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This from a dear friend whose family were one of the wealthiest Cuban families and were forced to flee when Castro stole their economic livelihood. I asked him his opinion of Obama's move regarding establishing Diplomatic Relations with Cuba:
"I am in favor of removing the embargo for several reasons:
1. The Cuban people have suffered enough . Hopefully my brother in Cuba will have the freedom to visit the USA one day.
2. The best way to defeat communism is to introduce USA style capitalism in Cuba.
3. We must end the unfair trade advantages that Mexico and Canada as well as many European countries enjoy in Cuba. Cubans love American products and American companies should be allowed to sell their products direct and not through a third party country .
4. Cuba could be a grave security threat if they were to align themselves with our enemies in the middle east or north Korea.
Dropping this embargo is morally right, politically right and economically right
And this from two other dear friends who were elites in Cub and escaped out of the country late a night.
." No mixed feelings here. All Cubans are furious and against the ''move''.
Another way to give Chinese money away to increase the debt.
We are about to be against the Pope if it is true that he instigated the move."
Stratfor's thoughts (See 1 below.)
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U.S. rejects unilateral action regarding the U.N. vote the Palestinians are seeking regarding statehood. (See 2 below.)
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Yesterday we witnessed two surrenders on both a moral and logic basis.
I wrote earlier I had no problem with Obama's recognition of Cuba but lamented the fact that he gave everything and extracted nothing.
As for the EU Court's decision that Hamas was not a terrorist organization, this defies everything and is absolute hypocrisy. It simply guarantees that terror pays and Europe justices have contempt for reality. (See 3 below.)
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Dick
Dick
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1) The United States and Cuba Begin Restoring Relations
The United States and Cuba on Dec. 17 took their most assertive step in several decades toward normalizing relations. The most important announcements concerned the resumption of high-level political discussions focused on renewing formal diplomatic ties between the countries, which have been nonexistent since 1961. Cuban and U.S. officials will hold high-level meetings in the coming months, and the two countries will work toward establishing embassies in Havana and Washington. The United States will also immediately relax some sanctions on trade and travel to Cuba. President Barack Obama announced that the United States would loosen certain restrictions on financial transactions with Cuba, remove some restrictions on U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba, and authorize the export of certain goods to the Cuban private sector. The U.S. State Department will also review Cuba's designation as a state sponsor of terrorism. Obama has the legal authority to immediately implement the measures he announced, but he left the issue of formally lifting the trade embargo up to Congress. Together, the announcements signaled a gradual process of reopening Cuba to the United States.
Havana has much to gain from starting such a process, especially at a time when its regional partner, Venezuela, faces severe instability. Cuba fears that a declining Venezuelan economy will limit one of the island nation's sources of financing and low-cost petroleum shipments while it is attempting to transition toward a new leadership and economic model..
However, a formal end to the embargo is a long way off. The United States' Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996 requires visible progress toward Cuban concessions such as liberalizing political activity, holding free elections and dissolving state security bodies. Nonetheless, the measures announced by Obama will allow the administration to deepen ties with Havana before it approaches Congress to request the lifting of sanctions. Talks between U.S. and Cuban officials will continue into the next year, with the April summit of the Organization of American States serving as the largest public forum at which the two sides can meet. Given Cuban President Raul Castro's advanced age, it is likely the talks will discuss an eventual political transition in the country.
A more immediate question is how the budding rapprochement between the United States and Cuba will affect the behavior of Venezuela, Cuba's most important ally in Latin America. Cuba shares intelligence with Venezuela, enabling Caracas to detect threats from within the country — though at the cost of fomenting discontent within the Venezuelan armed forces. While Cuba's rapprochement with the United States may not immediately change Caracas' relationship with Havana, Venezuela's mounting economic distress and potential for unrest may make it see Cuba's improved ties with the United States as a potential threat in the long run.
Ultimately, Venezuela's future will rely on global oil prices and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's ability to simultaneously manage unrest on the streets and from challengers within the government. The coming year will be a critical one for Maduro, and he is looking for any lifelines that could provide an economic reprieve. With Cuba openly engaging the United States, Maduro may have an additional incentive to seek his own rapprochement with the United States. In fact, several hours after the U.S.-Cuba prisoner swap was announced, Maduro publicly said Venezuela would be willing to improve its stagnant political ties with the United States.
Maduro would not be starting from scratch. Earlier this year, he designated an ambassadorial nominee to the United States and held discussions — albeit inconclusive ones — with Washington to restore normal diplomatic relations. Over the past year, several reports emerged that Caracas was negotiating the resumption of direct counternarcotic activities with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, though no deal has been reached yet. These discussions could be renewed as a result of today's agreements between Cuba and the United States.
Restoring relations with the United States will not solve all of Maduro's problems, however. Venezuela's plummeting economy and its negative impact on the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela is largely the result of long-term structural problems that cannot be easily reversed. It is highly unlikely that Maduro will be able to address these problems without incurring major political costs. Consequently, restoring political ties with the United States will depend more on domestic factors than moves from Obama or a subsequent U.S. president.
Regardless, today's developments signal the first step in a long process of reconciliation. While the details of the rapprochement have yet to be solidified, Obama's announcement sets a clear goal for U.S.-Cuban relations, one that could have broader implications throughout the region.
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2)
The European Union on Wednesday rejected an effort to declare its support for Palestinian statehood outside the contours of bilateral Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, a decision that marked a setback for upcoming efforts by Ramallah to secure a United Nations Security Council resolution supporting unilateral moves toward statehood. State Department Spokesperson Jen Psaki on Wednesday restated the American position that the U.S. “would not support unilateral actions … that would predetermine the outcome of negotiations” between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Palestinian moves to boost their diplomatic status outside of negotiations with Israel, which violate among other things Oslo Accord obligations – thespecific commitment is to refrain from “steps that will change the status of the West Bank… pending the outcome of the permanent status negotiations” – risk triggering U.S. legislation that conditions assistance on the Palestinians meeting treaty obligations banning unilateralism. Broad Palestinian failures to establish robust domestic institutions have long plagued efforts to achieve statehood. The Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority, based in the West Bank, has failed to secure political legitimacy, with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the tenth year of the four-year term to which he was elected. The PA has failed to achieve economic stability and has failed to establish sovereignty over the territory it declares as Palestinian, with the opposing Fatah and Hamas factions in control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip respectively.
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3) Europeans for Hamas
The General Court of the EU objects to the Palestinian outfit’s terror designation.
Hamas is no longer a terrorist organization. This is the astonishing verdict of the General Court of the European Union, delivered only a few months after Hamas indiscriminately fired thousands of rockets against civilian targets in Israel.
The court’s ruling on Wednesday in Hamas v. Council concluded that the Palestinian group’s terror-designation is “based not on acts examined and confirmed in decisions of competent authorities but on factual imputations derived from the press and the Internet.” In an ostensibly procedural ruling, the court objected that Brussels didn’t conduct its own original research when it first put the terrorist label on Hamas in 2001. It did, however, allow that Brussels may still maintain its asset freeze on Hamas—a group that openly avows responsibility for dozens of suicide bombings over many years. This judicial incursion into foreign policy is particularly troubling since courts should defer to law enforcers and political leaders when it comes to national security. By second-guessing European officials at a terror group’s behest, the court has jeopardized the ability of those officials to set security policy. Don’t be surprised if other terror groups line up in Luxembourg to litigate their way out of asset freezes and other sanctions. The court’s decision came on the same day that the European Parliament voted to grant “in principle recognition of Palestinian statehood.” Leftist and center-left blocs wanted to endorse Palestinian statehood without condition, but ultimately language about the need for negotiations and a two-state solution was added to the motion at the behest of the center-right bloc. The move follows similar votes in national parliaments in Ireland, Britain and France. The Swedish government in October recognized the state of Palestine. The votes are symbolic, but symbolism has its own power. Since Hamas continues to exercise effective control over Gaza (despite a fig-leaf agreement earlier this year that restored Ramallah’s de jure sovereignty), a vote for Palestinian statehood is tantamount to acceptance of Hamas as a legitimate political entity. All this takes place in a week when jihadists left their deadly stamp in Sydney and Peshawar. European judges and parliamentarians may imagine that Hamas is somehow different from other terrorist groups. In reality Hamas is their model. Europe legitimizes these cold killers at its own peril. Correction: The decision to reject Hamas’s terror-list designation in Hamas v. Council was rendered by the General Court of the European Union. An earlier version of this editorial mis-attributed the ruling.
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