Cuba charges Bush administration tightening embargo

[Nambe]

Cuba on Tuesday charged that the Bush administration was tightening a U.S. embargo on the island despite growing domestic and international opposition, as it launched an annual drive to have the United Nations condemn the policy.

''The economic, financial and commercial blockade the United States has maintained against Cuba for more than four decades has not only been scrupulously applied, but strengthened over the last two years,'' Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said at a Havana news conference. ---

For the last 11 years the U.N. General Assembly has overwhelmingly called for the United States to lift the embargo, last year by a vote of 173- 3 with four abstentions.

Perez said he expected similar results this year when the U.N. debates and votes on the embargo Nov. 4. ---

[Osolomia]

1. What a shame Dems don't do it too!

Bush has tightened the travel restrictions on Americans and denied entry visas to Cubans for example but Dems don't care if DU is any indication.

Meanwhile,

"This is an issue of freedom for Americans. Let me repeat that. This is an issue of freedom for Americans."
Rep. Jeff Flake (R)
Speaking on his amendment to lift the travel ban that passed with bipartisan support
9 September 2003

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?r108:20:./temp/~r108PlRM3Z:e32434:

[guajira]

2. B* is Showing his Pettiness and his Pandering to Miami Batistianos!!

Democrats who value freedom need to expose bush's attempts to deny Americans the right to travel - meanwhile he allows MiamiCubanos and their American relatives to fly directly from Miami to Havana, NY to Havana and LA to Havana.

A few thousand emails and phone calls to Congress, Senators and the Media is needed to change this policy. What would be even better is a few thousand Americans demonstrating in Havana!!

[Osolomia]

3. The Senate is expected to vote in the next week or so

A bipartisan majority of members in Congress asked for public support but judging from the number of letters sent DUers don't give a damn about freedom and democracy and have no one to blame but themselves for remaining embargoed and travel banned. It is not the "exiles" fault!

[Judi Lynn]

8. That idea would make an exceptional news piece

Thousands of Americans standing on the Malecon with signs for the cameras!


http://www.fine-art.com/falki/cuba.htm

[Judi Lynn]

4. You can be sure the UN will almost unanimously vote against the embargo

this year, too.

For anyone who's curious, I just found some information gathered during a meeting within the "COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD,"
at the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in Geneva.

It touches on interesting information on subjects like child welfare, and the following:

(snip)Ms. BERETERVIDE (Cuba) said that under Cuban law, the age of criminal responsibility was set at 18 years. However, for anyone between the ages of 18 and 20 found guilty of an offence, the court could reduce by a third the minimum and maximum limits of the applicable punishment and reduce by half that of minors between the ages of 16 and 18. Instead of being judged by the courts, minors under the age of 16 who committed an offence or manifested antisocial behaviour were taken into the care of a system of special institutions which took a pedagogical approach to the treatment of youthful offenders, and benefited from the services of educators, lawyers, and other specialists. Standards applied in Cuba in the area of juvenile justice administration were generally superior to those applied in other parts of the world. In fact, the utmost was done to see that most of the young people detained in those institutions acquired skills which would allow them upon leaving to practise an occupation. (snip)

Very interesting for anyone who's got a minute to learn more about what has been claimed about these "godless heathens."

http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/MasterFrameView/fd91092b973aee55802564c0003dfa97?Opendocument

[Muddleoftheroad]

6. The UN doesn't set American policy

Embargoes and boycotts are perfectly acceptable ways to express dissatisfaction. I am all for the Cuban people, as soon as Castro is gone.

[Osolomia]

9. Who should set US policy?

An extremist right wing minority in Florida or a bipartisan majority accross the country?

Hmmm? What kind of "democracy" do you prefer? Batistiano style?

[Mika]

16. Hypocrite

"I am all for the Cuban people, as soon as Castro is gone."


So, by your own account, you are not ALL for the Cuban people NOW.

Charming hypocricy.




Don't ask questions!

[joshcryer]

19. A common mentality with *all* pro-embargo people.

Embargos are unethical. This is my stance. It doesn't matter who they're against. They're unethical.

[Mika]

5. Only a few DUers dare care

It seems that not too many DUers care to offer their opinions on this subject.

Its as if the subject of ending the sanctions on our rights is as taboo a topic to Dems/DUers a a statue's breast is to John Asscroft.


Wierd, huh?

[Osolomia]

10. Very wierd

WTF are they afraid of? The truth?

Fortunately, judging from the vote in the House last week, there must be some Dems out there somewhere who know what's going on and have the cojones to take a stand. Pity all the Dem presidential candidates seem to be listening to the ignorant and apathetic.

[Judi Lynn]

11. Guess the Elian Gonzalez hostage-in-Miami situation

didn't move everyone to start finding out what the hell has been going on.

It got my attention when I read that his great-drunk-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez had VISITED his father in Cuba. I had NEVER heard that the same people who claim they had to flee to Miami ALSO GO BACK FOR VACATIONS!

Looks like things like this would rattle around in peoples' minds until the dissonance sends them to books and the internet to try to find out more about this obvious lie staring them right in the face, and send them on their own journey of discovery!

[Osolomia]

13. I bet the one thing that would get DUers attention in a hurry

would be US instigated violence in Cuba but by then it would be much too late.

[Mika]

15. It hasn't before

"I bet the one thing that would get DUers attention in a hurry would be US instigated violence in Cuba but by then it would be much too late."

In a hurry? That's a friggin laugh. How much violence does it take? ((Oh, that's right.. I forgot.. America would never commit nor support any terra. America only supports 'freedom fighters'.))

Move along. nothing to see here.


http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43b/142.html

http://www.cpa.org.au/garchive/947cuba.htm

http://www.ain.cubaweb.cu/english/escalaing/terroring1.htm




Don't ask questions!

[Judi Lynn]

17. Can you IMAGINE what would happen here if some groups

started doing things like this? There would be absolute bedlam.

This was in your first link, Mika:

(snip) Seven anti-Castro Cubans armed with automatic weapons landed in Cuba on October 15, killing one local resident and attempting to steal a vehicle before Cuban authorities arrested them. The seven, captured after a shootout with security forces, left for Cuba from a third country in order to avoid violating the US Neutrality Law, which prohibits launching armed operations from the US. They are members of the Miami-based Democratic National Unity Party (PUND), which claimed responsibility for their action. (snip)

(snip)ALPHA 66 THREATENS TOURISTS
On November 6, 1993 Canadian newspapers, particularly those from Montreal, ran disturbing headlines: Alpha 66, an anti-Cuban group from Miami. announced that starting on November 27, tourists travelling to Cuba would be attacked by Alpha 66 members operating in Cuba. In the following months, travel wholesalers in Montreal also receive death threats. "Adding insult to injury is the fact that in this same week the anti- Castro terrorist group Alpha 66 announced that it now considered tourists in Cuba as justifiable targets for kidnappings and assassinations. Since Canadian tourists make up the largest single group of tourists in Cubaa ... it is clear that we constitute the largest probable target."

"COMMANDOS L" THREATENS TOURISTS
According to an article in the Jan. 23 edition of the daily Jersey Journal, Tony Bryant, the new leader of the Cuban exile group Commandos L, has "warned international tourists to stay away" from Cuba, saying "We're going to attack them." Last October, Commandos L sprayed the hotel Melia at the Varadero beach tourist resort with gunfire in what bryant told his audience was meant as a message to tourists.

ALPHA 66 ATTACK TOURIST HOTEL
The anti-Castro paramilitary group Alpha 66 announced in Florida that several of its commandos attacked a tourist hotel on the northern coast of Cuba on Mar. 11, marking the start of a campaign against the island's tourist industry. According to Alpha 66, no one was hurt in the attack from the commandos' small boat offshore or by the fire returned by Cuban security forces. "All the Cuban tourist centres are military objectives for Alpha 66," said the group's military chief, Humberto Perez. Perez said the attack was launched from a base located outside the US, though it was coordinated in Miami; US legislation prohibits the launching of armed attacks from US territory against nations that are not at war with the US. Alpha 66 had threatened to begin attacks against foreign tourists in Cuba beginning Nov. 27 (snip)

Absolutely apalling.

Our own media just look the other way. Pathetic. I've heard of similar events, as well, one happening just a year or two ago, when several of their guys got to Cuba and got caught before they could kill anyone. Do you remember that they put them on trial there, and one of them helped catch another one, or something similar?

[Mika]

18. Imagine IF they killed an American in Cuba

I think Osolomia would be onto something then.

Killing Italian tourists or Cuban citizens in Cuba is OK, because that is 'freedom fighting' USA style, BUT.. IF any Americans were to be killed by an Alpha 66 or CANF attack it MIGHT get the attention of the US presscorporations.. but I wouldn't count on it. The facist lovin US press would probably spin a dead American tourist as a commie traitor taking advantage of the helpless poor Cuban people, and betraying the peace loving "exile" 'freedom fighters' who run Miami so well.

[Osolomia]

20. It is NOT the fault of the "exiles" or the media

that Dems and their presidential candidates are apathetic and pandering to the right wing minority.

Why did 63 Republicans defy Bush and vote for your freedom to travel last week? Did the "exiles" or the media make them do it?

[joshcryer]

22. All those links were pre-2000. DU was created in 2000...

This is by no means saying that DU would be totally against a lot of that stuff, but you gotta stop generalizing. This kind of generalization puts people off.

(Yes, I realize the last link has an event that occured in 2000, but it's not as relevant.)

[Judi Lynn]

23. Found an article which would answer a poster here who claimed

the U.S. government had never taken any part in terrorism against Cuba. A wry claim, wasn't it?

(snip) Throughout
the 1960s, the Caribbean island was subjected to countless sea
and air commando raids by exiles, at times accompanied by their
CIA supervisors, inflicting damage upon oil refineries, chemical
plants and railroad bridges, cane fields, sugar mills and sugar
warehouses; infiltrating spies, saboteurs and assassins ...
anything to damage the Cuban economy, promote disaffection, or
make the revolution look bad ... taking the lives of Cuban
militia members and others in the process ... pirate attacks on
Cuban fishing boats and merchant ships, bombardments of Soviet
vessels docked in Cuba, an assault upon a Soviet army camp with
12 Russian soldiers reported wounded ... a hotel and a theatre
shelled from offshore because Russians and East Europeans were
supposed to be present there ...{11}
These actions were not always carried out on the direct order
of the CIA or with its foreknowledge, but the Agency could hardly
plead "rogue elephant". It had created Operation Mongoose headquarters in
Miami that was truly a state within a city -- over, above, and
outside the laws of the United States, not to mention
international law, with a staff of several hundred Americans
directing many more Cuban agents in just such types of actions,
with a budget in excess of $50 million a year, and an arrangement
with the local press to keep operations in Florida secret except
when the CIA wanted something publicized.{12}
Title 18 of the US Code declares it to be a crime to launch a
"military or naval expedition or enterprise" from the United States
against a country with which the United States is not (officially) at war.
Although US authorities now and then aborted an exile plot or
impounded a boat -- sometimes because the Coast Guard or other
officials had not been properly clued in -- no Cubans were
prosecuted under this act. This was no more than to be expected
inasmuch as Attorney General Robert Kennedy had determined after
the Bay of Pigs that the invasion did not constitute a military
expedition.{13}
The commando raids were combined with a total US trade and credit
embargo, which continues to this day, and which genuinely hurt the
Cuban economy and chipped away at the society's standard of living.
So unyielding has the embargo been that when Cuba was hard hit by a
hurricane in October 1963, and Casa Cuba, a New York social club,
raised a large quantity of clothing for relief, the United States
refused to grant it an export license on the grounds that such shipment
was "contrary to the national interest".{14} (snip/...)

http://members.aol.com/bblum6/cuba.htm

[joshcryer]

21. Cuba is a sticky issue.

Cuba doesn't have a totally clean slate, and Cuba tends to be the 'fringe' of what sort of values we capitalists believe in.

This has nothing do with facts, mind you. This has to do with sentiments. You can't rightly judge people because their sentiments are muddled by half-truths. All you can do is try to share with them the truth.

I think you Cuba Truth Seekers do that pretty well. Don't be disheartened.

[Osolomia]

24. So freedom is a "sticky issue" for Dems who are

"muddled by half-truths" eh? Funny so many Republicans don't have a problem with it, e.g.:

"This is an issue of freedom for Americans. Let me repeat that. This is an issue of freedom for Americans."

Rep. Jeff Flake (R)
Speaking on his amendment to lift the travel ban that passed with bipartisan support
9 September 2003

[Judi Lynn]

25. Nor do these people who comprised or supported the US Cuba Commission

all the way back in the '90's"

(snip)Members of Congress:
U.S. Senators:
John W. Warner (R-VA)
Rod Grams (R-MN)
Christoper "Kit" S. Bond (R-MO)
James M. Jeffords (R-VT)
Chuck Hagel (R-NE)
Richard G. Luger (R-IN)
Michael B. Enzi (R-WY)
John H. Chafee (R-RI)
Arien Specter (R-PA)
Gordon Smith (R-OR)
Craig Thomas (R-WY)
Barbara Boxer (D-CA)

House Members:
Jon Christensen (R-2nd/NE)
Charles B.Rangel (D-15th/NY)
J. Robert Kerrey (D-NE)
Dale Bumpers (D-AR)
Jack Reed (D-RI)
Rick Santorum (R-PA)
Christopher J. Dodd (D-CT)
Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-NY)
Dirk Kempthorne (R-ID)
Pat Roberts (R-KS)
Patrick J. Leahy (D-VT)
Thad Cochran (R-MS)
Pete V. Domenici (R-NM)
Patty Murray (D-WA)

Former Secretaries Of State:
Lawrence S. Eagleburger
Henry A. Kissinger
George P. Shultz

Former Undersecretaries Of State:
William D. Rogers

Former Assistant Secretaries Of State:
Harry W. Shalaudeman

Former Sectretaries of Defense:
Frank Carlucci

Former Secretaries of Agriculture:
John Block
Clayton Yeutter

Former Majority Leader, U.S. Senate:
Howard H. Baker, Jr.

Former Ambassadors:
J. William Middendorf
Timothy Towell

Former CIA Officials:
Max Hugel - Deputy Director of Operations

Former Members of Congress:
Malcolm Wallop (R-WY)
Tom Hagedorn (R-MN)

Former Military Leaders:
Lieutenant General Gordon Sumner, Jr.

Religious Organizations:
United States Catholic Conference

Cuban-American/Hispanic Groups:
Cuban American Alliance Education Fund, Inc.
Cuban Committee for Democracy
Hispanic American Center For Economic Research

Organizations:
Christian Voice
Media Research Center

http://www.uscubacommission.org/htm/supportfr.htm

[joshcryer]

26. This was a comment about DUers...

Cuba is definitely a sticky issue to a lot of people here. You disagree? What's wrong with saying this? I'm merely putting it in to perspective. You guys are expecting people to just jump and travel to Cuba and celebrate the revolution...

You can't complain about having exclusive threads where only you guys post. There is no gain in this.

[Osolomia]

27. I expect DUers to stand up and fight for freedom

especially when the opportunity is being handed to you on a silver platter. Do you know how your Senator plans to vote on this next week, do you even give a damn?

[joshcryer]

28. Of course I give a damn...

...doesn't change anything, though.

[Osolomia]

29. So long as Dems insist

on keeping their heads in the sand and letting the extremist right wing minority walk all over everyone instead of supporting the bipartisan majority that's fighting for your freedom, then you're a bunch of losers imho if you can't figure this one out by now. What a shame.

[Judi Lynn]

7. It's going to be interesting this fall

if the Senate concurs with the House majority and approves lifting the travel ban.

It has been speculated that this year they could get the votes.

For anyone who doesn't know, Attorney General John Ashcroft (creator of "let The Mighty Eagle Soar" available for hearing at D.U.'s own Symbolman's site, http://www.symbolman.com/corpabuse.html) believed the embargo should be removed when he was Missouri's Senator.

The House already expressed a veto-proof majority last week on the subject. That was, ahem, somewhat bipartisan, the first amendment being introduced by Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican.

[Osolomia]

12. It will be interesting to see how Dem presidential candidates

react to the Senate vote considering the Dems are all currently pandering to the extremist right wing minority in Florida and ignoring the bipartisan majority across the country, which hardly sounds like a winning ticket to me.

[Mika]

14. a winning ticket - for the pro terra elements

".. considering the Dems are all currently pandering to the extremist right wing minority in Florida and ignoring the bipartisan majority across the country, which hardly sounds like a winning ticket to me."


Smells like desperation, when they have to scrape the literal bottom of the scum bucket by pandering to some of the most cretinous criminal terrorist elements of the Cuban exile diaspora.

With ALL of the platforms in Florida that JEB just hands the Dems on a silver platter, and many go for the miniscule right wingnut pro terror "exile" vote. Un-f'ing-believable!





Don't ask questions!