Bill Maher - yawn.

I'm not a fan of the continued embargo on the surface, but there have been various intelligent human beings who have flown into Washington DC and continued, or even doubled down on the embargo - including Democrats. For 50 years now, there have been clearly defined steps that the Castro govt have to undertake for relations to become 'normalized' with the US. Every one of them has to do with basic human rights. The last human rights survey in 1999 puts Cuba on par with the various shitholes in Africa - which is saying something.

Despite the Castro regimes longevity and stubbornness, for all intensive purposes, communism is dying in Cuba. Which arguably was the purest form of communism. You can now sell a plate of fruit on the streets of Havana, and pocket money as a result, for the fist time ever. If you save enough, you can buy one of the 19" TVs that the regime has seen to allow you to buy, starting in 2008. Air conditioners sales started in 2010. And in 2011, you could buy and sell real estate.

There are dictators that have killed many millions of their own people - but something about the Castro regime, and their ability to suppress basic humanity, a mere 90 miles from the US, is seriously depressing. Cubans do not dream. They will become one of the 90% unemployed, or leave for the US. That is their options. If you are a woman, they are even worse.

Save me the fucking diatribe, Bernstein. Especially when regurgitated from Bill Maher. And Im a left-leaning voter, by the way.