The sweeping proposal is a clear indication of the vision powerful exile leaders have for the island that they fled from years ago. It addresses everything from property rights to wages to political parties.
The plan calls for the privatization of ''joint ventures'' between the government and foreign investors, endorses the right of urban property dwellers in Cuba to remain in their homes, as long as old private owners are properly compensated, and suggests that social classes be officially reintroduced with defined roles and rights.
The plan is also a clear rejection of dissident Osvaldo Paya's Proyecto Varela, a referendum singed by tens of thousands of Cubans to effect change on the island by working within the communist constitution.
''It's important for us to set the tone that there will be no fundamental change in Cuba's system if you go along with the constitution drafted by Fidel Castro,'' said Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. ``This sets up a new path.''
The report, called ``Socio-Economic Reconstruction, suggestions and recommendations for a Post Castro Cuba, was prepared by Antonio Jorge, a political economy and international relations professor at Florida International University.
Exile leaders, including Congressmen Mario and Lincoln Diaz-Balart, said they hope the proposal will help influence the Bush administration's own planning for a Post-Castro Cuba. [End]
Let others listen to the ramblings of tyrants and the threats of terrorists.
We will hold fast - until that morning dawns - and live by the words our brother, Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet [biss-ETT], wrote in a letter to his wife, which was smuggled out of prison Kilo Ocho:
"No te asustes, ya queda poco tiempo para que este mal se acabe. Resiste hasta el final en el camino de Dios y Dios te dara las alegrias."
The path of God - el camino de Dios - is the path of freedom.
For Dr. Biscet and his wife, for all his fellow dissidents and prisoners, for everyone inside Cuba, for every name on a cross on this field, and for every soul suffering in the darkness anywhere in the world.
For our hope still "shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."
Tonight, on this field, we resist, we hope, we walk the path of God.
And the darkness is dying.***