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Originally posted by chellim1:

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I have seen reports that the working girls have gone back to work, and for just a few bucks a pop. Those greenbacks are valuable in the worker's paradise.

Hookers and blow!

Hookers and rum?

https://ss.sites.mtu.edu/mhugl...n-resettlement-1980/

"From 15 April to 31 October 1980, hordes of refugees crossed the US border by sea, these were called “The Freedom Flotilla.” What many Midwesterners thought would never affect them became a stark reality for those in Monroe Country, Wisconsin. Approximately 15,000 Cuban refugees flooded Fort McCoy, an active duty Army Installation as a part of the greater resettlement effort. This marked the beginning of an event which would change the perception of the United States military for the rest of time. The United States military was now taking on a humanitarian effort, at a scale it had never seen; converting a peacetime facility, which was being used regularly for training both active duty military, national guardsmen, and US Army reservists, into a haven for people abandoned by their own country."

The Gulf Stream does funny things.

I can remember seeing the remnants of makeshift rafts on Canaveral National Seashore beaches in the eighties and nineties. Constructs of scrap plywood, styrofoam, tar, rope.

It was and is very sobering to realize what people had risked to escape communism in Cuba and Haiti. It always made me wonder if the people on these made it to shore alive.

Cuban Government has begun jamming portions of the 40 meters Amateur Radio band (7.150 MHZ) which Cuban citizens used to report daily happenings to expats or families in the US.

A throw back to the Soviets jamming the VOA broadcasts from the US into Eastern Europe in the Cold War days.

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posted July 16, 2021 08:45 AM Hide Post
https://ss.sites.mtu.edu/mhugl...n-resettlement-1980/

"From 15 April to 31 October 1980, hordes of refugees crossed the US border by sea, these were called “The Freedom Flotilla.” What many Midwesterners thought would never affect them became a stark reality for those in Monroe Country, Wisconsin. Approximately 15,000 Cuban refugees flooded Fort McCoy, an active duty Army Installation as a part of the greater resettlement effort. This marked the beginning of an event which would change the perception of the United States military for the rest of time. The United States military was now taking on a humanitarian effort, at a scale it had never seen; converting a peacetime facility, which was being used regularly for training both active duty military, national guardsmen, and US Army reservists, into a haven for people abandoned by their own country."

^^^^^^^^^^^^^
If I recall it was called the Marielle boat lift and Castro basically emptied his prisons and mentally ill as a good part of the 15,000.

Trump speaking to the Cuban-American National Foundation in 1999.

"Castro's jails are full of dissidents, his graveyards are full of patriots, and his government is full of thugs".

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
If I recall it was called the Marielle boat lift and Castro basically emptied his prisons and mentally ill as a good part of the 15,000.

Correct.
While there was a good number of Cuban's who were 'allowed' to leave who genuinely recognized the new opportunity by coming to the US, a not insignificant chunk of the other parts of the group were criminals, menntaly ill and largely unemployable; there wasn't a lot of women but, a lot of 'working age men'. The criminals did what they always do prey on their community, the mentally ill become a burden on the medical communities as a whole, and the unemployable are limited to menial jobs, add in a language barrier and their activities can border on criminal.

Miami with its large existing Cuban population absorbed most of the refugees, bloating the population of low-skilled workers which in-turn saw a spike in crime; combined with the Overton & Liberty City riots, made Miami a hot spot of criminal activity in the 80's. The prison riots in Arkansas and Atlanta, where the worst of the bunch were kept, resulted in the US Army sending SOF-units in to quell the violence and unrest. I believe Clinton was gov then and this was a major issue during his election campaigns.