Killings of white farmers highlight toxic apartheid legacy in South Africa

By Reuters [Photos AP]

ERMELO, South Africa -- In a country cursed by one of the world's highest murder rates, being a white farmer makes a violent death an even higher risk.

Whether attacks have been motivated by race or robbery, a rising death rate from rural homicides is drawing attention to the lack of change on South Africa's farms nearly two decades after the end of apartheid -- and to the tensions burgeoning over enduring racial inequality.

Some of South Africa's predominantly white commercial farmers go as far as to brand the farm killings a genocide.

'Potentially explosive' issue
On the other side of the divide, populists are seizing on the discontent among the black majority to demand a forced redistribution of white-owned farms along the lines of neighboring Zimbabwe.

"The issue is potentially explosive," said Lechesa Tsenoli, deputy minister for land reform, arguing that South Africa's future depends on ending inequality on the farms.

The economic change promised by Nelson Mandela's African National Congress (ANC) when white-minority rule ended in 1994 has been even slower in the countryside than in cities and mines, where at least small elites of black South Africans have prospered.

Land ownership ratios are little changed from 1913, when the Natives' Land Act set aside 87 percent of land for whites. Meanwhile, black farm workers are among South Africa's poorest.

But life is getting more uncomfortable for the white farmers, too. Their number is down a third, to some 40,000, in the past 15 years. Headlines about the farm killings are another incentive to sell.

For while South Africa's overall annual murder rate has more than halved since the end of apartheid to around 32 people per 100,000, figures for commercial farmers show a near 50 percent rise to an average rate of some 290 per 100,000 a year in the five years to 2011.

Shot through the neck and chest

Shot at his home by black attackers two years ago, 34-year-old Johan Scholtz believes he was the victim of a racially motivated attack rather than a robbery.

"I was shot through my neck, I was shot through my chest and as I fell to the ground they came and stood over me and they shot again -- two times -- just missed my brain," Scholtz said, fighting back tears as he recalled the incident.

"My sheep were there around the house, they could've taken the sheep. My house was open, they could've easily gone in. But they left with nothing," he said, adding that the family did not own much worth stealing.

Scholtz now keeps a baseball bat by his bed at his livestock farm in Ermelo, in the undulating veld some 140 miles east of Johannesburg. He is asking himself how long he will stay in the business.

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Masked men stole 70 gold bars from fishing boat in Curacao

what the hell were doing 70 gold bars on a fishing boat?

-------------------------------

By Karen Attiah, The The "Summer Bliss" fishing boat sits docked at the Willemstad port in Curacao, on Nov. 30. Masked men in jackets emblazoned with the word "police" boarded the "Summer Bliss" in an early morning assault on Friday and stole 70 gold bars worth an estimated $11.5 million, police spokesman Reggie Huggins said.

Masked men in jackets emblazoned with the word "police" boarded a fishing boat Friday in Curacao and stole 70 gold bars worth an estimated $11.5 million, officials in the southern Caribbean island said.

The boat's captain was struck in the head in the early-morning assault before the thieves made off with the gold in three cars, police spokesman Reggie Huggins said. Authorities believe there were at least six men involved in the heist. No suspects were in custody.

Huggins declined to say who owned the approximately 476 pounds of gold but he said it was a legal shipment that was being trans-shipped through Curacao and officials in the island had been advised in advance that it was coming as part of normal security protocols. He declined to disclose the eventual destination of the metal.

"Authorities knew of the shipment because the official procedure was followed," the spokesman said.

Huggins said that guards to the port area let the assailants inside a restricted area in the mistaken belief that they were customs officials. The men's jackets had the word "police" in English but in Curacao the word would be written in Papiamento, one of the island's three official languages, as "polis." During the robbery, crew members said they wore hoods and masks and made off with the gold in a matter of minutes.

"The crew said it was like a movie operation, very fast," Huggins said.

The captain and three crew members were from the South American country of Guyana, he said.

The boat, by its appearance, would seem an unlikely place to stash that amount of gold. The "Summer Bliss" is a fishing boat with rust streaks on its white cabin and no visible security.

A crew member who gave his name as Raymond Emmanuel told The Associated Press that they left Guyana four days ago and arrived early Friday in Curacao. Contradicting police, he said they were delivering the gold to a company in Curacao but said he did not know the name of the business.

He referred questions about the source of the gold to the captain, who was meeting with authorities on the Dutch Caribbean island and was not immediately available.

Emmanuel said the gold was locked away when the thieves boarded the vessel. "They took everything," he said. More on NBC >>

China’s $3.8 Trillion Hemorrhage

Follow The Money

http://dailyreckoning.com/chinas-3-8-trillion-hemorrhage/

As we covered yesterday, China is starting to hemorrhage money.

How much?

Over the past decade, about $3.8 trillion has left China illicitly. The trend, if you’ll recall yesterday’s discussion, is accelerating. Somewhere around $50 billion per month is flooding out of China.

Today I want to cover the final ramifications of this monetary hemorrhage, and why it matters to your investments and your wealth…

At the individual level, what’s a Chinese saver to do? Over the past decade, the Chinese have sought wealth preservation, if not investment returns, in China’s stock market, as well as in Chinese property markets. These ideas worked out well for some Chinese investors, but not for others. Plus, as I mentioned yesterday, the Chinese buy gold — lots of it.

In addition to investing in Chinese assets — stocks, property, gold, etc. — there’s long been anecdotal evidence of Chinese moving funds offshore in shady ways, as illustrated by the Vancouver story about suitcases full of cash. In other times and other places, I’ve heard similar stories of Chinese suitcase money: in Russia, across the Middle East, in Africa and South America.

There’s an old saying in the field of statistics that “The plural form of the word anecdote is data.” And recently, a number of investigators have gained access to much more hard data about how much Chinese money has moved overseas. The amount of money is huge, to the point of shocking.

When it comes to funds that have moved away from China — and the fate of the individual owners is something else entirely — we’re dealing with what The Economist magazine recently called a form of “voluntary exile.”

The bottom line is that large numbers of Chinese are moving money offshore, by hook or by crook. According to Hurun Report — a Shanghai-based service that caters to a very upscale clientele — the average wealthy Chinese (defined as having a net worth over 10 million yuan, or about $1.6 million) holds 19% of his assets overseas.

Meanwhile, per Hurun, 85% of wealthy Chinese plan to send their children to school outside China, while 44% have plans to emigrate at some point in their life. In and of itself, that’s hardly a ringing endorsement for the future livability of China.

Also, according to a report issued Oct. 25, 2012, by the Washington, D.C.-based Global Financial Integrity (GFI) group, almost $3.8 trillion (yes, trillion!) illegally exited the Chinese economy between 2000 and the end of 2011. About $602 billion left China in just 2011, so the trend is accelerating.

Indeed, if about $50 billion per month ($602 billion divided by 12 months) left China in 2011, it’s no wonder that, for the past year, we’ve seen market-moving reports that China’s economy is slowing down. Perhaps China’s economy isn’t so much “slowing down,” in many respects, as it’s decapitalizing due to illicit outflows.

In the GFI report, the authors state that there are “serious questions about the stability of the Chinese economy.” Furthermore, per the report, “If outflows continue to ratchet upward, adverse repercussions on social and political stability cannot be ruled out.”

In other words, the massive, illicit capital outflows from China contribute to a growing sense of economic inequality, as well as pervasive corruption. The principal author of the GFI report, Dev Kar, formerly of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), opined that “The Chinese economy is a ticking time bomb. The social, political and economic order is not sustainable in the long run given such massive illicit outflows.”

The Chinese system is “not sustainable”? Now, that’s a problem.

US slams Israel's plan to expand settlements

Marko Djurica / Reuters

A masked Palestinian protester uses a sling to throw a stone at Israeli security officers 
(unseen) during clashes at a protest against Jewish settlements, in the West Bank village of 
Nabi Saleh, near Ramallah on Nov. 30.

By NBC News wire services

The White House  and the State Department said on Friday a new Israeli settlement expansion plan was "counterproductive" and could make it harder to bring Israel and the Palestinians back to the negotiating table.

"We reiterate our longstanding opposition to settlements and East Jerusalem construction and announcements," White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland reiterated this position, adding: "We're going to be evenhanded in our concern about any actions that are provocative, any actions that make it harder to get these two parties back to the table."

Israel plans to build thousands of new homes for its settlers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, an Israeli official said earlier, defying a U.N. vote that implicitly recognized Palestinian statehood there.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's conservative government had authorized the construction of 3,000 housing units and ordered "preliminary zoning and planning work for thousands" more.

Palestinians had a major symbolic victory when the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to recognize them, but the U.S. argued the new status could set back Palestinians in the path to peace. NBC's Andrea Mitchell reports.

"We believe these actions are counterproductive and make it harder to resume direct negotiations or achieve of a two state solution," Vietor said. "Direct negotiations remain our goal and we encourage all parties to take steps to make that easier to achieve."

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is meeting senior Israeli and Palestinian officials Friday to try to plot a path forward.

Clinton is seeing Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. She is also talking to Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh, a key mediator.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest says only "face-to-face" Israeli-Palestinian negotiations can lead to progress on a two-state solution.

Israeli media, including Haaretz newspaper, said the government sought to emphasize its rejection of Thursday's upgrade by the U.N. General Assembly of the Palestinians to "non-member observer state" from "entity."

Israel and the United States had opposed the resolution, which shored up the Palestinians' claim on all of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, saying territorial sovereignty should be addressed in direct peace talks with the Jewish state.

Jim Hollander / EPA file

A bulldozer sits at a construction site in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Pizgat Ze'ev, which many consider a sprawling Jewish settlement, on Nov. 8. Israel plans to build 3,000 new housing units for Jewish settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

More >>

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Ex represor cubano residente en Miami vuelve a Cuba

Nuevo Herald/ Juan Tamayo

Crescencio Marino Rivero, el ex jefe de prisiones cubano que estaba viviendo en Miami, ha regresado a la isla entre acusaciones de maltrato a los presos y una investigación de las autoridades estadounidenses de inmigración, informó el viernes un periodista disidente.

Jorge Luis Artiles Montiel dijo que vio a Rivero el martes haciendo compras en una bodega en la ciudad de Santa Clara, donde Rivero y su esposa, Juana Ferrer, vivían anteriormente. Otro residente de la ciudad también reportó haberlo visto el jueves en Santa Clara, indicó Artiles.

Rivero les dijo a algunos conocidos en la bodega que la pareja había regresado a Cuba "porque estaba muy difícil la situación en Miami", aseguró Artiles en declaraciones a El Nuevo Herald. Rivero agregó que planeaban pasar un tiempo en la isla y volver después a Miami.

La hija de Rivero, Anabel Rivero, le dijo a El Nuevo Herald el viernes que sus padres no habían regresado a Cuba, pero se negó a hacer más comentarios.

Una media docena de ex presos políticos en la isla y en el exilio han acusado a Rivero, de 71 años, de abusar de ellos o de ordenar a los guardias de la prisión que los maltrataran cuando estuvo a cargo de las cárceles en la provincia central de Villa Clara en los años 90.

Las autoridades estadounidenses de inmigración están investigando si Rivero y Ferrer mintieron sobre sus antecedentes cuando solicitaron sus visas para viajar a Estados Unidos y posteriormente su residencia en el país bajo la Ley de Ajuste Cubano.

Rivero negó haber abusado de los presos pero pareció admitir en una entrevista realizada en Miami este mes que la pareja no había dado a conocer todo su historial en las formas de solicitud de visa y residencia.

Read more here: http://www.elnuevoherald.com/2012/11/30/1354763/ex-represor-cubano-residente-en.html#storylink=cpy

Wife of American detained in Cuba speaks out

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Hugo Chavez in Cuba for cancer treatment again: What's next?

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez Battling Bone Metastasis, Report Says

Hugo Chavez in Cuba for cancer treatment again: What's next?

Video de excarcelacion de Antonio Rodiles

EstadodeSats

Cuba: Citizens with no property rights to pay 35% tax rate

Fausta's Blog/

Thanks to [more than] fifty years of Communist rule, Cuba’s broke, and will continue to be broke. And now, Cubans will be taxed on what they don’t own.

Adding to the preposterousness of the situation, Reuters reporter Marc Frank, formerly of Communist Daily, comes out with an article where he posits that Most Cubans have not paid taxes for half a century, but that will change under a new code starting January 1,

The new code covers 19 taxes, including such things as inheritance, environment, sales, transportation and farm land, various license fees and three contributions, including social security.

Inheritance of what?? The regime abolished private property from the get-go, and it has not restored it,

It’s a perversely absurd view of the issue. The truth is that the castro regime, like all other totalitarian ones, is concerned with complete control of the citizenry. Political control, economic control, it’s all the same and necessary for the retention of power which is the sole aim of despots. castro, inc. is interested in generating revenue wherever it can while maintaining as much control as possible. I’ve stated many times that if raul castro truly wanted to implement the “Chinese Model” economy into Cuba he could have done so by now. He doesn’t do it because he knows Cuba is not China and the Cuban people will not be so easy to control once they have more economic self-determination. The regime wouldn’t last six months under a Chinese type of economic system.

Frank’s assuming that “businesses will become cooperatives or be privately leased” and will be able to survive enough to pay taxes.

Yeah, right.

What happened to the small businesses that were mowed down in the 1990s? What about this year’s new import fees?

Kevin McCullough:

So when the state controlled industry, businesses endured a 100% tax rate, and the nation never rose to prosperity, never saw an increase in take home pay, never really ever saw a modern way of life take hold.

Memo to Kevin: The state still controls everything in Cuba,
New Cuban Tax Just Same Old Communist Expropriation

the money workers could earn if free to choose their employers at wages that reflect their worth now all goes to the state and its “free” programs. Officially or not, it’s a tax well beyond 99%. And what a surprise, the Castro brothers just happen to have personal fortunes in the billions of dollars, according to the last Forbes estimate. That’s a lot of taxes.
The Castro dictatorship is looking to take cash from the supposedly independent new businesses it’s permitted to set up shop, originally as a way of cutting the bloated state employment rolls.
Far from being a market liberalization or modernization, the Castroite tax hike is nothing but a shakedown of businesses that are struggling to grow, and an effort to reassert the power of the state over its citizens.

It’s the same-old, same-old, folks.

Respuesta a "¿Qué será lo que quiere el negro?"

Por fin:

 

 ¡La respuesta a la famosa canción!

 Ya se descubrió que es lo que quería el negro:

 

 Después de más de 20 años cantando y preguntándonos:

 

 “¿MAMI, QUÉ SERÁ LO QUE QUIERE EL NEGRO?”

 

 Fuentes fidedignas y bien informadas comunicaron que lo que el negro

 quería era ni más ni menos que ...

 

 

 

 

  ¡¡¡DORMIR EN LA CASA BLANCA !!!

Truco cubano para comer gratis

Un judío le dice a su amigo cubano:  Tengo un truco para comer gratis.
- ¡¡Carajo!! Cuéntame como lo haces.

- Voy al restaurante bastante tarde, pido un entrante, plato principal, quesos, postre y me tomo todo mi tiempo para beberme el café, el coñac, mientras me fumo un buen tabaco y espero a que cierren. Como ni me muevo, cuando ya recogen todas las mesas, ponen las sillas sobre las mesas para barrer, viene el mozo a preguntarme si le puedo ir pagando porque ya se van. 

Entonces le respondo:

“Pero si ya le pagué a su colega que se fue antes”. – Es así de simple.

El cubano entonces le dice: - ¡Qué genial! ¿probamos juntos mañana?

- Ok, le contesta el judío.

La noche siguiente los dos amigos van al restaurante y piden: entrante, plato principal, quesos, postre, etc…

Llega el momento de cerrar, se acerca el mozo, les pregunta si les puede cobrar y el judío le dice:

Lo siento, pero le pagamos a tu colega que ya se fue.

Y el cubano agrega:

...estamos desde hace rato esperando el vuelto…

What Canadians want more than a pay raise

Jennifer Kwan | Insight

Who wouldn't want more vacation time? Quality of life is important to over-worked Canadians and that may be why Canada is the only country in a global study that prefers extra paid time off over salary hikes.

In a survey of more than 10,000 workers in 10 markets, including the United States and United Kingdom, Canada was the only country that chose an extra week of paid time off as a preferred benefit. All other countries selected a salary increase as the top benefit. Canadians picked pay hikes as second best.

The survey titled "Making Smart Benefit Choices" by consultancy Mercer was conducted in July and August and sought to measure the perceived value employees place on various employer and employee paid benefits. Mercer also surveyed workers in Brazil, China, France, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy and Spain.

"Canadian employees have shown that they value more time off and increased pay in the current stress-filled economic environment," Brian Lindenberg, senior partner at Mercer's health and benefits business, said in a statement.

Perhaps the need for more time off is due to Canada's lack of statutory and public holidays compared to other developed nations? According to a separate Mercer analysis, Canada ranked dead last for work-free days, offering only 19 for the average Canadian employee with 10 years of service. In comparison, Malta offers 38, Venezuela 36, the U.K. 36, South Korea 34 and Pakistan 25.

It's no surprise time off is important as Canadians are apparently pretty stressed out. The Mercer study follows a recent nationwide work-life balance study that shows stress levels among Canadians have risen -- with nearly 60 per cent of people surveyed reporting they were highly  stressed -- while work satisfaction has dropped.

That study by professors at Carleton University and Western University examined work-life experiences of 25,000 Canadians. Those surveyed worked full time with an annual income of $60,000 or more in a range of professions including public, private and not-for-profit organizations across all provinces and territories. Two-thirds were parents.

It found work demands have risen, flexible work arrangements are increasingly rare and career advancement has gotten harder in recent years. All these pressures in the workplace lead to absenteeism and mental health issues among employees, the study suggests.

The Mercer survey also asked employees to rank the kind of benefits they are willing to pay for themselves, often referred to as voluntary or flexible benefits.

Responses reflected a broad split between markets, Mercer says. In Canada, where a wider range of health benefits are provided publicly, benefits that provide additional insurance are the most popular. Those include auto, home and critical illness insurance.

Whereas in countries such as Brazil and China, where health benefits are not as accessible, additional retirement or savings benefits ranked high. In some countries such as Ireland and Italy, where the state is the primary provider of health care, supplemental private medical insurance is popular as a voluntary or flexible benefit.

Senator Rubio at the 2012 Washington Ideas Forum

SenatorMarcoRubio

Havana Energy to sign Cuban biomass plant deal

Energy Business Review/

British firm Havana Energy will sign a previously announced joint venture agreement with Azcuba subsidiary Zerus following an approval from the Cuban government.

The venture is expected to develop a sugar cane bagasse burning biomass energy generating facility in Ciro Redondo in Central Cuba.

Havana Energy CEO Andrew Macdonald was quoted by The Financial Times as saying that, while Zerus will own 51% in Biopower, Havana Energy would own 49% stake.

"We plan to invest about $50m in this first plant in Ciro Redondo, which should be up and running in early 2015," Macdonald said.

Havana Energy Chairman and former British energy minister remarked, "This is a big step forward for the company and for Cuba, and I hope it pushes forward our bilateral economic relations."

The joint venture marks the first such project for the Cuban sugar sector and will generate energy for the national power grid.

Obama, What Is Your Plan?

Fox Nation/

Sen. John Cornyn: A road map for real bipartisan tax reform

The Dallas Morning News, Published: November 27, 2012

The American people have spoken — and once again, they have given us divided government in Washington.

Divided government means that neither Democrats nor Republicans will be able to pass legislation along strictly partisan lines. It means that bipartisan compromise is the only way to avoid further gridlock.

In the past, divided government has yielded some historic results. It produced landmark tax reform in 1986 and a sweeping overhaul of our welfare system 10 years later.

Of course, we’ve had divided government since January 2011, and thus far it has produced legislative stalemates and bitter recriminations. Why should we expect things to be any different this time around?

Quite simply, I believe there is now a bipartisan recognition that our current fiscal path is unsustainable. We cannot keep running trillion-dollar deficits. We cannot keep postponing structural changes to our largest entitlement programs. And unless we are happy with a tax code that wastes economic resources, stifles job creation and promotes crony capitalism, we cannot keep delaying genuine tax reform.

We don’t have to speculate about what bipartisan tax reform might look like.

In 2010, two separate bipartisan commissions recommended lowering the rates and broadening the base, which is exactly what Congress did in 1986.

Yet before we can implement 1986-style tax reform, we need to prevent the largest tax increase in American history, which is scheduled to take effect on New Year’s Day and could easily trigger a new recession.

All that Republicans are asking is to maintain the current rates until we adopt real bipartisan tax reform. Remember: These are the same tax rates that President Barack Obama signed into law two years ago. They are the same tax rates that received 81 votes in the Senate at a time when U.S. economic growth was much stronger than it is today. Indeed, if you were worried about the economic impact of a massive tax hike in 2010, you should be even more worried about it in 2012.

The president says raising tax rates would help solve our long-term debt problem, but it’s hard to take this argument seriously, for two reasons.

First: According to the president’s own Treasury Department, the tax increases he is advocating would generate $85 billion in new revenue next year. By comparison, the monthly budget deficit in October was about $120 billion, and the total deficit for fiscal year 2012 was roughly $1.1 trillion.

In other words, the proposed tax hikes would still leave us with a trillion-dollar deficit. Meanwhile, they would do significant damage to our fragile economic recovery.

Simply put: We cannot tax our way back to budget surpluses and economic prosperity. Without major spending cuts and entitlement reforms, we will continue running huge deficits, regardless of what we do on the revenue side.

After all, our unfunded liabilities over the next 75 years total nearly $100 trillion — that’s trillion, with a T. Those liabilities are separate from our $16 trillion national debt. In the most recent fiscal year, the federal government spent about $220 billion on interest payments alone. Under the president’s latest budget proposal, the annual cost of debt service would reach $804 billion in 2022, an amount greater than total U.S. defense spending in 2012.

Naked Protesters Storm House Speaker’s Office

Fox Nation/ 

Read >>

Twitter / @chrisgeidner

BuzzFeed's Chris Geidner tweets this photo of a group of nude protesters who stormed into House Majority Leader Rep. John Boehner’s (R-OH) office on Capitol Hill Tuesday afternoon.
Fox has learned that seven demonstrators from the group Act Up came into the personal office of House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) in the Longworth House Office Building around 12:30 pm. This is not the Speaker's Office, but his "regular" office alongside other rank and file members.
Act Up is devoted to backing legislation to fund additonal research to end the AIDS crisis. The protesters were upset about budget cuts to federal funding in the fight against AIDS and chanted, “Boehner, Boehner, don’t be a dick. Budget cuts will make us sick.”
US Capitol Police were called and arrested three of the women charging them with indecent exposure, according to reports.
Boehner's office is not commenting on the incident.

Read more: http://nation.foxnews.com/leftist-protesters/2012/11/27/naked-protesters-storm-boehner-s-office?cmpid=NL_FiredUpFoxNation#ixzz2DY1x4ksS

Cubans to pay taxes for first time in half a century

By Reuters

Greg Kahn / Getty Images, file

A street market sells necklaces and bracelets in Old Havana on November 12, 2012 in Havana, Cuba. Shops like this, until a year ago, were only found in the black market.

HAVANA -- Most Cubans have not paid taxes for half a century, but that will change under new regulations starting January 1.

The landmark move will change the relations of Cubans with their government and are a signal that market-oriented reforms are here to stay.

They were launched after President Raul Castro succeeded his brother, Fidel Castro, in 2008.

The recently published code constitutes the first comprehensive taxation in Cuba since the 1959 revolution abolished just about all taxes.

In the 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the country's main benefactor, the Cuban government imposed a few scattered taxes, but mostly preferred to maintain low wages so it could fund free social services.

The government's free-market reforms introduced over the last two years are designed to encourage small businesses, private farming and individual initiative. There are also plans to pay state workers more.

Under the new tax code, the state hopes to get its share of the proceeds.

'Major step' toward 21st century
The government also envisions replacing subsidies for all with targeted welfare, meaning that the largely tax-free life under a paternalistic government is on its way out.

"This radically changes the state's relationship with the population and taxes become an irritating issue," said Domingo Amuchastegui, a former Cuban intelligence analyst who lives in Miami and writes often about Cuba.

A Western businessman who has worked in Cuba for almost two decades told Reuters the reforms would take time, but added, "this is of course a major step forward toward the 21st century and a modern state."

The new code covers 19 taxes, including such things as inheritance, environment, sales, transportation and farm land, various license fees and three contributions, including social security.

A sliding-scale income tax -- from 15 percent for annual earnings of more than 10,000 pesos (about $400) to 50 percent for earnings of over 50,000 pesos (about $2,000) -- adopted in 1994, remains in the new code for the self-employed, small businesses and farms.

It also includes a series of new deductions to stimulate their work. For example, farmers may deduct up to 70 percent of income as costs.

'Can't spare a single peso'Eventually all workers will pay income taxes as well as a new 2 percent property tax, but both measures are suspended until "conditions permit" them to go into effect.

The government admits, with an average pay of about 450 pesos per month (or $19), many workers do not earn enough to make ends meet.

"They collect taxes for all these things around the world, it's normal," said Havana economist Isabel Fernandez.

"But here we face two problems. On the one hand we are not used to paying for anything and on the other our wages are so low we can't spare a single peso," she said.

Under the old system, large and small state-run companies, which accounted for more than 90 percent of economic activity, simply handed over all their revenues to the government, which then allocated resources to them.

The reforms call for large state-run businesses to be moved out of the ministries and become more autonomous.

The state-owned Cuban National News Agency said Cuba had studied the tax systems of a number of other countries, including several with capitalist economies.

"The experiences of China, Vietnam, Venezuela, Brazil, Spain and Mexico were taken into account, but they were refined to the particularities and conditions of the island," the news agency said.

Pravda: Illiterate society reelected Obama

Birther Report: Excerpts Via Gina Miller @ Renew America

Throughout most of the twentieth century, the Pravda newspaper was roughly the Russian equivalent of our leftist, state-controlled "mainstream" media, publishing only regime-approved, Communist party line content. Since undergoing a change in ownership in the early 1990s, it now offers warnings against the communism that infected the former Soviet Union and caused the deaths of millions of Russian citizens.

Despite the warnings of history and those who have lived under its iron fist, communism has come to America, and the useful idiots who dumbly adore the Communist-in-Chief, Barack Obama (or whatever his name is), are gladly and stupidly drinking the kool-aid of ignorance in embracing that deadly and dead-end ideology. Even the Russians can see this!

I read with sad amazement a couple of columns in the new, non-communist Pravda online by Xavier Lerma. One is titled, "Obama's Soviet Mistake," and the other, "The Reason Obama is President." Mr. Lerma clearly understands the terrible place of tyranny America has chosen, and he knows the reasons why. The reason Obama is President is the same reason I have repeatedly declared here in my columns: America has turned away from God and to self-worship and fleeting, carnal pleasures.

In "The Reason Obama is President," Mr. Lerma writes, [...]

[...] Despite the election result numbers, I do not believe the ignorant people yet outnumber the informed in America, although most of the informed are of the older generations. The Left has election and voter fraud down to a science, and it may well be that conservatism will not be allowed to win major elections anymore. The reports of election fraud since November 6th are sickening, but it appears the Republicans are content to lie down and take it, while they go off on misguided, introspective tangents about what they should have done differently to get the women and minority votes. It is stupidity in motion. If the election numbers are fraudulent, then speculation on "why" we "lost" is dumb, because without the election fraud tacked on, it is likely that we didn't lose!

Regardless, it remains that we are now saddled with the Communist federal government we deserve. Those of us who know better have allowed our liberty to lapse under decades of incremental thefts of our freedoms by an ever-growing monster bureaucracy in Washington. We have ceded our freedom to our Republican and Democrat masters in DC. Can we ever get it back? Not without a return to God's principles found in the Bible. And, looking around at the younger members of our degenerate, ignorant society, I am not holding my breath that they will suddenly turn to the Lord, although a few of them will, as God has called and chosen them.

Nevertheless, we will continue to pray for our nation and fight to rid our government of the evil criminals — both Democrat and Republican — who have commandeered it.

CONTINUED HERE: http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/miller/121127 >>

The Mockery of Cuba Sanctions Exceptions

Michael Rubin 

Early in his administration, President Barack Obama lifted a number of long-standing sanctions on Cuba. According to the Washington Post report from the time:

White House officials said the decision to lift travel and spending restrictions on Americans with family on the island will provide new support for the opponents of Raúl and Fidel Castro’s government. And they said lifting the ban on U.S. telecommunications companies reaching out to the island will flood Cuba with information while providing new opportunities for businesses. Obama left in place the broad trade embargo imposed on Cuba in 1962. But just days before leaving to attend a summit with the leaders of South and Central America, he reversed restrictions that barred U.S. citizens from visiting their Cuban relatives more than once every three years and lifted limits on the amount of money and goods Cuban Americans can send back to their families. He also cleared away virtually all U.S. regulations that had stopped American companies from attempting to bring their high-tech services and information to the island.

One of the major exceptions to sanctions for non-Cuban Americans is the education exchange. Ted Bromund touched on the issue here at COMMENTARY about a year ago. The Treasury Department explains a bit about how this works, here. In short, “each traveler must have a full-time schedule of educational exchange activities that will result in meaningful interaction between the travelers and individuals in Cuba.”

Not surprisingly, the idea of people-to-people and educational exchange appears to be interpreted liberally both by the Obama administration and by travel companies. This past week, I came across a “Journey to Cuba in 2013” brochure by the high-end travel company Travcoa. The brochure outlines a stellar 10-day itinerary, visiting Cienfugos, Santa Clara, Cayo Santa Maria, Remedios, the Bay of Pigs, Havana, and San Luis, all for around $7,000. The tourism must be great, but the educational opportunities appear fleeting: after lunch at a small paladar, the group can talk to its owner; at a small coastal village, talk to fisherman about fishing; visit a school and learn about Cuba’s education system; and visit a Santería priest to learn about the Santería religion. The museum guide at the Bay of Pigs will offer a Cuban perspective of that aborted invasion; while at another museum, guests can learn about Cuba’s efforts to promote literacy. At a Havana night club, tourists can learn about Cuban jazz.

I do not mean to diminish Travcoa—I’ve never been on their tours, but I know a number of people who have and speak very highly of their experience. The company is simply fulfilling a service to meet a demand, and it is not alone in doing so, as any Google search will indicate. The fact of the matter, though, is that the educational exchange the company promotes does not differ much from what tourists on non-educational trips to sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, or Central Asia might do.

Now, the wisdom of Cuba sanctions is another issue. I support the sanctions, and will push back on those who wish to dismantle them simply because they see them as a relic from the past. The major problem with lifting the sanctions at this point is that the main beneficiaries of tourist dollars will not be the Cuban people, but rather the government which owns and operates most of the tourist facilities at which most high-end tourists will stay. Indeed, from what I understand from Cuba watchers, it is not simply the government which is invested most deeply in these facilities but the Cuban military and Raul Castro himself. The idea of pumping money into an aging and decrepit dictatorship risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

If the Obama administration is going to lift sanctions, however, it should simply declare its intention to do so, and defend its position against its critics. The idea that it can, however, with sleight of hand and an educational exemption eviscerate the remaining barriers to infusing the Castro regime with hard currency is an insult to intelligence, and diminishes legitimate educational exchanges elsewhere.

Cuba Plans 'Announcement' on Alan Gross

Forward
Cuban officials have put U.S. media on alert that an announcement is imminent on the plight of Alan Gross, a Jewish contractor held in a Cuban jail for almost three years. The announcement is expected to be made the morning of November 28.  More >>

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James L. Berenthal/Associated Press - In this photo provided by James L. Berenthal, jailed American Alan Gross poses for a photo during a visit by Rabbi Elie Abadie and U.S. lawyer James L. Berenthal at Finlay military hospital in Havana, Cuba, Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012. T

JFK portrait found hidden in old frame

CBS 5 - KPHO

The Sideshow/ By Claudine Zap 

A $5 garage-sale find turned out to contain a hidden treasure worth thousands. Here's what happened.

Pam Dwyer of Glendale, Ariz., picked up a picture of a horse at a garage sale in Sun City. Dwyer's husband had a hunch they were getting something more. Dwyer told CBS 5, "He says, 'I just have this gut feeling that there's something behind that.'"

There was. An amazingly detailed and deftly drawn original portrait of John F. Kennedy, signed and dated from 1961.

The story gets odder. Dwyer did some research on the artist. Carmelo Soraci, she learned, was an infamous forger who did time for passing false checks, spending 21 years locked up in Dannemora Prison in New York, where he turned to a creative outlet of stained-glass making, which he discovered while "in college" inside.

The former forger redeemed himself by eventually building and installing stained-glass windows in the chapel at the prison, and was asked to do the same at Sing Sing Prison. He also apparently drew.

Dwyer took the portrait to an appraiser, who valued the piece at $2,500 to $5,000. "I'm happy with how much she was impressed by it," Dwyer said.

Dwyer added she would probably sell it—we're guessing not at a garage sale.

Behind the Israel's Iron Dome

Wall Street Journal/ Charles Levinson & Adam Entous

TEL AVIV—Israel's Iron Dome rocket-defense system spent the past two weeks successfully blasting Hamas rockets out of the sky—many in dramatic nighttime explosions—helping to end the recent hostilities between Israel and Hamas in just seven days.

The battle to build Iron Dome, however, lasted years and provided fireworks of its own.

Before Wednesday's cease-fire, Iron Dome knocked down 421 rockets launched from Gaza and bound for Israeli cities, an 84% success rate, according to the Israeli military. The system limited Israeli casualties to six during the seven days of bombardment. As a result, there was markedly less political pressure.

Also a Preliminary Evaluation  Here >>

Cuban-American Vote Explains Everything

Townhall.com/ Dennis Prager 

go.bloomberg.com

If you want to understand why President Obama was re-elected despite a largely unsuccessful presidency and almost unprecedentedly high and continuous unemployment, just look at the Cuban-American vote.

In fact, if you want to understand America today -- specifically, why it is in decline -- just look at the Cuban-American vote.

As reported in the Wall Street Journal, "The president captured 48 percent of the Cuban-American vote in Florida -- a record high for a Democrat."

Democratic presidential nominees went from 25 percent of the Cuban-American vote in 2000, to 29 percent in 2004, to 35 percent in 2008 to 48 percent on 2012.

We obviously have a dramatic trend here.

Now, why would that be?

There are two reasons: No experience of evil and American education.

The first generation of Cuban-Americans had escaped Communist evil. People who know evil are generally conservative. Leftism and liberalism -- no longer distinguishable -- are rooted in large measure in naivete and wishful thinking. The beliefs that people are basically good, and that evil regimes can almost always be negotiated with are two such examples.

Also, when you escape a Communist regime, you treasure liberty and you understand that as government and state expand, liberty must contract.

That is why Jews from the Soviet Union are the only non-Orthodox Jews who vote in the majority for Republicans. They, too, know evil, and they recognize the destructive appeal of a big, take-care-of-you, state.

The other reason for the dramatic shift in the Cuban-American vote is American education.

Most American elementary schools and high schools, and nearly all colleges and universities, teach everything that is significant from a liberal/left perspective. Multiculturalism has replaced E Pluribus Unum; the American past is villainous; the country is racist; morality is relative; and the left-wing cause of the day -- now global warming -- is taught as incontrovertible truth (ask your children if they have been shown Al Gore's global warming video, "An Inconvenient Truth," or if they have been taught both sides of the man-made-global-warming-leading-to-catastrophe hypothesis).

American schools, especially universities, are left-wing seminaries. The only difference between your local college and a Christian seminary is that the latter are more honest. The Christian seminary announces its goal -- to graduate committed Christians. The universities deceive when they say they have no agenda other than to open minds. They may believe this deception but it is one nevertheless. Almost no university ever has a conservative speaker at its commencement exercises; nearly every professor in liberal arts departments is a Democrat (and a left-wing Democrat at that), and on the few occasions that conservatives do receive an invitation to speak at a college, they are likely to be continuously heckled, may well need body guards, or their invitation is rescinded, as Fordham University did to Ann Coulter last week.

Members of the second Cuban-American generation have been far more influenced by their schools and by television shows than by their parents. And the same holds true for second and third and fourth and fifth generation Americans of every background.

A long time ago schools taught American history, not Politically Correct American history, as mandated, for example, by California law -- which forbids the use of any textbooks that do not emphasize the roles of women, blacks, Hispanics, gays, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered.

And a long time ago most Americans knew what America stood for and taught it to the next generation. In other words, even conservatives have largely forgotten either the distinctive American values system or how to communicate it. Meanwhile, the left has been utterly clear about what leftism stands for and has used schools, the news media and the entertainment media to transmit its values.

As a result, the American trinity of Liberty, In God We Trust, and E Pluribus Unum have been supplanted with egalitarianism, secularism, and multiculturalism -- Europe's trinity.

And that is why the children of Cuban-Americans, like the children of virtually every other group in America, including white Anglo-Saxon Protestant children, increasingly vote left.

Either conservatives -- from presidential candidates to the rest of us -- learn what we stand for and communicate it, or the greatest experiment in making a good society will come to its end.

84% de las playas cubanas afectadas por la erosion

www.americaeconomia.com/

telemundo51.com

La Habana. El 84% de las 413 playas cubanas sometidas a una investigación científica enfrenta "algún indicio de erosión" a causa del cambio climático, informaron este viernes especialistas del Instituto Nacional de Oceanología.

La investigación está dirigida a diseñar pronósticos para evaluar "la probable respuesta de los distintos perfiles de costas arenosas existentes en el país a la subida del nivel medio del mar", explicó el jefe del Departamento de Procesos Costeros de la institución, José Luis Juanes.

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Según el estudio, este proceso de erosión "responde en buena medida al aumento del nivel medio del mar y a las inadecuadas acciones practicadas por el hombre durante muchos años".

Entre esas acciones figuran la extracción de arena para fines diversos, la construcción de diferentes tipos de obras encima de las dunas y la incorrecta ubicación de espigones de entrada de canales y dársenas.

El experto aseveró que 35 playas de la isla caribeña están incluidas en una red de monitoreo nacional para detectar "las variaciones morfológicas y otras transformaciones que puedan ocurrir en esos ecosistemas, debido al efecto del cambio climático".

Cuba desarrolla un macroproyecto que hace pronósticos y busca medidas ante las penetraciones del mar y la erosión que estas puedan causar en las zonas de la costa del país para el período 2050-2100.

El pasado 25 de octubre, el huracán "Sandy" azotó el oriente cubano, donde transformó la costa y convirtió una playa en un litoral rocoso.

Rumania reclama a Cuba pago de 1,200 millones de deuda

la nota olvida mencionar las decenas de miles de jeeps "aro" y camiones de volteo "roman", que inundaron las carreteras cubanas a finales de los anos 80 y principios de los 90. como testimonio de la calidad de la industria automotriz de ceausescu, todos desaparecieron rapidamente del escenario convertidos en trastos inservibles.

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Finanzas.com/

Cuba adeuda unos 1.200 millones de dólares a Rumanía por los créditos concedidos a los "países amigos" durante el régimen comunista de Nicolae Ceausescu, informó hoy el diario local Adevarul con datos del Ministerio de Finanzas.

Según la administración pública, la deuda del país caribeño asciende a 1.300 millones de rublos soviéticos, utilizados hasta 1991, y que con la conversión de las autoridades rumanas supondrían unos 1.200 millones de dólares actuales.

La recuperación del dinero choca con el "absoluto rechazo de las autoridades cubanas, que acaparan el 100 % de la deuda rumana en rublos, a aceptar el inicio de las negociaciones para convenir el coeficiente de la conversión del rublo al dólar y establecer una modalidad de reembolso", precisa el Ministerio de Finanzas.

En total, Rumanía aún tiene que recuperar unos 2.355 millones de dólares de las deudas contraídas durante el pasado régimen comunista, y además de Cuba, los mayores deudores son Irak y Sudán, según las fuentes del Ministerio de Finanzas

A finales de los años 70 y a lo largo de la década de los 80, todos los productos de calidad rumanos (madera, cristal, alimentos) se exportaron para eliminar la deuda externa, lo que provocó malestar social entre la población.

Liberado Antonio Rodiles luego de 19 días de arresto

Redacción CaféFuerte/ Ivette Leyva Martínez

El activista político Antonio Rodiles fue liberado este lunes luego de 19 días de encarcelamiento en una estación policial de La Habana.

Rodiles, de 40 años, creador del proyecto alternativo Estado de SATS, e impulsor de la demanda cívica "Por Otra Cuba", pudo regresar a su casa esta tarde tras recibir una multa de 800 pesos cubanos. Las autoridades aceptaron el cambio de medida que había solicitado su abogada.

"Estamos aquí todos, él está reunido con su abogada ahora, lo trajimos en el carro y acabamos de llegar a la casa", confirmó a CaféFuerte el escritor Angel Santiesteban.

Su detención junto a varios activistas y blogueros, el pasado 7 de noviembre, generó una amplia campaña de apoyo internacional.  Amnistía Internacional abogó por su excarcelación y fue nominado al Premio Héroes de la Libertad de Expresión, auspiciado por la organización Index on Censorship y que anualmente distingue a personas y grupos que hayan demostrado valor y creatividad en la defensa de la libertad de expresión.

Santiesteban divulgó este lunes una carta pública a Raúl Castro, pidiendo la excarcelación inmediata de Rodiles. El escritor también fue arrestado durante la manifestación a favor de la abogada Yaremis Flores, pero fue liberado cuatro días después de la detención.

De la veintena de manifestantes que fueron capturados, Rodiles fue el activista que más tiempo permaneció en prisión, confinado a una celda de la estación policial de Acosta, municipio Diez de Octubre, en la capital cubana.

Durante el arresto, Rodiles fue fuertemente golpeado. Una foto tomada en el calabozo y enviada misteriosamente a su casa el pasado 16 de noviembre mostraba los golpes descritos por sus familiares.