Failing Cuba
Congress
stays on a misguided course
The
following editorial appeared in The Sacramento (Calif.) Bee on Aug.
18.
Almost
every year the U.S. trade and travel embargo against Cuba comes up
for votes in Congress. Every time it does, efforts to reverse the
failed policy, now nearly a half-century old, are defeated.
Why?
A small, vocal group of Cuban Americans in south Florida has
inordinate sway over U.S. policy.
Still,
there was hope that the new majority in Congress would change the
dynamic — especially since Cuban dictator Fidel Castro is aging and
ill. By engaging in people-to-people exchanges and trade, the United
States could have a positive impact on Cuba’s transition to a new
regime.
It’s
long past time to do something different. The U.S. embargo has done
nothing to weaken the Castro regime or to improve conditions for the
Cuban people.
But
hopes of a new policy were dashed July 27 when 66 Democrats voted
with 179 Republicans to defeat an amendment that would have made it
easier for U.S. farmers to sell agricultural goods to Cuba. The vote
was 182-245 against the amendment.
This
small island nation poses no threat to the United States. The Cold
War, in which Cuba was a battleground, is long over.
We
allow Americans to travel to Iran, but not Cuba. We trade with China
and countless other countries with terrible human rights records in
the hopes that this exchange will bring change.
The
46-year-old embargo has done nothing to dislodge Castro. In fact, it
has given the repressive regime a convenient scapegoat to blame for
Cuba’s many problems.
So
why not try something new — like expanding U.S. influence and trade
for the day that Castro is gone?
A
Florida International University poll in 2000 found that 74 percent
of Cuban Americans in Miami-Dade County, Fla., believe the U.S.
embargo against Cuba has not worked. Yet the new Congress, claiming a
"New Direction," remains fixed on the old course. How about
showing a little courage in taking on the tiny minority of
embargoists and paving the way for a post-Castro Cuba?
