Buckwheat Wants to Help Castro Stay in Power

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2007/8/20/230459.shtml?s=ic

Obama Calls for Easing Cuba Embargo

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is leaping into the

long-running Cuba debate by calling for the U.S. to ease restrictions for

Cuban-Americans who want to visit the island or send money home.

Obama's campaign said Monday that, if elected, the Illinois senator would

lift restrictions imposed by the Bush administration and allow

Cuban-Americans to visit their relatives more frequently, as well as ease

limits on the amount of money they can send to their families.

"Senator Obama feels that the Bush administration has made a humanitarian

and a strategic blunder," spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in an e-mail. "His

concern is that this has had a profoundly negative impact on the Cuban

people, making them more dependent on the Castro regime, thus isolating them

from the transformative message carried by Cuban-Americans."

Obama was explaining his position in an op-ed piece Tuesday in The Miami

Herald.

While the U.S. embargo has limited who can travel to the communist island

and what can be sent there since the early 1960s, restrictions added by the

Bush administration in 2004 made visiting and shipping gifts to Cuba more

difficult.

Most Cubans in the U.S. can only visit the island once every three years and

can only send quarterly remittances of up to $300 per household to immediate

family members. Previously, they could visit once a year and send up to

$3,000. The U.S. also tightened restrictions on travel for educational and

religious groups.

The Cuban-exile vote is considered key to winning Florida, and top

presidential candidates have generally followed the recommendations of the

community's most hard-line and vocal leaders, who support a full embargo

against Fidel Castro's government. Castro, 80, is in poor health and turned

over temporary power last year to his brother Raul.

But sentiment in the Cuban-American community is changing. Unlike the early

waves of immigrants who brought their entire families, often by plane, to

the U.S., most Cubans now flee by boat and are forced to leave relatives

behind. Fewer of these immigrants were overt political opponents of the

government, and they want to be able to visit loved ones and to send money

home.

Many Cuban exiles are also frustrated with the U.S. embargo, which has

failed to yield fruit after nearly 45 years. And with the specter of an

ailing Castro and a possible change in leadership, they are more open to

changing U.S. policy.

Last week, the Miami-Dade Democratic Party came out against the

restrictions. Obama will speak at a fundraiser for the chapter Saturday at

the Miami-Dade Auditorium, the same Little Havana site where Ronald Reagan

won over many in the Cuban-exile community more than two decades ago.

Joe Garcia, the group's chairman, praised Obama's proposal.

"It shows courage, and it shows commitment to move beyond the status-quo

politics of rhetoric, which is all the Cuban-American community has received

from any party for the last half century," said Garcia, a former head of the

Cuban-American Foundation, a leading exile group.

None of the other top presidential candidates have sought to ease the

restrictions.

In May, Democratic rival Hillary Clinton said she opposed immediate changes

in Cuba travel but added that there may be need for change in the next

presidency if Castro is no longer in power.

Such a change would be contingent on commitments to human rights and more

openness from the Cuban government, the New York senator said.

Clinton must contend with her husband's legacy on U.S.-Cuba relations,

particularly when he authorized U.S. agents to return young Elian Gonzalez

to his father in Cuba, alienating many exiles.

Mauricio Claver-Carone, a spokesman for the U.S.-Cuba Democracy Pact, which

supports full sanctions, said Obama's statement could hurt U.S.-Cuban

relations at a crucial time.

"I'm sure he's well intentioned," Claver-Carone said, but he added that with

the death of Castro possibly approaching and the potential for change on the

island, such a statement could send the wrong message.

"It entrenches the regime at this historic time," Claver-Carone said.