By Robert Novak Sun-Times columnist. Chicago Sun -Times. June 6, 2000.
Last Tuesday's edition of the Los Angeles Times published a letter by Rep. Jim McGovern, a second-term liberal Democrat from Worcester, Mass., giving advice to President Clinton: "Fly on Air Force One into Havana and declare to the Cuban people that the Cold War is finally over." What
McGovern proposes closely resembles Clinton's apparent post-Elian Gonzalez agenda of restoring diplomatic and economic relations with Fidel Castro's communist regime in Clinton's final months as president.
Congressional critics of Castro suspect that McGovern was inspired by Clinton's National Security Council, but McGovern told me that is absolutely untrue. He did fax his letter to the White House, he said, adding: "I hope they read it." With a federal appellate court ruling two days
after the McGovern letter that Elian cannot seek political asylum, McGovern's pro-Castro initiatives find the official and public moods more congenial than could have been imagined six months ago.
The little Cuban boy's arrival in Miami after his mother was drowned trying to bring her son to freedom has yielded ironic benefits for the communist dictator. One million Cuban Americans, once considered a classic immigrant success story, have been demonized as lawless troublemakers. The Cuban
police state has been characterized by Attorney General Janet Reno as just another political system. While Castro's refusal to reform his brutal role and deepening repression of his citizens has lost support in Europe, friends in America see this as the time to normalize relations.
That is part of Clinton's unwavering resolve against Elian staying here. Last week's decision by an appellate panel in Atlanta makes clear that the decision was in the hands of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. If somebody else were president and decided to let the boy stay, the court
indicated it would go along with that, too.
Clinton's involvement was exposed by the presence of Gregory Craig, the big-time lawyer who is one of the president's attorneys, in representing Juan Miguel Gonzalez and shuttling between Havana and Washington. Cuban-American activist Ramon Saul Sanchez in Miami described Craig on Thursday as "deeply,
deeply into dealing with the Cuban government" and contended "there is a much bigger agenda behind all this."
Such an agenda is revealed by Craig's role as well as the raid by federal agents seizing Elian and delivering him to Cuban government control well before any asylum hearing, should the court have ordered one. Clinton always has wanted normalized relations with Havana but has been deterred by
political considerations and Castro's violent intransigence.
Castro needs an American lift now that his iron resistance to democratic reform has cooled the ardor for him by Europeans and Latin Americans. Spain, Costa Rica and other countries no longer heed Castro's admonition against visiting dissidents in Havana. In Geneva, his greatest hemispheric ally,
Mexico, for the first time abstained on United Nations condemnation of Cuban human rights violations. The Canadian-based Sherritt International Corp. is pulling back from a $500 million investment in a Cuban nickel mine.
Normalizing Cuban relations hardly should be at the top of Clinton's Latin American agenda. Colombia is deteriorating, with vast amounts of territory turned over to narco-guerrillas. Next door, Venezuela is politically unstable under rule of a populist demagogue. Panama, newly demilitarized with
the withdrawal of U.S. troops, is becoming a trouble spot.
Yet, the Latin American event that most engages the Clinton administration's attention is the disputed re-election of Peru's Alberto Fujimori, who has triumphed over drug traffickers and leftist guerrillas. The U.S. government wants collective hemispheric action against Peru, including economic
sanctions.
Republican Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Cuban-American leader in Miami, is puzzled but philosophic about last week's adverse court decision. He is most troubled by the difference in attitudes about Fujimori and Castro. Diaz-Balart told me: "The same people who insist on the most pristine
elections in Peru are pressing for diplomatic relations and trade with Cuba, despite no elections at all."
From George Washington onward, lame-duck American presidents have used their final months in office to rush through controversial steps. If Clinton does dare to embrace Castro before he leaves the White House, the communist dictator can thank the ill fortune of a 6-year-old Cuban.
Robert Novak appears on the CNN programs "Capital Gang" at 6 p.m. Saturday and "Evans, Novak, Hunt and Shields" at 4:30 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. Sunday.
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