Obama to Announce Easing in U.S.-Cuba Relations

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus

Kennedy is like Obama, more bark than bite, as in far more of a DINO than he appears. Johnson was better, as was Nixon. Johnson Understood how to behave in public, how to appear respectable, and how to get things done by grey-area means if necessary. Nixon was much the same, and I feel that the investigation into watergate was a mistake that cost the country a great president. (This isn't to say nixon is perfect, he was highly paranoid, but he was a leader, one who was of the Eisenhower-Republican camp)


Really only Nixon could go to china, and only Nixon could go to Cuba. Perhaps someone like Jeb Bush, or Rubio or whatever could go to Cuba.. possibly that Canadian Cruz... Heck perhaps this is part of Fidel's grand conspiracy, communist takeover of america using right-wing rhetoric/free-market values.. so batsh^t it could work.

a reply to: intrepid
Hola Amigo! As an apparent 'fellow traveller', you might be interested in the following assessment:

Cuba Policy Changes Mark a Momentous First Step
As a historian of Cuba, as a Cuban-American, as an American citizen, I applaud President Obama's change of course on Cuba. Surprisingly, so do my 93 and 88-year old Republican parents in Miami. To say that they love neither Raúl Castro nor Barack Obama is an understatement. Yet, they were swayed by Obama's plain statement of fact: isolation has failed, and after more than 50 years we cannot reasonably expect it to produce a different result. They are weary, and yesterday they felt a stirring, a faint hope that finally something might move. HuffPo

It seems our friend does not represent the whole of the expat community. Yes, move forward with caution...but move forward.

a reply to: JohnnyCanuck

Castro was nice enough to declare victory over the US and thanked Obama for it.

a reply to: JohnnyCanuck

The problem is that many of you don't understand that Raul castro is more radical than his brother fidel. Even fidel has stated this in the past, and the actions of Raul, known by Cubans, also show those of us who know about him what he is really like. Raul is more, subversive, he does things more in hiding than his brother. But he is as much of a dictator as his brother is.

Are there Cubans that think this might bring good changes in the island? Yes, there are, but like me many others in Cuba and in exile also think that this is only going to give more power to a dictatorial regime that has existed for 54 years, and giving them more influx of money is going to make that DICTATORIAL regime stronger. This money won't go to the Cuban people. It will go to the dictatorial regime.

Watch this video, from Cuba, which was filmed recently about the march of the women in white. One of the founders of the women in white thinks this might bring some good changes. But then listen to the husband of another lady in white (he is in Cuba as well) and listen how like me, he states this will only give more power to the oppressive regime. Power and money which the regime can use to subjugate more the human right activists in Cuba, and even jam the communications from Cuba so this sort of information does not get out of Cuba, making it "look like things are getting better". This is what has ALWAYS happened. Raul is not going to change. He is even worse than Fidel.



This is what he says:

The resources that will be derived from the lifting of the embargo will be used by the Cuban regime to equip, train and perfect the oppresive force against human right activists.

BTW, even though he says it in Spanish, his statement is translated into English in the video as well.

That Cuban is in Cuba, and it shows that there are many other Cubans in the island who think exactly like me...

Intrepid and some others want to imply that I don't have family in Cuba...which just shows how ignorant he, and whomever agrees with him is of the situation in the island, and only wants to listen to foreign tourists who believe the lies they are shown in the tourist areas of Cuba.

BTW, just to show how much the regime of raul castro is like his brother. The same day that Obama announced that he will open relations with Cuba, a group of 29-32 Cubans, including 2 children, tried to leave the island, and the Cuban coast guard sank the boat by hitting the smaller boat of Cubans with the heavy coast guard boat until it sank. Some of the survivors related how they were yelling that there were children aboard. The Cuban coast guard didn't care, they sank the boat. And they did this in INTERNATIONAL WATERS.

(This happened this past Tuesday)

Saturday, December 20th 2014- 08:41 UTC
Cuba’s Coast Guard sinks boat carrying 32 refugees who were trying to reach Fla.

Survivor says her husband went missing. The other occupants were shipped back to the island. Women and children freed, men still in custody.

Masiel González Castellano, a woman who survived the attack and whose husband is allegedly missing, told reporters in Miami during a telephone conversation from Matanzas, Cuba, that her husband, Leosbel Díaz Beoto, was nowhere to be found after falling overboard.

“We were screaming and crying for help as the boat was sinking. But they ignored us. Instead, they continued charging against our boat. Some people dove in the water and others stayed aboard as the boat sank,” the Miami Herald reported Gonzalez, who was contacted during a press conference hosted in Miami by the Democracy Movement, as saying. “They knew there were children aboard, but continued to charge against us. They didn’t care.”

González said the boat was carrying 32 people, including seven women and two children, onwe of which was her eight-year-old son. After being hit on Tuesday morning, the Cuban Coast Guard rescued most of the survivors, who were then locked up by the State Security in Versailles, Matanzas.
...

en.mercopress.com...

This happens constantly in Cuba, but many people are apparently not aware of this. That's how the Cuban government "has changed"...

I am trying to find any video in English that shows this. So far i can only find them in spanish. This happened this month, on December.

The same has happened in the past, such as the "el remolcador 13 de Marzo" in 1994, another Cuban boat which also had children aboard which was also hit several times by the Cuban coast guard until they sank. There were 41 people, including children in that other boat. The regime of Cuba HASN'T CHANGED.

Of course, I am 100% certain, that quite a few of the same people in this thread who are cheering Obama and the regime of Raul, will claim that this is "just propaganda"...