to produce a wide variety of results.
 

Arkady

President
if Trump gets the cooperation he has sought[/quote]

I'm open to infrastructure investment, but I'm very skeptical about Trump on that front. I suspect that in the same way he and the Republicans are using "healthcare reform" as cover for an upper-class tax cut, they'll use "infrastructure investment" as a way to shovel taxpayer money and assets at politically connected businesses.

The idea is to put everyone to work and lower taxes while building the military
We heard that same song and dance from Bush, and the result was to move us from record surpluses to record deficits in a few short years, with sub-par economic growth to show for it. If things went that poorly when moving from a record surplus, picture how it will go when we're already starting in a hole.

But the economic climate is ripe for this to succeed, if the capitalization comes through.
How so?
 

Days

Commentator
if Trump gets the cooperation he has sought
I'm open to infrastructure investment, but I'm very skeptical about Trump on that front. I suspect that in the same way he and the Republicans are using "healthcare reform" as cover for an upper-class tax cut, they'll use "infrastructure investment" as a way to shovel taxpayer money and assets at politically connected businesses.



We heard that same song and dance from Bush, and the result was to move us from record surpluses to record deficits in a few short years, with sub-par economic growth to show for it. If things went that poorly when moving from a record surplus, picture how it will go when we're already starting in a hole.



How so?
We never saw investment in the infrastructure under GWB, quite the opposite, capital rushed for the exits. That's why I said I'm worried what the top 1% will do with the money, if Trump is able to return investment into America, he just might make America great again, although someone would still need to fix our currency - or it peters our pretty fast.

Agree that we are starting in the hole, this time around. It's a dangerous time; but the potential for growth is pretty good; we've adjusted to the service economy, so bringing back manufacturing quality jobs should make the economy pick up nicely. The trick is to bring in sufficient volume to result in decent growth; if Trump can grow the economy by 5% a year (which he promised to do) his austerity budget won't hurt us. But if we remain at this 2% growth slump, then all your fears will play out.

The reason for the military budget is our program to upgrade our carriers from Nimitz class to Ford class (and add an America class light carrier) ... that's going to cost some money over the next 15 years; that and building the F-35 fighter technology into our entire air defense system. There's a technology upgrade being made to our entire Navy, Army, and Air Force ... Trump put out a bare bones military budget to stay on pace with that... whoever won this time around was going to inherit the military budget.
 

Arkady

President
We never saw investment in the infrastructure under GWB, quite the opposite, capital rushed for the exits. That's why I said I'm worried what the top 1% will do with the money, if Trump is able to return investment into America, he just might make America great again, although someone would still need to fix our currency - or it peters our pretty fast.
Trump is basically repeating the Bush error -- imagining that cutting taxes for the very rich will have magical benefits for the economy. It's been a repeated disastrous failure, so I don't see why we should expect it will work better this time. If you want to invest in public infrastructure, just push through public infrastructure programs, financed by taxes. It's not about what happens to private sector capital.

if Trump can grow the economy by 5% a year (which he promised to do)
It's not going to happen. His first quarter came in under 2%, and was slower than Obama's last quarter. Second quarter will probably come in a bit higher, if the GDPNow number is right (it's hit or miss this early), but not a lot higher -- around 2.9%.

The reason for the military budget is our program to upgrade our carriers from Nimitz class to Ford class
It's not just that. The military budget is expanding for each of the services, not just the Navy. However, it's true that the vastly wasteful upgrade to Ford class carriers is a gigantic boondoggle that's costing us many tens of billions of dollars per year. There is no justification for that upgrade. The Nimitz class carriers are already GENERATIONS beyond what our enemies have.

I'm not exaggerating there. Look at the specs. The George H. W. Bush, a Nimitz carrier has a displacement of 102,000 long tons, is capable of over 30 knots, and has the unlimited range of a nuclear-powered vessel. That's 2.4 times the size of the Russian and Chinese carriers, faster than them, and unlike those foreign models, the Bush isn't limited in range by diesel engines The Bush also carries an air wing crew of 2,480, compared to just 626 for the Russian carrier. On that basis, you could argue the generation of carriers we're trying to upgrade FROM are four times as capable as anything anyone else in the world could deploy.

To find a US carrier on par with what the top-of-the-line is for the Russians and Chinese, you need to go back long, long before the Nimitz class. The USS Enterprise, which entered service way back in 1962, was faster and over twice as large as today's Chinese and Russian ships, and was nuclear. The USS Kitty Hawk was also considerably larger and faster than those Russian and Chinese ships, and capable of carrying a lot more aircraft. The Forrestal, from the mid-1950s, was also bigger, faster, longer-ranged, and had a much larger complement of aircraft than the Russian and Chinese vessels of today.

Hell, take a look at the USS Coral Sea, launched in 1946 -- it's slightly bigger than the Kuznetsov (45,000 tons displacement compared to 43,000), and faster (33 knots compare to 29) and carried more aircraft (45-55 in the 1980s, compared to 41 for the Kuznetsov). Same with the Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the Midway. You have to go back over 70 years to find a time when our top-of-the-line aircraft carriers weren't up to the standards of today's Russian and Chinese vessels. There are men dying of old age today who were toddlers the last time we were building something as crappy as the Russians and Chinese are relying on today.

So why the rush to move six or seven generations ahead of anything anyone else can field? The motivation isn't military, it's political: it's about serving up the pork for politically-connected "defense" contractors. Even if all we had were two refitted carriers from 1945, we'd already be a match for the Russians and Chinese combined. The 1960s-era carriers would be enough to put us in the clear lead, the Nimitz carriers were ridiculous overkill, and now we're layering even more overkill on top of that.

Trump put out a bare bones military budget to stay on pace with that... whoever won this time around was going to inherit the military budget.
Trump could have held the military budget in check if he'd wanted to. He'd simply have to demand spending reductions in exchange for his signature on spending bills. We've seen how that works. The military budget was shrunk in real terms in the Clinton years, for example. But it's a lot easier to just hand that pork over.
 

Days

Commentator
Trump is basically repeating the Bush error -- imagining that cutting taxes for the very rich will have magical benefits for the economy. It's been a repeated disastrous failure, so I don't see why we should expect it will work better this time. If you want to invest in public infrastructure, just push through public infrastructure programs, financed by taxes. It's not about what happens to private sector capital.



It's not going to happen. His first quarter came in under 2%, and was slower than Obama's last quarter. Second quarter will probably come in a bit higher, if the GDPNow number is right (it's hit or miss this early), but not a lot higher -- around 2.9%.



It's not just that. The military budget is expanding for each of the services, not just the Navy. However, it's true that the vastly wasteful upgrade to Ford class carriers is a gigantic boondoggle that's costing us many tens of billions of dollars per year. There is no justification for that upgrade. The Nimitz class carriers are already GENERATIONS beyond what our enemies have.

I'm not exaggerating there. Look at the specs. The George H. W. Bush, a Nimitz carrier has a displacement of 102,000 long tons, is capable of over 30 knots, and has the unlimited range of a nuclear-powered vessel. That's 2.4 times the size of the Russian and Chinese carriers, faster than them, and unlike those foreign models, the Bush isn't limited in range by diesel engines The Bush also carries an air wing crew of 2,480, compared to just 626 for the Russian carrier. On that basis, you could argue the generation of carriers we're trying to upgrade FROM are four times as capable as anything anyone else in the world could deploy.

To find a US carrier on par with what the top-of-the-line is for the Russians and Chinese, you need to go back long, long before the Nimitz class. The USS Enterprise, which entered service way back in 1962, was faster and over twice as large as today's Chinese and Russian ships, and was nuclear. The USS Kitty Hawk was also considerably larger and faster than those Russian and Chinese ships, and capable of carrying a lot more aircraft. The Forrestal, from the mid-1950s, was also bigger, faster, longer-ranged, and had a much larger complement of aircraft than the Russian and Chinese vessels of today.

Hell, take a look at the USS Coral Sea, launched in 1946 -- it's slightly bigger than the Kuznetsov (45,000 tons displacement compared to 43,000), and faster (33 knots compare to 29) and carried more aircraft (45-55 in the 1980s, compared to 41 for the Kuznetsov). Same with the Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the Midway. You have to go back over 70 years to find a time when our top-of-the-line aircraft carriers weren't up to the standards of today's Russian and Chinese vessels. There are men dying of old age today who were toddlers the last time we were building something as crappy as the Russians and Chinese are relying on today.

So why the rush to move six or seven generations ahead of anything anyone else can field? The motivation isn't military, it's political: it's about serving up the pork for politically-connected "defense" contractors. Even if all we had were two refitted carriers from 1945, we'd already be a match for the Russians and Chinese combined. The 1960s-era carriers would be enough to put us in the clear lead, the Nimitz carriers were ridiculous overkill, and now we're layering even more overkill on top of that.



Trump could have held the military budget in check if he'd wanted to. He'd simply have to demand spending reductions in exchange for his signature on spending bills. We've seen how that works. The military budget was shrunk in real terms in the Clinton years, for example. But it's a lot easier to just hand that pork over.
Well, we've watched the globalists go over seas with investment for so long now, we tend to forget that America was built upon the receiving end of that investment opportunity. Now that the Pacific Rim has been upgraded and we've been downgraded, there is no reason to expect the next wave of capital investment won't be spent - at least in part - in America. Trump sought and received some solid committments, but we have to wait and see how that pans out.

You need to understand that the Nimitz class carriers were built with the old steamship technology. All the power is steam. The catapults, all the systems run on steam. There is pipework every where in those ships and it is a maintenance nightmare... especially now that the ships are old. When that class ship gets over 50 years old, they get retired, and the Ford class is replacing the steam powered approach with electrical powered infrastructure... all the new tech is electric, the Ford class has electro-magnetic catapults, and all the high tech radar and weapons like rail guns, they are a completely different technology from the old steam. All the new ships are being built electric. The Navy brings in the old and recycles the steel, but is building all new technology into this next class of carriers. This program was started in the beginning of Obama's 2nd term and will be ongoing for the next 3 to 4 admins, depending on how strong it is funded.

here's a quickie...


NIMITZ vs FORD class: TOP 5 IMPROVEMENTS
Published on Jun 5, 2016
 
D

Deleted member 21794

Guest
No one was denied the right to travel to Cuba. Jay-Z and Beyonce went before the embargo was lifted. Did anything happen to them for going?
 

EatTheRich

President
Yawn. Since we lifted the sanctions I expect free and fair elections there any day now? What date will those take place? o_O

What you fail to understand is that with the lifting of sanctions it has allowed the Castro's (Raul) to buy more loyalty and influence in the Cuban Army making it all the easier for his son to carry on the family tradition. All it has done is shored up the support for the Castro's going forward. All we have done, all Obama did was make it easier for that particular Communist Government to survive now with more money then ever.....Bravo another great foreign policy achievement....

But hey, I am sure when Raul's son does take over the left will declare him a reformer right up until he in fine Castro family tradition starts lining up and shooting people who do not care for him.
Raul already broke with that "tradition."
 

EatTheRich

President
Yawn. Since we lifted the sanctions I expect free and fair elections there any day now? What date will those take place? o_O

What you fail to understand is that with the lifting of sanctions it has allowed the Castro's (Raul) to buy more loyalty and influence in the Cuban Army making it all the easier for his son to carry on the family tradition. All it has done is shored up the support for the Castro's going forward. All we have done, all Obama did was make it easier for that particular Communist Government to survive now with more money then ever.....Bravo another great foreign policy achievement....

But hey, I am sure when Raul's son does take over the left will declare him a reformer right up until he in fine Castro family tradition starts lining up and shooting people who do not care for him.
Free and fair elections have been routine in Cuba since 1976.
 

EatTheRich

President
Yes, I'm sure of that, too. Trump maybe shockingly ignorant, but even he couldn't have somehow failed to learn about the Cuban exile community's strong Republican voting record, or its concentration in Florida, or how close Florida tends to be in presidential elections. Hell, you could ask a tenth-grader in Peoria and he'd be aware of those things. A septuagenarian who'd recently won a Republican nomination against a pair of Cuban Americans would, of course, be well aware of it.



The smart move was to try to diminish the force of the sanctions before they could ensure our third straight Castro in the leadership spot. Sadly, Trump seems to want to keep that regime in place and, as I mentioned, one can't blame him from a partisan political perspective: the communist regime in Cuba is the gift that keeps on giving from a Republican political perspective.
Are we just assuming the presidency of Cuba is a familial dynasty now? Or by "third straight Castro" do you simply mean another leader who reflects the will of the Cuban millions?
 

EatTheRich

President
No one was denied the right to travel to Cuba. Jay-Z and Beyonce went before the embargo was lifted. Did anything happen to them for going?
Presumably, they were interviewed by the FBI (like other Americans who go to Cuba) despite the required advance permission.
 

Arkady

President
Well, we've watched the globalists go over seas with investment for so long now, we tend to forget that America was built upon the receiving end of that investment opportunity. Now that the Pacific Rim has been upgraded and we've been downgraded, there is no reason to expect the next wave of capital investment won't be spent - at least in part - in America. Trump sought and received some solid committments, but we have to wait and see how that pans out.
What commitments are you thinking of? If you mean commitments to build for-profit infrastructure (toll roads, etc.) wouldn't it be more efficient to cut out that profit and just build the infrastructure ourselves, as a public good, as happened in prior eras of infrastructure build-out?

You need to understand that the Nimitz class carriers were built with the old steamship technology.
They were built on very new steamship technology, relative to what our adversaries have. Again, the top-of-the-line Russian and Chinese carriers are arguably less capable than what we were building way back in 1945, and clearly worse than what we were building in the 1960s. What's the rush to throw away billions of dollars to move yet another generation ahead of what anyone else has?

All the power is steam. The catapults, all the systems run on steam. There is pipework every where in those ships and it is a maintenance nightmare... especially now that the ships are old.
If this were about reducing long-term costs by building out lower-maintenance systems, I could be brought on board. If buying a new generation of ships and retiring the old was going to be cheaper over the next twenty years than continuing to maintain the old ones, I'd support that (though I'd want to see a lot fewer carriers in the next generation) But it's not even close. The cost of building the new carriers dwarfs what it would cost to maintain the old.

here's a quickie...
Yes, I'm well aware of the militarist propaganda, and I'm not denying there are improvements. I'm saying we don't need those improvements at that cost. We're in a world where the other two military super powers, combined, have two aircraft carriers, each of which is on par with what we were building 70 years ago. We're not expanding and further updating our fleet to respond to a real-world challenge from abroad. We're doing it to feed the ravenous hunger of the military industrial complex. It's corrupt.
 

Arkady

President
Are we just assuming the presidency of Cuba is a familial dynasty now? Or by "third straight Castro" do you simply mean another leader who reflects the will of the Cuban millions?
I'm betting it's a de facto familial dynasty now. We'll see if that's true soon enough.
 
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