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Restrictions on Cuba are
unfair
Published by The
News-Press on December 29, 2004.
The irrationality and injustice of U.S.
travel and trade restrictions on Cuba are
two reasons for ending the failed four-decade-old
effort to topple or even moderate the communist
regime with embargoes.
New travel restrictions imposed in July
by the Bush administration cut in half the
number of airplane seat reservations in
the second six months of this year compared
with the same period in 2003.
The restrictions have caused suffering
among Cuban-Americans and their relatives
on the island, who get money, food, medicine
and emotional support from visits.
Yet, predictably, the repressive human
rights policies the restrictions were designed
to protest by reducing revenues for Cuba
continue unabated - although they remain
little or no worse than those in several
countries with which we maintain normal
relations and robust trade.
In fact, the same U.S. government that
enacts these fruitless nuisance restrictions
on travel and trade is at the same time
helping farm states sell products to Cuba,
to in fact expand trade from areas with
the political clout to demand it.
California, Texas and Maine have called
officially for more trade with Cuba, and
more than half the states are selling something
there, according to federal trade data.
Only the voting weight of the anti-Castro
Cuban-Americans in South Florida keeps this
hopeless nonsense going. We suspect even
they would be glad if the gates were finally
thrown open.
Copyright
2004 , The News-Press.
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