Broadcasting a Vision of Democracy Into a Void (TV Marti to Cuba)

[Mika]

January 20, 2006
Broadcasting a Vision of Democracy Into a Void
*The U.S. has sunk nearly $200 million into TV Marti's programming aimed at Cuba. But one scholar estimates it has 'nearly zero viewership.'
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-marti20jan20,0,7331148.story?coll=la-headlines-world

MIAMI — Tune in to TV Marti, and you can see anything from global news and hard-hitting documentaries to a sitcom with a bearded revolutionary wreaking havoc on a mythical island shaped a lot like Cuba.

But after 16 years and nearly $200 million from U.S. taxpayers, a question nags at its critics and even some who support the pro-democracy mission of the propaganda outlet: Is anyone in Cuba watching?

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Since then, a lumbering C-130 aircraft borrowed from the Pennsylvania National Guard has transmitted a four-hour segment on the occasional Saturday. But the plane has other demands on its time, including forays to Iraq and Afghanistan.

"The new plane will give us at least 30 hours per week" by making the transmitter a moving target and less susceptible to jamming, Radio/TV Marti director Pedro Roig said. The plane is expected to be flying this spring. Radio Marti's signal is also jammed, but less successfully, and its broadcasts are less problematic for its intended audience because it can be listened to less conspicuously.

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TV Marti operates in violation of the International Telecommunication Convention governing the use of world airwaves. Both the United States and Cuba are signatories. The frequency TV Marti uses is assigned to Cuba, and the convention prohibits other nations from deliberately intruding.

$28,000,000 per year of our tax dollars for an audience of near zero? For 4 hours on the occasional Saturday? Plus, in violation of international convention.

Can you spell money laundering? Payolla? Miamicubanexile campaign contributions?

This just reeks.

[central scrutinizer]

1. José Martí must be rolling in his grave

To have his name taken in vain by the Bushco criminals - everything they stand for would have been anathema to him.

[Mika]

4. TV Marti is not new - the plane is.

Radio & TV Marti are sinkholes for our tax dollars. The money is turned over, in a loop, into campaign contributions to the politicians who direct more dollars to Radio & TV Marti.

[saigon68]

2. I agree Mika

It's like pissing money down a rat-hole

[Judi Lynn]

3. A great Colorado Congressman, David Skaggs tried to get TV Marti cut

and the vicious, idiotic Cuban Republican "exile" Congressman from Miami, which receives around 30,000,000 annually for producing and staffing and running both TV and Radio Marti, Lincoln Diaz-Balart attacked him in his own state's press after telling him he would destroy every project Skaggs found near and dear.

He took out advertising in Colorado pointing out how Skaggs was responsible for losing some big money projects, and attacking him, and Skaggs lost his next election and got out of politics.{blockquote]7/1/93 After having funds for Radio and TV Marti deleted in a closed mark-up session, the House Appropriations Committee restores funds for Radio Marti but not TV Marti (CAC, 6/22/93; CM, 6/25/93; MH, 6/25/93). Rep. Diaz-Balart succeeds in cutting $23 million from the National Institute of Standards and Technology in an effort to repay Rep. David Skaggs (D-CO) for cutting $17.5 million from Radio and TV Marti. Rep. Skaggs complains, "I was greatly disturbed and saddened that the normal business of this House was subject to these retributive tactics. This is an example of how difficult it is to pull the plug on a program, even one as ineffective as this one." Skaggs believes the programs are unnecessary because Cubans are able to view commercial broadcasts from Florida.

http://cuban-exile.com/doc_126-150/doc0146b.html

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

The Washington Post
Monday, February 21, 2000; Page A02
Rifts in Hard Line on Cuba

~snip~
"You know that if you kick the Cuba issue, you're going to have a bad
day," said former representative David Skaggs (D-Colo.), who clashed
with the hard line on Havana, and paid for it with lost funding for his
district. "Other than to about 10 members, it doesn't matter that much.
when there are a few people who will die for the issue, and nobody
else gets anywhere close to that, they can have their way."
(snip)

The general public pays little attention to Cuba issues, said Skaggs, who
joined the Aspen Institute after his 1998 retirement from Congress. But
with the Elian case, he said, the public may have realized that the
hard-liners are "out of sync" with their values. "Maybe this will start to
contribute to some diminishment of their authority generally on Cuba
matters."
(snip)

Those who antagonize the foundation can expect a quick response. The
morning after Skaggs succeeded in temporarily killing funds for TV Marti
in July 1993, he was confronted by an angry Diaz-Balart who, Skaggs said
in an impassioned floor speech that afternoon, threatened "that if I followed
through with my plans, he would do all he could to go after everything he
could find that was important to me."

That same day, Diaz-Balart used a parliamentary "point of order" to ax
millions in federal funds for Skagg's Colorado district, as the foundation
was faxing a gloating press release detailing the maneuver, and the reason
for it, to every major newspaper in the state.

"We only go after people who come after us," Jose Cardenas, the
foundation's Washington director, said in a recent interview.
(snip/...)

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/us-cuba/rifts.htm

Utter assholes.