Reading this thread, I’m inspired to ask a question I have long wondered about… forgive me if it has been answered.
Why exactly would changing our policy toward Cuba result in the absolute forfeit of the Cuban-Floridian vote?
As best I can tell, it is mainly because a lot of those people have bad memories of the revolution. That just doesn’t compute for me. Yeah, it is bad that they’re commies over there. And sure, they don’t seem to plan on changing. But why would relaxing the embargo hurt either the Cuban-Americans or their Cuban friends? Wouldn’t they all have something to gain in better access to and from Cuba? Isn’t Cuba more likely to progress if we engage them? Is it really just an objection on principle? That by relaxing the embargo, we wave a white flag to the commies and Lenin finally wins? Am I wrong to think that’s silly?
Here’s hoping the electoral map changes enough to take this power away from the Cuban-Floridians. A few more elections, and maybe “We can’t upset those two towns in FL!” won’t mean enough to dictate foreign policy any more.
Interesting choice of words. The communist regime of Cuba restricts the use of computers and the internet by it’s citizens. Those who have escaped this understand what freedom means and they don’t want to support a repressive government. Does that make sense?
I guess I don’t equate lifting the embargo to “supporting a repressive govt”. It seems like there may even be potential to undermine that govt. Those who fled … seem to be holding the position of: “fuck that place, build a wall between us ASAP!” I would expect them to look back and say “what can we do to change things there?” Cutting off contact doesn’t seem likely to change anything (indeed, it apparently hasn’t yet), so I don’t see why the Cuban-Americans favor the current scheme.
East Germany was pretty damn poor, even with trade & tourism, but once that wall came down - bam! I won’t say “prosperity” but I’ll say “hell yeah big changes.”
It’s that wall we need to bring down, then see what happens. Will we get a Haiti, or a Puerto Rico? I don’t know, but I’m hoping for Puerto Rico.
We ARE a territory of the United States, remember?:smack:
Our ongoing socioeconomic quagmire is one akin to that of, say, New Orleans, or East Baltimore, or some floodplain farmland in the Midwest. Not to that of a “Failed Nation”.
(…yet.)
Which is not to say we are not concerned a free Cuba’s effect on our attractiveness to investors. Those Cuban workers even after liberalization are NOT going to be demanding $10/hr salaries with 90-min. lunch breaks, 15 paid holidays and a month’s vacation the first year…
Why would you want Cuban-Floridians to lose their political power? They are just like any other group that has a set of interests and knows how to use their political clout to make themselves heard. Same as the Israel lobby, the Palestinian lobby, the union lobby, and so on. If you don’t agree with their stance find a way to bring them to your side, not try to wish their power away.
To non-Cubans the Cubans in Florida may seem like a monolith but they are not. As a broad generalization there are three major groups in FL:
1960-70’s exiles
1980 Mariel exiles
Post Mariel immigrants
All of these groups, with some exceptions, are allowed to travel to Cuba by both the US and the Cuban government. And they are also allowed to send money to Cuba. Both travel and remittances have been restricted recently, so that travel to Cuban is only once every three years, and money is restricted to $300 per quarter.
I would say that group number one is more likely to have few relatives left in the island and less likely to send money or travel there. When this group left Cuba they were forbidden from ever returning, so this group essentially left Cuba knowing they would never set foot there again, unless the Cuban government changed. However I will add that this group is also the one that first was allowed to travel to the island in the late 1970’s and it was the influence of this group that led to the taking of the Peruvian embassy and the Mariel boatlift.
Group number 2 is slowly becoming more like group number 1, their relatives are mostly in the US or dead. But some still have ties to the island and they send money.
Group number 3 is probably the one that is most anti-embargo. This group is mostly composed of younger Cubans, who grew up under Castro and left either legally or illegally, but are equally able to travel to Cuba. And because they are younger they are more likely to have living relatives in the island.
It is group 3 that is calling for the easing of restrictions in travel and remittances, however since group 3 is the most recent arrivals they do not yet have much political power.
Nitpick: Don’t forget, in Tampa we have a sizeable Cuban-American community dating from the late 19th Century (they came here to work in the Ybor City cigar factories). Tampa Cubans are not all that passionate about Castro, not being defined as refugees from his regime.
And the Cuban cuisine, I can tell you, is a lot better in Tampa than it is in Miami. Those louts have never even heard of arroz con pollo! And their “Cuban sandwiches” are made on some sort of sugary hoagie-shaped Wonder bread!
If nothing else, for the D.R., it’s a matter of self-interest. If the Cuba embargo is removed, investment dollars will almost certainly be diverted from the D.R. to Cuba, which is similarly situated but offers in some respects an even better picture for business investment – near-universal literacy, for example, among potential workers.
This may not be the most noble grounds upon which to rest opposition to changing the Cuban embargo, but it’s very real.
True, but Cubans regularly try to escape, so there is a “wall” there that could very well come down. Is the way to do it by trying to isolate them, or love bombing them?
I say, end the embargo, settle the claims and get ready for a new cuban government. Eventually, the mob will be back in Havana…as old Hyman Roth said: “we have a governemnt that will work with us”:dubious:
Dude, are you saying that the only thing that keeps the mafia from taking over Cuba is the embargo? Seriously?
That’s bizarre on several different levels.
There’s no room for the mafia to take over Cuba because there’s already a native-born mafia that runs the island and they don’t take kindly to competition.
Seriously, think about it for a moment. Why in the would would Cuba in particular be a natural place for the mob to take over? Why in the world would the embargo prevent the mob from taking over Cuba? Why doesn’t the mob take over Haiti, or the Dominican Republic, or Belize, or El Salvador, or any of the dozens of small countries in Central America and the Carribean? Not to mention that the Sicilian mafia is a shell of its former self. What services can the mob provide in Cuba that tourists can’t get today, even in their own hometown? You don’t have to go all the way to Cuba for blackjack and hookers and whiskey.
Sure, organized crime flourishes in countries with weak central authority, but Cuba is not one of those countries, their problem is rather the opposite. Mob influence in Cuba was the product of particular circumstances in a particular time and place. Those circumstances aren’t going to be repeated in the future.
How did you come to that conclusion? The Cuban “wall” is what apparently makes Cubans want to leave. The Berlin wall came down when the people said “fuck it, we’re tearing it down.”
PR is an economic basket case dependent on U.S. government subsidies. It’s better off than Haiti, but what country isn’t?