Posted on 05/20/2002 8:16:13 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush on Monday refused to support lifting the Cuban trade embargo unless Fidel Castro releases political prisoners, conducts independently monitored elections and accepts a list of tough new U.S. conditions for a "new government that is fully democratic."
"Freedom sometimes grows step by step, and we will encourage those steps," the president said, outlining his new U.S. policy on Cuban Independence Day.
Seeking to balance his hard-line policy with a sensitivity to Cuba's grinding poverty, the president outlined administration actions designed to make life better for the Cuban people. One initiative would resume direct mail service to and from Cuba.
Bush's speech, which aides said has been in the works since January, came a week after former President Carter traveled to Cuba and urged the people to embrace democracy while calling on the United States to lift the 40-year-old trade embargo.
Carter and other critics argue that the restrictions have failed to end Castro's regime while making life tough on ordinary Cubans. Bush also has been accused of shaping his policy to win support of Cuban-Americans, a force in Florida politics and thus a key to his re-election hopes.
Indeed, Bush was traveling to Miami later in the day to address Cuban-Americans eager to hear his anti-Castro rhetoric.
Speaking in Spanish at times, Bush said Cuba's legacy of freedom "has been insulted by a tyrant who uses brutal methods to enforce a bankrupt vision. That legacy has been debased by a relic from another era who has turned a beautiful island into a prison."
If all his conditions are met, Bush will support lifting the congressionally mandated trade ban - even if Castro is still in charge - said two senior White House officials, speaking on condition of anonymity. But they said Bush does not envision Castro's making the necessary changes, prompting the new policy designed to foment change from within the country.
"If Mr. Castro refuses our offer he will be protecting his cronies at the expense of his people and eventually, despite all his tools of oppression, Fidel Castro will need to answer to his people," Bush said.
"Well-intentioned ideas about trade will merely prop up this dictator, enrich his cronies and enhance the totalitarian regime. It will not help the Cuban people," he said.
To win his approval of easing restrictions, Bush said Cuba must:
_Allow opposition parties to speak freely and organize.
_Allow independent trade unions.
_Free all political prisoners.
_Allow human rights organizations to visit Cuba to ensure that the conditions for free elections are being created.
_Allow outside observers to monitor 2003 elections.
_End discriminatory practices against Cuban workers.
"Full normalization of relations with Cuba, diplomatic recognition, open trade and a robust aid program will only be possible when Cuba has a new government that is fully democratic, when the rule of law is respected and when the human rights of all Cubans are fully protected," Bush said.
"Meaningful reform on Cuba's part will be answered with a meaningful United States response," he said. "The choice rests with Mr. Castro."
He voiced support for a referendum in Cuba asking voters whether they favor civil liberties, including freedom of speech and assembly, and amnesty for political prisoners.
Pledging to help the Cuban people weather the nation's economic crisis, Bush called for the resumption of mail service and promised assistance to nongovernmental organizations that aid Cubans. He also pledged to create scholarships in the United States for Cuban students, family members of political prisoners and professionals trying to build civil institutions in the communist regime.
Money still needs to be found for the scholarship program, White House officials said. They said the initiatives can be carried out without congressional approval
Last week, a 40-member, bipartisan group in Congress announced support for easing the embargo. The private Human Rights Watch called for the same, saying the embargo "imposes indiscriminate hardship on the Cuban people and impedes democratic change."
Politics loomed large over Bush's events Monday.
Cuban-American voters helped carry him to a narrow victory in Florida, the state that decided the 2000 election, and they favor the kind of hard line he was espousing. The tough talk also could appeal to the broader Hispanic vote throughout the United States.
Bush's brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, faces re-election this year and is depending on Cuban-Americans, who vote heavily Republican.
The president was to headline a fund-raiser Monday evening for the Florida Republican Party, which will use the money to boost Jeb Bush's re-election campaign. It will be the third fund-raiser for his brother the president has attended this year.
Am I the only one who sees the irony in giving the "Full Lewinski" to countries like China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Korea and Saudi Arabia who are all a million times worse than Castro ever could be, while locking down a crusty old communist who is about as dangerous to America as Nova Scotia, and no the paranoid ramblings of that slakjawed moron John Bolton don't count
The Cuba policy only does two things, one it gets votes from the god damn Miami Cubans, who I think we should deport the Haiti, and it incubates Castro "Don't look at me comrad, Cuba is a mess because of the embargo"
Besides, bringing "democracy" to Saudi Arabia will only bring the muftis to more power than they already enjoy.
CUBA LIBRE!!!
You'd think Carter would have ended it when HE was President.
I got out of my car, hauled out my video camera and started shooting. Everyone was really super-nice. It was at that moment that I grew to love Cubans - I could see that, unlike California's immigrants, they had a love for the US and a basic uncynical belief in our system I rarely see elsewhere.
From my point of view, they were a breath of fresh air. I definitely don't think Reno did the right thing in sending Elian back to Cuba. We sold them out, but I hope we didn't make them as cynical as we deserve them to be.
Miami has the only shopping mall I know of (CocoaWalk) where there is literally dancing in the aisles. The Cuban spirit is really something to see.
Cubans are optimists at heart, and of course they have done amazingly well here. Much better than California's immigrants; in fact, the contrast is a little startling.
In short, I don't think they're an "interest group" to appease. I think they deserve our support in fighting Castro and his government.
D
No Clemenza. We need a tighter version of Rockwell. I haven't bought any of their power tools in years.
Thanks for posting this, CW. (^:
A (then) liberal Democrat President imposed that embargo and successive Democrat Presidents and Democrat-controlled Congresses have voted to maintain it, despite all the pleas from Castro-lovers around the globe and especially in the U.S.
Castro and Cuba are an enemy right in front of our nose. No military threat but an affront to liberty and democracy that we cannot ignore, as we can Saudi Arabia, most African countries and in fact, a good chunk of the world that still seem remote.
Bush made some good points in his speech and the embargo may be 'expedient' but it's also a valuable tool for tweaking a corrupt, oppressive dictator. We can't change the world but we can certainly do at least a little bit - like an embargo - to annoy Castro and use it to point out his oppression, as President Bush just did.
So what if it's good politics? That doesn't make the embargo any less correct.
Did you personally live during the Cuban Missle Crisis of 1962? Do you remember it? Fidel hosted Russian missles tipped with nukes until the Russians lost their nerve. I remember the bomb drills and the fear, etc. I will never forget and will never forgive Fidel Castro. Can a tiger change its stripes? That old Stalinist never will! Sic Semper Tyrannis!
I think the embargo serves Castro pretty well, too. It gives him an excuse for his nation being a squalid hell-hole. If trade opens up, the cultural effects could destroy his regime. How ya gonna keep 'em down on the finca after they've seen MTV? The rest of the world trades with Cuba...if the place sucks, it's due to tyrannical Socialism, not the embargo.
And if memory serves, Florida swung the right way last time...appeasing a few thousand voters there may not be the worst thing to do.
But by all means, let's keep an embargo that doesn't work against a tiny country ruled by an aging despot. It keeps the monkeys cheering in their cages.
The embargo doesn't affect me one way or another, but the Cubans I know are marvelous, hard working honest and friendly. I think of that and realized that as long as Castro is there, very little of the benefits of trade will pass to the people still in Cuba.
Also, the U.S. is the only country that is embargoing Cuba, no? Then why don't they just sidle up to Canada or Mexico or some country in south or central America? The place could be rebuilt as a tourist mecca, injecting billions into their economy, yet it doesn't happen. Why? My vote goes to the failure of Communism to work outside of theory, and Castro's regime.
I think President Bush is right on, and Carter is a damn fool. As someone said above, why didn't he lift the embargo as president?
You know what? There is NO credible argument to revert to isolationism. We can't ignore the world any more.
At the turn of the century, the Old World erupted into one of its periodic tribal disputes. A petty monarch of an obscure country is assassinated, and all of Europe, citing an array of treaty obligations or a simple desire to grab a few additional acres, decides to jump in. Woodrow Wilson, fresh from emasculating the Senate, creating the Federal Reserve, and imposing an income tax, chooses to enter the fray on the side of Britain and France. Victory over monarchical government at last! Long live the rule of the rabble!
The winners impoverish Germany, slice off several Germanic minorities from their homeland, and carve up Eastern Europe into various artificial territories. The stage was set for a worldwide depression (ably enabled by the newly created Federal Reserve) and a second world war as soon as the ink dried at Versailles.
World War II of course gave us the welfare/warfare state, complete with Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the Soviet Bloc, and wars in Korea and Vietnam. After a series of hot wars and cold wars, the money finally ran out, forcing Nixon to abandon what remained of the gold standard or else declare a default.
The end result now is over $6T in debt and troops posted everywhere but at our own borders, coasts and airspace: the wealth-consuming, all-regulating total state. Thank you Woodrow Wilson and thank you interventionism. Thank you very f***ing much.
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