RE: Re-Established U.S. Relationship With Cuba - Good or Bad?

I would imagine that a lot of people with my kind of political inclinations are against what the Obama administration is doing to re-establish some kind of a civil relationship with Cuba. I, however, am not entirely against it. Obama is right when he says that U.S. policy has neither forced nor encouraged significant change in Cuba's Communist regime, and as a reasonably firm believer in the potential of capitalism, I fail to understand why ardent capitalists like Republican Congressmen and Senators would not at least want to try to expand international trade in this manner. Clearly, a number of big companies and their presumably "conservative" CEO's are chomping at the bit. If the goal is to sort of shame the Communist regime out of existence, if at all possible, then I, too, believe that the only potentially viable means of doing that is via a democratic and "capitalist" presence in Cuba (for lack of better terms). However large or small, that at least has the potential to not only show Cubans the benefits of democracy and of a regulated form of capitalism, but make them more acutely aware of what they miss and what they've given up in exchange for the "free" healthcare and education which probably comes with a number of logistical problems (which can probably only get worse without this alliance) and a healthy serving of propaganda to go with the reading, writing, and arithmetic.

What concerns me is what may or may not be motivating Cuba in the first place. From the standpoint of somehow encouraging change in Cuban policy, I see nothing to indicate an honestly cooperative or receptive attitude on the part of Raul Castro. Also, this scenario lacks the leverage that the U.S. had over the USSR of not only being able to guarantee mutual destruction via the nukes, but of clearly being the only one able to afford that leverage without forcing quite as many citizens to pay the price in the way of rampant poverty and blatant human rights violations. I frankly feel that this is a means to an end for the Cuban government, and that end is NOT a transition away from Communism or even a more honestly civil relationship with the United States. I suspect that it is a sly means of preserving and perhaps even strengthening Cuba's Communist system. I would imagine they see capitalism and democracy as a sort of big and incredibly stingy bear in the woods. If you can manage to get close to the bear without angering it, the bear might share a lot of honey, but doing so is extremely difficult and if you can't manage it, the bear is going to sit on you and make life miserable. Such was the case under Batista, when "trade" with Cuba took the form of blatant exploitation and corruption, much of which was perpetrated by U.S. based organized crime families that owned and operated hotels and casinos in Cuba. Literally everyone benefited... except for the Cubans. So I'm not at all convinced that Cuba's motivations are similar to Obama's or to that of anyone in the United States in any way, shape, or form. For them, I think this is a modified form of Lenin's strategic retreat - a brief period of cooperation that is going to strengthen the Cuban economy just enough to maybe placate some dissidents and, given Castro's regime is demanding to own 50% of pretty much any new business in the country (or so I've heard), generate enough wealth for the Cuban government to stay in power and, in its opinion, have even more resources with which to keep its own promises.

Even so, I think Congress should give this a chance - if only because any total and abrupt rejection of this course on which Obama has already set both nations (for better or worse) might only increase Cuba's ire towards the U.S. and conceivably convince it to team up with a nation like China, Russia, Iran, or even North Korea to actually BECOME a threat and also have the excuse of U.S. betrayal as justification. In so doing, however, I do think Congress needs to make it clear to Obama and then to Hillary or any other Democrat that might succeed Obama in the Oval office that they will not tolerate a situation in which Cuba is basically rewarded with wealth without having to do more than allow wireless Internet service, shared ownership of U.S. businesses in Cuba, and release four or five dissidents every time Cuba gets a cookie. This kind of thing is why people started saying, "Only Nixon could go to China" - because a Democrat would be seen as pandering to the nation's leftist policies. While I understand WHY Obama is doing what he is, I think he runs the risk of being dangerously presumptuous when it comes to more or less guaranteeing an eventual normalization of relations with the Cuban government and its people. We've gotten along just fine without doing business with Cuba for half of a century, so if this fails, then the U.S. has potentially far more to lose. Now, more than ever, the U.S. cannot afford to be so naive as to accept the morality of it all as the only reason anyone really needs to attempt something like this - and if you don't believe me, I suggest finding and re-watching the Q&A with Obama and Raul Castro that just ended a little while ago.