Embargo and Cuba

[Sandpointian]

Originally Posted by James420

It's been what 54 years, we may be arming an enemy from a few years ago in Syria, and I get the whole "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" but does anyone else think those in Cuba are like "seriously" this is getting ridiculous.

Is it time to lift the Embargo?

I should have been lifted 30-40 years ago. But the Cuban vote in Florida is large; Florida has a large number of electoral votes; and Florida is for the time being a swing state. this means the US is hostage to what the relatively small Cuban American community wants.

The meantime, the entire Western world is trading with Cuba save the US.

Makes no sense for the country as a whole.

[BugsyPal]

For your reading pleasure:

The Real Reason It's Nearly Impossible to End the Cuba Embargo - The Atlantic

[LordSquidworth]

Originally Posted by BugsyPal

Lifting the embargo against Cuba has less to do with the exile community in Florida (or elsewhere as many Cuban-Americans have spread all over the USA), but what things always come down to; a pissing contest between men where neither will back down first.

The USA simply cannot just lift the embargo without getting "something" otherwise our great nation will look like it "lost" and the Castro regime won. Plain and simple.

Will give you that Cuban-Americans especially those with connections often benefit greatly from the status quo. Cubans walk across the American border with Mexico at check points, arrive on the shores of Florida looking remarkably well fed and hydrated not to mention dress for persons that have been out to sea for days. Stranger still many have cell phones and or know the address/contect information of relatives in the USA who are some how not at all shocked by the arrival.

Cubans remaining in that country also benefit if they have American connections via the allowances of food, money etc.. that is sent back.

The main group as a whole not wishing to see the embargo lifted with Cuba is also the state of Florida especially in the South. A tropical island with legal gambling, beautiful men and women of all complexions, climate, etc... would be a magnet for Americans and other tourists that would dump South Beach etc... in a NYC minute.

and yet we could crush the Castro regime in no time by flooding it with our stuff.

[DCforever]

I think the embargo is going to just disappear. No one will formally lift it, US citizen will just not be prosecuted for visiting Cuba without permission. That means you'll have to fly to a third country, but that is not a major impediment.

[PedroMartinez]

IMHO, the embargo is ridiculous and should have been ended decades ago.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by Memphis1979

I don't think the embargo was a mistake in the beginning. With the missile crisis and other overt acts from Cuba, it served a purpose for a time.

Debates are based on facts, not fantasies.

All of the following are facts:

1] Castro took part in the fire-bombing of an army barracks
2] Castro and other participants were imprisoned
3] the US State Department pushed Batista into granting clemency for those involved
4] the US invited Castro to a meeting at US Embassy Mission Mexico City for purpose of recruiting Castro
5] Castro attended that meeting as was recruited to overthrow Batista
6] the CIA assigned agent Frank Sturgis as case officer.
7] Sturgis was responsible for operational planning of Batista's overthrow, and the coordination of logistics and intelligence for Castro's rebel army

Those are the facts as admitted into the record by the United States Government.

When the US acquired the Cuba as a colony from Spain in 1898 in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War, Cuban agricultural workers were paid $0.30/day.

That was on a par with American agricultural workers who were paid $0.35 per day to as much as $0.60 per day, depending entirely on where in the US they were working and what specifically they were doing.

The problem is that 60 year later in 1958, Cuban field workers were still being paid $0.30 per day.

Castro asked National Sugar and United Fruit (Chiquita) to increase wages to a level comparable to both company's field workers in Central and South America, which was about $0.90 per day.

Both National Sugar and United Fruit refused, which led Castro to start investigating their financials, at which he discovers that not only have National Sugar and United Fruit never paid any taxes, neither had any other US business.

Castro then seized all US corporate assets for failure to pay taxes.

Castro did nothing wrong, and certainly did nothing illegal.

To suggest that Castro's actions were overt is absurdly fantastical, since Castro gave them Due Process and ample time to pay back-taxes owed.

There was no relationship between Cuba and the Soviet Union prior to the US deployment of Jupiter Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles to Turkey and Italy.

To suggest that was an overt act on the part of Castro is laughably ridiculous and child-like.

The US brazenly overtly in a blatant act of aggression deployed IRBMs that threatened the life of every man, woman and child in the Soviet Union and East Bloc States.

This hostile act of aggression by the US is what prompted Moscow to open a dialogue with Castro.

The act by the Soviets was not aggressive, it was defensive, since it restored parity.

Moderator cut: OFF TOPIC

[GregW]

The embargo should never have been started and it is past time to end it. I cannot wait for the first MECUM Classic Car auction in Havana. Not to mention some really good rum.