
{"id":294860,"date":"2024-01-19T15:56:26","date_gmt":"2024-01-19T20:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/?p=294860"},"modified":"2024-01-19T15:56:26","modified_gmt":"2024-01-19T20:56:26","slug":"political-paradoxes-in-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/opinion\/columns\/in-plain-words\/political-paradoxes-in-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Political paradoxes in 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">According to the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/cuba\/letra-del-ano-2024-alerta-sobre-el-abuso-hacia-las-mujeres-y-el-incremento-de-actividades-delictivas\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Letter of the Yorubas<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, this year comes under the aegis of Eleggu\u00e1, the one who opens paths, and Oy\u00e1, queen of cemeteries and hurricane winds. Let\u2019s say, conflicting forces that, far from diminishing, reaffirm the contradictory nature of the real world and, instead of simplifying, make the vision of the future more complex.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In such conditions, it is not strange that the voluntarism of several politicians and the linear rationalism of some intellectuals converge, each in their own way, to obscure the present and above all confuse the exercise of predicting and the vocation of preaching. As if examining what happens was the same as giving an opinion and putting each person\u2019s wishes first; as if there were no way to elucidate where we are and where we are going without taking sides from the start.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the other hand, the priests of the Regla de Ocha, more modestly, give an account of what the <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">oddun<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> indicate, instead of putting their speculations and opinions above what the conchs say.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A simple inspection of the large-scale board that is the world today reveals what could be called the paradox of democracy: the more its defense as a doctrine and a global ideological banner extends, the larger the fissures that emerge in its practical exercise, even in countries considered paradigmatic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a former colonial metropolis and model of democracy like the United Kingdom, the head of government (not elected by universal and direct suffrage, but by his party), himself the son of ex-colonial immigrants, is not only advocating closing immigrants\u2019 entry, but <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.swissinfo.ch\/spa\/afp\/el-primer-ministro-brit%C3%A1nico-dice-que-su-plan-para-expulsar-a-migrantes-a-ruanda--funcionar%C3%A1-\/49040458\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>exporting them<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, as if they were toxic waste, to Rwanda, an African country characterized by insecurity and violence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The republic that was born from a great revolution, under the motto of Liberty, equality, fraternity, and that previously experienced the fiercest religious wars in the West, has experienced <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/es.euronews.com\/2023\/09\/23\/francia-manifestaciones-contra-el-racismo-y-la-violencia-policial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>conflicts<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0of intolerance, religious violence and the rise of racism that reach record numbers, after a year of incessant street demonstrations in defense of <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.france24.com\/es\/francia\/20230901-francia-entra-en-vigor-la-controvertida-reforma-pensional-promovida-por-macron\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>retirement rights<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, while the government prepares to celebrate the <\/span>Olympic Games<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, as if nothing were happening.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the democracy considered the oldest in the world, people concentrate on their main political ritual: <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/tag\/elecciones-2024-en-eeuu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>elections<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, which divide the population into two halves, in which a pair of candidates compete who accuse each other of being \u201ccommunist\u201d and \u201cNazi\u201d respectively; that is, totalitarians.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If that were not enough, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/tag\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>one of them<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, subject to several judicial processes for <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.citizensforethics.org\/reports-investigations\/crew-reports\/trumps-91-criminal-charges-and-where-they-stand\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>more than 90 charges<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (including inciting violence against the established powers), reaches astonishing <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/projects.fivethirtyeight.com\/polls\/favorability\/donald-trump\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>popularity<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0levels.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_294863\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-294863\" style=\"width: 1920px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-294863\" src=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1226\" srcset=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-300x192.jpg 300w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-1024x654.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-768x490.jpg 768w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-1536x981.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-750x479.jpg 750w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/elecciones-eeuu-efe-1-1140x728.jpg 1140w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-294863\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Raygun store in Des Moines, Iowa, on January 11, 2024. Photo: EFE\/EPA\/Justin Lane.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The latest thing in Latin America and the Caribbean, and also in the United States, is that politics is \u201cjudicialized.\u201d In Peru, Colombia and recently in Guatemala, the Prosecutor\u2019s Office, which is supposed to be independent as a judicial power, and the Congress, dominated by the right, have hindered the elected president and his inauguration, responding to the interest of a conservative establishment worthy of the 1970s. Let\u2019s say that two of the powers conspire to block the third, and legalize a certain type of coup d\u2019\u00e9tat against the elected president, as they have just done with Bernardo Ar\u00e9valo in Guatemala, the first president to take office <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/actualidadsur.com.ar\/2024\/01\/16\/con-una-jura-de-madrugada-arevalo-se-prepara-para-la-adopcion-de-medidas-dificiles\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>at dawn<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> because the others did not let him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To the extent that U.S. politics has become \u201cpopulistized,\u201d not only have Trump followers attempted to coerce, in the best style of a banana republic, established institutions (as in the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/tag\/asalto-al-capitolio\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>assault on Congress<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">); Democrats have also sought to use the courts (including the Supreme Court) to remove their opponents from the game.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lastly, the international system (not the institutional order, but those who, as the Yoruba would say, \u201ccut the cod\u201d) is not much more democratic and distributed than it was in the years of the Cold War.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, two years ago <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/tag\/war-in-ukraine\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Russia invaded Ukraine<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, a sovereign country whose territory does not belong to it, invoking reasons of national security. The Western alliance has blocked Moscow with <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/International_sanctions_during_the_Russo-Ukrainian_War\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>all types of sanctions,<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> economic, political-diplomatic, and demonizes its leadership in terms similar to the anti-communist rhetoric of the worst moment of the Cold War (although it is not precisely the RCP that governs Russia).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For its part, Israel, in response to the attack by an organization that does not represent the State or the nation, unleashes the bloodiest <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/tag\/palestine\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>massacre of Palestinian civilians<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in history in just one hundred days, on a territory that does not belong to it. Although questioned by the international community, Israel does not suffer United Nations sanctions nor is it ostracized by the main powers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The last trendy feature of democracy is that the right becomes popular, to the point of winning elections. This is a right that exploits nationalism and prides itself on rejecting dialogue, the same in Taiwan as in the Republic of Korea or Argentina. So anticipating a 2024 in which 70 countries are expected to vote on their positions is not exactly an optimistic outlook.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_294864\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-294864\" style=\"width: 1920px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-294864\" src=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-750x500.jpg 750w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/taiwan-elecciones-efe-1-1140x760.jpg 1140w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-294864\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Taiwan election officials count votes during the 2024 general elections, in New Taipei city, Taiwan, on January 13, 2024. Photo: EFE\/EPA\/Ritchie B. Tongo.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The second paradox, closely related to the previous one, would be that of security, according to the memorable phrase of the illustrious President Woodrow Wilson: \u201cCreate a safer world for democracy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the time of the Cold War, which some historians consider in force, the main perception of threat among the governments of our hemisphere was, supposedly, communism and pro-Cuban or pro-Chinese guerrillas. The remedy to avoid them, as is known, was the hypertrophy of the armed forces and their internal political role, which led to a chain of military dictatorships that spread between Central America and the Southern Cone, which completely ended the democracies themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The second main security concern, especially for the United States, the Soviet-Cuban alliance, had climaxed with the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/tag\/crisis-de-los-misiles\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Missile Crisis<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and would have lasted until the Central American wars, where there were no Soviet or Cuban troops, but there was the political lure that the countries of the isthmus were going to become \u201csatellites of the USSR.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Returning to the present, it turns out that during the last twenty years, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.americasquarterly.org\/russo-latin-american-arms-sales\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Russia has sold weapons<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and in some cases military advice, to numerous countries in the region (Argentina, Brazil, Nicaragua, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico) without the United States expressing concern or rejection. Paradoxically, all of those countries have had more recent Russian military cooperation than Cuba.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the other hand, as is known, China became the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cfr.org\/backgrounder\/china-influence-latin-america-argentina-brazil-venezuela-security-energy-bri\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>main trading partner<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of the largest economies in the region.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although some political analysts resist recognizing these differences \u2014 and many others \u2014 with the Cold War period, the main national security problem \u2014 and a real threat to democracies in Latin America \u2014 is no longer \u201ccommunism,\u201d nor is it Russia or China. In the absence of military dictatorships, the main threat is organized crime.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_294865\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-294865\" style=\"width: 1920px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-294865\" src=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-750x500.jpg 750w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rusia-efe-1-1140x760.jpg 1140w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-294865\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Announcement of the 2024 presidential elections in Saint Petersburg, Russia, January 11, 2024. Photo: EFE\/EPA\/Anatoly Maltsev.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let\u2019s say that the Yoruba Letter, among whose main precautions is \u201cthe increase in criminal activities,\u201d seems to be more focused than many independent observers on the hemispheric reality. Indeed, Latin America and the Caribbean closed 2023 as the region with the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.swissinfo.ch\/spa\/onu-homicidios_la-tasa-de-homicidios-de-los-pa%C3%ADses-de-am%C3%A9rica-latina-y-caribe\/49042834\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>highest homicide rate in the world<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Among the countries with the largest population, this rate has decreased in some cases (Mexico) but remains high (Colombia, Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico). What is new, however, is that it has grown in other countries considered safe until now, such as Chile, Costa Rica, and dramatically, Ecuador, where the homicide rate <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.swissinfo.ch\/spa\/ecuador-violencia--tema-de-fin-de-a%C3%B1o-_ecuador-toc%C3%B3-fondo-en-2023-y-termin%C3%B3-como-el-pa%C3%ADs-m%C3%A1s-violento-de-am%C3%A9rica-latina\/49094482#:~:text=Ecuador%20toc%C3%B3%20fondo%20en%202023,Am%C3%A9rica%20Latina%20%2D%20SWI%20swissinfo.ch\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><b>exceeded that of the rest of the region<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If we land these paradoxes in the Cuban circumstance, we would have a group of contrasts, in themselves also paradoxical.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In terms of human safety, according to data from the same source cited above <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/instituciones.sld.cu\/fatesa\/files\/2022\/11\/Anuario-Estad%C3%ADstico-de-Salud-2021.-Ed-2022.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>and from the Ministry of Public Health<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, the homicide rate would have grown from 4.42 per 100,000 inhabitants (2019) to 5.13 (2021), which places the island in 31st place among the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. Although the increase would be within the parameters that were recorded within the framework of COVID-19 (in the United States, homicides increased 29% in 2020-2021), the main difference is in the organized crime factor.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.elnuevoherald.com\/noticias\/america-latina\/cuba-es\/article279289984.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>commentators who address the issue<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> overlook that, if it is a comparison with Latin America and the Caribbean, and with the United States, this notable difference cannot be ignored: despite being in the heart of the Caribbean, on the routes of the historical drug trafficking to the United States, and the main industry is tourism, no law enforcement agency in the United States or other countries has been able to document the existence of organized crime networks on the island. This is a fundamental factor that explains, according to specialized sources (<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/insightcrime.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Insight Crime<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">), half of the murders in the region.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If, as some say, Miami is the second city in Cuban population, it would be worth mentioning that the homicide rate there triples the national average, and that in 2022 it was 18.6 (per 100,000 inhabitants), three quarters of which were caused by firearms. Above Mexico City, and the national rate of countries such as El Salvador, Panama, Nicaragua, Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Peru, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Cuba, Chile, Bolivia.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_294866\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-294866\" style=\"width: 1920px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-294866\" src=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-750x500.jpg 750w, https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/el-salvador-efe-1-1140x760.jpg 1140w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-294866\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of NGOs, human rights activists, war veterans and relatives of detainees under the emergency regime demonstrate against Nayib Bukele on January 14, 2024, during the commemoration of the 32nd anniversary of the signing of the Peace Accords, in San Salvador. Photo: EFE\/Rodrigo Sura.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The other relevant difference in human safety for comparison with Cuba is police violence. According to the FBI, U.S. police <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2024\/jan\/08\/2023-us-police-violence-increase-record-deadliest-year-decade\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>killed 1,232 people<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (a record number in more than a decade) in 2023, a quarter of whom were African Americans. Despite the lack of statistical transparency that many of us criticize the Cuban State for, and the continuous complaints on social media by opponents about abuses, violations of rights, etc., no one would believe that the Cuban police are even shooting at dangerous criminals, much less at dissidents. Curious paradox: lack of transparency and certainty, all mixed together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This brief space is not enough for me to expand on the Cuban paradoxes, not even restricting myself to those in the political field.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The fair examination of Cuban political issues, the contradictory process of the reforms, relations with the United States, the migratory flow and its complex factors, the ups and downs of a civic culture lost in daily life, the decline in participation, the dynamics of a consensus crossed like never before by dissent, the agitation of the public sphere, and many other tensions inherent to the transition, fill common sense with perplexities.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This formidable field of problems becomes fodder for all possible interpreters, whether the leader of a jazz band or a priest, a filmmaker or the owner of an SME, a retired doctor or a novel writer. All of them can have more instant credit than political analysis, especially when it stops before these problems as before an opaque, inscrutable object, before which many resort to the simple formula of attributing everything to the same, repeated cause: \u201cthe ideology.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I propose returning to that political and not merely ideological analysis in future rounds. I just want to note that the first thing, I believe, is to overcome the arrogance and the pretension of know-it-alls with which our problems and their causes are addressed, following the advice of the If\u00e1 priests: \u201cBe respectful of the differences between human beings to avoid unnecessary conflicts and disagreements.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Of all the premonitions and lessons that the Letter highlights, in addition to warning about the rise of \u201cfalse testimonies,\u201d I stick with the one that says: \u201cIgnorance makes a free man a slave.\u201d Perhaps we are all trapped in the web of a political culture that has not changed enough.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The more the defense of democracy as a doctrine and a global ideological banner extends, the larger the fissures that emerge in its practical exercise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3343,"featured_media":294862,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[34473],"tags":[19256],"ppma_author":[34051],"class_list":["post-294860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-plain-words","tag-featured"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Political paradoxes in 2024 | OnCubaNews English<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The more the defense of democracy as a doctrine and a global ideological banner extends, the larger the fissures that emerge in its practical exercise.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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