High Five, Barack.. or even just the Cuban Five

Barack Obama marked his first week in office by ordering the closing down of Guantanamo prison camp. A quick glance in this gift-horse’s mouth suggests anyone with a memory longer than the last election campaign may not be as well-rewarded as they are long in the teeth. As a gesture, it was irreproachable...but we are weary with empty gestures – about as weary as those who constructed the Christmas Island 800-bed detention centre in territory conveniently ‘excised’ from Australia in 2001, leaving it outside of their jurisdiction and probably anyone else’s as well....and leaving it about as empty as it has been since completion in 2006, presumably still awaiting its new residents fresh from the Caribbean. “Time for change” means more than just the view, Barack – a full guarantee from your honourable self and K Rudd that the leftover Guantanamo detainees aren’t going to just reappear on Christmas Island like pass-the-human-parcels might give some teeth to it.

I understand you have both hands full – but so did Fidel when he took the centre of his country’s political stage some 50 years ago, inheriting a land similarly plagued with rampant corruption, poverty, human rights abuses, and more misery than most US citizens could even imagine. Fidel and the Cuban people turned it around in their own country and managed to also assist a big chunk of the developing world at the same time. With similar imagination, commitment, intelligence, fortitude, and popular support you too can transform your country’s domestic wellbeing and its international reputation. And given the US penchant for occupation, if you really and truly want to occupy the moral high ground, here are five easy steps to get there.

First, you have to value children, the future of any nation. This means providing their mothers with the food and shelter necessary to ensure they deliver healthy babies that survive into childhood. Cuba managed to convert its third world neonatal mortality rates into those on a par with the US, and in fact better even than New Zealand, where killing kids appears to be fast replacing rugby as the national sport.

Second, you have to treat these children with respect – which means always putting their welfare first, before war-making, and especially before paying off greedy CEOs and banks. This applies to ALL children, not just your own or those of your extended family. This means that you have to guarantee adequate food and shelter for every family, as well as engendering caring communities. The last bit comes back to the ‘r’ word again – respect. Children whose physical, emotional and spiritual integrity is respected tend to treat others in a similar manner, and results in a nation of friendly, happy, respectful adults, as millions of tourists to Cuba from countries other than yours are discovering every year.

Third, providing free education to all your citizens guarantees a minimum standard and provides everyone with the intellectual tools to function harmoniously in society, as well as providing the necessary skill-base for the country’s continued development. The ability to reason, to express their opinion and to appreciate someone else’s point of view, are fundamental to the lack of crime, especially of violence, in Cuban society. Cubans exchange ideas rather than blows, and even the drunkest Cuban would rather talk, sing, dance – anything - rather than fight each other or anyone else. See Fourth point. Better still, come over and see for yourself.

Fourth, providing free access to culture and respecting and enabling full expression of the nation’s cultural diversity stimulates and taps the creativity of everyone, providing not only personal outlets but also a very cheap, and largely free, means for the celebration of individual, community and national identity. The right to be happy is way more fun than the right to bear arms, and far less dangerous.

Fifth is the need to organise the country’s economic relations to guarantee the first four. Of course this has risks, as Cuba discovered – a 50 year economic blockade, several attempted invasions, and numerous terrorist attacks against its country and international interests. But you are the President of the USA, the most powerful country on earth – if anyone can do it, you can!! Notching up human rights and foreign policy brownie points should be a cinch, and where better to start than your own back yard! To keep both hands busy, here’s another five steps to the higher moral ground a bit more quickly.

After guaranteeing that the Guantanamo inmates are not going to languish on Christmas Island, you can give Guantanamo back to its rightful owner, Cuba. Third, you can guarantee the immediate release of the five Cuban anti-terrorists currently imprisoned in the United States following the only US trial ever to be condemned by the United Nations Human Rights Committee. Fourth, you can end the illegal economic blockade of Cuba, also condemned at the United Nations by the majority of the worlds’ nations every year for decades, which will also assist your own country’s flailing domestic economy. And fifth, with the proceeds, you can start funding some of the health, education and cultural programmes that might actually produce a nation of worthy world citizens, such as those produced by Cuba.

Take the bit between your teeth, Barack - Give us the High Five! Or at least the Cuban Five…..

ENDS

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