Bush Says Castro Welcomes Sex Tourism

[ringmastery]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=8&u=/ap/20040716/ap_on_el_pr/bush_16

TAMPA, Fla. - President Bush (news - web sites) on Friday accused Fidel Castro (news - web sites) of exploiting Cuba's children by encouraging a sex-tourism industry designed to draw cash to the impoverished nation, comments certain to resonate with Cuban-American voters in the swing state of Florida.

"The regime in Havana, already one of the worst violators of human rights in the world, is adding to its crimes. The dictator welcomes sex tourism," Bush said at a conference on "human trafficking" — forced labor, sex and military service.

Bush's rival, John Kerry (news - web sites), agreed with the president and the Democratic campaign said human trafficking demands a coordinated international response. The Kerry campaign did take issue with the pace of Bush's response, arguing that the president had waited too long — until February of this year — to submit an international pact against trafficking to the Senate.

By combining the human-trafficking issue with his hard-line rhetoric against Castro, Bush hopes to bolster his standing with Cuban-Americans in the state that decided the 2000 election. Friday's trip was Bush's 23rd as president to Florida, and recent polls show the race tied.

Last year, the Bush administration imposed sanctions on Cuba, Burma and North Korea (news - web sites) for failing to take steps to stop such practices. In a report last month, the State Department listed Cuba among 10 nations that engage in human trafficking.

The president said Castro had "bragged about" Cuba's sex industry and he quoted Castro as saying: "Cuba has the cleanest and most educated prostitutes in the world."

[maddezmom]

1. similar thread here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=690181&mesg_id=690181

[neuvocat]

2. I just didn't Bush could go any lower.

I didn't think he could be any more depraved.

[lottie244]

15. And the 'vacationers' would be coming from......?

And they are all probably 'good Christain men and women.'

[Zorra]

26. Bu$h despises people that were born into poverty. He has no clue

about what it is like to not be rich.

All his life he was handed everything on a silver spoon. He is a compassionless POS, and believe it or not, I pity him, because he is just another clueles preppie spoiled rich kid asshole that stomps on the underprivileged because he thinks anyone that is not rich is scum, and he never had the opportunity to become a real human being.

Your Jesus is coming, George, and boy, is he pissed.

Signed,
Mary Magdalene

PS - Nevada welcomes gamblers and sex tourism also.

[jdj]

55. Reminds me of the bumper sticker, "God is coming, and she is pissed."

[Judi Lynn]

32. This kind of sexual insinuation has been done a lot before

by the Reagan Cuban "exile" maggot, Otto Reich, brought on board also by _{George W. Bush} when he tried to get him to run his Latin American affairs section of the State Department.

You may remember that when Minnesota Govenor Jesse Ventura went to the trade/agricultural fair in Cuba with a contigent from his state to promote food sales, Otto Reich publically claimed Ventura shouldn't be going to Cuba for any "sexual adventurism." Jesse Ventura was damned hacked off by this, and called him on his viciousness.

This is a technique Otto Reich employed while heading the Office of Public Diplomacy doing propaganda for Reagan. You may find this interesting if you haven't heard it already:

Our Man in Little Havana:
The secret Cold War history of Otto Juan Reich, George W. Bush's Frightening Nominee for Assistant Secretary of State of Western Hemisphere Affairs

By Jason Vest
Web Exclusive: 5.25.01
Print Friendly | Email Article

It was the summer of 1985 and John Lantigua, then The Washington Post's Nicaragua stringer, discovered he had a new nickname, at least among American right-wingers: "Johnny Sandinista."

For many senior politicos in the Reagan Administration, Nicaragua was a black and white issue. If you weren't pro-Contra and anti-Sandinista, you were a dupe of two malevolent forces: What one senior official euphemistically called "the source" of evil in this hemisphere -- Cuba -- and the power behind Cuba that then Director of Central Intelligence William J. Casey held was the center of all world terrorism and subversion: the Soviet Union.

John Lantigua's reporting didn't reflect such a Manichean worldview, and for that, the Administration would try to smear him and others who didn't "come on-side." In a "report" produced by the far-right "media watchdog" group Accuracy in Media, Daniel James -- identified only as a "Latin America expert," but, in fact, a longtime CIA contract propagandist -- reported that, according to unnamed U.S. government officials, Lantigua was being furnished with live-in female Sandinista sex slaves in exchange for penning Sandinista agitprop.

To those who covered Central America, the charges were absurd: Not only was Lantigua living with his American fiancée, but he was in the middle of a freeze-out by the Sandinistas, who, along with the Reagan Administration, sometimes found Lantigua's reporting to be inconvenient. Lantigua got a kick out of the item, assuming that it had originated with Otto Reich, a particularly ideological State Department official who Lantigua and his Newsday colleague Morris Thompson had met for lunch when Reich had made a brief visit to Managua. (Both Lantigua and Thompson remember the lunch as an unhappy experience for Reich: Thompson recalls Reich "loudly announcing things as fact about the Sandinistas' actions and polices that in fact were not true," which, Lantigua says, prompted a polite but persistent Thompson to "do a verbal tap dance on the guy.")
(snip/...)

http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2001/05/vest-j-05-25.html

[PragMantisT]

3. I guess we know where Neil Bush will be doing business.

Seriously, * is such a f-ing scumbag. Why doesn't he try to bring some law and order to this country instead of bitching about someone else's country. He needs to have someone read "Candide" to him.

"We must all tend our own garden."

What a piece of shit!

[lojasmo]

4. Neil must have told him. N/T

[truthisfreedom]

5. uhh... bush? 'scuse please? a minute, mr. bush? we have this little

place near las vegas, nevada, where prostitution is legal, and we test the prostitutes regularly to make sure they don't spread disease? just a little reminder, sir? thanks for your time... sorry to interrupt your fear-mongering. carry on, sir.

[phiddle]

6. Expect that they

hold the '08 Republican Convention there!

[Mojambo]

7. Oh man! Those are fightin' words!

The president said Castro had "bragged about" Cuba's sex industry and he quoted Castro as saying: "Cuba has the cleanest and most educated prostitutes in the world."

We must defend the honor of OUR prostitutes in Nevada. Do I smell a NEW Olympic sport on the horizon??

[guajira]

8. Very likely Miami has more Prostitutes than Cuba

How convenient that Americans are not allowed to go to Cuba and see for ourselves what a fukking liar we have in the White House. He knows he can say anything and get by with it.

Cuba has made many attempts to stop prostitution and anyone who visits the island knows that you would probably not even see any unless you were actually looking for it.

[struggle4progress]

9. Here's a WaPo article from last October

COMINGANDGOING
Sex in Cuba?
Washington Post
October 19, 2003

At a recent briefing, President Bush announced he was cracking down on travel to Cuba because of the government's "brutal oppression" and to thwart what he called a "rapidly growing illicit sex trade" that is " encouraged by the Cuban government."

CoGo was surprised to hear the latter. On a trip last spring, there was no evidence of an open sex trade, let alone anything like the markets in downtown Bangkok. In fact, Cubans complained to CoGo that they had to have a date to go to the best clubs -- a rule they said was to keep sex hustlers from seeking partners at clubs that attract foreigners. Plus, advocates of the U.S. travel ban have long complained that Cubans are prohibited from hotels and beaches frequented by foreigners.

So what's the evidence? The State Department's 2003 "Trafficking in Persons" report, said White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan. The report lists 80 countries as having a human exploitation problem. Cuba is on the list, as is the host of next summer's Olympics, Greece.

CoGo turned to the World Wide Web and found that while sex is for sale everywhere, including Cuba, sex tour operators most frequently extoll Thailand and Brazil. In the pedophile category, Brazil, India and Thailand lead the pack; Brazil alone has a half-million kids in the sex trade, according to the group ECPAT, whose full name describes its mission: End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and the Trafficking of Children. Cuba, ECPAT said, has fewer underage kids in the sex trade than any country in the region.

<snip>
http://www.globalexchange.org/countries/cuba/1189.html


And some fun facts ...

According to UNICEF, at the end of 2000, as many as 325,000 children were at risk of commercial sexual exploitation in the United States alone. According to ECPAT USA, an estimated 25 per cent of sex tourists outside the United States are American.
http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_fight_exploitation.html

It is estimated that Costa Rica received 5000 tourists with the specific intention of exploiting children in 1999 alone. Americans account for 80% of the arrests involving child sex tourism.
http://www.ecpat.net/eng/CSEC/faq/faq3.asp

... Some 75,000 Brazilian women and girls are estimated to be in prostitution in Europe, with 5,000 more in countries in Latin America. Many are trafficking victims. Internal trafficking also targets Brazilian children, often in the context of sex tourism. Internal trafficking for forced labor, primarily from urban to rural areas for agricultural work, is a major problem. The ILO estimates 25,000 Brazilians are victims of forced labor trafficking. Bolivians and Chinese are also trafficked into Brazil for labor exploitation ...
... In a recent criminal intelligence assessment, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) estimates that 800 persons are trafficked into Canada annually and that an additional 1,500-2,200 persons are trafficked through Canada into the U.S. Some observers believe these numbers significantly understate the problem ...
... Making a commendable research effort, the Chilean National Department of Children’s Affairs (SENAME) reported in 2003 that more than 3,700 children and adolescents have been victims of commercial sexual exploitation. There are police and press reports of cross-border trafficking of Chilean women to Argentina, Peru, Bolivia, the U.S., Western Europe, and Japan ...
... Experts estimate that 2,500-3,000 Haitian children are trafficked annually across the joint land border. Observers estimate 25,000-30,000 minors are in prostitution in the Dominican Republic; most are Dominicans, but some are Haitians. Many of these children are victimized in the sex tourism industry. The Dominican Republic is a significant transit country for many illegal migrants, including Chinese, most bound for the U.S ...
... Ecuador is a source, transit, and destination country for persons trafficked for sexual exploitation and forced labor. Most victims are children internally trafficked for prostitution; the ILO esti-mates that 5,200 minors are engaged in the sex industry. Ecuadorians are trafficked to Western Europe, particularly Spain ...
... Estimates of the total number of victims are not available, but one reliable NGO report identified 600-700 minors in centers of prostitution across Guatemala. A 2002 report by the UN Rapporteur estimated 2,000 minors in prostitution in Guatemala City alone ...
... Many victims are Honduran children trafficked from rural areas to urban and tourist centers such as San Pedro Sula, the North Caribbean coast, and the Bay Islands. Observers documented more than 1,000 minors (mostly Hondurans) that were victims of commercial sexual exploitation in 2003. Foreign victims trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation originate from Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, and El Salvador. Honduran women and children are trafficked to the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, and other countries in Central America ...
... The ILO estimated in 2001 that several hundred minors are involved in Jamaica’s sex trade ...
... Reliable estimates point to 16,000-20,000 Mexican and Central American child sex victims in Mexico, found largely in border, urban, and tourist areas ...
... Unofficial government estimates indicate over 1,000 Paraguayans are victims of trafficking internally and abroad ...
http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2004/33198.htm

[truthisfreedom]

10. further proof... if bush says it, it's guaranteed to be another rovian lie

what a schmuck.

[iverglas]

27. great info, thanks

I haven't been to Cuba since several trips in the 80s, so can't comment on the situation now. At the time, the measures taken to prevent prostitution offended me. I was a woman travelling alone on some of those trips, and the restrictions designed to inhibit contact between locals and tourists for the purposes of prostitution, and the suspicious eye always out for such activities, did have an impact on me (for instance having difficulty entering a club in Santiago de Cuba until it was decided that as a tourist I wasn't problematic) that I found insulting. I'm sure many Cubans do too, as it adds insult to the injury that some feel in respect of facilities reserved for tourists.

Nonetheless, with Cuba long having been the US's brothel under Battista, firm measures to rehabilitate the society and prevent a relapse were undeniably necessary. Here's a little more insight into the shallowness and disingenuousness of Bush's ignorant nattering:

http://havanajournal.com/politics_more/A915_0_5_0_M/

No Caribbean government is unaware of rampant sex tourism in what used to be called the American Lake. And few governments in the region expend as much energy fighting the quixotic battle against it as do the Cubans. Castro’s regime sincerely worries over what rampant "jiniterismo" (jockeying: literally, to ride foreigners for their dollars) is doing to Cuban society. A concrete indication of their concern is that in several locations across the island, the government has made major investments in the last few years building schools of social work. I personally watched one massive campus go up from start to finish outside of Holguin in 2001-2002.

The state sees what is happening as well as the citizenry: by opening up the country to tourism--and the resulting increase in economic stratification of society that comes with it--they are encountering classic social problems that dollar dependency brings. If they want to maintain the remarkable social peace on the island, a quality of life that makes Cuba a particularly unique place, they figure they’d better start training large numbers of social workers, fast.

The Cubans also have political reasons to lock up young "jiniteras." According to official doctrine, taught in the schools and shown on frequent television documentaries, prostitution is closely associated with pre-revolutionary Cuba. Then, the island was a brothel for American weekenders and U.S. Navy sailors. The Cuban state has stressed this for 40 years, and as the people have watched Caribbean sex tourism creep back into their society, government prestige has suffered.

However crude and repellent it is to set up detention camps to solve social problems, understanding that the Cuban state’s goal in this case is to impede an international scourge of exploitation is to expose the falsity of the current media campaign of the Bush Administration and State Department.

Poverty is an opportunity for exploitation, and will always engender prostitution. Embargos cause poverty.

And when it comes to what to do about the inevitable effects of a phenomenon that is beyond its control, the Cuban govt seems to be damned if it does and damned if it doesn't.

[chenGOD]

11. I wonder what * thinks about the re-emergence of the slave trade in the US

Slave trade is back in US, senators told

From the article:

"Americans may be particularly alarmed to learn that at least 15,000 human beings are trafficked into lives of slavery in the United States each year," Senator John Cornyn, told a Senate judiciary subcommittee hearing on Wednesday. Some estimates put the figure as high as 50,000 a year, he said.

Women, men and children are brought in from places as far apart as Uzbekistan and Mexico, lured with false promises of glamour, education or, in some cases, simply the prospect of a steady job.

-------snip-------

[acmavm]

12. Bush has some kind of serious fixation on anything sexual. It seems that

no matter what happens, the perv can turn it into some kind of rape room sexual thing. That's pretty frigging weird if you ask me.

Laura, do your job dammit. This guy sound like he's EXTREMELY frustrated. I don't care how distasteful it is, you married him, deal with it. Just get the frigging fruitcake's mind out of the gutter and stop his obsessing with everyone elses sex lives, real or imaginary.

[Tellurian]

49. I noticed that too...as a matter of fact, all Republicans have the same

views about sex...they seem to be the most depraved people on earth. With them constantly using sex as a weapon..

inborn dysfunctional, indeed..

[jdj]

56. I think Condi is doing Bush. Laura's batteries only run from

6 a.m. to 9 p.m.

I'm pretty sick of the tag words myself:

rape/rape rooms/torture/axis of evil/ruthless dictator/brutal dictator

Like the Saudis and the other wahabists?

Too bad most countries act like they have some kind of latent electra complex and seem to subconsciously lust for some big fascist daddy to come around. It's so weird there is always enough of a critical mass of this element in most countries that democracy is always teetering on the edge of destruction. We need to rework the whole system, starting with God first, give him a mother, a wife and a sister, a whole freaking crazy family running around, so people won't fixate of so much on the seductive brutality of tyrants. Make God accessible and not remote. I say we elect Homer Simpson God! Viva la revolucion!

[llmart]

60. Well, he was/is an alcoholic......

and you know what happens to men when they drink too much:)

He can't perform, so he has to focus on everyone else's sex life. Most Repugs are obsessed with this because they aren't enjoying themselves and they're jealous.

[Jacobin]

13. Does this mean we have to invade Nevada, too?

Isn't the military tired of fighting in deserts?

[0rganism]

31. That was my first thought too-- hey, doesn't Nevada support the sex trade?

Of course, this won't be the first time we've nuked Nevada.

[drscm]

14. Did he detour there on his way to Mexico? eom

eom

[buycitgo]

16. can't believe nobody's made the connection between this

and what's going on with the kids in Abu Ghraib, or wherever Hersh is talking about

nobody sees the irony there?

[Fovea]

17. It is a deflection... look over there, Castro molesting children

dressed a Michael Jackson.

[daleo]

18. Accusations of a sexual nature seem to be the new right wing talking point

Well not so new, given the campaign against Clinton for consensual sex. Offhand I can think of:

- the Conservative Party of Canada tried tarring Liberal leader Paul Martin with being soft on child pornography during the recent election campaign (one email smear campaign even tried to claim that he "supported" child pornography). Fortunately the Canadian electorate had the good sense to recognize the smear, and punish the Conservative Party for their poor judgment in the ensuing vote.

- the Republicans (and the lap dog elements of the media) seem to be trying some not so subtle veiled accusations of homoerotism between Kerry and Edwards (e.g. use of the phrase "sloppy seconds", Edward was said to be "swinging" his campaign into the south lately, etc.).

- now this smear of Castro.

I am sure there are plenty of others. Bush has some nerve, considering that his brother is on record (has stipulated in a divorce trial in fact) as having had sex with prostitutes in Thailand, which is pretty notorious for underage girls. Of course he didn't have to pay (an Asian company probably picked up the tab,as a quid pro quo for some influence he could lend them), so in the Republican morality that doesn't count. Not to mention the bizarre sexual abuses perpetrated in Iraq, likely at the command of someone high in the administration.

[Dirk39]

19. Our good old brothel Cuba!

"The regime in Washington, already one of the worst violators of human rights in the world, is adding to its crimes. The dictator and his corrupt gang and the silenced and opportunistic opposition welcomes sex tourism," Dirk39 said at a conference on "human trafficking" — forced labor, sex and military service.

We want our brothels back! We want our patriotic soldiers to go to Cuba and rape whatever they see for a few cents. Like it was in the good old days, before Castro. Fucking has become too expensive since those evil communists destroyed freedom in Cuba.
Let's nuke down those communist bastards. We want Cuba to become a paradise for our fellow american patriots like Lynndie England and their special kind of joy.

Sex-Tourism is too expensive! It must become cheaper. It must become affordable for every American soldier, after he killed enough gooks and muslims,
George W. Bush.

[Octafish]

20. Castro's worse than Hitler.

Except when he's needed in October.
Then he's useful as Saddam.
Or Hinckley.
Or Oswald.

[Aidoneus]

21. that's his brother Neil that he's thinking of

and his donors in DynCorp..

They're mixed up with Fidel ALL the time.

[NervousRex]

22. Castro ain't got shit...

on our EYE-raki rape rooms. If you want "sexual" tourism, just book a tour of US concentration camps. We got 'em all...young, old, men, women...even mules(they were packing TNT)...step right up folks!(UN or Red Cross NOT welcome)....step right up see the 4th Reich in it's infancy, a sight not to be missed in 60 years...!!!

[Dirk39]

23. Lynndie England replies: Shut up Cuba, there's more fun in Iraq

n/t
Hello from Germany,
Dirk

[Geo55]

24. Well....least

we know where Jack Ryan's goin'.....now that he's got some time on his hands.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

25. What was Cuba like before Castro?

...since Bush seems to be tapping into the outrage of Cuban ex-patriots to get their vote. It was my understanding that it was a mafia playground of gambling, vice, and prostitution. And I will bet that the Las Vegas crime syndicate would love to go back and start over again, if Castro were out of the picture. But I don't suppose another Mustang Ranch located outside Havana would bother Bush very much, would it. It would be entrepreneurial and privatized vice, which makes all the difference.

[Judi Lynn]

28. Here's a good site to look through,concerning Cuba prior to the revolution

Also, when you have time, there'll be a ton of info. concerning the Mafia dominated Cuban vice world of Batista's time, and a truly rotten reputation going back a long time, earning it the name, "Whorehouse of the Caribbean" many, many years ago.

Certain kinds of right-wing Batistiano "exiles" in Miami have tried to push the image of Cuba as a den of iniquity after they left, but that's simply stupid.

As Guajira already said, people like Bush can tell people ANYTHING about Cuba to a country denied the right to travel there to find out the truth of the matter. Isn't this a nasty trick? They can spin humongous whoppers yearly about Cuba, and simply keep Americans clueless, while people from everywhere ELSE in the world come and go from there, continually.

[iverglas]

33. uh oh; where's that site?? (nt)

[Judi Lynn]

34. Oh, jeez, iverglas. I'm sure glad I saw your post before I left.

Here it is. It was all material published in the 1950's, and it's really almost comical now, yet tacky!

http://cuban-exile.com/menu1/%21entertain.html

My special favorite is this bright idea, the NIGHTCLUB IN THE SKY!

http://cuban-exile.com/doc_201-225/doc0201.htm

[Elginoid]

45. the land of daquiris and sex...

from the link-



"...The Special is designed primarily for bon vivants desirous of sampling the night life of nearby Cuba. It takes off every Thursday from Miami's international airport. An hour later it sets its happier patrons down in the balmy air of the land of daiquiris and sex at Havana's Aeropuerto Jose Marti..."

[IndianaGreen]

29. I have been to Cuba, and I saw no such thing

I think Bush needs to get his medication adjusted again.

[Mika]

38. I have been to Cuba also, and there's more hookers in Miami than..

.. all of Cuba.

[Name removed]

30. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[0007]

35. The dictator Fulgencio Batista of Cuba and Myron Lansky,

the organized crime boss that had heavy connections in the U.S. government, certainly took advantaged of sex tourism. That was before Fidel Castro run them out of Cuba in 1959 and cleaned up Cuba.

No one in the world is gonna believe that Castro deals in such filth. This rumor is even worse than Iraq having WMD

[IndianaGreen]

36. It was Meyer Lansky

The famous Havana Hotel Nacional build in 1930 had a grand casino build by Lansky in the 1950s.

[0007]

39. Sorry for the mistake, and I do know better

Myron was the great, great nephew of the Meyer Lansky.

[IndianaGreen]

50. The many times I have been to Cuba

I have never set foot in the Nacional.

Lansky was quite a character, and he should have been allowed to remain in Israel. His crimes pale in relation to that of subsequent Israeli governments.

[Rockholm]

37. I Guess Brother Neil Will Be On Top Of The Situation.

[Darranar]

40. "one of the worst violators of human rights in the world"...

Look in the mirror, Mr. "President".

[missile_bender]

41. Right. Sure. Whatever. Prove it,

asshole.

When talking about the Bush Administration I apply something I like to call "Seinfeld's Razor": what ever they say is a lie so the opposite MUST be true.

So if Bush says they Cuba is trafficking in sex, that means they aren't. If Bush says Iraq has WMD, they don't. If Bush says he doesn't torture children, he does.

It's easy and fun!

Unembedded.com

[Mika]

42. Just where does Kerry and the Dem party stand on this red herring?

So far we know that Kerry's stated policy on Cuba isn't much different than Bush's.


Do you think that Kerry will respond to this BS? I don't.

Will Kerry defend Cuba's real record? Surely not.

Will Kerry point out any of the facts that point out that the sex trade flourishes in the US? Nope.

Will Kerry differentiate his position from Bush's on this? I seriously doubt it (because it isn't much different).


We will see, but I don't think that Kerry nor the Dem party will vary their position much from the repugs.

Here's why I say this,

Kerry's stated policy on Cuba:
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/8848574.htm

Under a Kerry administration Cuba will remain under US sanctions

Under a Kerry administration we will still be travel banned unless our travel is deemed politically worthy by US gov jackboots

Mr Kerry, Tear down the wall!

[leesa]

43. So What? Is he making more money off it than the Bush Crime Family

is in their ventures?

[shanti]

44. you can believe

that WHATEVER comes out of the mouth of the chimp is a friggin LIE. shut your piehole, boy george!

[Mz Pip]

46. That's funny

I guess the "Sex Industry" in NYC will see a huge drop in business when the GOP comes to town for its convention. <sarcasm>

Get your cameras ready. Time to catch a few upstanding family values politicians enjoying some of their time off from their ponitifcating.

MzPip
:dem:

[Vogon_Glory]

47. Sex Tourism Charges As Values Reinforcement

George Deucey-U Bush's charge that Fidel castro is supposedly promoting "sex tourism" in Cuba serves to reinforce my belief about today's Republican Party--that it is a ruthless, shameless organization that places no value whatsoever in telling the truth--especially when the truth interferes with its quest for power.

:puke:

[xxqqqzme]

48. there was a lively

sex trade business when Baptista was the iron fist in Cuba. My grandparents went there many, many times and I would hear their conversations. I don't know about now but I do know it was one of the 1st things Castro 'cleaned up' after the revolution.

Maybe someone can Xplain 2 the chmperor that there is a different government in Cuba now.

[The_Casual_Observer]

51. And there are no prostitutes in the USA

particularly in NYC during the GOP convention right?

After all of the cheap propaganda from health care to WMD chimpy couldn't convince me to take free money from him. So why would anybody take a bullshit comment from him like this on face value?

[Tatiana]

52. There's more of a sex industry in Ybor City than Cuba.

This is such utter bullshit. I don't believe the media lets him get away with this.

Let's see how Castro responds.

[jdj]

53. Finally, some out-sourcing Bush is opposed to.

sick joke I know.

[Mika]

59. good one

:hi:

[AP]

54. Castro says Bush pimps his daughters for votes.

Or, he should say that.

[Mika]

57. US gov says that 10% of US children are sexually exploited AT SCHOOL

The goddamn nerve of dictator Bush to accuse Cuba of such ugly behavior, when our own government admits that 10% of our own kids are sexually exploited at schools in the USA!


-Children face sex risk at US schools-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1263844,00.html

Research claiming that one in 10 American children has been sexually exploited at school - and that almost half the abusers are women - has shocked parents as one of the nation's most notorious pupil abusers is about to be released from prison.

More than 4.5 million school-age children have been subjected to some form of sexual behaviour from teachers or other adults meant to be looking after them, said the first official research commissioned by the US government's education department.

DU thread here
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x693702

[stepnw1f]

58. Obsession with Sex

a cheap trick