Wed 15 Apr 2009
Cuba, U.S.A.: Extending an Olive Branch?
Posted by Janine Mendes-Franco under Balkers
[14] Comments
The Obama administration yesterday announced some key changes to U.S. policy designed to “reach out to the Cuban people in support of their desire to freely determine their country’s future.” While the policy shift allows for a lift on travel and remittance restrictions and paves the way for greater telecommunications links with the island, some bloggers are concerned that the measure has not gone far enough (e.g.: the trade embargo still remains in place), rendering the new policy, in the words of The Cuban Triangle, “humanitarian, unsustainable, small-bore, a kind of inoculation, and a question mark.”
The blogger goes on to explain:
Today’s action – affecting travel and remittances, telecommunications equipment and services, and gift parcels – was dramatic because it changes eight years of movement in the opposite direction. But it still leaves President Obama with a 90 percent-Bush Cuba policy. (Candidate Obama said that policy amounted to “tough talk that never yields results.”) Beyond Cuban Americans, it does not address the issue of broader contact with American society, whether from tourists, universities, professional associations, churches, synagogues, or other parts of our civil society. Nor does it address diplomacy, and the President’s spokesmen repeatedly dodged questions about what kind of dialogue the Administration might seek with Cuba.
But Cuba-Blog seems comfortable with the fact that the President was delivering on his campaign promises, saying:
[He] has opened the door to Cuba and Cubans a little bit more…
Reaction in Cuba – as well as throughout the diaspora – has been…well…mixed. The Latin Americanist reports that former Cuban President Fidel Castro was unhappy about the embargo remaining in place:
In an article written in the Cuban press, Castro seemed to be pleased that President Barack Obama scrapped ‘several hateful restrictions‘ enacted by the previous presidential administration. Castro briefly struck a conciliatory tone when he wrote that the Cuban government would be willing to normalize relations with the U.S. Yet he also blasted the forty-year long blockade which he labeled as a ‘truly genocidal measure‘.
The Cuban Triangle also posts a roundup of reactions.
Cuba, desde mi ventana [ES], a blog whose mission statement reads: “I would like to share with you information about the international activity of Cuba, which is my country of origin, whose image is distorted in the world by the enemies of the Cuban Revolution”, is not pleased that the new U.S. policy did not extend to the embargo:
El presidente Barack Obama eliminó el lunes ”todas las restricciones” para que los cubanosamericanos puedan visitar Cuba y enviar remesas desde Estados Unidos, pero sin tocar aspectos del criminal bloqueo económico…que ha provocado pérdidas directas a la Isla caribeña por más de 93 mil millones de dólares…
Meanwhile, Havana-based Yohandry’s Weblog [ES] posts an interesting roundup of reactions to the policy change from ordinary Cubans.
Great coverage of this matter Janine.
(Also see her blog link at right, Francomenz)
It has received some media coverage in the U.S., but not a great deal. Mostly we’ve heard how visitation for families divided between Cuba and Florida, can now be unlimited instead of once a year.
I will have some more specific remarks on the policy later tonight. Interestingly, when Bill Clinton was elected in 1992 by the same U.S. electoral segments as elected Obama, he campaigned that he would not lift any restrictions. That was an appeal to anti-Castro immigrants in Miami. He received their vote, and never did ease any restrictions on Cuba.
I’ve mentioned before about a new world now… ;^)
Thanks for linking to the original Global Voices story, Roy – (and for adding my blog to your blogroll!) GV is all about facilitating discussion on topics like these.
Best,
Janine.
I dont even get the embargo, anyway. coupled with our love and trust of communist china, with the assistance of repubs , dems, and the entinties that supposedly HATE communism, because , SUPPOSEDLY, capitalism is INCOMPATABLE with communism. yet, here’s CORPORATE AMERICA, sending jobs to a COMMUNIST country. one thing communists and corporations have in common, their love to exploit the poor (aka as laborers).
we havent decided which commies to hate the most. or something.
Long overdue. The most interesting point will be whether the Cuban government permits US telecommunication services in country. Because once the Cuban people start getting our cable programming . . . the Castros will be done.
Welcome aboard new posters!
Doubt much of our programming will be allowed in Cuba, but agree the Castro’s are probably in their 9th inning. When Fidel goes, will Raul hold
on to power?
I favor normalization and anything that delivers peaceful co-existence. The Cuban people have a right to self-determination, which they are currently being denied. Many Americans do not know what fueled Fidel’s revolution: the United States had propped up a brutal dictator Fulgencio Batista, similar to what we’ve done in the past across Latin America, Shah of Iran, the list goes on.
It was largely out of concern, paranoid or legitimate, over holding Soviet expansion in check. Many people will point to imperialist objectives also, which usually had U.S. corporations exploiting citizens of these nations in slave-labor circumstances, and taking the gains of that labor from those nations and into their private coffers.
But the Soviet Union is gone and Latin America is evolving now. We are
not interfering when a nation like El Salvador recently elects FMLN, which for decades was a socialist insurgency movement. It is up to Obama at
the Summit of the Americas (Trinidad & Tobago 4/17-4/19), to let those south of us know we are finally ready to be a good neighbor.
Here is a link to the Op-Ed which Obama wrote yesterday in the Trinidad Express, St. Petersburg Times, Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald;
‘Choosing a Better Future in the Americas’
I’ve always felt that the US Government was very hypocritical in having economic and diplomatic relations with China, a Communist country, and not with Cuba, a Communist country. Both China and Cuba have human rights issues, but it seems that the US turned the other cheek at China’s problems.
Let the US companies go in there and make Cuba a modern country, rather than having the 1950’s cars there being the main form of transportation. Personally, I’d love to visit there, and to be able to go back and forth as I please.
Welcome pajaroman!
Link below, to the Fifth Summit of the Americas website. The conference
is underway in earnest today (Saturday / Western Hemisphere time) – host nation Trinidad & Tobago.
Friday on arrival, Obama had a handshake for Hugo Chavez – which I’m
sure sent the NeoCon blogosphere screaming ’round the bend. (…but
I never actually pull that garbage up, to know for sure ;^)
Does anyone else perceive, how quickly Obama and Hillary are diffusing tensions with adversaries all around the world?
In response to the partial loosening of embargo restrictions on Cuba by Obama, Raul Castro on Friday offered to meet with everything on the table (read; political prisoners, free press, etc), saying they (the Castro’s) could have been wrong on some things. Bush never came close, to obtaining such a conciliatory remark in 8 years on the job…
Fifth Summit of the Americas
Hillary’s Town Hall of the Americas, held Friday in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic;
Digital Town Hall of the Americas
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I figure they’ll be done when the Cubans get dollars and cars that they don’t have to hold together with bailing wire. A plus for Cuban car owners will be when antique car dealers and collectors start paying them $$$ to care for their cars.
Welcome Bayou Queen – LOL. Cuba probably appears frozen in time after
a 5-decade embargo… ;^)
But it’s time to normalize relations IMO, as soon as possible.
great domain name for blog like this)))
Welcome to Balkingpoints from Romania!
Three years ago my daughter and I visited Cuba, travelling through Mexico. While our two week visit was short, we did not encounter any antagonism. Cubans kept asking us where we were from. There were some old cars on the streets but we saw a lot of Toyotas, too, and watched CNN in our hotel rooms. We watched while chairs were placed for a speech by Fidel and Hugo Chavez, but were astonished that there was no security around in the square. On our return we mentioned attending mass in Havana and a friend didn’t believe that churches were open.
While walking past a war museum a young soldier on a balcony gestured to us, seems he wanted us to take his picture!
There were problems with water in one hotel, but all the bulbs were fluorescent.
Havana may not be free, as we were told by a young man, but the hysteria of lack of free speech is fed by the anti-Castro Cubans in Florida.
During our brief stay we met Swedes, Canadians and other Europeans who could travel freely without having to sneak in from another country.
Your post Elaine goes right to a central premise of Balkingpoints.com – which is that in the WWW age, we no longer need traditional media filtering what we do & do not know about other societies. We can simply talk to each other about it across borders.
And relay travel experiences like yours. Americans in general, don’t know jack about the Middle East or Asia either…
I believe Marika was thinking of writing a Balk about world travel experiences – favorite destinations, etc. Which could lead to more stories like yours.
I think the cable access may have just been for tourists in the hotels. Don’t
think average Cubans have anything other than broadcast TV, owned and programmed by the state.
But since the U.S. has had an isolation policy in place for 50 years against Cuba, I wouldn’t know for sure… ;^)
US taxpayers have spent %500,000,000 to broadcast to Cuba, via Radio Marti and TV Marti which employs Cuban Americans from Miami. Less than 1 in 9 Cubans have ever heard of the stations.
While Obama has reduced funds this year, in view of the economic crisis, they both should be shut down.
Cubans can easily pick up Florida stations, as well as Mexican ones less than 100 miles away.
When I grew up in Canada we used to listen to KSL (Salt Lake City) and KOA (Denver), thousands of miles away.
Forget trying to influence Cubans with propaganda from Miami. They know what’s going on.