An example for working people? Not even the plumber has a truck! (Source)
Roy Landerson publishes a piece in The Militant misleadingly entitled Why the Cuban Revolution is an example for all working people. That doesn't describe the article at all. Instead it's a sentimental post about how a dictator was overthrown by a bunch of ragtag "revolutionaries." This isn't an example for working people so much as a sentimental journey for those who were inspired by the so-called "revolution" at the time.
How many people in the US will recall Fidel Castro's supposedly inspirational speech History Will Absolve Me? It's two hours long! All but the most brainwashed Castro fans will fall asleep before it's over. It asserts that Castro partisans are unfailingly honest, innocent, peaceful (despite launching an insurrection) citizens, while the government officials are all and always liars, crooks and thieves. I confess I didn't read the whole thing--it was too boring and too incredible.
Yet Mr. Landerson will have us believe that History Will Absolve Me is the greatest document since the Declaration of Independence.
Usually, if a country is "an example for working people" it's because it has a higher standard of living, offers more freedom in terms of career, where to live, and how to spend your money and your free time. Cuba provides none of that: housing is hopelessly dilapidated, food is nearly non-existent, you can't choose a career, and--it seems to me worst of all--one has to spend one's free time listening to boring speeches and "volunteering" to contribute free labor.
Whatever the good life is, Cuba's is the complete opposite. When possible Cubans flee to the USA--or Mexico or Colombia, or Panama or any place besides Cuba. Mr. Landerson's headline is 180 degrees wrong.
The dictator that so offended Mr. Castro was a politician cum gangster named Fulgencio Batista, president of Cuba from 1952 to 1959. The Castroites had much to complain about (links & footnotes omitted).
Throughout the 1950s, Havana served as "a hedonistic playground for the world's elite", producing sizable gambling, prostitution and drug profits for the American mafia, corrupt law-enforcement officials, and their politically elected cronies. In the assessment of the Cuban-American historian Louis Perez, "Havana was then what Las Vegas has become." Relatedly, it is estimated that by the end of the 1950s the city of Havana had 270 brothels. In addition, drugs, be it marijuana or cocaine, were so plentiful at the time that one American magazine in 1950 proclaimed "Narcotics are hardly more difficult to obtain in Cuba than a shot of rum. And only slightly more expensive." As a result, the playwright Arthur Miller described Batista's Cuba in The Nation as "hopelessly corrupt, a Mafia playground, (and) a bordello for Americans and other foreigners."While the prostitution part is as much a draw today as it was back then, the Castro regime has curtailed the drug trade. They've tried to keep the tourist industry alive, but instead of attracting the rich or famous (eg, Ernest Hemingway), Cuba instead appeals to low-budget package tourists. Much less lucrative.
In 1960 (according to Google AI) Cuba produced between 5.6 and 6.0 million tons of sugar. After 66 years of Castro rule production is down to 200,000 tons.
Perhaps the country most like Cuba is the Dominican Republic--same ethnicity and former Spanish colony. In 1960 it was ruled by a dictator way more vicious than Mr. Batista, namely Rafael Trujillo ("Generalissimo" from 1934 until his death in 1961). He is credibly charged with murdering between 25,000 and 50,000 people. If Mr. Castro had been Dominican he would have been summarily shot and never put on trial.
I asked ChatGPT what fraction of Dominican households had access to electricity in 1960, and also today. Her answer, excerpted:
In 1960: the best estimate is roughly 15–25% of households had reliable electricity.I put the same question to her about Cuba:
Today (2025–2026): about 95–99% of Dominican households have reasonably reliable electricity, although reliability still varies substantially by neighborhood.
By the late 1950s Cuba was one of the more electrified countries in Latin America:Clearly, Mr. Batista was way more successful in getting electricity to his population than his Dominican counterpart. He also killed far fewer people. Corruption was, of course a problem, but comparatively a minor one..Historical studies of Latin American electrification suggest Cuba's household electrification rate around 1958–1960 was approximately 55–70%, much higher than most neighboring countries.
- Havana and other cities had extensive electric service.
- Cuba was considerably more urbanized than the Dominican Republic.
- Many towns had electricity, although rural electrification remained incomplete.
- Large rural areas still lacked service entirely.
Moreover, where electricity existed, it was generally dependable.
Regards today, Ms. GPT points out that 100% of Cuban households are connected to the electrical grid. But the grid is not reliable, and in recent years it's failed more or less completely. Apparently Cuba had another nationwide blackout in early June. She writes:
Access to the grid has improved from roughly 60% to essentially 100%. But reliability has deteriorated dramatically in recent years because of the collapse of the generating system and fuel shortages. A household that technically has electricity today may still experience many hours each day without power.
She goes on to estimate that despite 100% access, only between 30%- 50% of households have power at any given time. Ms. GPT does not have access to the most recent internet pages, so I think today's figure is no more than 30%.
In other words, since Trujillo died, the Dominican Republic has brought its electrical grid almost to first world standards. Meanwhile, Cuba has gone the opposite direction--from a dependable, nationwide grid under Batista, to complete collapse under the Castro brothers. This is NOT an example for working people--at least not a positive one.Mr. Landerson's retort will be Cuba's problems are entirely due to the perfidy of the United States. Of course that's small comfort to the average Cuban--why did the Castro brothers go so far out of their way to anger the US? Seems in retrospect to be totally unnecessary--what has Cuba gained from that? As Marco Rubio puts it, the only thing worse than a communist is a stupid communist.
But Mr. Landerson is wrong: Cuba is in significant part the author of her own problems, for when it comes to corruption, the Castros have been far worse than anything Batista did. The Castro regime has stolen 90% of people's paychecks--it's hard to get more corrupt than that.
A useful counterpoint to Mr. Landerson's piece appears in Left Voice in an article by Adrien Masson entitled Cuba’s Market Reforms Are a Huge Retreat for Socialism. He takes the regime to task for taking some obvious steps to rejuvenate its economy, to wit:
The main measures include the adoption of private banking, lifting the cap on how many companies private individuals can own, giving private companies control over how many workers they hire and at what wages, eliminating the government’s monopoly on foreign trade, repaying external debt by selling national assets, and expanding the private sector’s reach. State-owned properties and real estate can now be sold to both domestic and foreign companies and individuals, while subsidies for important goods will be taken away from most Cubans and means-tested for the most vulnerable.In other words, he accuses Cuba of going down the capitalist road and betraying the working class along with socialist ideals. He is right, of course, and the government's new policy is a straightforward admission that the idiotic, "revolutionary" fantasies held over the past 67 years are worthless. How many lives have been wasted sacrificing everything in a heroic effort that has done nothing but enrich the Castro clan?
The nonsense spouted by Mr. Masson deserves its own post. I won't go into detail here. His article is a very clear illustration of how Marxists completely misunderstand capitalism. The bottom line is Mr. Masson wants a do-over--his solution is to subject another three generations of Cubans to ever more poverty and misery.
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