Since I have been Oscar Mike for much of the Holiday season and still am, a links post is about all I can muster until I return to the wintry confines of the Rose City. I ushered in the New Year in San Francisco after watching the Ducks of the University of Oregon emerge triumphant over the Cowboys from Oklahoma State University in San Diego the previous night. I saw my Eagles get thumped over a Black & Tan and a couple Firestone Union Jack IPAs at Buffalo’s in San Luis Obispo’s downtown where we also saw the barnburning Sun Bowl come to a conclusion, Beavers mincing-up the Panthers 3-0.
Interesting stories to consider:
With the Cuban “Revolution” celebrating its 50th anniversary over the New Year and the 11th U.S. President since the Castro coup d’etat about to be inaugurated, it raises a number of issues.
Will Barack Obama be the one to normalize relations with Havana? Probably not, since the bitterness toward the regime is much more entrenched within the congressional anti-Castroites and status quo is preferred by the State Department. Even if Obama makes inroads toward a new U.S. policy toward Cuba, it will be the cause of much political drama thanks to the vociferous crowds down in southern Florida, New Jersey and elsewhere and the status quo ante Obama will likely remain.
The U.S., though, must change its Cuba policy. Obama is right about this. We need to allow free travel and (relatively) free trade in and out of the island nation. The Castros et al have held on to power for five decades by restricting freedom and blaming its northern neighbor for all of its problems. We’ve defeated Communism in nearly every other case by coming down on the side of freedom and against the totalitarianism and ideology of the Marxist-Leninists. Why, then, in Cuba do we foster a policy with such a marked difference? It makes no sense, and for freedom to exist in our hemisphere, the first domino should fall in Cuba, then it will move toward Venezuela, Bolivia, and so on down the line. The Cuban-American dissidents and Foggy Bottom bureaucrats should let Obama move in the proper direction and allow for freedom and liberty to topple the failed regime in Havana.
Sure the shining examples of the “Revolution” are that the Cuban people are largely “educated” and have access to healthcare, but the quality of both are terrible and by any objective measure, the Castro regime has taken the Latin American country which was arguably the most free and had the highest standard of living in 1958 and turned those standards on their collective heads.
The Bush Administration, concerned with regime change throughout the Asian continent, should have been a bit more concerned within the sphere of the Monroe Doctrine during the last 8 years. Perhaps Obama emerges triumphant in the move toward Cuban freedom, but with his largely neoconservative-trending foreign policy team already in place (especially with Hillary at Foggy Bottom), he’ll have the hardest time battling his own team of bureaucrats rather than Congress, the UN or anyone else to get anything accomplished in regard to Cuba and the Castros.
Even today, the Sage of Baltimore emerges wise.
Another column worth checking out…
Le Dernier Mot: Washingtonian Madness by Srdja Trifkovic (yes, that is his name, he is Serbian)
Dr. Trifkovic comes donw on the bipolar/duapolistic foreign policy problems we have in Washington. I tend to agree with his takes, but even if one doesn’t, it is certainly worth a read, in my opinion.