The cold war is long over. We won. Democracy 7, Communism 0.
Cuba has a different political system. So What?
Why do we still have a trade embargo?
What has Castro done to threaten the US in the last 30 years?
He has offered the assistance of 1,500 doctors for the hurricane releif. Why not take him up on it and bury the hatchet?
Theeres a bunch of Cuban nationals in Florida that hate his guts. So what?
What? You need to chalk up at least a few points on the Communist side for China, North Korea, Cuba and Vietnam.
So they’re a well-organized voting bloc in a swing state.
So a few hundred thousand living in one state dictate our foreign policy?
and your ok with that?
Please elaborate.
Allright. how about 13-7? It was close for awhile, then we kind of won at the end of the 4th quarter. No time left on the clock for the extra point.
The Cuban embargo and hostilities are our current policy. I think you’d need to offer compelling reasons to change it.
It goes a bit beyond that. China is Communist after all and we have fairly decent relations with them. Much of the antipathy came from the early days of Castro’s government when he siezed US companies assets. The repression of the Cuban people was the last straw and we broke relations and imposed an embargo.
Complicated question, but boiled down we have a trade embargo with Cuba because we want to use it as a club to break Castro and the Communist government. How effective this has been is debatable…probably as effective as keeping Saddam cornered through the 90’s. Certainly since the fall of the Soviets (and the ending of the gravy train) Cuba hasn’t really had the assets or energy to cause much mischief.
Not sure what this question has to do with anything to be honest. Castro and Cuba were certainly active when they had Soviet support (and the missiles the Soviets attempted to deploy there certainly WERE a threat…as well as allowing Soviet Subs access to Cuban ports for resupply), causing what trouble they could where they could. The embargo was never about stopping a Cuban threat to the US, but about breaking Castro and the Communist government.
BG asked this question in his thread. My answer would be ‘why should we?’ You are assuming its in the US’s best interest to bury the hatchet. Why? Castro is defanged…and I have my doubts the Cuban Communist party will survive his death. I see no compelling reason not to maintain the status quo…from the US’s perspective.
Well, they make up a fairly powerful voting block and political machine in Florida. I’d say that both parties have to keep that in mind. So…that. 
-XT
I’m not OK with it. I’m explaining, not justifying. If it were up to me, we would have dropped the embargo and normalized relations ten years ago. If we can trade with China and Vietnam, why not Cuba? Besides, starving the system to death, assuming it were a justifiable strategy, is not the way to go in practical terms. The more prosperous Cuba becomes, the smoother any future transition to capitalism/democracy will be. Compare the post-Communist experience of the desperately impoverished Soviet republics with that of the relatively prosperous non-Soviet states of the Warsaw Pact.
Sounds good enough for me, I just try and strive for accuracy here on the Dope.
Why wouldn’t it be in the U.S.’ interest to bury the hatchet? Communism is no longer the dynamic force it once was. The name of Marx has lost its power to conjure. The Zapatista rebels in Mexico do not even call themselves Marxists or Communists; if their rebellion had started 20 or even 10 years earlier, they almost certainly would have. Castro is no longer dangerous to anybody outside his own country. The days when he could meddle in African or Central American revolutionary movements are over. Cuba is now just another Third-World dictatorship, and we’ve never been shy about trading with those.
It would probably be in the best interest of both the United States and Cuba to normalize relations between the two countries. The embargo has been in place for decades and Castro is still in power; it’s time to admit it isn’t going to change the regime in Cuba. If anything, the embargo is strengthening his regime by giving him a plausible scapegoat for any failings of his government.
But all politics are local. And as BrainGlutton pointed out, there is a group of people who are committed to the most extreme anti-Castro policies possible. And they are a significant voting bloc in a state that is almost perfectly balanced between the two political parties. So, like dairy subsidies in New Hampshire and corn subsidies in Iowa, the Cuban Embargo will remain.
xtisme - I appreciate your point by point rebuttal of my OP. But I gotta say, I cant relate to single one of your points.
repression was the last straw? you got some background for that? Since when is repression a problem for US policy unless its done by a so called “enemy”?
Castro hasn’t been up to any mischief since the 1970s…and you dont think thats relavent?
Why should we take him up on his offer for help? oh gee, I dont know…maybe to quit acting like pompous assholes to anybody that doesnt kiss our ass?
The Florida power vote thing?.. It’s no reason to just throw up your hands and say “hey thats just the way it is”.
xtisme, thanks again. Sorry if I’m a little worked up, but our foreign policy makes no sense to me. I felt the same way under Clinton.
Because we can afford to cut off trade with Cuba. It’s small enough and poor enough. Our economy is fairly reliant on China; if we were to have a consistent foreign policy that rejected both China and Cuba as trade partners we’d collapse within a week. It would be easy, and probably pretty harmless, to reopen trade with Cuba. But the government still needs a whipping boy to show that yes, we still really hate communists, so Cuba is it.
If it sounds hypocritical, that’s because it is.
How about “It’s fucking stupid”.
The only reason it exists is that anyone that ran for president while advocating normalized relations would forfeit Florida’s electoral votes. That’s it, pure and simple. With electoral politics so close, don’t look for a change.
In other words “there hasnt been a president with enough balls to do it”
B-I-N-G-O
The irony is that while the USA justifies its embargo by pointing to Castro’s human rights abuses, the USA uses its base in Cuba to commit human rights abuses. Pot, meet kettle.
When has stupidity ever been a compelling reason to modify foreign policy?
I hope you realize I’m not talking about logical reasons, I’m talking about political reasons. It’s like the difference between “a preponderance of the evidence” and “beyond a reasonable doubt.” There has to be a real benefit, compared to the cost, for any politician or party to support changing the policy we have, and there simply isn’t. It could enrage the Cuban exile community and hurt the whole party; nobody wants to look soft on dictators, all that jazz.