Obama's Cuba deal & North Korea's Hacking.

Two Stories deserve
one article.

President  Obama decided to break 50 years of sanctions against Cuba . First of all I don't argue that the the 50 years of sanctions against Cuba made any difference . They were such a waste of diplomacy for America through out the cold war years .  The fire storm with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) joined with other Republicans on Wednesday who condemned President Barack Obama's decision to open diplomatic relations with Cuba."Make no mistake, although we are glad (former prisoner Alan Gross) is now free, the agreement the Obama Administration has entered into with the Castro regime has done nothing to resolve the underlying problem," Cruz, who is Cuban-American, said in a statement. "Indeed, it has made it worse."---  My view is I like that the sanctions against Cuba are going away , but the whole think stinks of hypocrisy . Its sending a mixed message, it's almost a slap in the face of Russia . The timing of President Barack Obama's Cuba announcement is kind of noteworthy, isn't it? Particularly if you're Russian President Vladimir Putin.Yesterday, the White House said Obama would a sign a bill that adds further sanctions to the Russian economy, which stemmed from the Kremlin's foray into Ukraine earlier this year.Today, Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro surprised the world by announcing that the U.S. will work toward establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba and easing an embargo that has been in place for almost a year longer than Obama has been alive. It was, on paper, the biggest debt write-off in Russian history. President Vladimir Putin’s government agreed to reduce ***Cuba’s debt to $3.2 billion from $32 billion, payable in equal installments over the next 10 years.This gives us an idea of how deeply the old Soviet Union was involved in maintaining Communist Cuba’s livelihood in the face of a hostile U.S. Meanwhile Obama has a rather difficult battle with Congress , But Republicans, and even some

As a "gesture" of  defiance , President Obama
takes a whiff of a Cuban Cigar .

Democrats, pushed back strongly, with some GOP heavy hitters calling Obama's plan “another concession to tyranny.”Just hours after Obama announced that a prisoner swap with the Cuban government for two Americans was the start of a new relationship with the communist country, Republicans began informally kicking around ideas to stop any changes to the U.S.-Cuba relationship. This part is interesting . Ending the embargo against Cuba could be a good thing if "Capitalism" gets a foot hold on Cuba . It's in a way vary much like  what happened  to China when President Nixon back in the 1970's opened the road for China . What specifically this Cuba move has to do with US policy towards Russia is debatable, but its not even being debated. Instead its nonstop yammering about Cuban cigars, tourism, extradition treaties, the Pope, etc. -- anything and everything but Russia. But afaic, the underlying message from Obama et. al. to Russia is, "We kept Cuba under embargo for over sixty years, we can do the same to you". Clearly the US has declared wrongfully a cold war on Russia, the only question is, whether its based on something truly substantive that Russia did, which once again the US media isn't talking about, worst of all it sends a wrong message to the world. Regardless ...........

NORTH KOREA STRIKES BACK! ?

This Movie should have been
a HBO special . ( Poster for film
The Interview )

What I am about to say might just make you all think that I am un-American , or such . Hearing President Obama defend this film for what it is worth is a double standard. A few years back during the Arab spring President Obama was "condemning " a anti - Islamic film that had made fun of Islam's Prophet Muhammad . Now the flip side . You have to look at this situation . It's clearly a mind game that makes no sense at all . The Hollywood elites don't care about ethics , for them anything goes . Movies about assassinations are not  new . This film makes a distinction of being a offending comedy. I saw some portions of it , that look like anti-communist  propaganda of the cold war days . yea , its funny rather scatological in nature , but plain dumb.    It's puzzling to me , so worth commenting here about .  I am SORRY to say this REGARDLESS of FREE SPEECH I am siding with the North Korean's on this one. I don't think North Korea did it . First of all Sony should have pulled the plug on this film , what is wrong with this film is that it is advocating assassinating a political figure who is alive . It might be a comedy , but the heavy handed dictatorship in North Korea did not think it was funny . How would we as American's like it if some other country made a movie about assassinating our President? Who thought that making this movie was a good idea? I feel like there was a missed/overlooked production step between pitching the idea and giving it the "okay" to film...I'm likely going to get a lot of hate for this but can we take a minute and just think, what if another country (doesn't even have to be a religious state, let's just say like Switzerland) made a movie about sending their celebrities to assassinate the CURRENT American President. I sincerely doubt USA would take that lightly. I don't shed a tear for the SONY cooperation Sony got what it deserved , they knew that it was risky, had all the warnings.. The hacking may have been retaltory .Remember there can be limits on speech here in America which has been a debate pretty much with the Supreme Court . While North Korea has expressed displeasure in the past for shows like South Park that make fun of them, those shows never took it as far as this movie did. They weren't just making a joke about the country, they didn't just go there for an interview and weird things happened along the way; this is a comedy about assassinating their leader. The fact that it's a comedy makes it even worse. Kim Jong-Un doesn't deserve respect due to the fact that he allows so much shit to happen to the citizens of North Korea, but did everyone in the making of this movie seriously think this would be a good idea and that it wouldn't piss anyone off? The Movie named "The Interview" is about the CIA puts the two deeply unqualified men on a mission to assassinate Kim during their trip.The end of the movie reportedly shows Kim exploding in a helicopter with Katy Perry’s “Firework” playing in the background. All threats against a world leader can and will be taken seriously. Obama has 24/7 security for a reason.  (1)> Sony pulling the film was taken just as seriously , we've  even  had <>  George Clooney making some interesting remarks on the speech issue . His point is why are we letting a Dictator wag his finger on us on what we can see or do. For me it just a matter of  morality .  

WHO HACKED SONY?

¹ The New York Times reported this evening that North Korea is “centrally involved” in the hack, citing unnamed U.S. intelligence officials. It’s unclear from the Times report what “centrally involved” means and whether the intelligence officials are saying the hackers were state-sponsored or actually agents of the state. The Timesalso notes that “It is not clear how the United States came to its determination that the North Korean regime played a central role in the Sony attacks.” The public evidence pointing at the Hermit Kingdom is flimsy.Despite all of this, media outlets won’t let the North Korea narrative go and don’t seem to want to consider other options. If there’s anything years of Law and Order reruns should tell us, it’s that focusing on a single suspect can lead to exclusionary bias where clues that contradict the favored theory get ignored. North Korea has repeatedly denied any connection to it (after all, it's a country that's fond of threatening to turn enemy nations into a "sea of flames")."There's no evidence pointing to North Korea, not even the barest of hints," Robert Graham, CEO of Errata Security, told Tom's Guide. "Some bit of code was compiled in Korea — but that's South Korean (which is banned in North Korea). Sure, they used threats to cancel The Interview — but after the FBI said they might."

NOTES AND COMMENTS:
***Definitely the Cubans will have new found economic wealth because there will be Americans coming in, the Americans will bring in US dollars and so forth. I think the Cuban government has shown throughout 54 years to be very shrewd, and they will take advantage of this. America's embargo policy is an abject failure. The original purpose of the embargo was to keep the economic status quo, and keep the expropriated properties safe until regime change. Regime change never came. People began to care less about their old home and businesses. Decades of watching their former neighbors suffer in Cuba as they prospered in Miami has softened their hatred and anger. Study Eastern Europe, communism collapsed through direct economic engagement. Communism will also collapse in Cuba. <> Clooney said this in a Deadline interview : " The South Park guys did it. They blew up his father’s head. The truth of the matter is, of course you should be able to make any movie you want. And, you should take the ramifications for it. Meaning, people can boycott the movie and not go see your film. They can say they’ll never see a Sony movie again. That’s all fine. That’s the risk you take for the decision you make. But to say we’re going to make you pull it. We’re going to censor you. That’s a whole other game. That is playing in some serious waters and it’s a very dangerous pool ". (1)> This is why theaters pulled back after receiving terrorists threats. If a theater runs the movie – and something does happen – they will likely face a class action suit on behalf of any victims.