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Castro Says Goodbye; Will the U.S. Say Hello?

With the ailing Fidel Castro having finally announced a formal end to his 49 years at the helm of communist Cuba, a would-be workers' utopia of his own imagining, "the ball is in the U.S. court right now," said Congressman Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts, speaking earlier today on a conference call of Cuba experts, organized by the New America Foundation. "If we want things to change in Cuba, then we have to change." To that end, McGovern and 103 other members of the House of Representatives, Republicans and Democrats, sent an open letter to Condoleezza Rice, requesting "a tough-minded review of U.S. policy." (The letter notably lacks signatures from any Florida representatives.) It reads:

President Castro has departed form office voluntarily. An orderly succession has occurred in Cuba, without violence or upheaval. The Cuban government, under a new leadership, is reportedly already considering changes in the economic arrangements on the island to give the Cuban people a long-sought improvement in their living standards.

For five decades, U.S. policy has tried economic sanctions and diplomatic isolation to force changes in Cuba's government. These developments demonstrate that the policy has not worked. Allies and adversaries alike have rejected our approach and instead engage the Cuban government directly on diplomatic issues and make billions of dollars in economic investments on the island, making it even less likely that our sanctions will ever achieve their stated purpose.

Posted by Bruce Falconer on 02/19/08 at 11:00 AM | Comments (1) | Email | Print

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