[Marxism] Rangel and Flake: Time for America to Be Relevant in Cuba

[Walter Lippmann <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

(Respectful and positive. Let's hope that the new Congressional
leadership, which has travelled to Syria and talked about going
to Iran, will see the need to repair U.S. relations with its
neighbor to the south. It's time and more than overtime for this.)
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The Washington Post

Time for America to Be Relevant in Cuba
By Charles B. Rangel and Jeff Flake
Saturday, April 14, 2007; A19

Several months after Cuba's revolutionary leader fell ill and left
public view, Havana has clearly moved into the post-Fidel Castro era.
Whether Washington will follow suit is another matter altogether.

Recently the Bush administration has shown new flexibility in foreign
policy. Consider: a nuclear deal with North Korea and talks aimed at
normalized relations, contact with Syria and Iran, and a stronger
push for Israel-Palestine negotiations.

What about Cuba?

RaÃl Castro, Cuba's interim president and designated successor, has
twice called for U.S.-Cuba negotiations. This offer deserves a
positive response. Potentially, we could profit by negotiating
increased cooperation on drug interdiction and migration policy, the
return of American fugitives residing in Cuba, and environmental
protections as Cuba explores for oil in waters near our own.

But more than deals with Cuba, we need a new deal with ourselves on
Cuba policy.

For too long, our approach has been guided by electoral
considerations. Ever-tightening sanctions have won votes in Florida
for both Republicans and Democrats. But these sanctions have done
nothing to promote change in Cuba, and they have kept American
strengths -- diplomacy and contact with American society -- squarely
on the sidelines.

Today, Cuba may be on the cusp of change, and we need to take a fresh
look. RaÃl Castro, at age 75, is a committed socialist. He has
convicted some pro-democracy activists, released others from jail and
continued harassment of dissidents. He has also allowed a debate over
past repression to open up in Cuba's cultural sector.

He acknowledges that his role is transitional, a bridge to Cuba's
next generation, and his greatest interest is to set the stage for
socialism's long-term survival.

It is a safe bet that he will seek to accomplish that goal through
economic reform. His reformist record dates to the 1980s, and he has
Cuban economists busy developing policy options. Dissident Vladimiro
Roca calls him Cuba's "number one reformer."

He has raised expectations that he will tackle chronic problems:
excessive centralization; broken-down state enterprises that cheat
consumers and breed corruption; low farm output; severe income
inequality; and a generation of young people that has known nothing
but shortage and sacrifice.

An economic opening would deliver political support for Cuba's
successor government. And it is the only means to deliver the growth,
jobs and higher incomes that can give hope to young Cubans and fair
wages to teachers, doctors and others left behind in Cuba's
post-Soviet economy.

How should we respond to these possibilities?

The administration should begin by ending its insistence that it will
respond only to Cuba's complete conversion to democracy and free
markets. Cubans surely would welcome incremental reforms that improve
living standards, not to mention economic and political freedom. The
administration's all-or-nothing posture is divorced from the reality
on which our approaches to North Korea, China, Vietnam and other
communist countries are based. It is a formula for irrelevance.

And Congress should increase American influence by building bridges
rather than barriers to Cuba.

The administration has all but cut off individual Americans' contacts
with Cuba. People-to-people and academic exchanges, family visits,
religious and humanitarian programs, and travel by average Americans
are nearly impossible -- if not illegal -- today.

President Bush's theory is that reduced travel cuts Cuba's
hard-currency earnings and helps to "hasten the end of the Castro
dictatorship." But his intelligence agencies certify that the
dictatorship is unbothered: Cuban economic growth was 7.5 percent
last year.

We should unite around a principle that Democrats and Republicans
have long embraced, a principle that aided the West's success in the
Cold War: American openness is a source of strength, not a concession
to dictatorships.

It is time to permit free travel to Cuba, as provided in legislation
we have introduced. Open travel would create a "free flow of ideas"
that "would promote democratization," as dissident Oscar Espinosa
Chepe wrote shortly after his release from prison in 2004. It would
also bring humanitarian benefits to Cubans as family visits increase
and travelers boost Cuba's small but vital entrepreneurial sector.

Electoral politics should not prevent us from reaching out to 11
million neighbors who have lived under communism for 48 long years.

Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) chairs the House Ways and Means
Committee. Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) led a 10-member House delegation
to Cuba in December.


Walter Lippmann
Havana, Cuba
"Un paraiso bajo el bloqueo"
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/
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