Cuba Searching For Greener Grass. For America Its Just Business

The problem with living in the shadows is having a view of the sun.

The problem with living in the sun is skin cancer.

Fidel Castro in front of a Havana statue of Cuban
 national hero José Martí in 2003. (wikipedia)

The decision to place trade embargo's against the nation of Cuba was made over a half century ago and it was made in support of the people of Cuba who asked the nation of free flowing sunshine to force the shadowy Castro regime out of power.  In essence, their belief was that squeezing the life out of Cuba would harm so many people that Fidel Castro (and now Raul, his brother) would be compelled by love of country to do the right thing.

It didn't work.

Not only has the embargo not worked, it has only hurt the people it was intended to liberate. If the embargo was intended to expand the entrepreneurial spirit of the people of Cuba who have taken their desolate situation and turned it into an opportunity to display the vibrant shine of Cuba and its people, then it did work. Cubans have survived the "mutually belligerent" policies (as Alan Gross called it) of Cuba and America, and America should not only embrace the vast entrepreneurial wave within Cuba, we should invest in it because Cubans and Americans have never been at odds even if our mutually belligerent policies are.

In fact, every nation in the world, except the US, does business in Cuba, and even WE fly directly their from Florida to accommodate particular interests that congress had to deem "acceptable", since congress is the only institution in America with the power to lift the embargo.  What congress does not have the power to do is stop the conversation that has started towards normalization.  Cubanos throughout the nation of Cuba stand resolute in their belief that it is time to normalize relations, so the primary reason that we continue to take our stand against the shadow is because we have determined ourselves to be the sun.

The greatest impact of the embargo has been all of the Cuban dissidents/exiles and their children that enriched our nation and our brain chest of ideas.  Marco Rubio stands as a significant example, but he grew up believing that Castro deserves punishment for what he caused to happen to families like the Rubio's.  For the Castro regime to receive three of theirs in exchange for one of ours represents having accomplished "everything he was asking for" according to Rubio.

While it is questionable if these three comprades are everything the Castro's wanted from America, it is not questionable that the embargo that they would prefer to address is still fully within the control of Rubio and his cohorts in congress.  In addition, this embargo reflected the will of a people that have changed their minds.  Those who chose to relinquish their Cuban citizenship in protest of Castro also relinquished their voice in the decisions of future inhabitants.  The future is now and the voices are calling for a change.  If Rubio would rather listen to Cuban-American opinion over Cuban-Cuban decisions, than he is showing an allegiance to exiled families, to the past and to his understanding of an issue that has changed since his father and countless others got away from it all.

The Cold War civilization of 1959 has evolved into Americans who somewhat correctly call their own president a communist, and China being the nation we borrow from the most. Lines between capitalism (called democracy) and socialism (called evil) is one more big American welfare program or Hong Kong student protest away from blurring completely across the globe. Socialism shouldn't even draw such comparisons to capitalism in that one is a system of governance and the other is suppose to be an economic system; however, those who honestly embrace capitalism or desperately temper it with socialism know better.  As Rubio and the anti-Castro regime clamor for a more democratic Cuba, they also quietly approve back-alley expansions in campaign financing that makes it easier for rich people to dictate democracy in America.

If Cuba is stuck with the Castro's and should be a victim of their governance, it will be for another 30 years or less, America will be dictated by rich men infinitum.