From: Bill Lucy 

In article ,
rgparker{at}west.net says...
MPG.1383e0abfbb44cf9989877{at}news.barkto.com>, note these cogitations
> from blucy{at}mediaone.net Bill Lucy:
> > I still don't believe there's a huge gap between freedom in Cuba and
freedom
> > here.
>
> Bill, how can you say that? Have you really seriously thought about
> this?

Yes, I've spent almost 30 years thinking about it. On a day to day basis, I
don't think a person would notice whether they were in Cuba or Puerto Rico,
unless they were told where they were.

> There are plenty of things that get said in this forum that would land a
> Cuban in jail.

How many of them are said? I heard an interesting statistic yesterday --
there are less than 500,000 Americans who actively participate in any
political process. That's less than 2/10% of the population. Some who have
been in the past are in jail -- and not because of any violent crime (in
some cases for no crime at all except association).

So we're really back to the relativistic argument. It's *relatively* safer
to open your mouth here than there. And if you are politically active in
the Communist Party, you are better off, even if you do open your mouth.

> There are huge numbers of books on sale at Amazon that the government of
> Cuba wouldn't let its people read.

There are books on sale at Amazon that local governments won't allow
children to read.

> >I have no doubt that I could do something fairly innocuous here that
> > would curtail many of my rights.
>
> This country has its flaws, no doubt. But you can at least learn just
> about any ideas you want to learn and the list of things that you can
> say that would land you in jail is pretty short I think.
>
> Plus, their is this not-so-small matter of personal property.

Unlike some, I don't place that much value on personal property.

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