The day President Obama decided part of his “Hope and Change” agenda included him single-handedly “normalizing” relations with the brutal Castro regime in Cuba, I reached out to an old friend and business colleague who escaped Cuba for the U.S. as a teenager 52 years ago. When we had talked about his experience I had remembered he had come to this country with just a few bucks in his pocket. We had not talked in years, but we had recently connected on Facebook. My question for him was simple: what do you think about President Obama’s “re-start” (Ha! Sorry Hillary) efforts on U.S.-Cuban relations. I wanted to get the perspective of someone “who was there” instead of blowing a lot of smoke from this Iowa-born kid. Below is my Cuban friend’s response. (Note, to protect my friend, I have edited out some references that make it easier to identify him. Many of my former colleagues will know in seconds who he is.)
Hi Jason,
Great to hear from you. We are in Paris at the moment, spending the holidays with friends. Back in (Colorado) in late January.
Your recollection of my arrival in the U.S. at the tender age of 16 was pretty accurate, except for the amount of money I had with me. It was zero. I mean zero; not even loose change. If you want the short story version I will send you a copy of an article I wrote for a (Colorado town) newspaper for their Thanksgiving Day issue in 2012 to mark the 50th anniversary of my arrival.
People always ask if I came from Cuba by myself, and my standard answer is: “No, it was worse than that; I came with my younger brother!”
With respect to the recent White House announcement on Cuba, it is hard to know where to start.
I have been convinced for a long time that Obama is the worst, most inept president who ever resided in the White House, but I never expected something so moronic to come out of this administration.
First, by our government’s actions today, we have announced to the world that if you want something out of us that you cannot get any other way, capture one of our citizens, put him in jail, treat him miserably and then, trade him for whatever you want.
Second, we are dealing with a country which is on the list of states that support terrorism. Just a few months ago, they were caught red-handed exporting MiGs and other weaponry to North Korean, hidden in a cargo of sugar cane.
Third, Obama says that our policy of isolation has failed to accomplish the objective of empowering Cubans to build an open and democratic country. That was never the objective of the policy. The trade embargo imposed on Cuba in 1961 by President Kennedy was in protest over the illegal expropriation of American property in Cuba. The Cuban government has always known what they had to do to get the embargo removed. Moreover, the policy of engagement announced is what every other country has been using, and they too have been unable to accomplish the “objective.”
The reason? Very simple answer: the Cuban constitution forbids any efforts to “build an open and democratic country.” You go to jail for that. You cannot publish a newspaper, you cannot run for office under any political party which is not the PCC (Partido Comunista de Cuba). You cannot stage a protest, you cannot say publicly anything contrary to government policy.
Alan Gross, the fellow that was released by the Cubans today, was incarcerated and almost killed for distributing devices to connect to the internet. And yet, Obama has the gall to say today that Cuba has one of the lowest internet penetration rates (5 percent) in the world. No kidding! It is illegal to connect to the internet in Cuba. Obama expects that “(U.S.) telecommunications providers will be allowed to set up the necessary mechanisms … to provide internet services.” They already exist, set up by the Europeans. The problem is that Cubans are not allowed to use them! They are only for the government and for foreign residents.
I see this announcement as a problem for the Democrats in 2016. Hillary Clinton will lose Florida (and possibly New Jersey) while Jeb Bush’s candidacy may gain from it. Already the Cuban-Americans in Congress have denounced the new policy, including my friend Senator Menendez (D-NJ) who is the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.
In 1961, the embargo was imposed though executive action. In 1996, it was codified into law after the Cuban air force shot down two unarmed planes which were distributing leaflets over Havana. The leaflets, by the way, were copies of the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights which, ironically, Cuba signed in 1948 when it was adopted. Because it is now the law of the land, the so-called Helms-Burton Act cannot be changed by Obama without first getting Congress to modify or repeal it; not very likely in a Republican-dominated Congress.
Moreover, the Cuban government knows the conditions needed to suspend the application of the law: 1) No Castros in the government, 2) freedom of the press; 3) allow other political parties to exist with free elections. No amount of “diplomatic relations” or tourist visits will get the Castro-led Cuban government to do any of those three things.
I could go on but it is getting late. Let me know if you want to see the story about the day I left Cuba.
Your friend (I am withholding his name for privacy purposes.)
whatdidjesusdrive 