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Rating: 
Summary: Hard to Read harder to Believe
Review: Fidel Castro Lover of Humanity? This book is a poor excuse for a bad propaganda piece. Castro rails at capitalism but refuses to point the finger at the real culprit of Cuba's economic demise (himself). Only some lunatic and blind socialist could read this book without bending over from laughter or being totally revolted. Those who still believe Castro' or his revolution are anything but an abject failure or a crime against humanity will undoubtedly enjoy this trash. His statistics are not independently corrobarated, but that won't matter to any good socialist.
Rating: 
Summary: not hard to believe & easy to read
Review: I enjoyed most of this book - it started to get old towards the end because Castro recycles material from earlier speeches. Nevertheless, I would recommend this book to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: A light that illuminates the contemporary world.
Review: I read Castro's book as part of an ongoing series in my attempt to make sense out of the jumble of political puzzle pieces strewn aroud in my head. Only now after many books, many articles and finally this compilation of Castro's speeches can I say that I have a good idea of the picture that is emerging out of the welter of political "spin" that clouds our contemporary world.I should have read this book three years ago when I started this mammouth mind-puzzle but I did not know that the book even existed. Had I known, it would have saved much time because Castro says what all the other writers say but in a far more concise manner. I know, I know-there will be many who dismiss this comment because they believe that a marxist socialist can never be believed even when he is quoting United Nation's facts and figures; however, his facts, figures and interpretations are repeated over and over again by other writers from other countries on other continents. The sum of the information is just too great to ignore-read this wonderful, concise volume and you will be much the wiser for your effort.
Rating:
Summary: A light that illuminates the contemporary world.
Review: I read Castro's book as part of an ongoing series in my attempt to make sense out of the jumble of political puzzle pieces strewn aroud in my head. Only now after many books, many articles and finally this compilation of Castro's speeches can I say that I have a good idea of the picture that is emerging out of the welter of political "spin" that clouds our contemporary world. I should have read this book three years ago when I started this mammouth mind-puzzle but I did not know that the book even existed. Had I known, it would have saved much time because Castro says what all the other writers say but in a far more concise manner. I know, I know-there will be many who dismiss this comment because they believe that a marxist socialist can never be believed even when he is quoting United Nation's facts and figures; however, his facts, figures and interpretations are repeated over and over again by other writers from other countries on other continents. The sum of the information is just too great to ignore-read this wonderful, concise volume and you will be much the wiser for your effort.
Rating: 
Summary: Fine survey of world's problems and their cause - capitalism
Review: This book contains a selection of Fidel's speeches given between June 2000 and November 2001. A portrait of a great and humane man emerges from these pages. He addresses a remarkable variety of subjects, but always links them to their root cause, our continued tolerance of the unjust and unworkable economic disorder that is capitalism. He defends Cuba's exceptional achievements in the fields of health and education, pointing out that in Cuba life expectancy is remarkably high. He upholds Cuba's democracy as more full and just than the parliamentary democracy that we increasingly reject. He notes that more Cuban doctors and health workers are providing free medical services in Third World countries than at any previous time. They are training 5000 Latin American medical students to become doctors in Latin America. Cuban doctors have set up medical schools in Gambia and Equatorial Guinea to educate doctors to live and work in Africa, not to poach them, as the Blair government does. Cuban doctors are working to assist African countries to cope with the devastations of AIDS. War, terrorism and economic crisis are all born of an unsuccessful and unsustainable political and economic order. Fidel deplores the fact that the US government holds the sole veto power in the IMF and the World Bank, which prevents these bodies from being changed from tools of destruction. Fidel asserts that theft of resources and of capital from Third World countries equals genocide, and looking at the huge numbers of unnecessary child deaths in those countries, one can only agree. He warns against recourse to war as a solution to problems. Instead, he proposes that the UN Security Council, an executive body, should be subordinated to the democratic legislature of the General Assembly. On the Middle East crisis, he points out that in 2001 the US government vetoed a draft resolution for setting up observers to protect the Palestinian people, and Blair's representative abstained! Since 1972, there have been 23 US vetoes on Resolutions aimed at solving the crisis there. The US alone blocks the two-state solution that the rest of the world demands.
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