Happy birthday Babalu!

Over the last years, Babalu has impacted me in three important ways:

First, it provides those of us who don't live in Miami with a steady flow of news from Cuba.  Babalu is like my Cuban coffee every morning.

Second, I've had the opportunity of making some wonderful friends, from Valentin Prieto to Alberto de la Cruz to Ziva Sahl to Jorge Ponce to Humberto Fontova to Carlos Eire to Henry Gomez to Marta Darby......who did I miss?

Third, Babalu has posted some of my thoughts and radio shows as well.  Thanks for doing that.

Let me congratulate Valentin Prieto for starting Babalu and everyone else for keeping the project alive and well.

How about another 10?  

How about a future celebration in a free Cuba?

P.S.  This is our show with Jorge Ponce, Fausta Wertz & Michael Prada about Babalu: 

Listen to internet radio with Silvio Canto Jr on BlogTalkRadio

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Tags: Happy birthday Babalu  To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the My View by Silvio Canto, Jr. Thanks!

How about playing 'hardball" with Ecuador?

(My new American Thinker post)

Ecuador is playing "hardball" with the US and it's hard to watch:

"Ecuador said Thursday it is renouncing tariff benefits on hundreds of millions of dollars in trade that are up for renewal by the U.S. Congress.

The announcement by Communications Minister Fernando Alvarez comes at a moment when Ecuador faces U.S. pressure to avoid granting asylum to National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden. Alvarez told a news conference that the trade deal had become "a new instrument of blackmail.

"In consequence, Ecuador unilaterally and irrevocably renounces said preferences."

Ecuador is a very nice, beautiful and small country under the very misguided leadership of a Chavez disciple Pres Correa. 

The key is that ".....nearly half Ecuador's foreign trade depends on the U.S."

Let me translate:  They need the US a lot more than we need them!

Furthermore, there is no country that will "bail out" Ecuador, as the USSR did with Cuba after the 1962 Missile Crisis.   The USSR subsidized Cuba for 30 years allowing that economic basket case south of Florida to survive.    The USSR got paid back by having Castro turn into a leftist mouthpiece and sending Cuban troops to fight "the wars of liberation" in Africa.

Correa is not so lucky. 

His disciple Chavez is dead,  Worse than that, Venezuela is broke.  Brazil has protests to worry about.  Argentina is worse off than Venezuela.  Cuba is on the verge of economic collapse.

The bottom line is that there is no one on the phone offering to replace the US as a trade partner.

So let's play "hardball".  

Let's deliver this message:  Grant Snowden asylum and you will have a lot of "flowers, artichokes and broccoli" staying in Ecuador rather than getting consumed in the US.

Let's give President Correa a little broccoli for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Let's see if he can handle the economic distortions that come with it!

Again, it's sad to watch the US getting pushed around like this on the world scene.  I hate it!

Click to hear Friday's show:

Listen to internet radio with Silvio Canto Jr on BlogTalkRadio

 

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Tags: Snowden, Ecuador and President Obama  To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the My View by Silvio Canto, Jr. Thanks!

Did they really read the bill?

We just learned something rather strange about the new immigration bill that passed the Senate with 68 votes. 

This is from The Weekly Standard:

"As the Washington Examiner's Philip Klein recently reported: "Under Obamacare, businesses with over 50 workers that employ American citizens without offering them qualifying health insurance could be subject to fines of up to $3,000 per worker. But because newly legalized immigrants wouldn’t be eligible for subsidies on the Obamacare exchanges until after they become citizens – at least 13 years under the Senate bill – businesses could avoid such fines by hiring the new immigrants instead."

On Tuesday, THE WEEKLY STANDARD asked five U.S. senators about this problem, and none of them knew if it was a problem. "We're trying to solve that right now. I don't know if that's been solved," Senator Max Baucus of Montana (chief author of Obamacare) told THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

"I don't know. I'd have to look at it closely," said Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania. "I just haven't read it that closely to know."

Senator Baucus wants to go back and fix it.  Senator Casey did not read it that closely.

Are you kidding me gentlemen?

The obvious problem is ObamaCare.  You can not fix this disparity between US workers and legalized immigrants without adding the latter to ObamaCare.

Frankly, where were the GOP Senators who voted for this?  Why didn't refuse to support it with this clause favoring the newly legalized workers.

This is bad, very bad legislating.  There is something very wrong with a law that discriminates against US workers.

Click here for Friday's show:

Listen to internet radio with Silvio Canto Jr on BlogTalkRadio

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Tags: Did they really read the bill?   To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the My View by Silvio Canto, Jr. Thanks!