Cuba libre?

Well, not exactly. But President Obama is making a bold (and long overdue) move by relaxing the restrictions on travel to Cuba for Cuban-Americans, and there is talk of opening up Cuban travel more broadly in the near future. It's a refreshing change from past policy of either acting like Cuba doesn't exist or behaving hostilely towards it.

"The president has directed that a series of steps be taken to reach out to the Cuban people to support their desire to enjoy basic human rights," said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs. "These are actions he has taken to open up the flow of information."

U.S. officials said Obama hoped the new measures would encourage Cuba's one-party state to implement democratic reforms long demanded by Washington as a condition for removing sanctions imposed after Fidel Castro took power in 1959.

Shares of companies that stand to gain from a thaw in U.S. ties with Cuba soared on the news, led by Canadian mining and energy company Sherritt International, a major player in Cuba's nickel and oil industry, whose stock rose 24.5 percent.

Miami-based cruise operator Royal Caribbean also saw its shares rise on hopes that the No. 2 cruise ship operator and rival Carnival, could sail to Cuba, just 90 miles from the United States.

U.S. telecommunications companies will now be allowed to set up fiber-optic cable and satellite links with Cuba, start roaming service agreements and permit U.S. residents to pay for telecoms, satellite radio and television services provided to people in Cuba, the White House said.

Obama also directed his government to look at starting regularly scheduled commercial flights to Cuba. Air travel between the United States and Cuba is now limited to charter flights.

Predictably, though, Florida politicians on both sides of the aisle are lining up against the decision. Democratic congresspersons Kendrick Meek and Debbie Wasserman Schultz "disagree[] with part of the Administration's new Cuba policy," and Rep. Connie Mack (R-Fla.) talks out of both sides of his mouth, as usual. However, it's the notoriously moronic Diaz-Balart brothers, two of Miami's "Three Hyphenated Stooges," who take their Obama Derangement Syndrome and run with it:

Despite the Cuban dictatorship increasing its repression of pro-democracy activists, torturing countless prisoners of conscience, and refusing to allow human rights activists and observers into the country, President Obama has violated his pledge of January 20 by unilaterally granting a concession to the dictatorship which will provide it with hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Unilateral concessions to the dictatorship embolden it to further isolate, imprison and brutalize pro-democracy activists, to continue to dictate which Cubans and Cuban-Americans are able to enter the island, and this unilateral concession provides the dictatorship with critical financial support.

No, you brotherly douchebags, the decision doesn't "provide the dictatorship with critical financial support." It provides real people -- Cubans and Americans -- with an opportunity to visit family and to help the island nation overcome and recover from the Castro regime. Of course, being Republicans, you two wouldn't understand the idea of helping real people, would you?

The idea that the embargo hurts Fidel (and Raul) Castro never really was correct, and it's certainly an antiquated notion now, as Fidel wastes away and Raul is little more than a figurehead. All the embargo has done is keep the Cuban populace from having the ability to help themselves economically. America's shunning of Cuba is anachronistic and essentially useless, at least insofar as the stated goals are concerned.

And you know who gets this, of all people? Florida's GOP U.S. senator, Mel Martinez, himself a Cuban-American:

The announcement today is good news for Cuban families separated by the lack of freedom in Cuba. Likewise the change in remittances should provide help to families in need. Given these changes will benefit the regime in Havana, it would be wise in the implementation to place some reasonable limits on this type of travel and the amounts that can be sent to Cuba.

The President has expressed his commitment to freedom - libertad - for the Cuban people, and policy implementation should advance that objective. To this end, the Administration is right to call on the Cuban government to end the onerous charge of 20 percent on remittances. Lowering remittance charges and allowing travel for Cuban families wishing to see relatives abroad are two steps the Cuban regime could immediately take that would show change in Havana.

Opposition to the president's action here can only be political, because it's certainly not rooted in anything factual or in any realistic foreign policy objectives. I know many Cuban-Americans have long memories. But it's well past time to realize that it's not 1959 anymore.

Annual travel to Cuba OK, says Nelson

The Cuban embargo, in place now for nearly half a century, shows no signs of ending soon. However, a relaxing of restrictions against Cuban-Americans traveling to their native country may be imminent, as the $410 billion spending bill containing provisions on Cuban travel makes its way to the White House.

Yesterday, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) backed down from his earlier objections to the plan once he received assurances from the Obama administration that other parts of the embargo would continue to be enforced.

Nelson released a letter from Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner saying the administration will insist that Cuba pay cash upfront for sales of food and medicine to Cuba. This assurance removed a sticking point, at least for Nelson, as the Senate prepares to vote on a big spending bill that contains controversial provisions on Cuba.

"I believe that if there is to be a new strategy towards Cuba then it must come from our commander in chief, not from the tinkering of a few lawmakers inserting language in a must-pass appropriations bill without any opportunity for debate," Nelson said in remarks he is preparing to give on the Senate floor.

The spending bill – which passed the House and [late yesterday] the Senate – would ease travel restrictions for Cuban-Americans and also make it easier to finance sales of food and medicine. Farmers in this country say this change would help expand a growing market for American products.

But many embargo supporters – notably Nelson, fellow Democrat Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Florida Republican Mel Martinez – oppose attempts to ease financing of food sales for fear it would weaken the embargo and perpetuate the Castro regime.

Geithner’s assurances are an attempt to draw Nelson, Menendez and perhaps others into supporting the spending bill that contains these provisions. The secretary indicated the administration will insist on cash up front, which continues a policy imposed by President Bush.

Unfortunately, there remains strong political pressure to retain the embargo, which actually does little if anything to maintain the crumbling Castro regime and hurts the Cuban populace far more than it does Fidel or Raul. Naturally, the pressure tends to come from Republicans (or, like Nelson, GOP-lite Democrats), who care about as much about the average Cuban as they do the average American. But, as long as that pressure exists, it's unlikely the embargo will be lifted in toto, as it should.

Nevertheless, this is a step in the right direction. The controversy over lifting the Cuban embargo isn't going away, but it's probably going to take baby steps, like today's, to get rid of it entirely.

Easing the Cuban embargo: it's about time

Good news from the Obama administration-to-be. Reversing the embarrassing and harmful trend by the Bush crime syndicate, President Obama will reduce restrictions on travel to and commerce with Cuba. Our stance towards Cuba, which may have had a purpose when it was begun nearly half a century ago, has been maintained purely for political purposes. It's a vestige of a time long past that has served only to punish a nation whose citizens largely weren't even alive when the policies started, or they barely remember the reasons for the policy in the first place.

The thorny relations between America and its nearby neighbor in the Caribbean deteriorated under President Bush, who allied himself with hard-line Cuban exile leaders long opposed to almost all contacts with the island's government.

Bush tightened the embargo, cutting back the number of visits allowed Cuban-Americans from once a year to once every three years, while also curtailing the amount of money exiles can send their Cuban relatives. The embargo, which blocks most travel and trade with Cuba, can only be dismantled by Congress, and Obama campaigned on a promise to keep it intact.

Obama is widely expected to meet his campaign promise to lift the restrictions on family travel and remittances. Obama may also expand "people-to-people" exchanges, a policy pushed by the Clinton administration that allowed American academics, church groups and students to visit Cuba with relative ease.

This is terrific news, and I hope it will silence the vocal minority of Cuban emigrés and Cuban-American citizens (many of whom live here in America's Glans™) who have long memories and short fuses. There's simply no reason anymore -- if there ever was -- to punish the citizens of our neighbor to the south for politics that most of them don't share, and which in any event have little if any impact today anyway. Sure, I wish that the embargo itself would be lifted, but at least we're moving in the right direction.

In short, whatever anti-Communist sentiment that remains in the U.S. is now nothing more than an anachronism, left ever farther back in history as communism itself fades away. Historically, it's a fact that communism as an economic system fails, and fails profoundly, when capitalist principles are introduced, even peripherally. The best way to "defeat" communism in Cuba is to open the country up to America, and to Americans.

It's nice to see the short-sightedness, bigotry, and fear of the current administration come to a well-deserved end.

A British view of Florida politics

As I mentioned the other day on Twitter, I will be appearing on national television in the UK next week, talking from Miami about blogs and their impact on the American election this year. I am trying to get details and, as soon as I can, I'll share them here. Not sure whether the broadcast will be live, but if so, it'll be 3:00 pm Monday afternoon Eastern time (9:00 7:00 pm in the UK) -- all I know at the moment is that time, which is when I'm supposed to be in the studio in Miami Beach, and the fact that it's going to air on Sky News in the UK. (Sorry I can't be more specific than that right now -- if I knew more, I'd tell you!) Hopefully you'll be able to see it here in the USA and elsewhere ...

Anyway, while doing research for the interview, I have found it interesting -- instructive, even -- to see how the British view our election. I think the British system is curious at best, but I have no doubt they feel the same about ours (Electoral College? Are you kidding me?). Anyway, even better, Sky has a correspondent in Florida -- Miami, specifically -- who is examining the impact of race and heritage on the presidential election here.

Racism is notoriously widespread in regions away from the traditionally Republican state's major cities, such as the Panhandle in the north.

A seventh-grade school teacher there was recently suspended for writing on a blackboard that Obama's "Change" slogan stood for "Come Help A N***** Get Elected".

How many times do I have to say it? Republicans. Aren't. Funny. Many of them, however, are moronic brownshirt fucks.

Anyway, the article continues:

Miguel Saabedra is president of the Vigilia Mambisa organisation for Cuban exiles which staged a street demonstration in the area of the capital known as Little Havana to show support for John McCain.

He and others at the event repeatedly linked Mr Obama with fundamentalist Islam - a charge that has been levelled against him since the primaries, despite the fact he has been a practising Christian for decades - and accused him of being a closet Communist.

"Obama wants to talk to Castro, he wants to talk to (Venezualan president Hugo) Chavez, he wants to talk to Iran," he told Sky News. "These people don't want to talk to us!

"It's not because he is black, if Condoleezza Rice was running for president, or Colin Powell, that would be good. I support black people. I have good friends who are black."

Yes! It's the classic "I have friends who are black" explanation! You can always count on a racist to bring that one up. Nice going, Mr. Saabedra -- you get a free month's subscription to Stormfront for that talking point!

Another demonstrator outside the Versailles restaurant, a focal point for the Cuban American community, waved a placard at passing motorists with a crudely-drawn picture of Mr Obama wearing what looked like a beard, robes and turban below the word "Evil".

Many passing cars tooted their horns in approval and several slowed down to shout encouragement - although one or two drove past shouting abuse and pro-Obama slogans.

For many Cuban Americans like Laura Vianello, the Democratic party still have not been forgiven for President John F Kennedy's failure to properly back up the Cuban expats who tried to topple the Castro regime in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.

So that's what this is all about? Something that happened nearly half a century ago?! No, the world hasn't changed at all in that time, no, sirree ...

Jeebus. I mean, I empathize with the Cuban-American community, really I do, but holy fuck, get over it already! In many cases, you're generations removed from the Bay of Pigs, and you're following a drastically altered Republican Party today -- indeed, I question whether or not Barry Goldwater, the de facto leader of the GOP back in Kennedy's day, would even recognize his party's current incarnation.

[Vianello] lost three uncles in the invasion, a memorial to which stands prominently in the street in Little Havana.

"Most Cubans here in Miami are Republican by tradition. You could put the Devil up there as a candidate and we would vote for him," she said.

Well, you pretty much did that in 2000 and 2004, Ms. Vianello, and sure enough, you voted for him. And you're going to do it again this year. Heckuva job, Laura. But enjoy President Obama ... check back with me in 2012 and let's see which party has been more responsive to Cuban and Cuban-American interests.

My money's on the Democrats. But then, I'm just a dirty fucking hippie ...

UPDATE (11:10 am 10/27/08): As commenter pseudonymous in NC reminds me, I went the wrong way on the clock adjustment in the UK when I calculated it above. They are on Daylight Time now, which means their clocks went back over the weekend, while we've got a week to go here in the States. So 3pm here actually is 7pm in the UK. Thanks, pseud.

Huggy Bear to Cuban-American group: I won't meet with you

Spiteful little prick Huggy Bear, in the aftermath of his "joke" about killing Iranians with cigarettes, is finding new and better ways to win friends and influence people. This time, it's the Cuban-American community in Miami.

An advisor to Republican John McCain said that the candidate would not meet with a politically moderate Cuban-American organization because it "embraced" Democrat Barack Obama and his call for overhauling the Bush administration's Cuba policy.

The Cuban American National Foundation [(CANF)] tried to set up a meeting with McCain last month in New Orleans on the same day he was attending a private fundraiser organized by one of the group's directors. The foundation is officially nonpartisan, but many individual members are politically active.

Lobbyist Ana Navarro, a McCain advisor who frequently travels with the campaign, did an interview with WAQI-710 Radio Mambí from New Orleans on June 4, the day after the fundraiser.

"I understand [the foundation] had intended to come to a fundraiser in New Orleans, that they offered a large sum of money in exchange for a private meeting with McCain. They were told no," she said. "I don't like talking about the foundation, because I consider them fairly irrelevant."

She added: "It is obvious they have chosen, they have embraced, they have given a welcome and a forum to Barack Obama -- a man who wants to sit down with Raúl Castro without preconditions. . . . So I don't understand the insistence of the gentlemen in the Cuban American National Foundation in wanting to get together with John McCain when John McCain doesn't want to get together with them."

The McCain campaign did not respond to repeated requests Tuesday for comment.

McCain and Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were all invited to the foundation's Cuban Independence Day luncheon in Miami in May. Only Obama appeared, and gave a speech to the group.

This is classic GOP strategery. If you don't agree with the warmongering right-wing rhetoric, you're "irrelevant." If they're our enemies, we won't sit down with them and use diplomacy -- or, in this case, political dexterity -- to negotiate with them. It's asinine, it's childish, and it's the Republican Way.

And, unsurprisingly, Tweedle-Dumb and Tweedle-Dumber, two of the Three Hyphenated Stooges who represent Miami in Congress, are in the thick of the controversy.

CANF president Pepe Hernandez, who planned to go to New Orleans with chairman Jorge Mas Santos, blamed U.S. Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart of Miami for the meeting's collapse.

The two brothers are leading supporters of McCain in Florida and are vehement supporters of the current restrictions on travel and remittances, and Hernandez and Mas Santos are supporting their Democratic challengers. "They are letting their own personal interests undermine the interests of the McCain campaign and the Cuban-American community," Hernandez said.

A spokesman for the Diaz-Balarts denied that they were involved in blocking the meeting, but added that "it makes no sense to give "special treatment to a group that does not represent the Cuban-American community." [sic]

I'm more convinced than ever that the primary qualification to be a Republican politician these days is to be a massive asshole.