Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Odds and ends

  • Blogger Yoani Sanchez is informed by Cuban immigration authorities that she will not receive permission to travel to New York to accept a journalism prize.

  • Menawhile, a justice ministry advisor and others spoke in favor of ending some policies affecting Cuban emigrants – the seizure of their property, the requirement that they maintain a Cuban passport to travel home – and said that normalized relations with the United States would help Cuba reform these and other practices. One of the panelists complained about “legislative inertia.” AFP Spanish story here.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Blogger Yoani Sanchez barred from leaving the island. Now that's change we can believe in!

C'mon bootlickers, can't wait to hear how it is all the fault of the US.

chingon

brianmack said...

Again, very bad PR from the worst
Publicists in the world!

Anonymous said...

pidgen -- a mistake from the cuban government, it's not a big deal to admit it. they should let her go, but shit happens. i disagree totally with the decision.
but then again, they should let the NY philharmonic go to cuba. governments are stupid and make mistakes, but don't hold cuba up to a higher standard.

leftside said...

The difference is that it is not an AP or Reuters story when the US denies the wives of the Cuban Five to visit their husbands - whom they have not seen in (like) 9 years. Or when they deny a elderly musician or scientist. But every Cuban that gets denied (for whatever reason, however bureaucratic), gets blown up into a proper news story.

Anonymous said...

I definitely like following Yoani and think she's a refreshing voice that better represents the new generation of Cubans than probably any other well-known voice on the island.

My concern is about the libreta. It's hard for me to imagine that they're serious about getting rid of it. I guess if you make enough money or get enough remitances from abroad...? I shudder to think what the families that I know would be forced to do if the libreta was eliminated.

Is it safe to say that no major changes will happen soon? I have to say that this is one change, unlike all the tightening of the US embargo, that could bring mass protest. One of my main criticisms of the anti-cuba groups is that they fail to understand that the people generally like the idea of the social programs, they just want MORE. Taking these programs away in the short term could potentially lead to chaos.........no?

Thoughts?