Just over a week ago I linked to an article by Michael Totten written from Cuba. Today we see another of Totten's World Affairs Journal reports from that benighted island.
His major topic today is just how impressive the architecture of Havana was once, before decades of failure-to-maintain allowed it to implode. Totten believes the grandeur that was Havana gave lie to Castro's story line of a nation of poor peasants overthrowing a small handful of oligarchs.
A city with such fine architecture would have had a substantial middle class - many people of means - before Castro drove them away or killed them. Now poverty is required by law, according to Totten. Salaries are capped and ration books are mandatory.
I'm reminded of what Soviets would say of life in the socialist paradise: "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us." No wonder collectivism is a guaranteed generator of poverty.
