Iran would be such an example. Sure Iranians can't pick the Supreme Leader, but they can choose the representatives and president who clearly differ in opinions and will go through with policies that other elected representatives wouldn't. There's no way the Conservatives would have gone through with the nuclear deal had they been in power.

Iran is considerably more democratic than Cuba. They choose the people who choose the Supreme Leader, for a start. They also aren't restricted to a single party.

Also, loyalists to the Supreme Leader ran the majlis until this year. They would just have been fighting the president on the nuclear deal. They swore to tear it up if they'd won this year's election, and Rouhani made a coalition around preserving it, which won.

And no, Cubans DON'T have more sway over their politics. There are countless ways to become politically involved in the US. Cuba can't say the same.

An interesting three pages. I haven't been to Cuba, but have friends who have been there, for work as well as the go to a new country experience.
There seems to be an assumption that the USA has a moral superiority over Cuba based on freedoms.. Political and economic.
I note that none of those contributors.expressing views consistent with this assumption, advocating it, have discussed the Good Works by that purportedly morally superior USA nation and government, going on over many years at Guantanamo Bay. The Bay of Pigs got a brief mention
Guantanamo Bay... USA's Cuban Liberty Bell writ large.

My award for the most understated irony ? goes to Octavious. I read the ding dong over per capita income stats etc, and just loved the way Octavious chips in with the observation that there are various data sets available and there has been selective use of statistical information to suit various propositions.
Irony ? / not really satirical ? Just a casual understated truth.

Castro: "Give us Guantanemo"
Eisenhower: "Uh...nah"
Castro: "Ah, damn, ya got me. Keep it"

If we'd handed over Gitmo when Castro asked, it may have turned into a UMAP. American use of it between then and 2002 was primarily to help people.

I can only presume that the individuals expressing the view that Cuba has anything approaching "democracy" are engaged in satire, trolling or both.

And the USA has been using it ever since...and putting on such a wonderful example of this a purported moral superiority based on political freedom, rule of law, presumption of guilt, oops, Constitutional rights of the individual protected.... Guantanamo Bay, the satirical grotesque tragedy, glad you find it amusing TyPrado

The chaps at the undertakers are looking at the biggest corpse they've ever seen.. Huge bloke way too big for any coffin they stock.So trying to divert the conversation with the family from the coffin they cannot supply they ask about the deceased person. They are told that the deceased was "full.of moral authority" and the undertakers are immediately relieved ..as soon as they are out of the grieving families hearing the murmured solution is agreed upon. Prick the blighter with a needle, let out all that hot air, and use a shoebox for the deflated corpse

No one claimed the US is morally perfect. It doesn't have to be to stand up and condemn the horrors of Fidel Castro. We didn't lock people up for being gay and instead of jailing draft dodgers we just elected one president earlier this month.

"We didn't lock people up for being gay"

"Didn't" is a strong word. The first US state to decriminalize gay sex did so in 1962.

No, an implied relative moral.superiority is different from an implied moral.perfection. if distorting my statements is required to then create the illusion of a rebuttal, TyPrado then it is you who is the person peddling falsehoods.

@ TrPrado: You're going to play the gay rights card?

Homosexual sex across the whole of Cuba was legalised in 1979 - at that time, gay sex between two men was still outlawed as "sodomy" in the majority of US states. As many as 14 US states only legalised gay sex in 2003 (after being forced to do so by the Supreme Court, following the Lawrence v Texas judgement).

Gay sex still carries a jail sentence of up to 15 years in Michigan, despite Lawrence v Texas:

http://www.thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/johnwright/michigan_senate_passes_bill_saying_sodomy_is_a_felony

Oh I'm sorry, grabbing men off the street for being effeminate. Guess I wasn't clear enough.

Also, conscientious objection is strictly illegal in Cuba. The US has recognized it as a right in varying degrees for centuries.

Accessing the Internet from the privacy of your home is illegal :)

But the care the Cuban government gives its people by far surpasses what the US government allows Americans. Sure Americans have more of a freedom to campaign for various causes, but at the end of the day the corporations that control the politicians they elect will never act in their favor unless forced to do so, and that does not happen often. Cuba on the other hand with its universal healthcare and education system. Yes I realize that living in the US means there's just so much more to do and more opportunities to voice your opinion, but there are also millions of unemployed, millions that are homeless, and millions that can't afford access to medicine. It would be easy for me, a person whose parents are both university professors, to say that the US is a better place. I can afford a decent life style because of them. People who can't would not prefer the US and I imagine they'd prefer Cuba. If you could get them to believe socialism isn't evil of course...

It just depends on the life you live I think. It's easy to speak ill of Cuba when your country is a large, rich, and powerful one. But Cubans didn't have the same opportunities many Western countries had. This was by far their best option, and to speak of it in a disrespectful way is just wrong. Especially, and dear God I can't stress this enough, if you're from some Western imperialist power. I'm not saying criticizing shouldn't happen. Criticize all you want its your right. What I mean is you really don't have the right to look down on Cuba's government and its wrongdoings as if you have the moral higher ground that Cuba lacks. Hypocrisy is just annoying at times.

"but at the end of the day the corporations that control the politicians they elect will never act in their favor unless forced to do so, and that does not happen often"
You underestimate public outcry and the power of pestering politicians over the phone.

"People who can't would not prefer the US and I imagine they'd prefer Cuba"
Heaven forbid they be political dissidents though.

"This was by far their best option, and to speak of it in a disrespectful way is just wrong."
So I can't decry the injustices of any given country? I can't argue that we DON'T have the best possible Cuba (not for the US, for Cubans)? Especially because I was born and raised in a country which wrongly intervened in the affairs of certain other countries?

Would you tell someone like Yoani Sánchez that she was kidnapped and beaten by the "best option" for her home country?

Yes you can. What you can't do is assume that any wrongdoings the Cuban government has done even compares to what the US government has done. To even think of comparing them is ridiculous. There's a difference of millions of dead all over the world. No comparison whatsoever.

Millions. From South America to Africa to the Middle East to South East Asia. All over the world the death toll of American imperialism is in the millions.

Khrushchev not listening to Castro about attacking the US with nuclear weapons is the only reason Cuba's isn't in the billions.

You've been repeating that a lot.
Castro asked Khrushchev to CONSIDER nuking the the U.S IF the US invaded Cuba with the objective of subjugating Cuba once again. Now it's great it didn't happen, and I wouldn't have wanted that to happen had the US actually invaded Cuba. But it was his country he wanted to protect. He did not tell Khrushchev to just nuke the US for the hell of it. He was asked to consider it in case the US invaded Cuba. Not something I particularly like to be honest. BUT, let's not forget the US nuked Japan just because Japan would not completely surrender to the US. Castro's reasons are more fair, though yes the outcome would have been completely shit for all of us.

That's my one and only time bringing it up, actually.

The dangers of the nuclear bomb were only clear after first uses. And Japanese soldiers weren't going to surrender at all. Many didn't even after the country itself gave up. Some found excuses to fight against the former Allied forces with other groups.