Bush Proposes a Plan to Aid Opponents of Castro in Cuba

[dragon wench]

Bush Proposes a Plan to Aid Opponents of Castro in Cuba
By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS, NYT


WASHINGTON, May 6 - President Bush announced a plan on Thursday to use military aircraft to help American broadcasters reach Cuba and to increase sharply the money for Cuban critics of the government of President Fidel Castro.

In a White House ceremony to mark his receipt of a nearly 500-page report on Cuba by a presidential commission, Mr. Bush said his actions would help hasten an end to the Castro government, which has held power for 45 years.

The measures, which include further restrictions on travel and cash transfers to Cuba, were embraced by Republican Cuban-American lawmakers and other adherents of a hard-line position toward Havana, and they were expected to be viewed as provocative by Mr. Castro.

But the moves ran into a wall of criticism by Democrats and a bipartisan group of lawmakers, mostly from farm states, who are seeking to take the policy in the opposite direction. Over the administration's objections, Congress has steadily sought to increase travel and trade with Cuba in recent years.

Representative Robert Menendez of New Jersey, the lone Cuban-American Democrat in Congress, accused Mr. Bush of pandering to Cuban exiles in South Florida, who White House advisers have acknowledged are central to Mr. Bush's re-election strategy.

"The need and timing of a White House Cuba Commission and its release of a report today is highly dubious and politically transparent," Mr. Menendez said.

Other critics questioned the plan's expense. Officials said the administration would cover the costs by taking up to $59 million from other foreign spending accounts.

Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana and the ranking member of the Finance Committee, said the new plan amounted to a misuse of taxpayer money.

"At a time when the United States faces very real terrorist threats in the Middle East and elsewhere, the administration's absurd and increasingly bizarre obsession with Cuba is more than just a shame, it's a dangerous diversion from reality," Mr. Baucus said.

The president declined a proposal to cut the payments that Cuban Americans send to relatives in Cuba, ending an internal squabble within the commission, officials said. Proponents of cutting or freezing remittances, which have been valued by the United Nations at more than $800 million a year, said it would deprive the Castro government of cash, but opponents said it would hurt the most vulnerable people in Cuba.

The president's plan calls for more closely supervising the cash transfers and limiting them to direct family members who are not Communist Party officials. He also called for scaling back family visits from once a year to once every three years, and cutting back on educational travel to curtail what officials say is disguised tourism.

Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Miami Republican, praised Mr. Bush for striking a balance between humanitarian impulses and the desire to keep cash from reaching Mr. Castro.

"Closer scrutiny of remittance regulations and travel permits will help to ensure the Castro regime does not plunder the Cuban-American exile community's hard work and contributions to their family members suffering in the island," she said.

But critics countered that the Treasury Department, which enforces economic sanctions, is already spending an inordinate amount of time on Cuba, largely in response to domestic political pressure. Of the 120 employees at the Office of Foreign Assets Control, Senator Baucus said, 21 are dedicated to enforcing the Cuba embargo and only 4 to tracking the finances of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

Administration officials said the best-financed part of the program would be to provide $36 million for Cuban dissidents, youth groups and others, most likely in materials, not cash, delivered through third parties.

Roger F. Noriega, the assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, predicted that more dissidents would risk their freedom in coming months and years, despite a crackdown last year by Mr. Castro that sent about 75 prominent critics to jail, many for allegedly conspiring with the United States.

Mr. Bush approved spending up to $18 million to use a specially equipped plane to broadcast the Spanish-language government TV station, and its radio partner, to Cuba. The plane, an EC-130 known as Commando Solo, has been used in psychological operations in Bosnia, Kosovo, Haiti and Panama and may be able to overcome Cuban jamming as it flies in international waters near the island. TV Marti has been effectively jammed since it was set up in 1990.


Thoughts...? Opinions on the actual issue aside for the moment, I think it is all about appealing to the Florida/ Miami Cuban voting block.. and largely political posturing...

And I just accused Fable of stirring up the pot in the old political thread....

[Moonbiter]

I just had to check my calendar to see if it's April Fools Day....

[dragon wench]

Quote:

Originally posted by Moonbiter I just had to check my calendar to see if it's April Fools Day....

I think for certain administrations every day is April Fool's Day...

[Gwalchmai]

Geez, the guy never learns, does he?

I've always felt that if the US made relations with Cuba a little more porous, then 'Democracy' (i.e. capitalism) would eventually creep in, and we would see an event like the destruction of the Berlin Wall or the election of someone like Gorbashev (sp?) come out of the blue. In other words, I think the best way to proselytize our system of government is through gentle encouragement rather than sanctions and military support. The US has made a big mess out of Latin America using the latter means in the past, why not try to be benevolent for a change?

I'm not sure if I'm expressing myself well enough....

[Weasel]

I've came to realize, one of us crackpots in SYM is Bush.

Where as I wish I could claim I was this stupid, sadly I cannot....even I have my limits to stupid behavior (Yes it's true I do)


The options..

1)America is lost..the drug of "Rush" has reached the highest office. Code red, blow the house up!

2)See option one.

[RandomThug]

... I am going to go listen to some good music in the corner over here, headphones on real loud. Come get me next year, this time.

[Gwalchmai]

Quote:

Originally posted by RandomThug ... I am going to go listen to some good music in the corner over here, headphones on real loud. Come get me next year, this time.

** One Year Later **

Thug! Thug! Wake up!

Emperor Bush has routed the English! Now its on to Waterloo! Isn't this great?

[Chanak]

For the love of Pete. I am sure that all of this administration's planning, strategy and brainstorming over Cuba was done whilst puffing on big, fat contraband Cuban cigars. Transparent is not the word. Try moronic.

[dragon wench]

Quote:

Originally posted by Gwalchmai Geez, the guy never learns, does he? I've always felt that if the US made relations with Cuba a little more porous, then 'Democracy' (i.e. capitalism) would eventually creep in, and we would see an event like the destruction of the Berlin Wall or the election of someone like Gorbashev (sp?) come out of the blue. In other words, I think the best way to proselytize our system of government is through gentle encouragement rather than sanctions and military support. The US has made a big mess out of Latin America using the latter means in the past, why not try to be benevolent for a change? I'm not sure if I'm expressing myself well enough....

I think I know what you mean... I guess my question is, why even proselytize at all? I know it is all about geopolitics, power and influence... but my own feelings are that unless a nation is truly a threat and guilty of utterly unconscionable human rights violations (such as Nazi Germany)... why not just leave them be?

Yes, human rights have been an issue in Cuba (though IMO, the situation was far, far worse under Batista and his cohort of mafia thugs...), but I wouldn't buy that argument coming out of the Bush adminstration. Iraq has amply proven that the issue of human rights is simply a foil for promoting and ensuring US oil interests (amongst others).

Some might say imperialism is to protect trading interests, but IMO it is inherently natural for humans to trade, and left to their own devices they will do so regardless.... As you obviously know, humans have been trading since the dawn of Cro Magnon man if not even earlier....

Sorry if I sound confused or incoherant, lots on my mind right now

@Chan, indeed, well put...

[Chanak]

Quote:

Originally posted by dragon wench Some might say imperialism is to protect trading interests, but IMO it is inherently natural for humans to trade, and left to their own devices they will do so regardless.... As you obviously know, humans have been trading since the dawn of Cro Magnon man if not even earlier.... Sorry if I sound confused or incoherant, lots on my mind right now

*big hug* You don't sound that bad, DW. Why, just the other day, I was tearing the house apart at 5:45 AM looking for my glasses...fuming that I would be late for work if I didn't find them soon. I didn't realize, of course, that they were in my hand the whole time...

Quite true concerning trade being a natural occurence between groups of humans. As early as the 10th century, Scandanavians were conducting trade with people in the Middle East.

[Nippy]

Quote:

Originally posted by Gwalchmai ** One Year Later ** Thug! Thug! Wake up! Emperor Bush has routed the English! Now its on to Waterloo! Isn't this great?

Never! We Redcoats won't lie down and take it, I say! Onwards to glory!

[fable]

Hispanics are the single largest growing minority in the US, and now second in size to Caucasians. They are generally conservative, and Republicans are targeting them wherever they can find 'em. With Florida so much of a problem in the last election, and with the bottom third of Florida heavily Hispanic, Bush simply wants to get that vote, and will do anything that doesn't involve research, learning facts, or acting intelligently. This kind of act is simply a cheap and easy vote-getter. If he gets elected, watch it melt away under the heat of the Miami sun.

[Luis Antonio]

Quote:

Originally posted by fable Hispanics are the single largest growing minority in the US, and now second in size to Caucasians. They are generally conservative, and Republicans are targeting them wherever they can find 'em. With Florida so much of a problem in the last election, and with the bottom third of Florida heavily Hispanic, Bush simply wants to get that vote, and will do anything that doesn't involve research, learning facts, or acting intelligently. This kind of act is simply a cheap and easy vote-getter. If he gets elected, watch it melt away under the heat of the Miami sun.

Thats true, but you must consider the power inside Cuba. Its people are highly educated, lowly paid and live under repression. If Cuba goes out of the 'red' side, they become a very large potential market and source of minds for the rest of the world.

*raises from chair*
Long live to Cuba!

[Chanak]

@fable: It appears to be nothing more than vote stacking to me as well. It's the same old thing, been done before, now President Bush is jumping on the bandwagon. Castro has been in power in Cuba for years...ever since the Bay of Pigs fiasco, it's been - well, for lack of a better phrase - un-American to think that normalizing relations with that country might achieve something worthwhile for the Cuban people. Instead, we help keep a sort of Dark Ages going on there, giving Fidel fuel for the fire, so to speak. I'm not an admirer of Fidel Castro by a long shot, and I personally thought pulling the plug on the former Soviet Union's attempt at using Cuba as a base for ICBMs was a good thing...that aside, it's high time the Dark Ages ended. Besides, Fidel is not immortal, he will certainly kick the bucket one day.

[Therion]

What I find really funny is that he acts against Castro while he (and other western governments like the Dutch) are more than willing to lay aside all human rights violations and repression when it's got to do with China.

Politicians are so.. it's not pragmatic, lying and deceitful bastards comes closer.

-edit: Yes, I know that last is a generalisation.