Max J. Castro. Published Wednesday, April 12, 2000, in the Miami Herald
Sometimes the best course is to accept defeat, cut losses and move on. For Elian Gonzalez's Miami relatives and their supporters, this is one of those times. They have fought long and hard. Now Attorney General Janet Reno has decided that the 6-year-old boy who lost his mother should be reunited
with his father without delay. It's the right decision, supported by the force of law and the weight of public opinion.
Reno's steely resolve is unlikely to be swayed by the lack of cooperation of the Miami relatives or by crowd resistance. For the sake of avoiding more damage to the boy and the community, everyone should face reality and cooperate in a smooth transition. In exchange for that, Juan Miguel
Gonzalez should reiterate his agreement to keep Elian in the United States until the appeals process in the courts is completed. The attorney general should ensure that agreement is kept.
From the ashes of a devastating defeat can come new wisdom, new ideas and a new beginning. The debacle of the Falklands War led to democracy in Argentina. The people, whipped into a nationalist frenzy by the generals who ruled the country, turned around and asked who had led them into the trap.
Argentina was never the same again. Will Cuban Americans ask the same question?
For a setback to be turned into a victory, it's crucial to acknowledge the truth. This cause lost in the courts. It was lost in the minds of the American people. It upset our neighbors in this city. It gave the Cuban regime a great nationalist card. It pitted exiles against Cuban dissidents and
the island's Catholic bishops. It hurt Miami. It hurt Elian. It hurt one of the community's most promising politicians. From Peoria to Paris, it hurt the image of Cuban Americans. Like the Bay of Pigs, it was the perfect disaster. This time it was of our own making.
The Cuban-American community has accomplished a great deal. The cause of democracy that it espouses is just. There is no contest between authoritarian communism and liberal democracy. Liberal democracy, with all its terrible flaws, is a better system. There cannot be a just or democratic society
without political rights. Cuba is not democratic because Cubans cannot exercise fundamental political rights. The vast majority of Americans and the leaders of every democratic nation on Earth favor a democratic transition in Cuba. Their view of the Cuban system is dismal. So why are Cuban Americans
so isolated?
The self-defeating answer would be to find scapegoats. That already has started and needs to stop if we are to going learn anything. Searching for who lost Elian, whining about the media, vilifying President Clinton and Reno, howling about how we have been betrayed again by the U.S. government
and abandoned by our Anglo and black neighbors, looking for traitors in the ranks, even bashing Fidel Castro, won't help.
What is needed is fundamental rethinking, a Copernican revolution in outlook:
Start from the Declaration of Independence's ``decent respect to the opinions of mankind.''
Don't draw the line of allies narrowly around those who believe that a son should be wrested from his father because the father wants to live under a bad system or that you bring democracy by waging economic war.
Draw the circle of friends around all those who believe in democracy.
Heed Lech Walesa's advice that Cuban exiles rely on the love and forgiveness of the New Testament and not on the ``eye for an eye'' of the Old.
Put the Cuban people's welfare far above any political struggle.
End all economic and cultural embargoes.
Banish from our midst any trace of censorship, fanaticism, authoritarianism and intolerance.
That would do more for the cause of democracy and for improving the public view of Cuban Americans than all the anti-Castro diatribes and all the anti-media rants in the world.
Max J. Castro, Ph.D., is a senior research associate at the University of Miami's Dante B. Fascell North-South Center. maxcastro@miami.edu
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