Foster freedom in Cuba, but don't subsidize Castro
Published October 17, 2003
I dissent from your Oct. 16 editorial, Travel games. Business and travel restrictions to Cuba are in the best interests of establishing a free Cuba.
You stated that "there is no better way to promote American values than to show the benefits of freedom firsthand." However, I believe there is no better way to undermine American values than to allow American businesses and tourists to, in effect, support the Castro regime by helping its state-owned business infrastructure. Official connection between Castro's regime and the United States will only benefit Castro, who will see more support for his regime, and U.S. industry, which will be able to profit from cheap Communist labor. In addition, seeing Americans, like European tourists, take advantage of the apartheid-like economic society that is Cuba is too much to bear.
You stated that "nothing beats direct contact" between Americans and Cubans and that more open relations will will expose Castro's regime. However, no amount of exposure will shame the shameless Castro. In fact, just after the greatest amount of exposure Castro's regime received, when former President Jimmy Carter visited Cuba and publicly attacked Castro, came the greatest cycle of repression seen in Cuba in a generation. All Castro did was take all of the positive he could out of Carter's trip and ignore or undermine Carter's courageous attacks.
Castro would do the same with U.S. industry, trade and travel. He would take what he could from U.S. dollars and industry and use it to his advantage and squash the benefits for average Cubans.
Castro's legacy is, as you pointed out, disastrous. It has condemned generations of Cubans to a life of fear, oppression and violence. If we were, in effect, to remove the international stigma from this government, then we would be betraying not only those Cuban exiles like my parents and grandparents who trust and love this great nation, but also basic American values. What the United States must do is foster freedom in Cuba, not subsidize Castro's power. Accordingly, the Bush administration should use its international political capital on a Solidarity-like international effort to politically isolate the Castro regime, support the likes of Oswaldo Paya in Cuba and expose its international supporters as the spineless morally relative forces they are. In addition, we should reform our immigration policy so that we take a real stance of solidarity with the rafters who risk their lives to come to the United States by liberalizing our "wet food, dry land" policy. These steps, and not steps that seek to accommodate Castro, will bring us closer to the Cuban dream of freedom and justice for all and a world free of the presence of Fidel Castro.
-- Luis Viera, Temple Terrace
Don't we have enough trouble?
Re: Bush tightens screws on Castro, Oct. 11.
Good golly, don't we have enough trouble without starting up with Cuba? We are involved with so many countries all over the world, why is Bush involving us further with Castro?
Where, oh where, will it end?
-- Dorothy E. Karkheck, Dunedin
Pandering to voters
Re: Bush tightens screws on Castro.
Why did President Bush launch his recent initiative to rid Cuba of Fidel Castro? After 44 years, don't Cuban-American voters see through this repetitious ploy as each election nears?
Having seen firsthand the universal poverty and stifling oppression in Cuba, and having over the years provided housing and jump-start assistance to recently arrived Cuban refugees, I nevertheless object to my tax dollars bankrolling radio and TV broadcasts to that island nation. Instead of their futile political contributions, why can't enterprising Cuban-Americans fund those efforts? Instead, they prop up Castro by funneling dollars to him through their captive relatives. But Americans also are captives of sorts - we're the only nation in the world that restricts its citizens in their travel to Cuba.
If Castro is deposed, will our government's transition plan be better than the one in Iraq? Will it maintain or improve Cuba's universal health care, and its education system, whereby a youth can study free as long as aptitude and interest are displayed, even through medical school? Will we continue Cuba's outstanding record regarding prevention of child neglect and abuse? And without dictator Fidel, who will protect us from the importation of illegal drugs from Cuba's 2,000-mile shoreline? Currently, Castro is our best defense against the scourge of drugs, which are not a problem in his fiefdom.
Meantime, would my government reach out to offer Castro freedom of speech to address the American people, as Castro permitted former President Jimmy Carter to do in Havana in 2002?
If Haitian-Americans represented a decisive voting block, the squalor and oppression in Haiti, which makes Cuba look like a Paradise of Plenty, would also be attacked with words of vigor and fanfare. But alas, some humanitarian gestures pander to votes, not need, surreptitiously subsidized by Americans' tax dollars.
-- Arnold Fultz, Tampa
Just a convenient distraction
Re: Bush tightens screws on Castro, Oct. 11.
The Bush administration currently has the need to do something to take our minds off its foreign policy failures in Iraq, the re-emergence of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and its simpleton approach to bringing about peace between Israel and the Palestinians, which has led to even more violence. Add to this the devastation of our economy at home caused by tax cuts for the rich and many of our good-paying jobs going overseas and you have the worst presidential failure since Herbert Hoover.
Now the administration has decided to go after Fidel Castro. The attempt makes great headlines, but is there any benefit to Americans by pursuing such a policy? I think not.
Other than assuring the Bush team additional South Florida votes in the next election, there are no benefits to anyone in pursuing this course of action.
It's time for our nation to take a hard look at the Cuba situation and bring our policies into the 21st century. Doing so, we will come to the logical conclusions that an aging Castro will not be there forever, that Cuba does not represent a military or ideological threat to the United States and, most important, that we can help our own economy and, at the same time, advance the doctrine of capitalism by selling Cuba the goods and materials to rebuild its economy.
-- Jim Jacobs, Tampa
Our president's the worrisome one
Re: Bush tightens screws on Castro.
"No matter what the dictator intends or plans, Cuba sera pronto libre," Bush said, slipping into Spanish that translates into "Cuba will soon be free.' "
Isn't this the same kind of talk that got us into a war with Iraq? No matter what the dictator intends or plans? What does our president plan? Fidel Castro doesn't worry me. Our president does.
-- Donald F. Kelly, St. Petersburg
Don't try to dispel blame in Plame case
Re: No one is spotless in CIA-leak scandal, Oct. 14.
I have to marvel at the headline on Nicholas D. Kristof's column. He immediately proceeds to tell us that he, himself, knows Valerie Plame and that he had no idea that she had been or was a CIA operative. That's a pretty good cover, wouldn't you think?
She was just a soccer mom who had two 3-year-olds and who helped out other women suffering from post-partum distress.
Well, not any more. Columnist Robert Novak, et al., have cleared that one up pretty good, I suggest. And is there any thinking adult in the world who has any doubt as to why that was done? I didn't think so.
So the next time Kristof claims everyone is equally at fault in this, which is what this kind of spin is ultimately intended to do (if all are guilty, none are guilty), let him call up Valerie Plame and ask her what she thinks of his point of view.
The woman was wronged, and for the lowest and most contemptible political reasons. If the president had any true ethics he would be the first to demand the leaker be rooted out, fired and prosecuted to the fullest letter of the law.
-- Michael P. Higgins, Clearwater
Shades of Nixon's coverup
Is President Bush a modern-day Richard Nixon? At the height of the Watergate investigation, President Nixon attempted to cover his culpability by preventing the special prosecutor, Archibald Cox, from having access to the presidential tapes. When that failed, the president then tried to have Cox removed; ultimately the coverup led to his undoing.
I am reminded of President Nixon when I watch how President Bush is handling the investigation (coverup?) of the outed CIA operative, Valerie Plame Wilson. On July 14, conservative columnist Robert Novak reported that Valerie Plame was a CIA operative and cited "two senior administrative officials" as his sources. It has been widely reported that the motive behind the White House leak was retribution because Joseph Wilson, husband of Valerie Plame, dared to reveal that President Bush was less than candid with the American public when the president reported that Saddam Hussein shopped for uranium ore from Niger to develop weapons of mass destruction.
It took several weeks before the story got legs and as a result created a public uproar as well as a demand for an investigation. Although the Republicans in Congress spent $70-million and appointed a special prosecutor to investigate President Clinton, the Bush administration in a Nixonian fashion, refuses to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate itself in one of the most egregious treasonous acts in recent memory.
Although the president publicly stated that he is fully cooperating with the investigation, his actions are contrary to his statements. Prior to turning over staff e-mails to the Justice Department, the White House attorneys are reviewing the records for alleged classified information and they will only turn over the information they deem fit. Does anyone really believe that the administrative leakers will be discovered under such an investigation?
-- With apologies to Yogi Berra, it sounds like "deja vu all over again" with Nixonian overtones.
Robert T. Joyce, Tampa
Punish those who "outed' agent
The recent "outing" of an important asset in the intelligence business is treasonous, and I hope those responsible are found, brought to justice and given the highest of penalties suiting this crime. I also hope that columnist Robert Novak is not protected by the media just because he is a journalist of long-standing.
Why did he name the agent when he was asked by the CIA not to do so? And why did the other six journalists, who were given the same information, not name the agent? They didn't name the agent because they are all true, patriotic Americans.
Do most Americans understand the enormity of this crime? I doubt it. Millions of dollars have been spent training the agent, establishing covers and developing a network of "friendly" assets. It is, without question, one of the most serious crimes brought about intentionally to embarrass a man who happens to disagree with the president.
All the technology in the world will not replace the human aspect of intelligence. The lack of good human intelligence is what made 9/11 work so well. The lack of good human intelligence is why we are having so much difficulty in Iraq and why we cannot control the Taliban in Afghanistan and find Osama bin Laden. This administration's choice to compromise our intelligence agencies - which we depend on for our security - is unconscionable.
-- Billy Cox, Clearwater
[Last modified October 17, 2003, 01:48:36]
