We get letters .. LOTSSA LETTERS!
One of the nice things that accompany hosting a BLOG are the emails from totally unknowns . Especially the NICE ones (I keep looking for Swiss bank account numbers but so far I have been SOL) . The others they can just kiss my "Monte Barreto" (now there's a HABANA reference for ya !.Someone named Rodolfo (All of the people who write to us have cool "code" names, don't they?) sent me this little essay he wrote and wanted to share with me, well I didn’t get to it until 2:58AM on Sun - (Don't ask, my life is more complicated than the explanation as to how Camilo disappeared, and right now I AM REALLY pissed at Russian furniture delivery men!. I told ya DON’T ASK!..Anyhow here's RRRRRodolfo contribution - Hope ya like it.
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Fidel reflects on his world on his 79th birthdayLooking into the mirror after awakening a little latethis 13th of August 2005,Fidel had to admit he looked pretty good."It was a good speech I gave last night on TV rebel".Although I had planned on speaking only an hour or sothought Fidel (I really was trying to quit before thelatest pirated first run movie was to be shown at8:00PM) I really got carried away and just couldn'tstop haranguing those damn Yanquis about the Cubanfive and our latest victory in the court.So oh well we can show the damn movie some othernight.What time did I quit anyway? Last I remember wastaking the Parkinson's medicine around midnight anddrifting off to sleep shortly thereafter.I have to remember to call Randy and apologize fortaking his program "Roundtable" off the air last nightin order to make the airwaves available for mydiscussion.And by the way, while I can hold a thought, I need tocall Raul and make sure he gets something on my palRandy so that if that bastard keeps getting morepopular we can have a little accident and make himdisappear. Ah Camilo what are you up to buddy? Maybeyou can call Randy and let him know what happens toanyone who becomes more popular than me!!You know I simply can't understand. I pick theugliest, baldest, foulest smelling bastard in thewhole country to host that Roundtable show and now myinternal polling mechanisms are showing that thispinhead is sitting with more than half the popularsupport that I have. This simply can't continue. Oh well why worry about this when it's my birthday!!!Boy I can't wait to see what all my hand pickedgovernment cronies will bring me. I know what Raul has in mind. What a great Bro he is.He always brings me the latest firing squad statisticsand a couple of fingers in a jar of embalming fluid.Who could ask for anything better? (I hope he bringsthe drug smuggling stats too)But how about Pedro? I know he will be here when welight the candles. What will that sly devil think offor a present? Some sort of diplomatic success forsure. He just keeps ringing up those internationalvictories. Kind of reminds me of the 60's. Maybe hewill bring the latest Che t-shirt sales volumereports. Can't get enough of that shit I'll tell you.I wish I could really trust this guy but he's so youngand wasn't around in 59 I just can't let him into theinner circle, or at least what's left of it. Gosh let me think of when was my best ever birthdayparty? The one time I was in Moscow? Ah no who canenjoy your birthday when so far from home? Althoughthe KGB boys sure knew how to make a guy happy. Iwonder if those broads they had at the party reallyvolunteered to come or where they really whores. Ohwell no more trips to Moscow for me. I know my lackey Juan Almeida will be coming as usual.Boy is it great to have a token Negro around. Andespecially one who has been with me since the Moncada.Isn't he just one lucky dude? The little prick justkept bugging me all that time up in the Sierras,always hangin around, trying to cook me dinner,shining my boots and looking for local campesino girlsfor me. Hell he almost broke the radio shacktransmitter for radio rebelde. Couldn't find a Batistasoldier for the life of him (although to be truthful Inever saw one up close until we started blowing theirbrains out in January 59). I finally had to make him acommandante of a column just to get rid of him. Andhad to make him a big hero afterwards so everyoneknows that this revolution really is non racist. Hecertainly is no trouble now and I'm glad to have him,even though he couldn't ever have the guts to blowanyone's head off.Speaking of guts, maybe I better call Raul soon andhave him send out the order to all the prison camps,work camps, child reform centers, aids quarantinecamps and what the hell. all the camps, reform centersand anyway Raul knows the list. I can't be expectedto remember all of them and what we call them thesedays can I? Anyway what was I thinking? Guts? Oh yehguts. Raul can send out the order for an extra rationof chicken guts for everyone as a special gift on mybirthday. Gotta remember to call him. What palace ishe staying at these days? What palace am I in rightnow? Oh what the hell, does it really matter? Speaking of chicken thought the maximum Jefe as heshook crumbs from last night gently out of his beard.I sure am glad our friends up at Tyson foods and allthose other low production cost operations up in thestates can now send us all that cheap frozen chickenat such a low cost. Sales of chicken has skyrocketedin all our foreign currency stores. And margins (isthat what those economic ministry people call it,Margin? must have something to do with profitsalthough I can never say that word can I since it's socapitalistic) are way up they tell me. Only twoproblems with the whole thing one of which is thebastards make me pay up front. I can't believe theywouldn't trust me and let me ride a month or so onthese invoices. Oh well I have all those liberalfriends up there who can keep hammering on the wackopoliticians and get that changed some day. I just knowthat once that happens we can find all kinds of waysto rack up those outstanding balances (you know I lovethat phrase "outstanding balance" because thosebalances really are that) with each supplier and thencome up with all kinds of capitalist catch words torenege on the payment and then look for anothersupplier. It's worked well over the years and allthose suckers out there just keep shipping to us. "Ohwe had some real quality issues on the last fewshipments, Spoilage is over 20% on every shipload".Etc etc. and that's good enough to break the contractand start up fresh with someone else. These guys justdon't get it. I guess cause I'm the only one that cancome up with that unique little way of doing business.Secondly the other problem is what do they call it?Slippage?Yeh that's it, slippage. If you ask me I call itstealing from the revolution. Why can't they stop allthis stealing. I asked for a study a few months backabout the difference between deliveries of all therotten half spoiled chicken we don't sell at thestores and send out to the neighborhoods to give outto the proletariat. I figure if I can find out howmany tons are delivered and how many are given out inthe daily ration books then we can see what thedifference is. Well what do you know the reports cameback and they say somehow 20% is not accounted for.What the hell is going on here.? We spend good moneyfor that chicken and 20% of it never makes it out tothe revolutionary populace? (even though chicken isonly sent out a couple times a year, on my birthdayand the 26th of July) Some people have told me thatthe local gang at the distribution centers and thedock workers and the delivery guys, not to mention theregional warehouse staff and who knows who else arestealing a percentage for their own consumption or foractual sales to others. Well all I can say is Ipersonally have the pulse of this country right hereand I know that can't be happening in a trulyrevolutionary country like our great republicespecially since we pay those guys over 300 pesos amonth each. Can you imagine it? Over 300 pesos each? Iremember when a good salary was 75 pesos a month. Wellmaybe I can't really remember that but I know it'strue anyway. I know the Russians always warned me ofthe possibility of theft but I know that Cuba is muchdifferent and this would never happen here. I guess what I should do is call Randy and see if hecan get this issue out to the public on Roundtable.... On second thought maybe that isn't such a goodIdea. I really better calm down here and not bethinking about these negative thoughts or my bloodpressure will go way up and who knows what will happento my cholesterol. Might get so high not even PPG willbe able to bring it down.Anyway what was I originally thinking about? Oh yehchicken. Makes me wonder what's for dinner at theparty. You know last year I figured we would try andactually get the meal catered by one of the fewremaining Private restaurants out there. Boy was thata shindig let me tell you. What a great meal and sowell prepared and we made sure they had top qualityingredients and plenty of poison testers trying thestuff out before it got to me. It's too bad I had toshut all those restaurants down though. You know itwould be nice to have a little private enterprise outthere because I know that the average Cuban is a hardworking person and it sure was good PR. But hey whenthese bastards start outselling our state runoperations and all the tourists are flocking to theseoperations we just had to put an end to it. You knowI still remember the unpaid invoice to that restaurantfrom last year. I think it's still sitting on my desksomewhere. (Need to clean that desk this week) I guessI'm pretty sure that the owners would just as soonforgive the invoice as a gesture to the revolution andwhat a great world we have made for them and theirkids. I'm sure we have shut them down by now but heymaybe we have an opening in one of the kitchens at oneof the palaces for those people. Have to check on thatwhen I remember.Oh now I'm in such a better mood I have to think aboutthe wonderful entertainment for the evening. Gosh it'swonderful to be me. Every musical group or danceensemble or whatever just can't wait to be invited toone of my parties to perform. Even though it disgustsme personally maybe we will have some group for theyounger crowd. Lets see last year we had who was it?Cubanos? No that's not it. Oh yeah Cubanito.Personally I couldn't stand em but they sure went overwell. You can be sure that bitch Gloria ain't going tobe here. And none of those other ungrateful musicians(or sports stars for that matter) that have opted torequest asylum in other countries when we allowed themout of the country.You know it really galls me about these pricks. Wegave em a great education, plenty of resources tostudy or train 18 hours a day at the regional sportstraining facilities. We even fed them beef once aweek. And anyone earning any medal (even a lousybronze) at an Olympics was even given a car no morethan four years old and a nice boost in their rationcards. We even got them on TV and we would dointerviews with their parents while they werecompeting in some distant foreign country and madesure they saw the interview so they were reminded ofwho would suffer if they stayed. All of this and someof these ingrates still do it. They stay. Then thecapitalist pigs start making big money asprofessionals and even spend part of their money onfast cigar boats out of Miami to come and take theirfamilies in the middle of the night. I simply can't believe it. After all we have done forthem. You know that's one of the worst things about myjob dammit. I know I have to let these people out ofthe country so we can prove to the world what greatartistic and athletic abilities we have. And stillthey betray me. Oh well with all the little cubanosout there and more of that profit from Tyson foods wecan afford to increase our training budgets by a fewpesos. Speaking of that I need to make sure to get a meetingorganized with all national and regional CDR leadersand make sure they know about the latest budgetincreases I'm planning for them. Now I know that someof them might be a little dismayed when I tell themthat 90% of the increase will be going for the lineitem Chivatos (or local spies for those of you whodon't know about our really neat little system ofacronyms and interesting sayings here in Cuba). But Ijust need to convince them that increasing thisprogram really pays off in a revolutionary way. Thesechivatos we have been recruiting are really comingthrough for us big time. I'm sure most of you knowthat internally we generate mucho dinero from oursystem of Multas or fines. Well I know the majority ofyou don't like getting a parking ticket or an IRSinterest fine or something like that. But everyoneneeds to know about towing the line in society. Whatthat means is we can't have any violations of any ofour societal regulations (almost every one of which Ipersonally came up with after all). No some of you maythink it a bit unjust to fine people for things likehaving some foreign guest stay in your home. Well thisis one of our most important rules. Even if that guestis your son in law you absolutely have to come down toimmigration and register that person (and pay the 50$fee). Why you might say? After all this is a familymember. Well if you have to ask that question youstupido then I'll tell you. If we were to just letanyone just do things like invite friends to stay withthem then just think of the havoc that would bewrought. Well first of all neighbors would get jealouscause for sure your son in law would bring stuff likesoap or probably jeans or maybe even new shoes for thefamily members. We can't have this kind of jealousygoing on in society. Well you may ask well if I paythe registration fee this would still happen and I'llbe out 50$ to boot. Well Ok I admit you are right butwe simply need to attach some type of monetary valueto this type of special privilege that the governmentis giving you in order to maintain order in society.And besides which you know that that 50$ will end upback with all the neighbors anyway in some form. Nowit might take a few years to filter back but it will Ican assure you, just take it from me that this is thetruth. You trust me after all don't you? Anyway back to the Chivatos. Now as I've said thesepeople are really helping us out. Now as I'm sure youwould agree that anyone who would spy on theirneighbors for a few pesos is some kind of horriblecreep or worse. Personally I can't stand them but youknow Batista had them and our Russian pals helped usrefine the system and what about POLICE INFORMANTS?Yeh, bet you didn't think about that did you? Name meany country in the world that doesn't have PAID POLICEINFORMANTS? You can't name one can you? So of course as one of the third worlds most civilizedand well organized countries we have probably withoutdoubt the most well organized system around. Now tokeep the system going it costs most of the profit fromTyson and even all the profits from our world renownedmedical clinics for foreigners where our doctors arewell reimbursed (relatively speaking of course) forconvincing stupid foreigners that they need a backoperation when a couple of Advil's would do just aswell.I don't know why I said that as it's supposed to be asecret, but hey I trust that you can keep that oneconfidential. Ok now where was I anyway? Oh yeh local spies. Anyway if you still are notconvinced let me just run down a few of the law andrule violations we uncover using these chivatos. Thisway you can see that these offenses are grave anddeserve punishment even if your country doesn't seemto think so. I'll also give you the dollar amount ofthe fine so you can see we are not taking advantage ofpeople. Violation Dollar fineHaving unregistered foreign guest in your home $1,000.00Selling coffee or cheese you smuggled inFrom the country side $ 100.00Saying something bad about me or anyOf my trusted aides $ depends on the day and How I'm feelingHaving Beef in your refrigerator At least 250$ ormaybeEight years prison if you killed the cow, and probablyforfeit your refri tooHaving an unregistered bicycle taxi Loss of thebike for sure and You use to haul around foreign tourists at least 100$fine. (maybe jail if you are a smart ass too)Having a household appliance in your home without a receipt from our government stores Loss ofthe appliance and 50$Admitting you will not attend a rally Where Raul is coming to speak No fine, first offensebut socially ostracized for sureNow I could go on and on with more examples but I amsure that as a rational person you would wholeheartedly agree that probably thepunishment doesn't fit the crime in these examples and should actually be much higher. When Ithink about it I'm softening up a bit in my advanced age and really should review thesefines and adjust them up for inflation. (Did I say inflation? We have no inflationin Cuba, any price increase is definitely Caused by the embargo)Anyway I'm sure some of you skeptics out there aresaying things like $1,000 for having a Foreign guest in your home? Can that be correct and ifso who pays the fine the Cuban or the foreigner? Well now I'll let you in on a littlesecret. Guess what? Now remember who comes up with these laws and fines. I do that's whoand being the sly devil I am after all I put mucho thought into these things. In thisparticular case who pays the fine? Well they both do. You see in this example the Cuban gets thefine and if they don't pay we come in to the home (well of course not me personally, I'mmuch to busy do that sort of work) and snatch anything of value up the $1,000. If theydon't have it we take the house. How's that for an incentive to pay? Anyway what normallyhappens in this case is that the foreigner feels so bad about the thing that they paythe fine for the Cuban. How's that for a gimmick huh? Now we actually havethe rule I believe (and if we don't Ill order it up starting tomorrow) that we could fine theforeign tourist as well and you can be sure we pull them in for a nice scary chat will aColonel in immigration but we simply tell the tourist that in this first offense for them wewon't fine them but unfortunately we have to fine the Cuban in order to maintain social orderyou can understand that can't you?Our success rate on this gimmick you might call it ishovering around 86% where the foreigner pays up. In the other cases we sometimesreduce the fine for the Cuban or if they are belligerent you can be sure we take everything.Anyway we really don't want people just staying with friends. If that happens all overthe place how the hell our we going to support our hotel business anyway. Do you think we arethat stupid? Of course not!!And to make things fair in case there was some type ofmistake or something here's what we do. First of all we do not make the citizen gothrough the unnecessary expense of hiring a private attorney to defend themselves or appeal. Whocould afford that or why is that needed? We allow the person to appeal the decision. Theysimply have the right to go back to the original person who issued the fine andappeal. In this case the Colonel, and explain why they are not guilty. They have a whole 48 hours todo this. Fortunately this works very well except in the case where the colonel has toattend a conference in another part of the country and will not be back for 72 hours. And withall the economic problems we have had to face because of the embargo we seldom haveconferences out of town. Now if the colonel is sick for three days well that's anotherstory but with our great medical system hardly anyone ever gets sick so that is veryunlikely. I'm sure you would agree that this system is much better than anything acapitalistic country could ever come up with. And to prove my point we have done studies and youknow what? 98% of these original decisions are upheld on appeal. That's right, 98% ofthe time the original person who gives out the fine upholds his or her original decision onappeal. Now if that isn't almost perfect than what is? And you know what in the other 2% of thecases we find out that the person accepts a bribe to reduce or eliminate the fine. Youcan bet in these cases justice is served I can assure you. Enough of this OK? Any imbecile cansee that our system is as close to perfect as is humanly possible. Ok so your probably saying ok in this case how muchdoes the informant get? Well the answer is as little as possible but enough to givethem the incentive to keep doing it ofcourse. We have reams and reams of statistics over theyears on what is the correct remuneration for these valuable services. Right now inHavana we pay about the equivalent of 4$ per verifiable information that results in afine. In the outlying cities it's much less of course. Supply and demand right?Well what about the case where the informant justdoesn't like the person and makes something up about them? Well I guess you got me on that one. Now I know thatthat tactic worked really well for us during the glorious revolution. I have to admit weused it by giving Batista anonymous tips about actual Batista supporters we didn't like andhiding 26th of July armbands in their houses. When they were searched and the armband wasdiscovered the person would conveniently disappear. Those damned Batista peoplewere so paranoid they never stopped to investigate. Hah hah hah. That's a good one isn'tit?Anyway if this were to happen (and I seriously doubtit) we would find out later that the person was innocent. I grant you it would take about ayear or so since we are extremely busy people. But anyway think about it this way. Beingin prison is very similar to being in the army here. So if the person hasn't done theircompulsory military service yet (and sadly we get so many more juveniles committing crimes thesedays) being in prison for a year or so is simply a warm up for their militaryservice. And you can bet that these people will have a leg up on their colleagues in the militarywhen they get there for having been accustomed to the prison. Also they will have no bodyfat so their rigorous physical training in the military will be that much easier. Okso if it's someone older who has served in the resplendent Revolutionary Armed Forces of Cubathen the prison life will be a great reminder of the fun they had in the military so yousee why would I personally not be worried about this type of situation. Everything worksout for the better in the long run. Believe me I know. Ok I hope you are satisfied and have no furtherquestions. You know I really did not intend for this to be some type of interview situation. Iguess that the more I ruminated about my wonderful life by looking in the mirror the more mymind started to wander and these questions started to pop up. And we all know I'm onehell of a talker so here we are. But you know I'm a bit fatigued with all this and I haveso many things to consider, and today of course is my birthday so give me a break willya and let me go take a nap. And then for sure I simply have to go down stairs and findout what palace I'm staying at and make that call to Pedro. Or was it Raul? Oh mierda,I'll talk to you again next year. You can be sure I'll be here. There really are so manyimportant issues we have not discussed. And I didn't even get a chance to talk about my goodbuddy Hugo Chaves. Oh well next Year then and if I'm not around talk to Raul will ya.Yeh I know he's not as interesting but he remembers everything and I've taught him a lotover the years. Whatever you do don't go trying to interview Almeida. Leave the guyalone will Ya. Ok goodbye. Now where the hell did I put thattelephone dammit!!
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Fidel reflects on his world on his 79th birthdayLooking into the mirror after awakening a little latethis 13th of August 2005,Fidel had to admit he looked pretty good."It was a good speech I gave last night on TV rebel".Although I had planned on speaking only an hour or sothought Fidel (I really was trying to quit before thelatest pirated first run movie was to be shown at8:00PM) I really got carried away and just couldn'tstop haranguing those damn Yanquis about the Cubanfive and our latest victory in the court.So oh well we can show the damn movie some othernight.What time did I quit anyway? Last I remember wastaking the Parkinson's medicine around midnight anddrifting off to sleep shortly thereafter.I have to remember to call Randy and apologize fortaking his program "Roundtable" off the air last nightin order to make the airwaves available for mydiscussion.And by the way, while I can hold a thought, I need tocall Raul and make sure he gets something on my palRandy so that if that bastard keeps getting morepopular we can have a little accident and make himdisappear. Ah Camilo what are you up to buddy? Maybeyou can call Randy and let him know what happens toanyone who becomes more popular than me!!You know I simply can't understand. I pick theugliest, baldest, foulest smelling bastard in thewhole country to host that Roundtable show and now myinternal polling mechanisms are showing that thispinhead is sitting with more than half the popularsupport that I have. This simply can't continue. Oh well why worry about this when it's my birthday!!!Boy I can't wait to see what all my hand pickedgovernment cronies will bring me. I know what Raul has in mind. What a great Bro he is.He always brings me the latest firing squad statisticsand a couple of fingers in a jar of embalming fluid.Who could ask for anything better? (I hope he bringsthe drug smuggling stats too)But how about Pedro? I know he will be here when welight the candles. What will that sly devil think offor a present? Some sort of diplomatic success forsure. He just keeps ringing up those internationalvictories. Kind of reminds me of the 60's. Maybe hewill bring the latest Che t-shirt sales volumereports. Can't get enough of that shit I'll tell you.I wish I could really trust this guy but he's so youngand wasn't around in 59 I just can't let him into theinner circle, or at least what's left of it. Gosh let me think of when was my best ever birthdayparty? The one time I was in Moscow? Ah no who canenjoy your birthday when so far from home? Althoughthe KGB boys sure knew how to make a guy happy. Iwonder if those broads they had at the party reallyvolunteered to come or where they really whores. Ohwell no more trips to Moscow for me. I know my lackey Juan Almeida will be coming as usual.Boy is it great to have a token Negro around. Andespecially one who has been with me since the Moncada.Isn't he just one lucky dude? The little prick justkept bugging me all that time up in the Sierras,always hangin around, trying to cook me dinner,shining my boots and looking for local campesino girlsfor me. Hell he almost broke the radio shacktransmitter for radio rebelde. Couldn't find a Batistasoldier for the life of him (although to be truthful Inever saw one up close until we started blowing theirbrains out in January 59). I finally had to make him acommandante of a column just to get rid of him. Andhad to make him a big hero afterwards so everyoneknows that this revolution really is non racist. Hecertainly is no trouble now and I'm glad to have him,even though he couldn't ever have the guts to blowanyone's head off.Speaking of guts, maybe I better call Raul soon andhave him send out the order to all the prison camps,work camps, child reform centers, aids quarantinecamps and what the hell. all the camps, reform centersand anyway Raul knows the list. I can't be expectedto remember all of them and what we call them thesedays can I? Anyway what was I thinking? Guts? Oh yehguts. Raul can send out the order for an extra rationof chicken guts for everyone as a special gift on mybirthday. Gotta remember to call him. What palace ishe staying at these days? What palace am I in rightnow? Oh what the hell, does it really matter? Speaking of chicken thought the maximum Jefe as heshook crumbs from last night gently out of his beard.I sure am glad our friends up at Tyson foods and allthose other low production cost operations up in thestates can now send us all that cheap frozen chickenat such a low cost. Sales of chicken has skyrocketedin all our foreign currency stores. And margins (isthat what those economic ministry people call it,Margin? must have something to do with profitsalthough I can never say that word can I since it's socapitalistic) are way up they tell me. Only twoproblems with the whole thing one of which is thebastards make me pay up front. I can't believe theywouldn't trust me and let me ride a month or so onthese invoices. Oh well I have all those liberalfriends up there who can keep hammering on the wackopoliticians and get that changed some day. I just knowthat once that happens we can find all kinds of waysto rack up those outstanding balances (you know I lovethat phrase "outstanding balance" because thosebalances really are that) with each supplier and thencome up with all kinds of capitalist catch words torenege on the payment and then look for anothersupplier. It's worked well over the years and allthose suckers out there just keep shipping to us. "Ohwe had some real quality issues on the last fewshipments, Spoilage is over 20% on every shipload".Etc etc. and that's good enough to break the contractand start up fresh with someone else. These guys justdon't get it. I guess cause I'm the only one that cancome up with that unique little way of doing business.Secondly the other problem is what do they call it?Slippage?Yeh that's it, slippage. If you ask me I call itstealing from the revolution. Why can't they stop allthis stealing. I asked for a study a few months backabout the difference between deliveries of all therotten half spoiled chicken we don't sell at thestores and send out to the neighborhoods to give outto the proletariat. I figure if I can find out howmany tons are delivered and how many are given out inthe daily ration books then we can see what thedifference is. Well what do you know the reports cameback and they say somehow 20% is not accounted for.What the hell is going on here.? We spend good moneyfor that chicken and 20% of it never makes it out tothe revolutionary populace? (even though chicken isonly sent out a couple times a year, on my birthdayand the 26th of July) Some people have told me thatthe local gang at the distribution centers and thedock workers and the delivery guys, not to mention theregional warehouse staff and who knows who else arestealing a percentage for their own consumption or foractual sales to others. Well all I can say is Ipersonally have the pulse of this country right hereand I know that can't be happening in a trulyrevolutionary country like our great republicespecially since we pay those guys over 300 pesos amonth each. Can you imagine it? Over 300 pesos each? Iremember when a good salary was 75 pesos a month. Wellmaybe I can't really remember that but I know it'strue anyway. I know the Russians always warned me ofthe possibility of theft but I know that Cuba is muchdifferent and this would never happen here. I guess what I should do is call Randy and see if hecan get this issue out to the public on Roundtable.... On second thought maybe that isn't such a goodIdea. I really better calm down here and not bethinking about these negative thoughts or my bloodpressure will go way up and who knows what will happento my cholesterol. Might get so high not even PPG willbe able to bring it down.Anyway what was I originally thinking about? Oh yehchicken. Makes me wonder what's for dinner at theparty. You know last year I figured we would try andactually get the meal catered by one of the fewremaining Private restaurants out there. Boy was thata shindig let me tell you. What a great meal and sowell prepared and we made sure they had top qualityingredients and plenty of poison testers trying thestuff out before it got to me. It's too bad I had toshut all those restaurants down though. You know itwould be nice to have a little private enterprise outthere because I know that the average Cuban is a hardworking person and it sure was good PR. But hey whenthese bastards start outselling our state runoperations and all the tourists are flocking to theseoperations we just had to put an end to it. You knowI still remember the unpaid invoice to that restaurantfrom last year. I think it's still sitting on my desksomewhere. (Need to clean that desk this week) I guessI'm pretty sure that the owners would just as soonforgive the invoice as a gesture to the revolution andwhat a great world we have made for them and theirkids. I'm sure we have shut them down by now but heymaybe we have an opening in one of the kitchens at oneof the palaces for those people. Have to check on thatwhen I remember.Oh now I'm in such a better mood I have to think aboutthe wonderful entertainment for the evening. Gosh it'swonderful to be me. Every musical group or danceensemble or whatever just can't wait to be invited toone of my parties to perform. Even though it disgustsme personally maybe we will have some group for theyounger crowd. Lets see last year we had who was it?Cubanos? No that's not it. Oh yeah Cubanito.Personally I couldn't stand em but they sure went overwell. You can be sure that bitch Gloria ain't going tobe here. And none of those other ungrateful musicians(or sports stars for that matter) that have opted torequest asylum in other countries when we allowed themout of the country.You know it really galls me about these pricks. Wegave em a great education, plenty of resources tostudy or train 18 hours a day at the regional sportstraining facilities. We even fed them beef once aweek. And anyone earning any medal (even a lousybronze) at an Olympics was even given a car no morethan four years old and a nice boost in their rationcards. We even got them on TV and we would dointerviews with their parents while they werecompeting in some distant foreign country and madesure they saw the interview so they were reminded ofwho would suffer if they stayed. All of this and someof these ingrates still do it. They stay. Then thecapitalist pigs start making big money asprofessionals and even spend part of their money onfast cigar boats out of Miami to come and take theirfamilies in the middle of the night. I simply can't believe it. After all we have done forthem. You know that's one of the worst things about myjob dammit. I know I have to let these people out ofthe country so we can prove to the world what greatartistic and athletic abilities we have. And stillthey betray me. Oh well with all the little cubanosout there and more of that profit from Tyson foods wecan afford to increase our training budgets by a fewpesos. Speaking of that I need to make sure to get a meetingorganized with all national and regional CDR leadersand make sure they know about the latest budgetincreases I'm planning for them. Now I know that someof them might be a little dismayed when I tell themthat 90% of the increase will be going for the lineitem Chivatos (or local spies for those of you whodon't know about our really neat little system ofacronyms and interesting sayings here in Cuba). But Ijust need to convince them that increasing thisprogram really pays off in a revolutionary way. Thesechivatos we have been recruiting are really comingthrough for us big time. I'm sure most of you knowthat internally we generate mucho dinero from oursystem of Multas or fines. Well I know the majority ofyou don't like getting a parking ticket or an IRSinterest fine or something like that. But everyoneneeds to know about towing the line in society. Whatthat means is we can't have any violations of any ofour societal regulations (almost every one of which Ipersonally came up with after all). No some of you maythink it a bit unjust to fine people for things likehaving some foreign guest stay in your home. Well thisis one of our most important rules. Even if that guestis your son in law you absolutely have to come down toimmigration and register that person (and pay the 50$fee). Why you might say? After all this is a familymember. Well if you have to ask that question youstupido then I'll tell you. If we were to just letanyone just do things like invite friends to stay withthem then just think of the havoc that would bewrought. Well first of all neighbors would get jealouscause for sure your son in law would bring stuff likesoap or probably jeans or maybe even new shoes for thefamily members. We can't have this kind of jealousygoing on in society. Well you may ask well if I paythe registration fee this would still happen and I'llbe out 50$ to boot. Well Ok I admit you are right butwe simply need to attach some type of monetary valueto this type of special privilege that the governmentis giving you in order to maintain order in society.And besides which you know that that 50$ will end upback with all the neighbors anyway in some form. Nowit might take a few years to filter back but it will Ican assure you, just take it from me that this is thetruth. You trust me after all don't you? Anyway back to the Chivatos. Now as I've said thesepeople are really helping us out. Now as I'm sure youwould agree that anyone who would spy on theirneighbors for a few pesos is some kind of horriblecreep or worse. Personally I can't stand them but youknow Batista had them and our Russian pals helped usrefine the system and what about POLICE INFORMANTS?Yeh, bet you didn't think about that did you? Name meany country in the world that doesn't have PAID POLICEINFORMANTS? You can't name one can you? So of course as one of the third worlds most civilizedand well organized countries we have probably withoutdoubt the most well organized system around. Now tokeep the system going it costs most of the profit fromTyson and even all the profits from our world renownedmedical clinics for foreigners where our doctors arewell reimbursed (relatively speaking of course) forconvincing stupid foreigners that they need a backoperation when a couple of Advil's would do just aswell.I don't know why I said that as it's supposed to be asecret, but hey I trust that you can keep that oneconfidential. Ok now where was I anyway? Oh yeh local spies. Anyway if you still are notconvinced let me just run down a few of the law andrule violations we uncover using these chivatos. Thisway you can see that these offenses are grave anddeserve punishment even if your country doesn't seemto think so. I'll also give you the dollar amount ofthe fine so you can see we are not taking advantage ofpeople. Violation Dollar fineHaving unregistered foreign guest in your home $1,000.00Selling coffee or cheese you smuggled inFrom the country side $ 100.00Saying something bad about me or anyOf my trusted aides $ depends on the day and How I'm feelingHaving Beef in your refrigerator At least 250$ ormaybeEight years prison if you killed the cow, and probablyforfeit your refri tooHaving an unregistered bicycle taxi Loss of thebike for sure and You use to haul around foreign tourists at least 100$fine. (maybe jail if you are a smart ass too)Having a household appliance in your home without a receipt from our government stores Loss ofthe appliance and 50$Admitting you will not attend a rally Where Raul is coming to speak No fine, first offensebut socially ostracized for sureNow I could go on and on with more examples but I amsure that as a rational person you would wholeheartedly agree that probably thepunishment doesn't fit the crime in these examples and should actually be much higher. When Ithink about it I'm softening up a bit in my advanced age and really should review thesefines and adjust them up for inflation. (Did I say inflation? We have no inflationin Cuba, any price increase is definitely Caused by the embargo)Anyway I'm sure some of you skeptics out there aresaying things like $1,000 for having a Foreign guest in your home? Can that be correct and ifso who pays the fine the Cuban or the foreigner? Well now I'll let you in on a littlesecret. Guess what? Now remember who comes up with these laws and fines. I do that's whoand being the sly devil I am after all I put mucho thought into these things. In thisparticular case who pays the fine? Well they both do. You see in this example the Cuban gets thefine and if they don't pay we come in to the home (well of course not me personally, I'mmuch to busy do that sort of work) and snatch anything of value up the $1,000. If theydon't have it we take the house. How's that for an incentive to pay? Anyway what normallyhappens in this case is that the foreigner feels so bad about the thing that they paythe fine for the Cuban. How's that for a gimmick huh? Now we actually havethe rule I believe (and if we don't Ill order it up starting tomorrow) that we could fine theforeign tourist as well and you can be sure we pull them in for a nice scary chat will aColonel in immigration but we simply tell the tourist that in this first offense for them wewon't fine them but unfortunately we have to fine the Cuban in order to maintain social orderyou can understand that can't you?Our success rate on this gimmick you might call it ishovering around 86% where the foreigner pays up. In the other cases we sometimesreduce the fine for the Cuban or if they are belligerent you can be sure we take everything.Anyway we really don't want people just staying with friends. If that happens all overthe place how the hell our we going to support our hotel business anyway. Do you think we arethat stupid? Of course not!!And to make things fair in case there was some type ofmistake or something here's what we do. First of all we do not make the citizen gothrough the unnecessary expense of hiring a private attorney to defend themselves or appeal. Whocould afford that or why is that needed? We allow the person to appeal the decision. Theysimply have the right to go back to the original person who issued the fine andappeal. In this case the Colonel, and explain why they are not guilty. They have a whole 48 hours todo this. Fortunately this works very well except in the case where the colonel has toattend a conference in another part of the country and will not be back for 72 hours. And withall the economic problems we have had to face because of the embargo we seldom haveconferences out of town. Now if the colonel is sick for three days well that's anotherstory but with our great medical system hardly anyone ever gets sick so that is veryunlikely. I'm sure you would agree that this system is much better than anything acapitalistic country could ever come up with. And to prove my point we have done studies and youknow what? 98% of these original decisions are upheld on appeal. That's right, 98% ofthe time the original person who gives out the fine upholds his or her original decision onappeal. Now if that isn't almost perfect than what is? And you know what in the other 2% of thecases we find out that the person accepts a bribe to reduce or eliminate the fine. Youcan bet in these cases justice is served I can assure you. Enough of this OK? Any imbecile cansee that our system is as close to perfect as is humanly possible. Ok so your probably saying ok in this case how muchdoes the informant get? Well the answer is as little as possible but enough to givethem the incentive to keep doing it ofcourse. We have reams and reams of statistics over theyears on what is the correct remuneration for these valuable services. Right now inHavana we pay about the equivalent of 4$ per verifiable information that results in afine. In the outlying cities it's much less of course. Supply and demand right?Well what about the case where the informant justdoesn't like the person and makes something up about them? Well I guess you got me on that one. Now I know thatthat tactic worked really well for us during the glorious revolution. I have to admit weused it by giving Batista anonymous tips about actual Batista supporters we didn't like andhiding 26th of July armbands in their houses. When they were searched and the armband wasdiscovered the person would conveniently disappear. Those damned Batista peoplewere so paranoid they never stopped to investigate. Hah hah hah. That's a good one isn'tit?Anyway if this were to happen (and I seriously doubtit) we would find out later that the person was innocent. I grant you it would take about ayear or so since we are extremely busy people. But anyway think about it this way. Beingin prison is very similar to being in the army here. So if the person hasn't done theircompulsory military service yet (and sadly we get so many more juveniles committing crimes thesedays) being in prison for a year or so is simply a warm up for their militaryservice. And you can bet that these people will have a leg up on their colleagues in the militarywhen they get there for having been accustomed to the prison. Also they will have no bodyfat so their rigorous physical training in the military will be that much easier. Okso if it's someone older who has served in the resplendent Revolutionary Armed Forces of Cubathen the prison life will be a great reminder of the fun they had in the military so yousee why would I personally not be worried about this type of situation. Everything worksout for the better in the long run. Believe me I know. Ok I hope you are satisfied and have no furtherquestions. You know I really did not intend for this to be some type of interview situation. Iguess that the more I ruminated about my wonderful life by looking in the mirror the more mymind started to wander and these questions started to pop up. And we all know I'm onehell of a talker so here we are. But you know I'm a bit fatigued with all this and I haveso many things to consider, and today of course is my birthday so give me a break willya and let me go take a nap. And then for sure I simply have to go down stairs and findout what palace I'm staying at and make that call to Pedro. Or was it Raul? Oh mierda,I'll talk to you again next year. You can be sure I'll be here. There really are so manyimportant issues we have not discussed. And I didn't even get a chance to talk about my goodbuddy Hugo Chaves. Oh well next Year then and if I'm not around talk to Raul will ya.Yeh I know he's not as interesting but he remembers everything and I've taught him a lotover the years. Whatever you do don't go trying to interview Almeida. Leave the guyalone will Ya. Ok goodbye. Now where the hell did I put thattelephone dammit!!
2 Comments:
LMAO!! This is too good.
Hi Rodolfo!
That's a great one man!
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