According to an analyst on NPR this morning, several times since the hand-over, Raul has tried to change some policy, such as taking steps towards normalizing relations with the US, only to have a letter show up in the papers from Castro stating that “now is not the time”. Steps revoked.
As someone upthread mentioned, Castro remains the 1st Secretary of the Communist Party. How much control over the state this will give him remains to be seen, I suppose.
I think Obama might let Florida be seated as is rather than risk getting the answer wrong and losing by an even bigger margin. Outside of Florida, I doubt it matters as much. Even if he gets the wrong answer, it’s hardly a priority question (as compared to the economy and Iraq) and I think people are willing to let their leaders lead on this issue.
I agree. The people I know who care about US-Cuba relations (and that is a very small number) don’t see the point of our current embargo but they don’t care enough to fight for normalization of relations. And let’s face it, if Florida was the size of Wyoming nobody would care what people in Florida think.
I bet this will help fix the holes in the Yankees rotation.
The “right answer” seems obvious enough anyways: “It’s much too early to tell what implications this has for Cuba. We hope that it leads to greater democracy and freedom for the people of Cuba. We will watch closely the developments, but any changes in policy would be premature until we have a better grasp on what is going to happen.” And then you refuse to speculate on hypotheticals.
From the letter, Castro refers to his brother as Raul Castro Ruz and himself as Fidel Castro Ruz. What does “Ruz” mean?
That would be their mother’s maiden name, IIRC. The Spanish-language convention is FirstName (MiddleName(s)) Patronymic Matronymic. So their father’s surname was Castro, and their mother’s was Ruz. The “real” surname as used in general situations is the patronymic.
Edited: According to Castro’s Wikipedia entry, his mother’s name was Lina Ruz Gonzalez.
Obama already has a Cuba policy, and it’s hard to see how this would cause him to change it:
Hillary’s got a Cuba policy too: she backs the current restrictions.
Ramon Castro is not, officially at least, part of the Cuban government. He’s more or less a “guajiro”, or farmer, who gets trucked to different farms and dispenses wisdom on the order of:
“The only way we’ll increase milk production is by having the cows produce more milk.”
A really interesting thing in Castro’s resignation letter is the following:
“Afortunadamente nuestro proceso cuenta todavía con cuadros de la vieja guardia, junto a otros que eran muy jóvenes cuando se inició la primera etapa de la Revolución”
translated:
“Fortunately our process still includes members from the old guard, along with others who were too young during the first stages of the Revolution.”
Which I take to mean that Raul Castro is not necessarily a shoe in for succesion, nor is Alarcon, both of whom are “old guard”. Perez-Roque, one of the young ones, is Castro’s hand picked succesor, and might come out on top. We’ll now soon enough, February 24th is when the choosing takes place.
The Helms-Burton Act seems to preclude establishing normal relations with any government that includes Raul Castro and gives Congress the power to override presidential attempts to lift the embargo.
I went to school with a guy whose family had been wealthy under Batista and fled when Castro took power. He was born in Miami, grew up in Florida and Puerto Rico, lived in Montgomery due to some type of civilian military job at the AFB, was married to another Cuban American who was born here, they had several kids born here, but he still referred to Cuba (which he had never seen) as home and planned to “return” there when Castro was out of power.
When the regime is dead, I wonder how many Cuban-Americans will return, or if the U.S. is now home.
PPS- Now that Fidel’s retired I wonder if he’ll do what many retirees do: move to Florida. God knows he has enough family there to live with.
Is democracy a contingency for U.S. diplomatic relations with Cuba? It doesn’t seem to be a prerequisite for trade relations with China. Maybe capitalism, not democracy, will assure U.S./Cuba trade diplomacy.
Interesting sidelight: Obama and Clinton take similar but different positions WRT Cuba. Obama favors defunding Radio Marti (which the Cuban government jams anyway), easing family travel restrictions, and opening bilateral talks with a post-Castro government. Clinton says we should keep everything as is, at least until we see what emerges post-Castro.
I actually agree more with Clinton on this one…I think we should take a wait and see approach, though I think bilateral talks couldn’t hurt and may be useful. Problem I see is how much Fidel ACTUALLY takes his hands off the reins. If it’s a lot then there may be a chance for change…if not…not.
-XT
Actually it’s TV Marti that is jammed, Radio Marti comes in loud and clear, as well as many other radio station from Miami and Mexico.
As far as TV is concerned the way some Cubans get access to foreign TV is by either pirating the signal from the hotels, or by using DirecTV or Dish Network receivers. Many neighborhoods in Havana are wired for cable by someone with an illegal dish so they can watch foreign programming. The government very actively chases down the receivers and shuts then down, so many receivers are hidden during the day.
Yes, I heard it in Havana, as well as quite a few commercial stations on AM, especially at night. I even heard an AM station from New Jersey in northern Colombia.
According to this article, there are some signs Raul might liberalize things, especially in the economy.
The trouble is, as long as Castro’s alive, any potential liberalizer has to fear Castro rising from his deathbed screaming “Heretic! Burn the witch!”. No one will try to seize overt power or undertake serious reforms while Castro is still alive, because it can all be undone with one denunciation by The Leader, even if The Leader is mostly dead.
Which is probably why the US should be cautious in our expectations and actions wrt Cuba. We don’t KNOW that Raul will be different than Fidel…and we don’t KNOW that, even if he is he will be allowed to follow through with any radical reforms.
I was reading that Raul is the more pragmatic of the two…but also that Raul was the more fervent communist of the pair. And also the one to go that route first. On the other side of the coin I’ve seen that Raul is more open to a dialog with the US, and has actually had a sort of back channel dialog going with the US for quite some time (since the '80’s if memory servers).
So…there is reason to be optimistic. But cautiously so. I see no urgent reason to leap into a major policy change at this point. We’ve been in this stupid mode for decades…no point in jumping the gun now. Lets see who is elected president in the next term and see how Raul pans out…and then see if something can be done. I can put off my fine Cuban cigars for another couple of years…
sigh
-XT