Bryan

Why would that get deleted?

It's just Marxism under a new name. Using the guise of stopping oppression as a cover to carry out actual oppression. Branding some identifiable group as 'elite' or 'privileged' to fight against is right out of Stalin's playbook.

That would be a credible sentiment if the reality was not that those extremes are exactly what kinds of legal positions are being increasingly put forward.

That I know of not yet, but the lunacy of the HRCs and the like reaches ever more ridiculous proportions on an almost daily basis. We have new laws stating that using the wrong pronoun is hate speech. It's not a stretch at all to think that some of those same people would at least put forth the notion that burning the pride flag would be hate speech.

One flag is unlikely to burn someone to death.

That's a good point. If someone were to burn a Rainbow flag at a pride march, would that freedom of expression be protected? I have a strong feeling that some would try to argue that is a hate crime. Burning a symbol that means something to a given group is not just "expression", it's a provocation. You are deliberately trying to get a reaction out of those people. So sure, you have a 'right' to do it, but if you somehow end up wrapped in that flag while it still burns, that's on you.

They can and they do.

You appear to be speaking from a position of ignorance. People can and do criticize the government. I've seen them. I'm well aware of what does and does not happen to them. I have been to Cuba many times. I've been all over the main island and on several of the cayos. I have made many friends in Cuba over the years. I have eaten in their homes. Some of them have eaten in my family's home in Canada. We have Canadian friends who have also moved to Cuba (who routinely travel back and forth as well). I know them, and I know their lives. I know what they can and can't do. Cuba is not what we would recognize as a western captialist democracy, for sure. But it's not the Soviet Union either. It's its own thing.

That's not how it works over there either. The people getting jailed are committing treason by taking money from a foreign power to try to destabilize the country. The people just protesting do so all the time. There are several organized protest groups. They're small, but they march all the time and the worst thing that happens to them is they get moved away from whatever they're trying to block, and are immediately released.

The "than you burn" part is the sticky wicket, because certain foods have a greater thermic effect than others, meaning you can eat more calories of them than others and still lose weight. Calories count, just not very much.

Our bodies are far more complex systems than that.

They can and they do. We have Cuban family friends that live in Canada. We have a few family friends who live in Cuba that routinely go back and forth between Cuba and Canada. I met many Cubans who have travelled abroad for jobs, education, for vacations, etc.

Cubans can and do speak their minds. The suggestion that they don't is every bit as ridiculous as claiming that Canadians don't say what they really feel about our leaders.

Nothing you're talking about even remotely applies to Cuba. People are free to do and say pretty much what they want.

People absolutely were talking about those very things with respect to saturated fat and cholesterol as recently as a year ago. Promoting a lower carb diet was illegal in Canada.

The same scientists who have been wrong almost every time with regards to nutrition? That's my concern. If we were listening to them, things like eggs would have been banned or heavily taxed. We think we know sugar is bad now. We were really sure about cholesterol and fat before. Turns out scientists find what they are paid to find. I hear you on the wife though. You should definitely listen to her.

There IS something wrong -- you're putting the government in charge of deciding what "unhealthy" means.

We need less taxes all around, not more.

I'll leave fact-free opinions to others. I'll base mine on what I've seen first hand. I've been to Cuba several times, been all over the island, have friends who live there, my parents have spent several months at a time there, and our family has hosted Cuban families who have come to visit and happily chosen to return home. I know Cuba fairly well, and I know many Cuban people fairly well. Well enough to know that what we are told by the diaspora in Florida doesn't match up to the reality on the ground on the island.

The US has the Cuban adjustment act that lets Cubans (and only Cubans) get automatic residency if they can get into the country. Once they've set one foot on US soil, they don't get sent back. It's a far greater pull to the US than anything in Cuba does to push them out. If they can get to Florida, economically (and culturally) they're good. But if the other option is almost anywhere else, most Cubans are quite fine with staying home.

Not everyone wants out. They just want the US to stop messing with their economy. I know plenty of Cubans who are quite happy there. We have family friends who often travel to Canada to visit, yet happily return home each time.

That's a pretty accurate statement. Considering the crushing economic oppression of the embargo, it's truly amazing what the Castros have been able to do in Cuba.

From what I've seen personally, most people in Cuba truly love(d) the man. Not quite as much as they loved Che, but he's definitely a national hero. It really is a eye opener to go to Cuba and see how different things are there compared to what we are told over here.

I would not expect much to change short term. Raul is the one in charge, and has been for quite some time. He also has a succession plan in place, and said two years ago that he was stepping down in 2018. Perhaps after that we might see some real movement.

The problem with that is public policy is usually far behind the current science. We'll get taxed for things that we're being TOLD are bad, whether they actually are or not. It will quickly become an excuse to raise revenue, rather than an attempt to help anyone.