This is the first Trump legislative/executive order issue with which I agree. I think that Obama’s changes benefited only the ruling elite in Cuba, not the Cuban people.
So Trump is winning my approval, so far, on this, and on Gorsuch’s appointment. (There are some other appointments with which I agree, but they aren’t major; there’s very little attention to US Attorney picks, for example).
But how does going back to the embargo help the Cuban people? Wouldn’t the Cuban people have been better off for the last 50 years if we treated Cuba like we treat China or Vietnam?
Arkansas has spent the last year negotiating trade with Cuba. Our Governor visited Cuba and has worked hard to sell our rice to Cuba.
All for nothing. Thanks to stinking politics.
That bastard Trump.
How many other states got screwed?
This has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with orange petulance and intellectual incompetence.
Fair question.
And the answer is: it does not, at least in the short term help. But that means only that this factor is absent on both sides of the equation.
The difference between China/South Vietnam and Cuba is the wholesale theft of American property (“nationalization”) that Cuba committed.
Okay, that’s a difference… but if we had treated them the same since the 60s or 70s or so, isn’t there a pretty good chance that the lives of Cuban people would have improved, at least to some degree, just like the lives of the Chinese and Vietnamese people improved since then due to increasing prosperity?
Castro’s a monster, but these policies IMO helped him, since it’s easier to oppress a poor country than an increasingly prosperous one.
He was just doing Marco Rubio, who sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee, a favour. Now Rubio, who sits on the Senate Intelligence Commttee, owes Trump a favour.
This had nothing to do with ingratiating himself to Rubio. Rubio would have rolled over for Trump even if Trump shot someone in broad daylight on 5th avenue.
Yeah, you’re right. It’s probably just Trump being small and petty because he can be.
I’m not fan of this new policy, but the lives of the Chinese people improved because of the liberalized economic policies of the government. Had the Communist Party kept the same policies they had under Mao, I doubt it would have mattered what the US did or did not do. Since pretty much every other country in the world trades with Cuba, isn’t it at least a bit arrogant to assume that the US is going to make much of a difference anyway?
Tump is desperate for an opportunity to show what a tough, masterful President he is.
He has been unable to do much with even the House and its right-wing amateurs.
Beating up Fidel’s ghost is about all he can do.
This gives him a lock on all of 200 aging fascist Cuban’s.
I just love it when he is so masterful.
I am curious: to what degree was Castro worse than Batista?
Clearly he’s protecting business interests while trying to satisfy a campaign promise. He claims the Cuban government gets too much money from the Obama rules, but he’s mainly dropped the tourism provision which denies money to individual Cubans while guaranteeing American companies can still profit and probably has little effect on how much the Cuban government makes out of the deal.
Yes, I agree that the lives of the Cuban people might have improved if other tactics were taken, but those other tactics were not taken by Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush 41, Clinton, or Bush 43. Obama’s tactic (while different) also did not help the Cuban people. It seems myopic to say that Trump should bear the responsibility for the failures.
Who said that? 
What does that have to do with whether or not Trump’s policy is good or not.
Rome was not built in a day.
Who in this thread is saying that, much less the poster you were responding to???
Obama’s was the first positive step in many preceding administrations. Trump could have fairly criticized Obama for not taking a bold enough step forward. Instead, he chose to take a petulant and short-sighted step backwards. So yeah, Trump bears responsibility for this failure.
Thanks, pal!
We’ve got the bastard on the ropes now!
Are you serious?
The US is a huge market, indeed still the world’s biggest market by some measures, right on Cuba’s doorstep.
Yes it makes a big difference whether or not Cuba can trade with the US, it’s not just arrogance.
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