Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day to all! Heres an email from Mr. Bunton, Professor Michelman, and the visiting mediators regarding the articles you could glance over to prepare for the meeting on Latin America this Thursday: from Mr. Bunton- .....first Great Decisions meeting of 2015 this Thursday - anything Latin, Hispanic, from the southern border of Texas to Tierra del Fuego! But obviously the reason is the current news about Cuba. If you have time, check out these articles and maybe Wikipedia the basic story - its always up-to-date. Always take the opportunity to learn new stuff and, if you have one, give your opinion. Brazil is in the Great Decisions book. We have copies to give out Thursday. Remember, if you would like to hear Mary Schapiro, chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission during the recent great recession, tell Vanessa or me. It is TOMORROW (Tuesday) at UNF, 7:00-8:30. Also remember that to be fair we will use attendance at meetings this year to decide who gets to have dinner with next months speaker General Anthony Zinni AND the ICME on February 21. Also also remember that if you get this e-mail, you are like me and do NOT use Facebook often or at all. If you DO use Facebook, let Vanessa or me know so we change you to that list. FB From Professor Michelman: Latin America We am attaching a bunch of material for students to take a look at so they can be informed: 1. Recent improvements in poverty in Latin America 2. IMF, World Bank and ECLAC Outlook for Latin American countries 3. Doing Business in Latin America Cuba This articles is by Gustavo Pérez Firmat. theconversation/the-last-exiles-35746 See below for several others Dr. Febles also attached another one from the Council of Hemispheric Affairs, a left-of-center think tank. An Information Service of the Cuba Transition Project Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies University of Miami Issue 229 January 13, 2015 Carlos A. Montaner* Cuba: Legacy or Nightmare?** President Barack Obama wants to normalize relations with the Cuban regime. He presumes that it will be part of his legacy. Likely, that risky diplomatic move will backfire, although polls show that most U.S. Americans support the reestablishment of relations with Cuba and the end of the embargo. According to the measures adversaries, normalization is a morally questionable mission. Why lend a hand to a stubborn dictatorship in its terminal stages? It makes no sense. Besides, Raúl Castro complicates everything. He insists that the islands repressive one-party communist model will endure. An editorial in The Washington Post summarized that point of view: Mr. Obama may claim that he has dismantled a 50-year-old failed policy; what he has really done is give a 50-year-old failed regime a new lease on life. Maybe Obamas initial mistake was to renounce something that didnt exist. A few weeks after Kennedys death, Lyndon Johnson put an end to the efforts to terminate the Castro brothers dictatorship by force. Since then, the strategy to change the Cuban regime has been replaced by an attempt to contain it. How? Through economic pressure, diplomatic isolation and propaganda. Cold War measures against a Cold War government that continues to behave as if the Berlin Wall had not been toppled in 1989 and the Soviet Union continued to exist. Thats the way it has been for decades. To which was added, with the passing of time, a consoling theory: after the death of the Castros and the disappearance of the Sierra Maestra generation, the heirs would abandon that cruel way of governing and a peaceful transition to democracy and freedom would begin in Cuba. There would be a repeat of what happened in eastern Europe to the communist regimes and in Latin America to the military dictatorships. Why should anything different happen in Cuba? After the surprise announcement of Dec. 17, the first one to get in Obamas face was Democratic senator Bob Menéndez, the son of Cubans, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. Menéndez was justly indignant. Despite his important post, and without taking into account the fact that he is a Democrat, the White House concealed from him its negotiations with Cuba and deceived him. Until the day that the scheme was revealed, Obama insisted that he would make no further concessions to Havana, so long as Cuba didnt take steps toward an opening. That was a lie. Menéndez issued a harsh public statement. He felt cheated. Governors Chris Christie of New Jersey and Susana Martinez of New Mexico wasted no time joining the fray. Both called on the Obama administration to demand that Raúl Castro surrender to the United States several American felons -- murderers of policemen and hijackers of airplanes -- who have found asylum in Cuba. What kind of normalization is that, with neighbors who protect criminals? Hadnt the White House decided that the island was no longer a haven for terrorists? Obama has presented the Republicans with a good campaign issue for the period close to the 2016 elections. Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida, shortly before he announced that he would try to become his partys presidential candidate, hastened to describe Obamas new policy toward Cuba as a misstep that benefits the dictatorship. Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, along with representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Mario Díaz-Balart and the newly elected Congressman Carlos Curbelo (Fla.) -- all Cuban-American Republicans -- made similar statements but, understandably, with a tone of greater indignation. Nevertheless, the institution where Obama and the Democrats will be punished most severely will be Congress. Republican representatives and senators will utilize the change of policy toward Cuba essayed by Obama to test the constitutional limits of the separation of powers, now that they hold a majority in both chambers. Senator Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, which funds U.S. embassies, has said that not a cent will be spent to bankroll the new policy. The U.S. Interests Section in Havana might now be called an embassy but there wont be an ambassador. John Boehner, Speaker of the House, has stated that a lifting of the embargo wont even be debated in the chamber. The embargo will remain in effect; no substantial changes will be made. Perhaps the main course will be the public hearings that the Senate and the House will surely hold to question, under oath, the functionaries who took part in the negotiations with Havana. The presumption is that several laws were broken and the lawmakers will try to bring those violations before the courts. Whosoever lies shall be charged with perjury. The Republicans objective is to turn Obamas purported Cuban legacy into a nightmare. They are convinced that the President acted against the law and the principles and values of U.S. society. There was a reason why 10 presidents before him, Democratic and Republican, abstained from trying to straighten up the twisted relations with the neighboring dictatorship until change might come to the island. That was the prudent thing to do. _________________________________________________ **Previously published in the Huffington Post on January 3, 2015. _________________________________________________ *Carlos A. Montaner is a Non-resident Senior Research Associate at Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies. _________________________________________________ An Information Service of the Cuba Transition Project Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies University of Miami Issue 227 January 8, 2015 Jaime Suchlicki* Dont Pack Your Suitcases When Communism collapsed in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe in 1990, Cuban-Americans, American companies and tourists optimistically expected Cuba to be the next domino to fall. I became well known back then for telling everyone “not to pack their suitcases!” The recent announcement by President Obama about a change in U. S.-Cuba policy is generating similar optimism. Yet my warnings from the 1990s are still valid today. There are four main reasons to tone down our expectations. First the Raul Castro military regime is not about to provide any major concessions to the United States. On the contrary, Castro remains a steadfast Stalinist, allied with Iran, Russia, North Korea, and Venezuela, and a supporter of terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah and ETA. He is no Den Chao Ping, no reformist, and no believer in market reforms. For him and his octogenarian military allies, the way to preserve and transfer power to their selected heirs is by maintaining tight political control with no major political reforms in Cuba. Human rights conditions will deteriorate rather than improve. It would be difficult for President Obama to justify further U. S. concessions. Second, the President faces strong opposition in Congress to any unilateral concessions to the Castro brothers. A unified and powerful coalition of Republican and Democrat legislators will thwart the Presidents attempt to give too much and get little from the Castros. The abolition or modification of the Helms-Burton Law, which codifies the embargo, must be approved by Congress, a most unlikely event. Third, the foreign policy challenges facing the President in 2015 and beyond will prevent his continuous attention to the Cuba issue. Relations with Russia; conflict with Iran; violence and instability in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan; increasing tensions in the Korean Peninsula; and growth of worldwide and domestic terrorism will more than fill the Presidents plate. Finally, dismantling the embargo is a complex and slow process. The maze of laws, regulations and issues surrounding the Helms-Burton Law will require time, effort and significant finesse. For example, the issue of the Castro governments confiscation of U. S. and Cuban properties must be resolved before any real normalization. A cadre of sophisticated American and Cuban-American lawyers await the moment to collect on the judgments rendered by U. S. Courts against the government of Cuba and/or to file new law suits to garnish the proceeds of any trade with Cuba and investments on the island. The issue of property confiscations is one of many thorny issues that need to be resolved before any real normalization. For the time being the current U. S. Interests Section in Havana may be upgraded into an Embassy and several thousand more Americans will visit Cuba. This will do little to improve the lives of the Cubans or to bring democracy to the island. For the past decade several million tourists from Europe, Canada and Latin America have visited Cuba, yet the island is no freer or prosperous. If we believe that American tourists can change Cuban society, we should send them to North Korea, Iran and Venezuela. At a time that the U. S. is sanctioning some of these countries, it is ironic that we are removing sanctions from Cuba. Engaging with a military dictatorship in Havana is an ill-advised policy that sends a message that the U. S. is willing to accept anew a militarism in Latin America that we have rejected for the past forty years. Our new engagement with Cuba and our recent one with the military in Egypt send contradictory messages about American foreign policy and questions our commitment to Human Rights and freedom in the world. _________________________________________________ * Jaime Suchlicki is Emilio Bacardi Moreau Distinguished Professor and Director, Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies, University of Miami. He is the author of Cuba: From Columbus to Castro, now in its fifth edition; Mexico: From Montezuma to the Rise of PAN, now in its second edition and the recently published Breve Historia de Cuba. _________________________________________________ The CTP can be contacted at P.O. Box 248174, Coral Gables, Florida 33124-3010, Tel: 305-284-CUBA (2822), Fax: 305-284-4875, and by email at [email protected]. The CTP Website is accessible at ctp.iccas.miami.edu.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 23:55:04 +0000
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