Cubans in Cuba Calling US Relatives to Vote for Kerry

[guajira]

Guess they heard about B* "liberating" Iraq, and they don't want him "liberating" them too!!!

snippet:
A multitude of unlikely volunteers is working the phones for Sen. John Kerry in the swing state of Florida. His campaign is unaware of the support, as the volunteers do not live in the United States, but in Communist-run Cuba.

Cubans, angered by a recent Bush administration measure restricting visits home by Cuban-Americans, say they are lobbying relatives hard to vote against the president just two weeks before Election Day. Early voting has already begun in Florida.

"My family in Miami never votes. They are not interested. I told them they had to get rid of Bush, and they all promised to go vote against him," housewife Amilia said, as she leaned over her third-floor balcony in a dilapidated Havana housing project. Amilia, like the other Cubans interviewed, did not want her last name used.
more....

http://www.lanuevacuba.com/nuevacuba/notic-04-10-2009.htm

[Judi Lynn]

1. Thanks for the info.! They're really taking this election seriously.

From the article:

The official Cuban government position is that it makes little difference if Bush or Kerry sits in the White House.

"Both candidates support the U.S. blockade of our country, it will be more of the same whomever wins," National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon said last week.

But just about everyone on this Caribbean island has a mother, father, brother, sister, uncle, aunt or cousin in the United States and most say they disagree with Alarcon.

The phone traffic is always thick between Cuba's 11.2 million residents and the 800,000 Cuban-Americans who have sought a better life in Florida, and never more than now as the election draws near, a local telephone operator said.

Family affairs and the U.S. election dominate the conversations, the Cubans say.

"My father is a Democrat and will vote for Kerry. I told him to talk to his friends so Bush doesn't win. Why do I have to see my father every three years when I could see him every year?" Miguel, a university student whose father lives in Tampa, said.

This could make so much difference, psychologically. The current conditions _Bush has given them are painful, to say the least.

[desi]

2. Magnifico..

Are absentee ballots allowed from my big sister island..???

[Say_What]

3. Read this on the CubaNews board and one of the Havana posters

said the NYTs article endorsing Kerry for President got plenty of play on Cuban TV. Radio Mambi must be in a state of hysteria over this one--I can just hear those wacko callers now.

On edit: Any Radio Mambi listeners out there who can report in?? :hi:

Meanwhile, about a week of so ago Franciso Aruca interviewed Alvaro Fernández, regional director in Florida of the Southwest Voter Registration and Education Project (SVREP), a prestigious nation-wide institution dedicated particularly to Hispanics, who said "there are one million new voters that we expect will cast their vote on November 2." Fernandez also said "... Five weeks ago we began calling, looking for Cubans that travel to Cuba, who have relatives in Cuba. We had found that many of them were not registered voters. The results have been great. In that time, and in spite of the hurricanes, we were able to register some 1,100 new voters, new Cuban Americans. We expect them to be at the polls on November 2.

Here's a link to the interview:

http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=interview&otherweek=1098248400

:kick: :kick:

[Judi Lynn]

7. According to the interview you posted, with Alvaro Fernández,

_Bush's choice for Democratic Senator Bob Graham's seat, Mel Martinez, Cuban "exile," is NOT favored by a lot of Cuban Americans as he supports _Bush's anti-Cuban measures, which have had a goddawful effect on Cubans who still wish to travel back and forth to Cuba, and to maintain contact with their relatives and friends there.

Instead, these people favor Betty Castor, the Democrat, who is NOT Cuban.

Sure hope they'll all get out and vote. Thanks for the news. That's a terrific voice in South Florida: Francisco Aruca, the interviewer, and major presence at Radio Progreso.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Adding Miami Herald article on Mel Martinez:

Posted on Wed, Oct. 20, 2004


Moderate Martinez turned more partisan after DC experience

MIKE SCHNEIDER
Associated Press


ORLANDO, Fla. - In his speeches and ads, GOP senatorial candidate Mel Martinez casts his life as a classic immigrant success story - a teenage refugee from Cuba who eventually reaches the height of political power as the first Cuban-American in a presidential cabinet.

Martinez's meteoric rise to the national stage is the political equivalent of actress Lana Turner being "discovered" while sitting on a soda fountain stool at Schwab's drugstore.

Few people outside the Orlando area knew of Martinez in 2000 when President Bush plucked him from political obscurity - he was chairman of Orange County government - and named him Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. And like an old-time budding starlet shaped by a Hollywood studio machine, Martinez has been groomed in national politics during the past three years by Bush and his Republican advisers.

The result is a changed politician - more partisan, divisive and willing to use hardball tactics, say some of those former backers from his days in Orange County politics.

Martinez, who faces Democrat Betty Castor on Nov. 2, stepped down from his cabinet post at the urging of the White House and Bush political adviser Karl Rove, who hoped his addition to the ballot would shore up the Cuban vote for the president and pre-empt U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris, R-Fla., from entering the race.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/politics/9967702.htm

[Cha]

4. Iranians for bush(love to cut their own throats!)..

And Cubanos for Kerry!

[guajira]

9. No Surprise there with Iran making nukes just like N. Korea

and considering that B* goes after his personal enemies like Saddam, and ignores the nuke-producing countries.

[chimpy the poopthrower]

5. This doesn't seem like an unbiased source.

I can't read most of the site (not in English), but the story seems to be trying to subtly link Kerry with Communism. Anyone know anything about this site? I'd like to see this story backed up by another news site.

[Say_What]

6. The article ran on an ABC News outlet and was POSTED to that site

the link is at the article.

[Judi Lynn]

8. I believe LaNueva is the Spanish edition for Cubans published by the Miami

Herald. They have their own writers, editors, etc.

[Mika]

16. I guess we need someone to post a Cubanet article

LOL


:evilgrin:

[Judi Lynn]

19. To be sure!All the taxpayer funded dissident news that's fit to print! n/t

[ret5hd]

10. i know this whole story is bullshit...

because every right minded american knows that the godless communists would never allow the peasants to communicate with the outside world, especially by telephone. none of them have ever called ME!

on edit: </sarcasm> (for those that have a faulty or malfunctioning sarcasm detector)

[Judi Lynn]

11. Glad you caught it! I've never been called by a Cuban, either! n/t

[guajira]

13. I Have been called by a Cuban

The calls are collect, and not cheap! A Cuban friend called me several times and each call was about $25. Thank god the calls are very infrequent!

As you know, Cubans on the island and their relatives in Miami visit back and forth on a regular basis. It's a load of gusano propaganda shit to say that the only way Cubans can get off the island is by raft. Many of them fly from Havana to Miami and then return home to Havana when their visit is over!!

[Mika]

15. So have I

But I usually tell them I'll call them right back because I can more afford the calls than them.



:hi:

[Judi Lynn]

20. Not too long ago a visitor to D.U. claimed that Cubans aren't allowed

to leave the island. Got really belligerant about it, sadly.

Some of us have tried to tell them Cubans come and go, but noooooooo.
If the propagandists say they don't, then, by god, they DON'T!

My answer at the time wasn't detailed, as I don't live in South Florida and have first hand knowledge, was that they DO come and go to Florida to visit their relatives, which people in South Florida already know, and that they even travel out of state all over the country, (as well as other countries) or did until _Bush started refusing to let people from into the U.S.

The right-wingers can keep these clowns in the dark only as long as they can keep Americans from going to Cuba and meeting them, or from meeting Cubans who have come to the U.S., like the ones you mentioned.

Once the travel ban's removed, EVERYONE will know they've been lying to us. (That's probably one reason they're fighting so hard to keep it going!)

[Judi Lynn]

12. Cuba study abroad spring program canceled

Cuba study abroad spring program canceled
By richard strohmenger
October 19, 2004


On the heels of the cancellation of the Cuba study abroad program this fall, plans for a spring session were also canceled following the implementation of a set of governmental restraints.

In June, the Office of Foreign Assets Control, addressing instructions from the Department of the Treasury, announced regulations barring educational programs for American students in Cuba. The decision stemmed from economic sanctions imposed on Cuba by the Bush administration, and it prevents students from pursuing any study abroad options in that country.

"This is not an issue of safety," Penn Abroad Overseas Program Manager Donna Butler said. "It is all a result of changes in government policy in not allowing students to go to Cuba, which is what originally canceled our plans for the program this fall."

In the past, Penn has sent students to Cuba to study for a semester through the Butler University program in Indianapolis, which had students studying at the Universidad de La Habana. This program focused on classes in the humanities and social sciences.
(snip/...)

http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/10/19/4174c5833fc74

[MasonJar]

14. This summer I was at a Kerry party in Louisville, Ky. (where I live)

At this dekightful party on the top of a downtown building I sat down at a table with Cubans. Two were living in Ky. and two were visiting from Miami. They were adamantly opposed to GWShrub; they said that half of the Cubans in Miami were. The young Cubans who want to travel and the ones who want to travel more often. They were actually furious at Bush. Bush is only going to get half of the Cuban vote in Florida. That should help. We will need all the help we can get with Jeb and his cohorts cheating the voters big time.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

17. It'll make all the difference

This is like a percentage point or 2 gain for Kerry. All because of the travel ban.

[Mika]

18. Not just "all" because of the travel ban

The Cuban-American community has never been monolithic. Contrary to the going uninformed belief, there are plenty of librul Cuban-Americans too.


charts from opensecrets.org






Poll: Cuban-Americans focus is local, not on Cuba or Castro
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/world/cuba/6269237.htm

[Lydia Leftcoast]

21. My church has an exchange/work party trip to Cuba planned for January

tied in with a peace and reconciliation project and hurricane relief efforts, and we're assured that it's still being permitted. I hope I can scrape together the money to go. (I'm self-employed, and it doesn't look good at this point, but the thing about being self-employed is that you can get sudden windfalls).

With the whole left-right tennis match going on, I'd like to see for myself.

[Mika]

22. If you can - GO GO GO!!

:hi:

Cuba is poor, but you will absolutely love the Cuban people, especially after learning some of the real history of Cuba.


Do it!!


Have a great trip. (Try a sip or two of some REAL rum while you're at it!)