Viva Cuba!

A New York Times article over the weekend caught a nice anecdote from Obama’s ambush, er, attendance at the Summit of the Americas. Our Latin American brothers (and they are mostly brothers) seized the opportunity to press the issue of the Cuban Embargo in their first meeting with the new president - to the point that it became a near diplomatic mugging. The embargo

Always the cool customer, Obama was probably more serious than he let on in praising Canada, which, aside from constructing a workable system of universal healthcare, has always been a friend of Cuba - much to the benefit of both countries. While the United States has nursed a 50 year-old grudge against the island nation just 90 miles off its shores, Canada and the rest of the world have forged valuable trade relationships that will only grow for decades to come.

Since 1962, our leaders have fooled themselves into believing the pain of our anti-Cuban embargo will finally push the Cubans to revolt against Fidel, or now his brother Raul. But they’re dreaming. Like so many failed U.S. policies relying on force rather than diplomacy, the embargo accomplishes nothing except giving the Cuban people a reason to hate the U.S. government. These same people would gladly rise up if they were to see the friendly face of our country, if they believed the U.S. would support them in their cause. But given the hostility they have seen, what assurance do they have that the U.S. wouldn’t treat them like another third world nation and simply insert another dictator, this one even less concerned about their needs than the Bearded One?

The embargo, which the rest of world almost universally opposes, serves as an obvious example of the United States playing World Boss, but fewer people realize the mean, petty little ways our country has taken it even further. The Helms-Burton law, for example, punishes other countries for doing business with Cuba. The law decrees that any ship entering Havana Bay within the last six months is prohibited from berthing in the United States, and that the leaders of foreign companies doing business with Cuba be barred from even setting foot on American soil. In the late 1990s, the U. S. banned a Canadian mining executive and his family from going to Disneyland because he had been the CEO of a nickel mine in Cuba. Free trade for all, except when it prevents us from strangling a tiny island nation.

The embargo kills all sorts of opportunities for U.S. businesses whose presence would help the Cuban people while also helping the American economy. As we speak, countries from all over the world are scoring contracts in Cuban medicine, biotech, technology, and agriculture, industriously planting roots in a country of 11 million. But the United States, the island’s closest neighbor and most logical trading partner, just goes on nursing a grudge like a bratty little school kid.

What’s keeping us from lifting the embargo on Cuba? Are we really supposed to believe that the embargo is the wish of the American people?-that Americans as a whole despise Castro’s communist island nation? If you think that sounds a little bit off the mark, you’re right. The fact is, our national embargo persists thanks largely to an embittered minority of Americans. Approximately two million Cuban exiles-most in South Florida, some in New Jersey-hate Fidel Castro so passionately that they alone ensure that the embargo remains in place. The rest of the American population simply doesn’t care. It’s that simple. If not for these fierce Cuban expates, both Gore and Kerry would have been elected president.

But Obama would have been elected even without Florida.

He has the votes, and more importantly, the public good will. And god knows, there are huge constituencies that would love to see the end of the blockade. As the Times article points out, American businesses are dying to get into Cuba, and both Houses of Congress have drafted legislation calling for an end to the travel restrictions as well as to parts of the embargo. Surveys show the grandkids of Cuban ex-patriots, now just coming of voting age, are much softer of the embargo as well.

So how about it, Mr. President?

What’s it going to take to implement some reasonable, judicious foreign policy regarding Cuba? Why not help out its impoverished people instead of worsening their conditions, and maybe do a little bit of good for America’s global reputation in the meantime?