(My new American Thinker post)
Cuba is collapsing, according to Dr. Oscar Biscet, a brave human rights leader in the island. Dr. Biscet speaks his mind and has been arrested because of it. He got into trouble with the Castro regime for exposing late-term abortions carried out in the Havana maternity hospital where he served as medical director. He ended up in prison and earned the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush. Dr. Biscet could not attend but his wife accepted on his behalf.
This week, Dr. Biscet wrote a devastating account of things in Cuba. This is from Newsweek:
It is sometimes said that when people slide into bankruptcy, they do so gradually, then suddenly.
The same can be said of bankrupt governments, including the communist regime that has ruled Cuba for 63 years. The slow deterioration of Cuban society that began with the Cuban revolution in 1959 has intensified in recent years. Today, many Cubans wonder how long it will be until the government collapses entirely.
The signs of impending collapse are everywhere.
Dr. Biscet goes on:
Perhaps the most striking evidence of the regime's weakness is seen in the record number of people fleeing the island.
In the fiscal year through the end of August, some 200,000 Cuban migrants were detained by U.S. officials after crossing the U.S. Southern border, an increase of more than 400 percent from 2021. That means nearly 2 percent of the entire population of Cuba has fled in just the last year.
Many of those who remain survive on remittances sent from family and friends living abroad. They stand in hours-long lines to obtain even the most basic food and medicine. Power outages remain common, and discontent hangs heavy in the air.
Dr. Biscet confirmed what we've heard about the Cuban economy ruined by mismanagement, inflation, and a slowdown in tourism due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The government can no longer attract outside investment because of a dead economy and too many loans being rescheduled.
Of course, the question is how much longer can the system survive? I remember a time when Cuban families in the U.S. had a bottle of champagne ready to pop when the regime collapsed. I recall the very persuasive stories of Cuba collapsing after the end of the USSR. I remember, but no collapse.
Dr. Biscet is right on about the corrupt regime collapsing from within. Somehow it survives and that's hard to believe.
My late father often quoted a Spanish saying that went like this: "No hay mal que dure cien años." It loosely means that nothing bad last 100 years. In the case of Cuba, I wonder how much longer can something as bad as this last?
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