VLS joins US-Cuba agriculture initiative
August 03,2015
In another sign of better relations between the U.S. and Cuba, Vermont
Law School is participating in a program to improve sustainable food and
agriculture practices in both countries.
The law school's Center for Agriculture and Food Systems has joined the
Cuba-U.S. Agroecology Network as a charter member.
It's a partnership that fits nicely with the center's mission of
supporting the work of sustainable food advocates and entrepreneurs
while providing legal training to accomplish those goals, said Laurie
Ristino, director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems.
If the goal of the U.S. is to increase sustainable agriculture
production, Ristino said, "you do need to understand how practices and
environmental laws and polices intersect on the land, what they
ultimately result in, both good and bad."
She said the U.S. can learn much from Cuba in the area of sustainable
agriculture.
During what Cubans refer to as "the special period" following the
collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba faced hard economic times. The belt
tightening extended to agriculture, where the Cubans were forced to
abandon the use of petroleum-based fertilizers and pesticides.
"What they had to do was essentially go back to using (farming)
practices that were more traditional and more resilient," Ristino said.
Because of the trial and error of its sustainable farming practices,
Cuba offers a one-of-a-kind situation to learn from its experience, she
said.
"To have this culture that was petroleum-based and then went to a more
sustainable platform is almost like a living laboratory in a way which
has been successful," Ristino said.
She said Cuba's program comes at a time when there is emerging interest
in sustainable agriculture in the U.S., which coincides with concerns
over how food is produced.
Joining the Vermont Law School as one of the three dozen charter members
is the Vermont Caribbean Institute.
With U.S agribusinesses hoping to profit from normalization between the
two countries, Vermont Caribbean Institute Executive Director Margarita
Fernandez said it was important to form a group to counterbalance the
interests of industrialized agriculture. "For me, as someone who works
in agroecology, I felt we need to develop another network to sort of be
able to show solidarity with Cuba, (which) has a strong agroecology
movement for the past 20 years," said Fernandez, whose Burlington-based
organization is engaged in people-to-people programs in Cuba and the
Dominican Republic.
Greg Watson, who heads the Cuba-U.S. Agroecology Network in Great
Barrington, Mass., was looking for examples of urban farming programs
when it became apparent that all his research pointed to Cuba.
Cuba's decision to pursue this agroecology wasn't based on political
ideology, but rather on absolute necessity, said Watson, director of
policy and systems design at the Schumacher Center for a New Economics,
which oversees the Cuba-U.S initiative.
With the end of Soviet largesse, he said not only did Cuba lose access
to chemical fertilizers and pesticides but also fuel to run its farm
equipment and to bring food to market.
"They were actually faced with impending starvation for a while and
(the) government said find a way to grow food without those inputs,"
said Watson, who served two stints as Massachusetts agriculture
commissioner.
Watson, who visited Cuba last fall, said what impressed him was that the
food policies had made a big difference in meeting the food needs of its
11 million people.
And while the U.S. uses many of the same methods in sustainable
agriculture, Watson said Cuba is the only country that has done it on
such a large scale.
Cuba, for example, has established what Watson said is a very effective
farmer-to-farmer network to share information and support research. He
said the Cubans have started to explore cooperatives to support networks
of small farms.
"There is an age-old question: Can a country or nation support itself
via sustainable agriculture/organic agriculture movement," he said.
He said 60 to 70 percent of Havana's food supply comes from urban farms.
Cuba, too can learn valuable economic lessons from the experience of
U.S. farmers.
Watson said Cuban farmers, while supportive of the social gains brought
about by the Castro government, did express disappointment in the
failure of "the socialist economic model."
"Cuba is in the midst of trying to figure out what is the economic model
that is somewhere between the socialist and capitalist model," he said.
Ristino said advocates in the U.S. also have knowledge to share on
policies and laws that can enhance and strengthen sustainable farming.
She said one of the issues facing consumers in the U.S. is the lack of
transparency when it comes to food production.
As Cuba moves to open its economy, she said that could portend a return
to a reliance on petroleum-based fertilizers and pesticides.
"The industrialized agriculture and commercial forces are so great and
have a great concentration of those resources that might occur," Ristino
said. "I think for Cuba, it's up to them."
Fernandez, of the Vermont Caribbean Institute, said sustainable
agriculture is just one area where Vermont and Cuba have common interests.
"That's sort of the crux, the link, between Cuba and Vermont," she said,
"is we both have very similar values around sustainability, around
meeting needs of people and communities and looking for solutions to
build better societies."
Source: VLS joins US-Cuba agriculture initiative : Times Argus Online -
http://www.timesargus.com/article/20150803/THISJUSTIN/708039965
Monday, August 3, 2015
Sunday, August 2, 2015
Cuba, McDonald's and cheap sex
Cuba, McDonald's and cheap sex
5:00 AM Sunday Aug 2, 2015Add a comment
We were liquored up and keen to dance and they saw us straight away. An
unattached white male? Boom. You've not seen women like this unless
you've been to Cuba. That might sound sexist; it certainly sounds crass
but I cannot recall ever seeing a concentration of living, breathing and
not photoshopped women so alarmingly physically attractive. It is, after
all, the sort of thing one remembers.
They were tall and lean and Latin, booties, busts and bare shoulders,
all flesh and eyelashes and vacuum-packed in elastic mini-dresses. One
surprised me. I didn't see her until she swept a finger down the small
of my back. She wore massive heels and a blood-red dress, early-20s
maybe, and purring.
My brother giggled.
"No, gracias ... ahhh ... Somos juntos!" he said. We're together. We're
lovers.
"Prove it and kiss him, then," she cooed in Spanish and was off, quick
as a cat.
The guy to our right was talking to two girls, then was gone. A
grey-haired man tried to cheat his age with a goatee and an ill-advised
bracelet. His hand was on one woman's behind and every few beats the
lights would roll across the room and hit his wedding ring.
I was last in Cuba's capital city in 2011.
That same time, President Raul Castro began a series of political
reforms allowing for limited development and private commerce. The
changes culminated in this month's re-establishment of diplomatic ties
with the United States.
I'm taken by the rate of construction and development. Prime buildings
are being snapped up and you hit building sites all the time. Last time
I was here, I don't remember seeing cranes or teams of painters and
carpenters. Cubans walk around in clothes festooned with the Stars and
Stripes.
A few days after Friday night, our host drove us through the city. He's
an hombre de negocios - a born businessman - and just last weekend
bought a second apartment in Havana to rent out to foreigners by the night.
He was plain when we asked what he thought about the impending tide of
American dollars and tourists.
It'd be a bit of shame to see McDonald's, he said. But at least not all
the Americans will be in Havana for cheap sex.
Jack Tame is on Newstalk ZB Saturdays, 9am-midday
Source: Cuba, McDonald's and cheap sex - National - NZ Herald News -
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11490606&ref=rss
5:00 AM Sunday Aug 2, 2015Add a comment
We were liquored up and keen to dance and they saw us straight away. An
unattached white male? Boom. You've not seen women like this unless
you've been to Cuba. That might sound sexist; it certainly sounds crass
but I cannot recall ever seeing a concentration of living, breathing and
not photoshopped women so alarmingly physically attractive. It is, after
all, the sort of thing one remembers.
They were tall and lean and Latin, booties, busts and bare shoulders,
all flesh and eyelashes and vacuum-packed in elastic mini-dresses. One
surprised me. I didn't see her until she swept a finger down the small
of my back. She wore massive heels and a blood-red dress, early-20s
maybe, and purring.
My brother giggled.
"No, gracias ... ahhh ... Somos juntos!" he said. We're together. We're
lovers.
"Prove it and kiss him, then," she cooed in Spanish and was off, quick
as a cat.
The guy to our right was talking to two girls, then was gone. A
grey-haired man tried to cheat his age with a goatee and an ill-advised
bracelet. His hand was on one woman's behind and every few beats the
lights would roll across the room and hit his wedding ring.
I was last in Cuba's capital city in 2011.
That same time, President Raul Castro began a series of political
reforms allowing for limited development and private commerce. The
changes culminated in this month's re-establishment of diplomatic ties
with the United States.
I'm taken by the rate of construction and development. Prime buildings
are being snapped up and you hit building sites all the time. Last time
I was here, I don't remember seeing cranes or teams of painters and
carpenters. Cubans walk around in clothes festooned with the Stars and
Stripes.
A few days after Friday night, our host drove us through the city. He's
an hombre de negocios - a born businessman - and just last weekend
bought a second apartment in Havana to rent out to foreigners by the night.
He was plain when we asked what he thought about the impending tide of
American dollars and tourists.
It'd be a bit of shame to see McDonald's, he said. But at least not all
the Americans will be in Havana for cheap sex.
Jack Tame is on Newstalk ZB Saturdays, 9am-midday
Source: Cuba, McDonald's and cheap sex - National - NZ Herald News -
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11490606&ref=rss
Cuba’s medical breakthroughs have caught U.S. attention
Cuba's medical breakthroughs have caught U.S. attention
By Paul Guzzo | Tribune Staff
Published: August 2, 2015
TAMPA — As relations with Cuba improve, many people in Tampa are hoping
for easier access to one export item the island nation has made famous —
premium cigars.
But there's far more at stake with another product developed in Cuba — a
treatment for lung cancer, the disease most commonly caused by tobacco
smoking.
The H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute in Tampa is one
American institution that has expressed interest in the Cuban drug
CimaVax, recently sending representatives to the island nation.
In addition, an unnamed Tampa medical center is said to be interested in
bringing doctors here from Cuba. And local cancer survivors and their
families are traveling to Cuba to learn more from their counterparts there.
"As the doors open wider between our countries, there will be other
medical benefits," said Candace Johnson, CEO of Roswell Park Cancer
Institute in Buffalo, New York, which is seeking FDA approval to run a
clinical trial on CimaVax.
Evaluations could begin within six months. In the coming years, Roswell
may test other Cuban pharmaceuticals.
"I am optimistic that a field like health can open the way for real
positive relations between these two countries," said Gail Reed, founder
of the Oakland, California-based nonprofit Medical Education Cooperation
with Cuba, MEDICC.
It may sound improbable that a nation isolated for decades by the U.S.
embargo, a land of old cars and crumbling ruins in the minds of many
Americans, might have scored such a sought-after medical breakthrough.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of death from cancer in the U.S.,
according to the National Cancer Institute, and women are dying from the
disease in rising numbers even as cigarette smoking declines.
But in Cuba, the field of medicine belies that Third World image.
The United Nations reports that Cuba's infant mortality rate is less
than five deaths per 1,000 births compared to six in the U.S. Cubans
also have the same life expectancy as people in the U.S. — 79 years,
according to the U.N. report.
What's more, Cuba trains almost seven doctors for every 1,000 citizens
compared with just under three in the U.S., the World Health
Organization reports.
❖ ❖ ❖
Those medical professionals have become one of Cuba's most sought-after
exports. The Cuban government says it has sent nearly 40,000 health care
workers to work temporarily in 77 countries — most recently, helping
treat Ebola patients in West Africa — and generated $8 billion a year in
foreign exchange.
One of Cuba's biggest health care partners is Venezuela, which provides
much-needed oil in return.
Bringing Cuban doctors to Florida to study and practice on a temporary
basis was the subject of a recent meeting at a Tampa medical center,
said Jonathan Edelheit, CEO of the nonprofit Medical Tourism Association
in Palm Beach Gardens, which advocates for international health care
options.
"I can't say more right now," Edelheit told the Tribune. "But there were
some stakeholders from Tampa's government at the meetings."
Representatives from Moffitt Cancer Center were part of a Greater Tampa
Chamber of Commerce trip to Cuba in May and toured its National
Institute of Oncology and Radiology in Havana.
Moffitt Vice President David de La Parte had little to say about the
prospects of working with the institute.
"Similar to Moffitt, the cancer hospital is focused on patient care,
research and education," de La Parte said in an email. "That resulted
in a discussion about potential opportunities down the road in the areas
of training, education and collaboration. We look forward to continuing
our discussions."
Reed, who edits the MEDICC medical journal in Havana, said Tampa
medical centers have good reason to study Cuba's health care system.
The country has developed systems for vaccination that are among the
best in the developing world, Reed said, because the communist
government has made it a financial priority.
Cuba produced a vaccine for meningitis B in 1989, she said, while it
took until 2014 for the U.S. to approve one.
Cuba also has a vaccine for diabetic foot ulcers, which is the reason
behind some 80,000 amputations a year in the U.S., Reed said.
In Cuba, the vaccine has reduced amputations by 70 percent. It is
available in 26 countries but not in the U.S.
Cuba is currently working on a vaccine for cholera, Reed said.
❖ ❖ ❖
Researchers in the U.S. hope Cuba's CimaVax can also be administered as
a cancer prevention, said Johnson, the Roswell Park CEO.
CimaVax targets a protein that cancer cells attract and use to multiply,
Johnson said. The vaccine may work as an immunization for patients at
risk of cancer.
"Cuba did a randomized trial with 4,000 late-stage lung cancer
patients," Reed said. "Standard therapy did not work for them. Those
given the vaccine once a month through an injection in the arm lived
twice as long as the others. And their quality of life was good. Some
even went back to work."
The vaccine has been available to Cubans since 2011. Through a
delegation to Cuba led by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Roswell signed an
agreement with the Center for Molecular Immunology in Havana to import
CimaVax to the U.S.
Still, in many respects, Cuba does resemble a Third World nation when it
comes to the nation's health care system.
With its struggling economy, there are shortages of basic necessities
such as bandages.
"You can get a heart transplant but might have to bring your own sheets
to the hospital," said Reed.
Medical supplies are one of the commodities that U.S. citizens can
legally sell to Cuba.
Tampa, a center for the manufacture of medical devices, can capitalize
on this opportunity, Chamber of Commerce President Bob Rohrlack said
before his group's trip to Cuba in May.
Cuba does not buy much from the U.S. health care industry — just $7.5
million worth since 2003, said John Kavulich, president of U.S.-Cuba
Trade and Economic Council in New York.
There are a number of reasons for this, he said.
Some U.S. companies don't want to go through the Commerce Department
licensing process, for example. And Cuba grudgingly pays in cash — the
only way many U.S. companies are allowed to do business there now.
The Cuban government believes that buying U.S. health care products
would signal acceptance of these U.S. trade restrictions.
What's more, many U.S. medical products simply cost more than those from
other nations, Kavulich said. "However, their doors have always been
open to donations without any issues," he said. "Thus far this year,
donated products from the U.S. exceed $1.8 million."
❖ ❖ ❖
Alberto Jones of Palm Coast in Flagler County is among those making the
donations, gathering and delivering goods from people in the Tampa area
who are working to improve relations with Cuba.
Jones' wife was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2013 and successfully
treated in the U.S.
A native of Guantanamo, Jones kept his family in Cuba informed of her
progress. He was shocked to learn that despite the island's excellent
record of cancer treatment, patients lack items taken for granted in the
U.S. — creams for dry skin, for example, or slings for lymphedema, both
brought on by treatment. Wheelchairs and prosthetics also are in short
supply.
With support from Tampa donors, he and his wife have been collecting and
delivering such material to Cuba.
On their first visit to Guantanamo in 2013, Jones and his wife found
women waiting for them in lines that stretched across town.
"The U.S. and Cuba both have something to offer each other," Jones said.
"We need to continue building bridges between the two. It will only
result in benefits for the sick."
Jones is leading a delegation of cancer survivors, physicians and
caregivers to Havana in October.
Called "Pink to Pink," the group will meet with Cuban counterparts to
continue Jones' push for collaborative efforts.
Among those going is Rayshana Black, who received a graduate studies
degree from the University of South Florida in 2010 and was diagnosed
with leukemia three years later.
Now 32 and living in Atlanta and with a clean bill of health, she
founded the support group Black Girls Survive Cancer and looks forward
to meeting with organizations in Cuba to see if she can take away any
lessons on helping survivors.
She is also interested in learning more about how Cuban cancer centers
deal with their patients.
"In the U.S. we are a little more focused on the disease than the
patient," Black said. "Sometimes we forget the patient is a human trying
to survive. That makes us feel like we are the disease rather than a
person."
❖ ❖ ❖
Because Cuban doctors are trained to work with low-income patients in
other countries, without the "bells and whistles" available in the U.S.
health care system, bedside manner is stressed, said Reed.
"They do more hands-on training in community settings starting with
their undergrad medical education," Reed said. "From day one they
emphasize that every physician is also their patient's teacher."
Cuba's Latin American School of Medicine has educated more than 200 U.S.
citizens through scholarships.
Cuba may also be open to U.S. medical tourists — those visiting another
country for health care procedures.
An estimated 750,000 Americans a year travel abroad as medical tourists,
said Edelheit, with Medical Tourism Association.
Among the attractions can be affordable prices and the availability of
procedures not approved here, such as stem cell therapy.
Today, Cuba is an illegal destination for U.S. medical tourists. They
can only travel to the island for educational, research, humanitarian,
family or athletic purposes.
If and when U.S. citizens are allowed to undergo medical procedures in
Cuba, Edelheit said, it could grow into a popular choice, especially for
people in nearby Florida, where Tampa and Miami have ancestral links.
"If a Cuban can benefit from a U.S. drug, wonderful. And if an American
can benefit from a Cuban drug, wonderful," Reed said. "The two
communities can be an example of why we should all work together."
pguzzo@tampatrib.com
Source: Cuba's medical breakthroughs have caught U.S. attention |
TBO.com and The Tampa Tribune -
http://tbo.com/news/politics/cubas-medical-breakthroughs-have-caught-us-attention-20150802/
By Paul Guzzo | Tribune Staff
Published: August 2, 2015
TAMPA — As relations with Cuba improve, many people in Tampa are hoping
for easier access to one export item the island nation has made famous —
premium cigars.
But there's far more at stake with another product developed in Cuba — a
treatment for lung cancer, the disease most commonly caused by tobacco
smoking.
The H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute in Tampa is one
American institution that has expressed interest in the Cuban drug
CimaVax, recently sending representatives to the island nation.
In addition, an unnamed Tampa medical center is said to be interested in
bringing doctors here from Cuba. And local cancer survivors and their
families are traveling to Cuba to learn more from their counterparts there.
"As the doors open wider between our countries, there will be other
medical benefits," said Candace Johnson, CEO of Roswell Park Cancer
Institute in Buffalo, New York, which is seeking FDA approval to run a
clinical trial on CimaVax.
Evaluations could begin within six months. In the coming years, Roswell
may test other Cuban pharmaceuticals.
"I am optimistic that a field like health can open the way for real
positive relations between these two countries," said Gail Reed, founder
of the Oakland, California-based nonprofit Medical Education Cooperation
with Cuba, MEDICC.
It may sound improbable that a nation isolated for decades by the U.S.
embargo, a land of old cars and crumbling ruins in the minds of many
Americans, might have scored such a sought-after medical breakthrough.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of death from cancer in the U.S.,
according to the National Cancer Institute, and women are dying from the
disease in rising numbers even as cigarette smoking declines.
But in Cuba, the field of medicine belies that Third World image.
The United Nations reports that Cuba's infant mortality rate is less
than five deaths per 1,000 births compared to six in the U.S. Cubans
also have the same life expectancy as people in the U.S. — 79 years,
according to the U.N. report.
What's more, Cuba trains almost seven doctors for every 1,000 citizens
compared with just under three in the U.S., the World Health
Organization reports.
❖ ❖ ❖
Those medical professionals have become one of Cuba's most sought-after
exports. The Cuban government says it has sent nearly 40,000 health care
workers to work temporarily in 77 countries — most recently, helping
treat Ebola patients in West Africa — and generated $8 billion a year in
foreign exchange.
One of Cuba's biggest health care partners is Venezuela, which provides
much-needed oil in return.
Bringing Cuban doctors to Florida to study and practice on a temporary
basis was the subject of a recent meeting at a Tampa medical center,
said Jonathan Edelheit, CEO of the nonprofit Medical Tourism Association
in Palm Beach Gardens, which advocates for international health care
options.
"I can't say more right now," Edelheit told the Tribune. "But there were
some stakeholders from Tampa's government at the meetings."
Representatives from Moffitt Cancer Center were part of a Greater Tampa
Chamber of Commerce trip to Cuba in May and toured its National
Institute of Oncology and Radiology in Havana.
Moffitt Vice President David de La Parte had little to say about the
prospects of working with the institute.
"Similar to Moffitt, the cancer hospital is focused on patient care,
research and education," de La Parte said in an email. "That resulted
in a discussion about potential opportunities down the road in the areas
of training, education and collaboration. We look forward to continuing
our discussions."
Reed, who edits the MEDICC medical journal in Havana, said Tampa
medical centers have good reason to study Cuba's health care system.
The country has developed systems for vaccination that are among the
best in the developing world, Reed said, because the communist
government has made it a financial priority.
Cuba produced a vaccine for meningitis B in 1989, she said, while it
took until 2014 for the U.S. to approve one.
Cuba also has a vaccine for diabetic foot ulcers, which is the reason
behind some 80,000 amputations a year in the U.S., Reed said.
In Cuba, the vaccine has reduced amputations by 70 percent. It is
available in 26 countries but not in the U.S.
Cuba is currently working on a vaccine for cholera, Reed said.
❖ ❖ ❖
Researchers in the U.S. hope Cuba's CimaVax can also be administered as
a cancer prevention, said Johnson, the Roswell Park CEO.
CimaVax targets a protein that cancer cells attract and use to multiply,
Johnson said. The vaccine may work as an immunization for patients at
risk of cancer.
"Cuba did a randomized trial with 4,000 late-stage lung cancer
patients," Reed said. "Standard therapy did not work for them. Those
given the vaccine once a month through an injection in the arm lived
twice as long as the others. And their quality of life was good. Some
even went back to work."
The vaccine has been available to Cubans since 2011. Through a
delegation to Cuba led by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Roswell signed an
agreement with the Center for Molecular Immunology in Havana to import
CimaVax to the U.S.
Still, in many respects, Cuba does resemble a Third World nation when it
comes to the nation's health care system.
With its struggling economy, there are shortages of basic necessities
such as bandages.
"You can get a heart transplant but might have to bring your own sheets
to the hospital," said Reed.
Medical supplies are one of the commodities that U.S. citizens can
legally sell to Cuba.
Tampa, a center for the manufacture of medical devices, can capitalize
on this opportunity, Chamber of Commerce President Bob Rohrlack said
before his group's trip to Cuba in May.
Cuba does not buy much from the U.S. health care industry — just $7.5
million worth since 2003, said John Kavulich, president of U.S.-Cuba
Trade and Economic Council in New York.
There are a number of reasons for this, he said.
Some U.S. companies don't want to go through the Commerce Department
licensing process, for example. And Cuba grudgingly pays in cash — the
only way many U.S. companies are allowed to do business there now.
The Cuban government believes that buying U.S. health care products
would signal acceptance of these U.S. trade restrictions.
What's more, many U.S. medical products simply cost more than those from
other nations, Kavulich said. "However, their doors have always been
open to donations without any issues," he said. "Thus far this year,
donated products from the U.S. exceed $1.8 million."
❖ ❖ ❖
Alberto Jones of Palm Coast in Flagler County is among those making the
donations, gathering and delivering goods from people in the Tampa area
who are working to improve relations with Cuba.
Jones' wife was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2013 and successfully
treated in the U.S.
A native of Guantanamo, Jones kept his family in Cuba informed of her
progress. He was shocked to learn that despite the island's excellent
record of cancer treatment, patients lack items taken for granted in the
U.S. — creams for dry skin, for example, or slings for lymphedema, both
brought on by treatment. Wheelchairs and prosthetics also are in short
supply.
With support from Tampa donors, he and his wife have been collecting and
delivering such material to Cuba.
On their first visit to Guantanamo in 2013, Jones and his wife found
women waiting for them in lines that stretched across town.
"The U.S. and Cuba both have something to offer each other," Jones said.
"We need to continue building bridges between the two. It will only
result in benefits for the sick."
Jones is leading a delegation of cancer survivors, physicians and
caregivers to Havana in October.
Called "Pink to Pink," the group will meet with Cuban counterparts to
continue Jones' push for collaborative efforts.
Among those going is Rayshana Black, who received a graduate studies
degree from the University of South Florida in 2010 and was diagnosed
with leukemia three years later.
Now 32 and living in Atlanta and with a clean bill of health, she
founded the support group Black Girls Survive Cancer and looks forward
to meeting with organizations in Cuba to see if she can take away any
lessons on helping survivors.
She is also interested in learning more about how Cuban cancer centers
deal with their patients.
"In the U.S. we are a little more focused on the disease than the
patient," Black said. "Sometimes we forget the patient is a human trying
to survive. That makes us feel like we are the disease rather than a
person."
❖ ❖ ❖
Because Cuban doctors are trained to work with low-income patients in
other countries, without the "bells and whistles" available in the U.S.
health care system, bedside manner is stressed, said Reed.
"They do more hands-on training in community settings starting with
their undergrad medical education," Reed said. "From day one they
emphasize that every physician is also their patient's teacher."
Cuba's Latin American School of Medicine has educated more than 200 U.S.
citizens through scholarships.
Cuba may also be open to U.S. medical tourists — those visiting another
country for health care procedures.
An estimated 750,000 Americans a year travel abroad as medical tourists,
said Edelheit, with Medical Tourism Association.
Among the attractions can be affordable prices and the availability of
procedures not approved here, such as stem cell therapy.
Today, Cuba is an illegal destination for U.S. medical tourists. They
can only travel to the island for educational, research, humanitarian,
family or athletic purposes.
If and when U.S. citizens are allowed to undergo medical procedures in
Cuba, Edelheit said, it could grow into a popular choice, especially for
people in nearby Florida, where Tampa and Miami have ancestral links.
"If a Cuban can benefit from a U.S. drug, wonderful. And if an American
can benefit from a Cuban drug, wonderful," Reed said. "The two
communities can be an example of why we should all work together."
pguzzo@tampatrib.com
Source: Cuba's medical breakthroughs have caught U.S. attention |
TBO.com and The Tampa Tribune -
http://tbo.com/news/politics/cubas-medical-breakthroughs-have-caught-us-attention-20150802/
Clinton goes left again with her new Cuba policy
Clinton goes left again with her new Cuba policy
By Silvio Canto, Jr.
Mrs. Clinton called for an end to the U.S. embargo yesterday.
Some will say that she is supporting President Obama's foreign policy.
However, this has more to do with the American left than anything else.
Mrs. Clinton is desperately trying to go left, or sadly where the
Democratic Party is.
Lifting the embargo will not do a darned thing to help the people stuck
in the Castro regime.
I agree with The Miami Herald:
Despite months of talks between the two countries that began in December
with President Obama's announcement that relations would be normalized,
we have yet to see any significant actions by the Castro regime that
will benefit the United States or enhance the civil liberties and
freedoms of the Cuban people.
Internally, the regime maintains the same repressive attitude that has
allowed it to stay in power for decades.
That includes harassment of peaceful groups like the famed Ladies in
White for a series of successive Sundays, when they engage in peaceful
marches. The daily arrests, acts of repudiation and censorship of any
person or group that questions the official line are still in place.
Financially, Cuba has much to gain from the lifting of the embargo.
Venezuela, which has been helping prop up Cuba's chronically weak
economy, is running low on cash.
The Castros needed another lifeline.
If little has changed if and when Mrs. Clinton reaches the White House,
she should wait before restoring full trade relations with Cuba. The
embargo may be a relic of the past.
But so, too, is Cuba's government.
Sadly, Mrs. Clinton has joined the ranks of those among the American
left who think that you can end dictatorships by giving them a lifeline.
Or that you can free people by allowing U.S. companies to build beach
hotels that most Cubans will not go to. Or that you can create
prosperity in Cuba by doing business with state enterprises ultimately
owned by the Castro family, the infamous Castro Inc. that we've
discussed in previous posts.
Mrs. Clinton was once a strong supporter of the embargo and a tough
approach toward the Castro regime. It is a shame to see her running to
the left so rapidly and irresponsibly.
She could have said this:
Lift the embargo after the Cuban government releases political prisoners
and stops harassing independent journalists, settles with U.S. citizens
who had their property stolen, returns Joanne Chesimard to meet justice
in the U.S. for the killing of a New Jersey state trooper, and allows
access to the internet for dissidents and all Cubans, as well as when
the Castro regime stops harboring fugitives from U.S. law and other
countries.
Mrs. Clinton is throwing Cuban dissidents under the bus by
strengthening, not weakening the corrupt Castro regime. Maybe they are
applauding at the college lounges, but not in Cuba, especially in the
political prisons.
Source: Blog: Clinton goes left again with her new Cuba policy -
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/08/clinton_goes_left_again_with_her_new_cuba_policy.html
By Silvio Canto, Jr.
Mrs. Clinton called for an end to the U.S. embargo yesterday.
Some will say that she is supporting President Obama's foreign policy.
However, this has more to do with the American left than anything else.
Mrs. Clinton is desperately trying to go left, or sadly where the
Democratic Party is.
Lifting the embargo will not do a darned thing to help the people stuck
in the Castro regime.
I agree with The Miami Herald:
Despite months of talks between the two countries that began in December
with President Obama's announcement that relations would be normalized,
we have yet to see any significant actions by the Castro regime that
will benefit the United States or enhance the civil liberties and
freedoms of the Cuban people.
Internally, the regime maintains the same repressive attitude that has
allowed it to stay in power for decades.
That includes harassment of peaceful groups like the famed Ladies in
White for a series of successive Sundays, when they engage in peaceful
marches. The daily arrests, acts of repudiation and censorship of any
person or group that questions the official line are still in place.
Financially, Cuba has much to gain from the lifting of the embargo.
Venezuela, which has been helping prop up Cuba's chronically weak
economy, is running low on cash.
The Castros needed another lifeline.
If little has changed if and when Mrs. Clinton reaches the White House,
she should wait before restoring full trade relations with Cuba. The
embargo may be a relic of the past.
But so, too, is Cuba's government.
Sadly, Mrs. Clinton has joined the ranks of those among the American
left who think that you can end dictatorships by giving them a lifeline.
Or that you can free people by allowing U.S. companies to build beach
hotels that most Cubans will not go to. Or that you can create
prosperity in Cuba by doing business with state enterprises ultimately
owned by the Castro family, the infamous Castro Inc. that we've
discussed in previous posts.
Mrs. Clinton was once a strong supporter of the embargo and a tough
approach toward the Castro regime. It is a shame to see her running to
the left so rapidly and irresponsibly.
She could have said this:
Lift the embargo after the Cuban government releases political prisoners
and stops harassing independent journalists, settles with U.S. citizens
who had their property stolen, returns Joanne Chesimard to meet justice
in the U.S. for the killing of a New Jersey state trooper, and allows
access to the internet for dissidents and all Cubans, as well as when
the Castro regime stops harboring fugitives from U.S. law and other
countries.
Mrs. Clinton is throwing Cuban dissidents under the bus by
strengthening, not weakening the corrupt Castro regime. Maybe they are
applauding at the college lounges, but not in Cuba, especially in the
political prisons.
Source: Blog: Clinton goes left again with her new Cuba policy -
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/08/clinton_goes_left_again_with_her_new_cuba_policy.html
Cruise lines, ferries, airlines gear up for Cuba
Cruise lines, ferries, airlines gear up for Cuba
Doreen Hemlock and Arlene Satchell, SUN SENTINEL
POSTED: Sunday, August 2, 2015, 3:01 AM
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - From cruise lines to ferries to airlines,
businesses are getting in line to shepherd masses of Americans to the
long-forbidden island of Cuba.
Many hope to benefit quickly under new U.S. rules allowing "purposeful"
trips such as humanitarian or educational missions without a license.
Others are preparing for what appears to be the inevitable day when the
United States permits open travel.
The latest to act was Carnival Corp., which announced that it would
begin cruises to the island in May for cultural exchanges.
But so many more businesses are interested that South Florida lawyer
Pedro Freyre calls it "a tsunami." His team at Cuba Practice Group at
law firm Akerman L.L.P. has visited the island at least 10 times this
year, mainly accompanying clients looking to develop travel business.
Cuba is banking on tourism as an economic engine, especially if
financially troubled Venezuela reduces support to the island. Cuba
already ranks as the second-largest tourist destination in the Caribbean
(surpassed by the Dominican Republic) and could become tops. Americans
accounted for roughly one in six of Cuba's three million visitors last
year, mainly Cuban Americans visiting family. With unrestricted U.S.
travel, about 1.5 million additional Americans might visit yearly, Cuban
officials estimate.
Already under new rules this year, visits by Americans without family in
Cuba rose 36 percent to 51,458 through May 9, compared with the same
time last year, the Associated Press reported.
Carnival is angling to be the first to operate cruise service from the
U.S. to Cuba in half a century, since Washington imposed its embargo on
the communist-led nation. Though it awaits Cuban approval, Carnival
plans weeklong trips from Miami every other week starting in spring on a
710-passenger ship through its new brand called "fathom," which
specializes in "social-impact travel" such as volunteering and cultural
exchange.
Others are mulling U.S.-Cuba cruises soon, too.
Airline Brokers Co. of Miami received U.S. approval to operate a ferry
to Cuba next spring and recently expanded approval for cruises, said
company president Vivian Mannerud, a veteran in Cuba travel. She's now
talking to cruise operators to offer "people-to-people" cruises, similar
to those planned by Carnival.
U.S. travel agents who book cruises have been fielding more calls this
year on Cuba.
"We're seeing a lot of interest from people asking, 'How can I get there
before it opens up?' " said Vicky Garcia, co-owner of Cruise Planners in
Coral Springs. Many clients say they want an authentic Cuba experience
before it becomes too Americanized or touristy, she said.
Cuba has been encouraging cruises, now taken mainly by Canadian,
European, and Latin American visitors. The number of cruise passengers
to the island rose from 6,770 in 2012 to 37,519 last year. And it jumped
to 62,183 through May this year, according to government data cited by AP.
Still unclear is when Cuba might approve U.S. cruises or ferries and
when the services might start. Among other things, the U.S. Coast Guard
still must inspect Cuban ports, operators say.
Ferries: At least seven companies have received U.S. approval since
April to operate the first ferry services from Florida to Cuba since the
1960s. The earliest a ferry service might start would be fall, pending
Cuban approvals and other logistics.
Charter flights: Longtime operators of charter flights to Cuba are
expanding to new cities to meet rising U.S. demand. Island Travel & Tour
this month began twice-a-week flights from Orlando to Cuba. And Cuba
Travel Services offers a weekly charter to New York starting this month
using a JetBlue Airways plane. That's on top of charters already
operated from Fort Lauderdale, Miami, and Tampa.
Tour operators: Apple Vacations this month started selling five- and
seven-night "people-to-people" packages beginning in September to Cuba
from Miami.
Airlines: Commercial airlines can't offer U.S.-Cuba service, but are
watching developments. Low-cost carrier Spirit Airlines, based in
Miramar, will consider flights to Cuba "when the travel restrictions are
lifted, and air travel from the U.S. to Cuba can be done where we
control our own prices and schedules - and we can offer the absolute
lowest price," said spokesman Paul Berry.
Hotels: The U.S. embargo bans investment in Cuba, but U.S. hotel
companies see rivals from overseas already operating there. Hotel giant
Hilton Worldwide is interested in Cuba when conditions allow, as is
Driftwood Hospitality Management of North Palm Beach.
"Given time, this is the next Cancun or Costa Rica," said Carlos
Rodriguez, who spearheads Driftwood's hotel-development division.
The big question is when open U.S. travel will be permitted to the
island of 11 million residents.
Bills are pending in Congress to lift the U.S. travel ban to Cuba, and
they're gaining support.
"Open travel is probably the most likely to happen before anything
else," Freyre, the lawyer said, "because it's the simplest ask in Congress.
"The travel ban is the one that most sticks in the craw of American
people," who value their freedom of movement and now can travel to
China, Vietnam, and elsewhere, he said. "I think the odds are relatively
good that in the next couple of years, the travel ban would be lifted."
Source: Cruise lines, ferries, airlines gear up for Cuba -
http://www.philly.com/philly/home/20150802_Cruise_lines__ferries__airlines_gear_up_for_Cuba.html
Doreen Hemlock and Arlene Satchell, SUN SENTINEL
POSTED: Sunday, August 2, 2015, 3:01 AM
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - From cruise lines to ferries to airlines,
businesses are getting in line to shepherd masses of Americans to the
long-forbidden island of Cuba.
Many hope to benefit quickly under new U.S. rules allowing "purposeful"
trips such as humanitarian or educational missions without a license.
Others are preparing for what appears to be the inevitable day when the
United States permits open travel.
The latest to act was Carnival Corp., which announced that it would
begin cruises to the island in May for cultural exchanges.
But so many more businesses are interested that South Florida lawyer
Pedro Freyre calls it "a tsunami." His team at Cuba Practice Group at
law firm Akerman L.L.P. has visited the island at least 10 times this
year, mainly accompanying clients looking to develop travel business.
Cuba is banking on tourism as an economic engine, especially if
financially troubled Venezuela reduces support to the island. Cuba
already ranks as the second-largest tourist destination in the Caribbean
(surpassed by the Dominican Republic) and could become tops. Americans
accounted for roughly one in six of Cuba's three million visitors last
year, mainly Cuban Americans visiting family. With unrestricted U.S.
travel, about 1.5 million additional Americans might visit yearly, Cuban
officials estimate.
Already under new rules this year, visits by Americans without family in
Cuba rose 36 percent to 51,458 through May 9, compared with the same
time last year, the Associated Press reported.
Carnival is angling to be the first to operate cruise service from the
U.S. to Cuba in half a century, since Washington imposed its embargo on
the communist-led nation. Though it awaits Cuban approval, Carnival
plans weeklong trips from Miami every other week starting in spring on a
710-passenger ship through its new brand called "fathom," which
specializes in "social-impact travel" such as volunteering and cultural
exchange.
Others are mulling U.S.-Cuba cruises soon, too.
Airline Brokers Co. of Miami received U.S. approval to operate a ferry
to Cuba next spring and recently expanded approval for cruises, said
company president Vivian Mannerud, a veteran in Cuba travel. She's now
talking to cruise operators to offer "people-to-people" cruises, similar
to those planned by Carnival.
U.S. travel agents who book cruises have been fielding more calls this
year on Cuba.
"We're seeing a lot of interest from people asking, 'How can I get there
before it opens up?' " said Vicky Garcia, co-owner of Cruise Planners in
Coral Springs. Many clients say they want an authentic Cuba experience
before it becomes too Americanized or touristy, she said.
Cuba has been encouraging cruises, now taken mainly by Canadian,
European, and Latin American visitors. The number of cruise passengers
to the island rose from 6,770 in 2012 to 37,519 last year. And it jumped
to 62,183 through May this year, according to government data cited by AP.
Still unclear is when Cuba might approve U.S. cruises or ferries and
when the services might start. Among other things, the U.S. Coast Guard
still must inspect Cuban ports, operators say.
Ferries: At least seven companies have received U.S. approval since
April to operate the first ferry services from Florida to Cuba since the
1960s. The earliest a ferry service might start would be fall, pending
Cuban approvals and other logistics.
Charter flights: Longtime operators of charter flights to Cuba are
expanding to new cities to meet rising U.S. demand. Island Travel & Tour
this month began twice-a-week flights from Orlando to Cuba. And Cuba
Travel Services offers a weekly charter to New York starting this month
using a JetBlue Airways plane. That's on top of charters already
operated from Fort Lauderdale, Miami, and Tampa.
Tour operators: Apple Vacations this month started selling five- and
seven-night "people-to-people" packages beginning in September to Cuba
from Miami.
Airlines: Commercial airlines can't offer U.S.-Cuba service, but are
watching developments. Low-cost carrier Spirit Airlines, based in
Miramar, will consider flights to Cuba "when the travel restrictions are
lifted, and air travel from the U.S. to Cuba can be done where we
control our own prices and schedules - and we can offer the absolute
lowest price," said spokesman Paul Berry.
Hotels: The U.S. embargo bans investment in Cuba, but U.S. hotel
companies see rivals from overseas already operating there. Hotel giant
Hilton Worldwide is interested in Cuba when conditions allow, as is
Driftwood Hospitality Management of North Palm Beach.
"Given time, this is the next Cancun or Costa Rica," said Carlos
Rodriguez, who spearheads Driftwood's hotel-development division.
The big question is when open U.S. travel will be permitted to the
island of 11 million residents.
Bills are pending in Congress to lift the U.S. travel ban to Cuba, and
they're gaining support.
"Open travel is probably the most likely to happen before anything
else," Freyre, the lawyer said, "because it's the simplest ask in Congress.
"The travel ban is the one that most sticks in the craw of American
people," who value their freedom of movement and now can travel to
China, Vietnam, and elsewhere, he said. "I think the odds are relatively
good that in the next couple of years, the travel ban would be lifted."
Source: Cruise lines, ferries, airlines gear up for Cuba -
http://www.philly.com/philly/home/20150802_Cruise_lines__ferries__airlines_gear_up_for_Cuba.html
German sets Florida-to-Cuba speedboat record
German sets Florida-to-Cuba speedboat record
AFP
August 2, 2015, 6:42 am
Havana (AFP) - A German businessman and power boating fanatic on
Saturday broke a 57-year-old record for the fastest boat crossing
between the United States and Cuba.
Roger Klueh, 50, powered his "Apache Star" powerboat the 160 kilometers
(90 miles) separating Key West and Havana, shattering a record that had
stood since 1958.
Klueh and his small crew piloted the high-tech speedboat between Key
West and Havana in just under two hours. The boat was capable of top
speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour.
The earlier speed record, set by American Forest Johnson, was a
comparatively leisurely six hours 23 minutes.
Five months after that race, Fidel Castro and his band of rebels seized
power from Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, the beginning of the
downturn in US-Cuban relations and the end of boat competitions across
the Florida Straits.
Klueh has said his record attempt was made possible by the historic thaw
in ties between the former Cold War foes.
Source: German sets Florida-to-Cuba speedboat record - Yahoo7 -
https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/29159928/german-sets-florida-to-cuba-speedboat-record/
AFP
August 2, 2015, 6:42 am
Havana (AFP) - A German businessman and power boating fanatic on
Saturday broke a 57-year-old record for the fastest boat crossing
between the United States and Cuba.
Roger Klueh, 50, powered his "Apache Star" powerboat the 160 kilometers
(90 miles) separating Key West and Havana, shattering a record that had
stood since 1958.
Klueh and his small crew piloted the high-tech speedboat between Key
West and Havana in just under two hours. The boat was capable of top
speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour.
The earlier speed record, set by American Forest Johnson, was a
comparatively leisurely six hours 23 minutes.
Five months after that race, Fidel Castro and his band of rebels seized
power from Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, the beginning of the
downturn in US-Cuban relations and the end of boat competitions across
the Florida Straits.
Klueh has said his record attempt was made possible by the historic thaw
in ties between the former Cold War foes.
Source: German sets Florida-to-Cuba speedboat record - Yahoo7 -
https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/29159928/german-sets-florida-to-cuba-speedboat-record/
Giving Up Revolutionary Pleasures
Cuba: Giving Up Revolutionary Pleasures
July 31, 2015
By Martin Guevara
HAVANA TIMES — Cuba has entered a new and encouraging stage in the
building of a new kind of socialism, a system notably different from
that "real socialism" it once tried to force into the relaxed and
festive Caribbean spirit of Cubans.
What will the Party's Central Committee do to change the whole range of
tastes that are deeply rooted in the revolutionary, austere and nearly
ascetic spirit they claim took hold of Cubans' collective desires after
the revolution?
For more than half a century, Cubans looked down at the vice-ridden ways
and customs of the capitalist world with contempt. As such, rather than
endure their situation, they were happy with only one pair of shoes, a
stoic jar of water in their fridges, a sunk mattress impaled by springs
and having to co-exist with mosquitos and cockroaches instead of
employing an environmentally unfriendly bug repellent.
It is therefore important to forewarn visitors and hapless tourists,
those who are unaware of the aesthetic parameters and the heights of
sacrifice of the Cuban people, such that they do not confuse the
pastel-colored ruins, the drunk vagrants, the minimalist fashion,
footwear and lifestyles, with any kind of problems, so that they
understand this is a sovereign and thought-out decision by the people of
Havana, who would rather see their once intense and photogenic city
collapse than witness its development into a comfortable place.
That is where the authentic nature of Cubans lies. Cubans prefer to
spend the night in the aged and dilapidated tenements of Havana (known
as solares), where, in the form of an identity trait, there is no
electricity, no water and no shortage of families.
Because of their adventurous spirits, Cubans enjoy every minute of
uncertainty as to whether their roofs will collapse on top of them,
something that happens every month in the said tenements.
What's more, Cubans truly feel consolation, joy, pleasure, even
happiness, to know that foreign visitors are resting at a hotel with all
of the comforts they could never afford (which they of course also don't
want). Cubans are happy to know their sisters, aunts and even wives
leave their homes at night to become the delicacies of foreign visitors,
so that they may return to their country with a comprehensive and
complete experience of the island.
Cubans hate lobster, all kinds of seafood, good fish, tasty sauces, rum
and quality cigars. Of course, they can't even see beef in pictures and
the sight of a juicy steak can sometimes give them a heart attack.
Cubans simply hate meat.
Instead, they love that amorphous and pungent mass people call "goose
paste," the revolutionary alternative to perverse bourgeois pleasures
advanced by the Comandante, our bearded spiritual leader. Cubans are
thrilled by weevil-infested rice, coffee made out of roasted chick-peas,
and pizzas with melted condoms for cheese. Cubans are happy as long as
they can see foreign visitors (those who enjoy their sisters at night)
ingesting all of those taste-filled things that are the enemies of the
proletariat, those things many people long to have.
And another thing: Cubans love bicycles, single-speed bicycles
preferably, and what they enjoy most is pedaling under the summer's most
intense sun, to go in search of a head of garlic, a handful of nuts and
bolts or a can of paint stolen from a State shelf at the other end of
the city.
They love waiting for public transportation for hours. It's not that the
system doesn't work well, Cubans love standing in line and wrestling
with others, getting home late and exhausted…and with an empty stomach.
As long as they see foreign visitors traveling comfortably in their
rentals and perfect, air-conditioned buses, eating well, drinking the
best of the best, having fun with their wives or sisters, bathing at the
best beaches, enjoying a game of golf, going scuba-diving, yachting
about, then Cubans are happy and feel realized as revolutionaries.
What evil plot could the government now have in store for the people, so
that they will begrudgingly give up such delicacies as "goose pate" and
weevil-infested rice?
I only beg of them, on behalf of the people of Cuba: let it be anything
but the imperialist imposition of lobster and ham!
Source: Cuba: Giving Up Revolutionary Pleasures - Havana Times.org -
http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=113004
July 31, 2015
By Martin Guevara
HAVANA TIMES — Cuba has entered a new and encouraging stage in the
building of a new kind of socialism, a system notably different from
that "real socialism" it once tried to force into the relaxed and
festive Caribbean spirit of Cubans.
What will the Party's Central Committee do to change the whole range of
tastes that are deeply rooted in the revolutionary, austere and nearly
ascetic spirit they claim took hold of Cubans' collective desires after
the revolution?
For more than half a century, Cubans looked down at the vice-ridden ways
and customs of the capitalist world with contempt. As such, rather than
endure their situation, they were happy with only one pair of shoes, a
stoic jar of water in their fridges, a sunk mattress impaled by springs
and having to co-exist with mosquitos and cockroaches instead of
employing an environmentally unfriendly bug repellent.
It is therefore important to forewarn visitors and hapless tourists,
those who are unaware of the aesthetic parameters and the heights of
sacrifice of the Cuban people, such that they do not confuse the
pastel-colored ruins, the drunk vagrants, the minimalist fashion,
footwear and lifestyles, with any kind of problems, so that they
understand this is a sovereign and thought-out decision by the people of
Havana, who would rather see their once intense and photogenic city
collapse than witness its development into a comfortable place.
That is where the authentic nature of Cubans lies. Cubans prefer to
spend the night in the aged and dilapidated tenements of Havana (known
as solares), where, in the form of an identity trait, there is no
electricity, no water and no shortage of families.
Because of their adventurous spirits, Cubans enjoy every minute of
uncertainty as to whether their roofs will collapse on top of them,
something that happens every month in the said tenements.
What's more, Cubans truly feel consolation, joy, pleasure, even
happiness, to know that foreign visitors are resting at a hotel with all
of the comforts they could never afford (which they of course also don't
want). Cubans are happy to know their sisters, aunts and even wives
leave their homes at night to become the delicacies of foreign visitors,
so that they may return to their country with a comprehensive and
complete experience of the island.
Cubans hate lobster, all kinds of seafood, good fish, tasty sauces, rum
and quality cigars. Of course, they can't even see beef in pictures and
the sight of a juicy steak can sometimes give them a heart attack.
Cubans simply hate meat.
Instead, they love that amorphous and pungent mass people call "goose
paste," the revolutionary alternative to perverse bourgeois pleasures
advanced by the Comandante, our bearded spiritual leader. Cubans are
thrilled by weevil-infested rice, coffee made out of roasted chick-peas,
and pizzas with melted condoms for cheese. Cubans are happy as long as
they can see foreign visitors (those who enjoy their sisters at night)
ingesting all of those taste-filled things that are the enemies of the
proletariat, those things many people long to have.
And another thing: Cubans love bicycles, single-speed bicycles
preferably, and what they enjoy most is pedaling under the summer's most
intense sun, to go in search of a head of garlic, a handful of nuts and
bolts or a can of paint stolen from a State shelf at the other end of
the city.
They love waiting for public transportation for hours. It's not that the
system doesn't work well, Cubans love standing in line and wrestling
with others, getting home late and exhausted…and with an empty stomach.
As long as they see foreign visitors traveling comfortably in their
rentals and perfect, air-conditioned buses, eating well, drinking the
best of the best, having fun with their wives or sisters, bathing at the
best beaches, enjoying a game of golf, going scuba-diving, yachting
about, then Cubans are happy and feel realized as revolutionaries.
What evil plot could the government now have in store for the people, so
that they will begrudgingly give up such delicacies as "goose pate" and
weevil-infested rice?
I only beg of them, on behalf of the people of Cuba: let it be anything
but the imperialist imposition of lobster and ham!
Source: Cuba: Giving Up Revolutionary Pleasures - Havana Times.org -
http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=113004
Saturday, August 1, 2015
Cuban Dissidents Outline A Common Agenda
Cuban Dissidents Outline A Common Agenda / 14ymedio
Posted on August 1, 2015
14ymedio, Havana, 31 July 2015 – The meeting held Thursday in Havana by
some twenty civil society organizations and the political community has
been defined as a new step in a common agenda. The initiative aims to
work for democracy, fundamental freedoms, and a Rule of Law in Cuba,
according to the activist Manuel Cuesta Morúa.
The gathering is the continuation of a meeting with similar aims held in
Mexico between June 18 and 23 of this year, with the cooperation of the
Konrad Adenauer Foundation, which brought together various organizations
from the island and the diaspora.
At the meeting it was agreed to endorse Civil Society Open Forum four
points of consensus, which involved the majority of the organizations
that now decided to take this additional step in the direction of
creating a strictly political space for democratic action.
It was also agreed to create of secretariat to distribute information
and coordinate the coming meetings to which other organizations and
actors will be invited to continue outlining the structure, rules and
strategies of this new effort of plural political agreement.
The participants included, among others, representatives from the
Patriotic of Union of Cuba (UNPACU), the Anti-totalitarian United Front,
the Cuban Liberal Solidarity Party, the Progressive Arc, the
Socialdemocratic Party, the Opposition Movement for a New Republic, the
Center for the Support of the Transition, the Young Roundtable, the
Successors Foundation, and Cuba Decides.
Also present were attorneys from Cubalex and the the Agromontista
Current, independent journalists, artists and intellectuals, including
Tania Bruguera and the recently released Angel Santiesteban, Rafael
Vilches and Jorge Olivera.
Source: Cuban Dissidents Outline A Common Agenda / 14ymedio |
Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/cuban-dissidents-outline-a-common-agenda-14ymedio/
Posted on August 1, 2015
14ymedio, Havana, 31 July 2015 – The meeting held Thursday in Havana by
some twenty civil society organizations and the political community has
been defined as a new step in a common agenda. The initiative aims to
work for democracy, fundamental freedoms, and a Rule of Law in Cuba,
according to the activist Manuel Cuesta Morúa.
The gathering is the continuation of a meeting with similar aims held in
Mexico between June 18 and 23 of this year, with the cooperation of the
Konrad Adenauer Foundation, which brought together various organizations
from the island and the diaspora.
At the meeting it was agreed to endorse Civil Society Open Forum four
points of consensus, which involved the majority of the organizations
that now decided to take this additional step in the direction of
creating a strictly political space for democratic action.
It was also agreed to create of secretariat to distribute information
and coordinate the coming meetings to which other organizations and
actors will be invited to continue outlining the structure, rules and
strategies of this new effort of plural political agreement.
The participants included, among others, representatives from the
Patriotic of Union of Cuba (UNPACU), the Anti-totalitarian United Front,
the Cuban Liberal Solidarity Party, the Progressive Arc, the
Socialdemocratic Party, the Opposition Movement for a New Republic, the
Center for the Support of the Transition, the Young Roundtable, the
Successors Foundation, and Cuba Decides.
Also present were attorneys from Cubalex and the the Agromontista
Current, independent journalists, artists and intellectuals, including
Tania Bruguera and the recently released Angel Santiesteban, Rafael
Vilches and Jorge Olivera.
Source: Cuban Dissidents Outline A Common Agenda / 14ymedio |
Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/cuban-dissidents-outline-a-common-agenda-14ymedio/
When the Eggs Go Missing
When the Eggs Go Missing / 14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar
Posted on August 1, 2015
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 30 July 2015 — One day it's cooking
oil, another it's floor cleaning clothes or washing detergent, but there
is always a product that all of a sudden doesn't appear on the shelves
either in the ration market or in the hard currency stores, "nor even in
the spiritual centers" as some say.
When the eggs go missing, it is almost never the fault of the hens, but
of the bad organization in production or distribution. The egg is a key
player in the dramatic food situation of Cubans. As my neighbor
Magdalena says, "It's a can't-miss," because of which we call it a
"lifesaver." However, it vanishes, disappears, goes poof! like in those
magic acts, and then alternative ways of selling it have to be put to work.
On the ration card, every citizen gets five eggs a month at a price of
15 centavos. In the free market, a 30-egg carton costs 33 Cuban pesos,
and in the "shopping" – as we call the hard currency stores – they cost
3.60 convertible pesos (CUC), almost triple what they cost in the free
market. In the black market, which functions according to the strict
rules of supply and demand, eggs will always be more expensive than in
the ration stores and cheaper than in convertible pesos, with their
price rising and falling according to their presence or absence.
In March of this year, a high-profile corruption case came to light in
which 19 officials from a State company were sentenced to prison terms
of between 5 and 15 years for their involvement in the diversion of more
than 8 million eggs to the illegal market, with an economic impact of
over 8,907,562 pesos. But no one can believe that once those lawbreakers
were discovered the racket ended. It was enough for the scarcity to come
up with a new fiddle in which each played his or her role of greater or
lesser risk, greater or lesser effort and hence, with greater or lesser
profit.
At that time private restaurants and snack bars were not authorized, the
underground market in eggs was limited to door-to-door sales, offering
the merchandise to people in their homes. I'll never forget one day when
a woman came to my house accompanied by a child with a beach ball. "Do
you want eggs?" she asked me. "Give me ten," I said and then, as if by
magic, she took the eggs out of the ball. Now the owners of paladares –
private restaurants – and especially those who make sweets, monopolize
the purchase. The official media try to blame all the scarcities on
private entrepreneurs, and even hold them responsible for the frequent
detours, almost like kidnappings, of what leaves the warehouses headed
to the markets.
The cyclist in the photo walked several miles along Rancho Boyeros
Avenue in Havana with his precious cargo. At first he tried to pedal,
but the height of his construction made him lose his balance. Throughout
his journey he suffered every kind of joke from taxi drivers and truck
drivers, but he was lucky not to stumble into a police patrol.
Source: When the Eggs Go Missing / 14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar |
Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/when-the-eggs-go-missing-14ymedio-reinaldo-escobar/
Posted on August 1, 2015
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 30 July 2015 — One day it's cooking
oil, another it's floor cleaning clothes or washing detergent, but there
is always a product that all of a sudden doesn't appear on the shelves
either in the ration market or in the hard currency stores, "nor even in
the spiritual centers" as some say.
When the eggs go missing, it is almost never the fault of the hens, but
of the bad organization in production or distribution. The egg is a key
player in the dramatic food situation of Cubans. As my neighbor
Magdalena says, "It's a can't-miss," because of which we call it a
"lifesaver." However, it vanishes, disappears, goes poof! like in those
magic acts, and then alternative ways of selling it have to be put to work.
On the ration card, every citizen gets five eggs a month at a price of
15 centavos. In the free market, a 30-egg carton costs 33 Cuban pesos,
and in the "shopping" – as we call the hard currency stores – they cost
3.60 convertible pesos (CUC), almost triple what they cost in the free
market. In the black market, which functions according to the strict
rules of supply and demand, eggs will always be more expensive than in
the ration stores and cheaper than in convertible pesos, with their
price rising and falling according to their presence or absence.
In March of this year, a high-profile corruption case came to light in
which 19 officials from a State company were sentenced to prison terms
of between 5 and 15 years for their involvement in the diversion of more
than 8 million eggs to the illegal market, with an economic impact of
over 8,907,562 pesos. But no one can believe that once those lawbreakers
were discovered the racket ended. It was enough for the scarcity to come
up with a new fiddle in which each played his or her role of greater or
lesser risk, greater or lesser effort and hence, with greater or lesser
profit.
At that time private restaurants and snack bars were not authorized, the
underground market in eggs was limited to door-to-door sales, offering
the merchandise to people in their homes. I'll never forget one day when
a woman came to my house accompanied by a child with a beach ball. "Do
you want eggs?" she asked me. "Give me ten," I said and then, as if by
magic, she took the eggs out of the ball. Now the owners of paladares –
private restaurants – and especially those who make sweets, monopolize
the purchase. The official media try to blame all the scarcities on
private entrepreneurs, and even hold them responsible for the frequent
detours, almost like kidnappings, of what leaves the warehouses headed
to the markets.
The cyclist in the photo walked several miles along Rancho Boyeros
Avenue in Havana with his precious cargo. At first he tried to pedal,
but the height of his construction made him lose his balance. Throughout
his journey he suffered every kind of joke from taxi drivers and truck
drivers, but he was lucky not to stumble into a police patrol.
Source: When the Eggs Go Missing / 14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar |
Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/when-the-eggs-go-missing-14ymedio-reinaldo-escobar/
Cuba - Living to Eat
Cuba: Living to Eat / Ivan Garcia
Posted on July 31, 2015
Iván García, 28 July 2015 — Juliana, a seventy-three-year-old housewife,
devotes much of her time to tasks related to feeding her family. "I
spend eight hours cleaning rice, picking through beans, which are very
dirty, buying bread, scouring produce markets, butcher shops and corner
stores to see what is available and making lunch and dinner," she
explains while preparing black bean soup.
Julia and those like her do not fit the national pattern: They still
have breakfast, lunch and dinner at home. "My daughters make good
salaries and I get dollars from relatives in the United States, but it
evaporates in trying to eat as best we can."
In Cuba people live to eat. Food costs eat up 90% of the average salary.
"And it's not enough," notes Renier, a laborer. "The only reason I don't
spend my entire salary on food is because I have to pay the light, water
and gas bills."
The average monthly salary is around twenty-three dollars. The state
provides a meager amount of foodstuffs each month at subsidized prices
through the ration book. It includes seven pounds of rice, three pounds
of refined sugar, two pounds of brown sugar, twenty ounces of dried
beans, a pound of chicken and half a kilogram of ground beef mixed with
soy. The cost per person does not exceed twenty pesos (less than a
dollar). Everyone also has the right to a daily 2.8 ounce bread roll
once a day for five cents.
"It doesn't last for more than ten days. The rest of the month is a
problem," says a Cuban doctor. "The biggest tragedy for Cubans is the
issue of food. Even if you have money, you can't find what you want. Not
in the hard-currency store, not on the black market. Finding enough to
eat is a very stressful."
In hospital clinics it is customary to give doctors presents in exchange
for good treatment. "Patients often give us food like ham and cheese
sandwiches, chicken thighs or pork legs. Many doctors have a more
comfortable life thanks to these gifts," he adds.
The big debate in Cuba is when the country's vaunted economic growth
will reach Cuban dinner tables. According the the regime, the country's
GDP trend line has been moving upward for fifteen years.
However, this incremental growth has not translated into lower food
prices or an increase in production. If you look at the figures for
meat, poultry, fish or produce production, you will see that any
increase has been minimal and in many cases it has actually gone into
reverse.
The former sugar supplier to the world now produces less than two
million tons of sugar a year. Fresh milk is a luxury, as are beef, fish
and shellfish.
Fruits like guava, chirimoya, sugar apple and orange are distant
memories to the Cuban palate. Behind a slight increase in certain
legumes and vegetables lies skillful manipulation. The government is
blowing smoke.
In no sector of the food industry does the increased growth match the
highpoint of 1989. While it was also an era of shortages, the production
of bread, milk, eggs and potatoes did meet demand.
But not now. There is a joke that, before the nightly news, people place
baskets under their televisions to collect the harvests of fruits,
vegetables and meat which only grow in the official media.
The average family in Cuba has only one hot meal a day. "For lunch I
heat up something from the night before," says Regla, a professor who
cooks meals at home for her husband and two children. "On Sundays I
often make a nice lunch with pork or chicken and at night we eat
something light. The regular Monday-to-Saturday menu consists of white
rice or congrí (rice cooked with black beans), eggs in some fashion, and
a cucumber, cabbage, avocado or tomato salad."
Except when there are visitors, everything is served on one plate to
avoid having too many dishes to wash. Rice makes up the largest portion.
Some people do not even sit at the table anymore, preferring to eat
while watching television.
Prices in hard currency stores are shocking. A kilogram of domestically
produced white cheese costs 3.75 CUC and 8.10 CUC for Gouda. Ham goes
for more than 8 CUC while a half-kilogram steak is about 10 CUC. A
packet of chicken thighs costs 2.40 CUC. A thousand-gram can of tuna is
8.90 CUC and a liter of cooking oil is 2.10 CUC.
Produce markets accept Cuban pesos but inflation has also impacted the
national currency. A pound of pork chops costs 45 pesos. A pound of
black beans goes for 12 pesos, 14 pesos for the colored variety.
Chickpeas are the most expensive at 18 to 20 pesos a pound. A pound of
tomatoes is 15 pesos. An avocado is 10. A pound of mango costs 5 to 6
pesos, while a pound of peanuts goes for 16 pesos.
"I go shopping at the produce market once a week for my household," says
Gerardo, a private sector worker. "I spend 1,200 pesos (55 dollars),
which buys enough to last four or five days. No matter what we do, we
are always blowing through money."
Poor people, who make up the majority, and those with low incomes who do
not have relatives on the other side of the pond, eat little and poorly.
"My main course is often croquettes made from 'poultry' (chicken,
according to the government), sausages they sell for 1.10 CUC a packet
or eggs, the national dish par excellence," says Carmen, a retiree.
Those with fatter wallets eat better. They shop with hard currency,
which on the black market buys them shellfish, fresh fish and beef. But
everyone — those with more money and those with less money — spends most
of his or her income on food. In Cuba you do not eat to live, you live
to eat.
Source: Cuba: Living to Eat / Ivan Garcia | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/cuba-living-to-eat-ivan-garcia/
Posted on July 31, 2015
Iván García, 28 July 2015 — Juliana, a seventy-three-year-old housewife,
devotes much of her time to tasks related to feeding her family. "I
spend eight hours cleaning rice, picking through beans, which are very
dirty, buying bread, scouring produce markets, butcher shops and corner
stores to see what is available and making lunch and dinner," she
explains while preparing black bean soup.
Julia and those like her do not fit the national pattern: They still
have breakfast, lunch and dinner at home. "My daughters make good
salaries and I get dollars from relatives in the United States, but it
evaporates in trying to eat as best we can."
In Cuba people live to eat. Food costs eat up 90% of the average salary.
"And it's not enough," notes Renier, a laborer. "The only reason I don't
spend my entire salary on food is because I have to pay the light, water
and gas bills."
The average monthly salary is around twenty-three dollars. The state
provides a meager amount of foodstuffs each month at subsidized prices
through the ration book. It includes seven pounds of rice, three pounds
of refined sugar, two pounds of brown sugar, twenty ounces of dried
beans, a pound of chicken and half a kilogram of ground beef mixed with
soy. The cost per person does not exceed twenty pesos (less than a
dollar). Everyone also has the right to a daily 2.8 ounce bread roll
once a day for five cents.
"It doesn't last for more than ten days. The rest of the month is a
problem," says a Cuban doctor. "The biggest tragedy for Cubans is the
issue of food. Even if you have money, you can't find what you want. Not
in the hard-currency store, not on the black market. Finding enough to
eat is a very stressful."
In hospital clinics it is customary to give doctors presents in exchange
for good treatment. "Patients often give us food like ham and cheese
sandwiches, chicken thighs or pork legs. Many doctors have a more
comfortable life thanks to these gifts," he adds.
The big debate in Cuba is when the country's vaunted economic growth
will reach Cuban dinner tables. According the the regime, the country's
GDP trend line has been moving upward for fifteen years.
However, this incremental growth has not translated into lower food
prices or an increase in production. If you look at the figures for
meat, poultry, fish or produce production, you will see that any
increase has been minimal and in many cases it has actually gone into
reverse.
The former sugar supplier to the world now produces less than two
million tons of sugar a year. Fresh milk is a luxury, as are beef, fish
and shellfish.
Fruits like guava, chirimoya, sugar apple and orange are distant
memories to the Cuban palate. Behind a slight increase in certain
legumes and vegetables lies skillful manipulation. The government is
blowing smoke.
In no sector of the food industry does the increased growth match the
highpoint of 1989. While it was also an era of shortages, the production
of bread, milk, eggs and potatoes did meet demand.
But not now. There is a joke that, before the nightly news, people place
baskets under their televisions to collect the harvests of fruits,
vegetables and meat which only grow in the official media.
The average family in Cuba has only one hot meal a day. "For lunch I
heat up something from the night before," says Regla, a professor who
cooks meals at home for her husband and two children. "On Sundays I
often make a nice lunch with pork or chicken and at night we eat
something light. The regular Monday-to-Saturday menu consists of white
rice or congrí (rice cooked with black beans), eggs in some fashion, and
a cucumber, cabbage, avocado or tomato salad."
Except when there are visitors, everything is served on one plate to
avoid having too many dishes to wash. Rice makes up the largest portion.
Some people do not even sit at the table anymore, preferring to eat
while watching television.
Prices in hard currency stores are shocking. A kilogram of domestically
produced white cheese costs 3.75 CUC and 8.10 CUC for Gouda. Ham goes
for more than 8 CUC while a half-kilogram steak is about 10 CUC. A
packet of chicken thighs costs 2.40 CUC. A thousand-gram can of tuna is
8.90 CUC and a liter of cooking oil is 2.10 CUC.
Produce markets accept Cuban pesos but inflation has also impacted the
national currency. A pound of pork chops costs 45 pesos. A pound of
black beans goes for 12 pesos, 14 pesos for the colored variety.
Chickpeas are the most expensive at 18 to 20 pesos a pound. A pound of
tomatoes is 15 pesos. An avocado is 10. A pound of mango costs 5 to 6
pesos, while a pound of peanuts goes for 16 pesos.
"I go shopping at the produce market once a week for my household," says
Gerardo, a private sector worker. "I spend 1,200 pesos (55 dollars),
which buys enough to last four or five days. No matter what we do, we
are always blowing through money."
Poor people, who make up the majority, and those with low incomes who do
not have relatives on the other side of the pond, eat little and poorly.
"My main course is often croquettes made from 'poultry' (chicken,
according to the government), sausages they sell for 1.10 CUC a packet
or eggs, the national dish par excellence," says Carmen, a retiree.
Those with fatter wallets eat better. They shop with hard currency,
which on the black market buys them shellfish, fresh fish and beef. But
everyone — those with more money and those with less money — spends most
of his or her income on food. In Cuba you do not eat to live, you live
to eat.
Source: Cuba: Living to Eat / Ivan Garcia | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/cuba-living-to-eat-ivan-garcia/
Leaving the Footprints of Some First Steps
Leaving the Footprints of Some First Steps / Somos+, Niurvys Roca
Posted on July 31, 2015
Somos+, Niurvys Roca, 22 June 2015 — I inserted a flash drive in my old
and slow computer, and a young man's image appeared, nothing special
about it except for his courage in questioning the limitations that we
Cubans must endure. I admit that I had to contain an exclamation. Until
that moment, I did not think anyone capable of revealing our problems in
such a bold way, direct and honest. The next morning, people were
talking about it, in whispers, in the schools, on street corners, and
even at my workplace. Later, a silence took over and everything seemed
to return to normality — not because it is normal, but because it is the
same, that which involves despair, denial and sadness.
Many years after connecting that flash drive, a young man I barely knew
asked me, "Do you remember Eliécer Ávila, that guy from the University
of Information Science (UCI)? He has a proposal that you should read."
I thought that Eliécer had been "disappeared," and I confess that I was
very happy to find out that he was active, because this was about a hope
for changes for my country. The young man continued, "He's started a
movement called Somos+, but…you know…without Internet access it's almost
impossible to hear much from them. I've heard that there's a girl in
Spain who helps out. I'll try to get in touch with her."
Meanwhile, a group of friends and I would gather to discuss how we could
help Cuba in any way possible and, suddenly, that young man who was now
well-known to me, said to me, "We have contact with those who are
supporting the movement from abroad!" I knew than that we should take
part in our country's history, and that it was the perfect opportunity
to get involved.
Today we really are more, and so many more are joining that, when I try
to recall those early days when there were hardly ten of us in exile, it
is almost impossible not to share the excitement. I remember a comment
about how we should be called "Somos-" ["We Are Less"], which hurt me at
that time, but now I laugh about it because time puts everything in its
place. You have to be inside of this thing to know how delicious it is
to unite with other Cubans who are full of energy, abilities, proposals,
curiosity, and genuine desire to do for our country. Today I can only
feel pride in what is accomplished if only the individual desires it —
all that is obtained when love and dedication are given to something.
Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison
Source: Leaving the Footprints of Some First Steps / Somos+, Niurvys
Roca | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/leaving-the-footprints-of-some-first-steps-somos-niurvys-roca/
Posted on July 31, 2015
Somos+, Niurvys Roca, 22 June 2015 — I inserted a flash drive in my old
and slow computer, and a young man's image appeared, nothing special
about it except for his courage in questioning the limitations that we
Cubans must endure. I admit that I had to contain an exclamation. Until
that moment, I did not think anyone capable of revealing our problems in
such a bold way, direct and honest. The next morning, people were
talking about it, in whispers, in the schools, on street corners, and
even at my workplace. Later, a silence took over and everything seemed
to return to normality — not because it is normal, but because it is the
same, that which involves despair, denial and sadness.
Many years after connecting that flash drive, a young man I barely knew
asked me, "Do you remember Eliécer Ávila, that guy from the University
of Information Science (UCI)? He has a proposal that you should read."
I thought that Eliécer had been "disappeared," and I confess that I was
very happy to find out that he was active, because this was about a hope
for changes for my country. The young man continued, "He's started a
movement called Somos+, but…you know…without Internet access it's almost
impossible to hear much from them. I've heard that there's a girl in
Spain who helps out. I'll try to get in touch with her."
Meanwhile, a group of friends and I would gather to discuss how we could
help Cuba in any way possible and, suddenly, that young man who was now
well-known to me, said to me, "We have contact with those who are
supporting the movement from abroad!" I knew than that we should take
part in our country's history, and that it was the perfect opportunity
to get involved.
Today we really are more, and so many more are joining that, when I try
to recall those early days when there were hardly ten of us in exile, it
is almost impossible not to share the excitement. I remember a comment
about how we should be called "Somos-" ["We Are Less"], which hurt me at
that time, but now I laugh about it because time puts everything in its
place. You have to be inside of this thing to know how delicious it is
to unite with other Cubans who are full of energy, abilities, proposals,
curiosity, and genuine desire to do for our country. Today I can only
feel pride in what is accomplished if only the individual desires it —
all that is obtained when love and dedication are given to something.
Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison
Source: Leaving the Footprints of Some First Steps / Somos+, Niurvys
Roca | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/leaving-the-footprints-of-some-first-steps-somos-niurvys-roca/
Five questions with Dave Seleski about Stonegate Bank and Cuba
Five questions with Dave Seleski about Stonegate Bank and Cuba
By Donna Gehrke-White
Sun Sentinel
Tourism, construction benefit from Cuba trade, Stonegate chief says
Dave Seleski has long been a history buff. Now he's making history as a
banker helping to normalize commercial relations between the U.S. and Cuba.
His Stonegate Bank of Pompano Beach announced a milestone July 23 when
it signed the first U.S. correspondent banking deal with a Cuban bank in
half a century — meaning it can conduct transactions on behalf of Banco
Internacional de Comercio S.A.
Earlier, Stonegate had agreed to become the bank for Cuba's government
offices in the U.S.
The agreements will help normalize commercial relations between the U.S.
and Cuba, said Seleski, Stonegate's president and CEO.
In trips to Cuba during the past four years, he said, he has noticed
"some pretty big changes" on the island. People are more optimistic that
their lives will improve in a "very poor country," Seleski said.
South Florida companies stand to benefit if more trading is allowed
between the countries and the Cuban standard of living improves, he
suggested.
"It's all about creating a middle class who will buy more goods," he said.
Seleski recently answered five questions from the Sun Sentinel:
Q: How is Stonegate going to overcome the digital divide in resuming
U.S.-Cuba banking relations? Will you be working on improving technology
in Cuba?
A: There really is no digital divide in terms of moving money from the
U.S. to Cuba. The Cuban banks are very sophisticated and have the latest
technology. The biggest issue is simply monitoring what are permissible
activities given the fact that the embargo is still in place.
Q: You've talked about how the resumption of U.S.-Cuba banking will help
Cubans lift their standard of living and make life easier in a poor
nation. How will it help South Floridians?
A: I believe in three ways. First, Miami, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale all
have ports that are the closest to Cuba. Therefore, most shipments of
goods from the U.S. will most likely come from those ports.
Second, a recent Obama administration exemption from the trade embargo
is construction goods that are sold for private residential
construction. One of the largest costs to construction goods is
shipping. In theory, the closer the destination the cheaper the product.
I believe that this will be a huge opportunity for Florida-based
construction companies in the future.
Third, just like we benefit from the cruise industry now, I think
tourism will get an additional boost given our proximity to Cuba as
people stop in Miami or Fort Lauderdale for a day after a trip to Cuba.
Q: You've said you see the Cuban banking agreement as a long-term
investment for Stonegate. Why is this and how will the bank benefit
long-term?
A: Banking in general is a long-term game. One of Stonegate's key to
success has been investing in long-term projects with minimal return.
Over time those returns improve and your clients look to you as a stable
reliable partner that does not abandon a strategy for something that at
the time may appear more lucrative.
We have found that in a society that generally favors immediate
gratification that you can differentiate yourself in this manner. In my
sales meetings I always use the analogy of the tortoise and the hare. We
are definitely the tortoise.
Q. You've said the Cubans have been welcoming to Stonegate. Has the
Cuban government eased its red tape? Are Cuban leaders becoming amenable
to the idea of private businesses operating in Cuba?
A: I think the answer is yes. However it is important to realize that in
my opinion they will prioritize their time on businesses that are going
to help the Cuban people and economy first. There are some exciting
changes going on in Cuba. A good example of this is the Mariel Special
Economic Zone outside of Havana. I would strongly suggest anybody
interested in this topic visit their website at zedmariel.com.
Q: What advice would you give South Florida companies interested in
doing business in Cuba?
A: First and foremost, I would make sure it is a permissible activity.
Second, I would go with the attitude that this is a long-term
relationship that all parties must benefit from. You need to realize
that you are a pioneer and to some degree an ambassador of the U.S.
trying to mend over 50 years of a very dysfunctional relationship.
Finally, pick the right advisers. There are lots of people out there
professing to be "experts" who can get you in front of the right people,
etc. … Avoid these people and go with the advisers that have actually
been doing business with Cuba over the years.
dgehrke@tribpub.com or Twitter @donnagehrke
Source: Stonegate Bank: Cubans buying more helps South Florida
businesses - Sun Sentinel -
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/fl-stonegate-cubaqa-20150731-story.html
By Donna Gehrke-White
Sun Sentinel
Tourism, construction benefit from Cuba trade, Stonegate chief says
Dave Seleski has long been a history buff. Now he's making history as a
banker helping to normalize commercial relations between the U.S. and Cuba.
His Stonegate Bank of Pompano Beach announced a milestone July 23 when
it signed the first U.S. correspondent banking deal with a Cuban bank in
half a century — meaning it can conduct transactions on behalf of Banco
Internacional de Comercio S.A.
Earlier, Stonegate had agreed to become the bank for Cuba's government
offices in the U.S.
The agreements will help normalize commercial relations between the U.S.
and Cuba, said Seleski, Stonegate's president and CEO.
In trips to Cuba during the past four years, he said, he has noticed
"some pretty big changes" on the island. People are more optimistic that
their lives will improve in a "very poor country," Seleski said.
South Florida companies stand to benefit if more trading is allowed
between the countries and the Cuban standard of living improves, he
suggested.
"It's all about creating a middle class who will buy more goods," he said.
Seleski recently answered five questions from the Sun Sentinel:
Q: How is Stonegate going to overcome the digital divide in resuming
U.S.-Cuba banking relations? Will you be working on improving technology
in Cuba?
A: There really is no digital divide in terms of moving money from the
U.S. to Cuba. The Cuban banks are very sophisticated and have the latest
technology. The biggest issue is simply monitoring what are permissible
activities given the fact that the embargo is still in place.
Q: You've talked about how the resumption of U.S.-Cuba banking will help
Cubans lift their standard of living and make life easier in a poor
nation. How will it help South Floridians?
A: I believe in three ways. First, Miami, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale all
have ports that are the closest to Cuba. Therefore, most shipments of
goods from the U.S. will most likely come from those ports.
Second, a recent Obama administration exemption from the trade embargo
is construction goods that are sold for private residential
construction. One of the largest costs to construction goods is
shipping. In theory, the closer the destination the cheaper the product.
I believe that this will be a huge opportunity for Florida-based
construction companies in the future.
Third, just like we benefit from the cruise industry now, I think
tourism will get an additional boost given our proximity to Cuba as
people stop in Miami or Fort Lauderdale for a day after a trip to Cuba.
Q: You've said you see the Cuban banking agreement as a long-term
investment for Stonegate. Why is this and how will the bank benefit
long-term?
A: Banking in general is a long-term game. One of Stonegate's key to
success has been investing in long-term projects with minimal return.
Over time those returns improve and your clients look to you as a stable
reliable partner that does not abandon a strategy for something that at
the time may appear more lucrative.
We have found that in a society that generally favors immediate
gratification that you can differentiate yourself in this manner. In my
sales meetings I always use the analogy of the tortoise and the hare. We
are definitely the tortoise.
Q. You've said the Cubans have been welcoming to Stonegate. Has the
Cuban government eased its red tape? Are Cuban leaders becoming amenable
to the idea of private businesses operating in Cuba?
A: I think the answer is yes. However it is important to realize that in
my opinion they will prioritize their time on businesses that are going
to help the Cuban people and economy first. There are some exciting
changes going on in Cuba. A good example of this is the Mariel Special
Economic Zone outside of Havana. I would strongly suggest anybody
interested in this topic visit their website at zedmariel.com.
Q: What advice would you give South Florida companies interested in
doing business in Cuba?
A: First and foremost, I would make sure it is a permissible activity.
Second, I would go with the attitude that this is a long-term
relationship that all parties must benefit from. You need to realize
that you are a pioneer and to some degree an ambassador of the U.S.
trying to mend over 50 years of a very dysfunctional relationship.
Finally, pick the right advisers. There are lots of people out there
professing to be "experts" who can get you in front of the right people,
etc. … Avoid these people and go with the advisers that have actually
been doing business with Cuba over the years.
dgehrke@tribpub.com or Twitter @donnagehrke
Source: Stonegate Bank: Cubans buying more helps South Florida
businesses - Sun Sentinel -
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/fl-stonegate-cubaqa-20150731-story.html
Illinois firms race to establish foothold in Cuba
Illinois firms race to establish foothold in Cuba
By Kathy Bergen
Chicago Tribune
When Cuba's foreign minister raised his nation's single-star flag
outside its newly opened embassy in Washington last month, construction
equipment giant Caterpillar did the same outside its Peoria headquarters.
Caterpillar is one of a growing number of Illinois and Chicago-area
companies, civic organizations and cultural institutions rushing into a
nationwide race to establish a foothold in the tiny communist country
just 90 miles off the Florida shore — a potential trove of new profits
on an island that has been off-limits, for the most part, for more than
a half-century.
"Just about everybody focuses on the tens of thousands of 60-year-old
cars that are on the streets, but for Caterpillar, we focus on the
60-year-old roads they are being driven on. That's where we see our
opportunity," said Bill Lane, the company's director of global
government affairs.
Illinois' own Havana dreams of linking arms with tropical counterpart
Though a 54-year-old embargo on trade and travel remains in place,
President Barack Obama last December began normalizing relations with
Cuba by easing trade restrictions on several sectors, including travel,
telecommunications, Internet services, building equipment, banking and
airlines. Exceptions for agricultural and medical products have been in
place since 2000 and 1992, respectively.
In May, the U.S. removed Cuba's designation as a state sponsor of
terrorism. And on July 20, both countries formally reopened their
embassies in Havana and Washington.
Now, in cities across the country, the race is on to stake a claim on
Cuba's future.
In Illinois, farms and food companies, medical device outfits and
construction firms are among those embarking on scouting missions. But
companies elsewhere are just as eager.
From the tech-heavy Bay Area, Airbnb established operations on the
island April 2, just four months after Obama and Cuban President Raul
Castro announced in mid-December that they would restore diplomatic
relations — one of the first U.S. companies to dive in. Google
executives visited in June to advocate for open Internet access.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo flew in for a 26-hour trade mission in April,
the first sitting U.S. governor to visit since the December
announcement. And in Tampa, Fla., once a fundraising hub for Cuban
independence hero Jose Marti, officials are pushing for a Cuban consulate.
Chicago businesses and investors "better learn, and we better learn
fast, because others are looking," said local attorney Patrick Croke,
who assists companies in entering Latin America. "I'm sure New York and
Miami will be all over this."
Entering the Cuban market remains a daunting task, even for businesses
with a presidential green light to proceed. Payment and shipping
restrictions, for instance, put U.S. firms and farmers at a disadvantage
to foreign rivals — a situation that has caused Illinois growers to lose
most of their Cuba export business to Asia and Brazil over the past decade.
And "at the end of the day, it's an island with 11 million residents
with limited spending capacity," said Matthew Aho, a consultant in the
Cuba practice of law firm Akerman. "It's important to remember Cuba is a
communist country in which the government controls the vast majority of
the economy, so it's a different operating environment, to say the least."
Still, getting in first is often critical to winning business in an
emerging market, said Aho, who assisted Airbnb on its entry into Cuba.
"I think we'll see a lot of jockeying by U.S. businesses now."
Many companies "want to push the envelope to see how far this
administration is willing to go," said Janet Kim, head of the
international trade practice at law firm Baker & McKenzie.
"Once you open Cuba, it becomes yet another entry point for South
America — and South America is a huge market for the Midwest," said
Theresa Mintle, president of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.
At the moment, Cuba is a small and shrinking slice of business for
Illinois, just $3 million in exports last year, mostly chicken parts.
But observers see potential for significant growth and say the state has
some competitive advantages.
While Florida is just 90 miles from Cuba and home to 70 percent of
Cuban-Americans, it also has an acrimonious history with its Caribbean
neighbor.
Illinois has a small Cuban-American population but "has long been at the
forefront of engagement," Aho said. "Since 2001, when food and
agriculture products were authorized for export, Illinois farmers and
farm exporters have been actively pursuing contracts in Cuba."
Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan led a delegation of government,
business and academic leaders there in 1999, the first sitting governor
to visit since revolutionary leader Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.
The push for business ties is widening now. Behind some of the efforts
is Chicago commercial real estate broker Ruben Ruban Jr., whose father
fled Cuba in 1967, at age 19, after stealthily making his way onto the
U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, a place of refuge.
"He's got scars all over his back, still, from (climbing through) the
barbed wire," Ruban said.
Asked how his father feels about his son's efforts to restore commercial
and cultural ties with communist Cuba, Ruban said, "He's actually very,
very happy. ... Anything I can potentially do to help out family and the
Cuban population at large, that's only a good thing."
Along with business consultant Paul Johnson, who heads a statewide group
focused on building ties with Cuba, Ruban is working on several
initiatives. Plans in the works include bringing in a Cuban delegation
to discuss cross-border commerce at a Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce
forum this fall; organizing an agriculture-oriented trade mission,
potentially led by Lt. Gov. Evelyn Sanguinetti and U.S. Reps. Rodney
Davis and Cheri Bustos in October; and crafting a telecommunications-
and medical-focused trade mission in December.
"In order for us to increase trade between both countries, we have to
compete with existing relationships that Cuba has … such as with Brazil,
Argentina, Canada, Russia and China," Johnson said.
Independently, a number of local companies and industries are joining
the race.
Burr Ridge-based Grafton Medical Alliance, which sells implants used in
spinal surgeries, plans a trip to Cuba this summer to meet with hospital
administrators and surgeons. The market's potential "is an eye-opener
for any entrepreneur," said Jim Henry, president of the firm, which
started in a garage four years ago and expects $12 million in sales this
year.
Meanwhile, American tourism is surging since Obama eased travel
restrictions late last year, rising 36 percent, to 51,458 visitors, from
Jan. 1 to May 9, according to The Associated Press. Plans for cultural
exchanges are on the rise, with groups such as the Chicago Children's
Choir planning a trip next year.
"We believe music is that cultural bridge," said Josephine Lee, the
choir's president and artistic director. Touring "is life-altering for
our kids and for the people they visit."
As Cuba prepares for the influx of tourists, Illinois businesses see
related opportunities, particularly if trade restrictions are eased further.
Roy Donoso, whose companies in Chicago and throughout Latin America
consult on construction projects, will trek to the Cuban city of
Trinidad next month. Through a company he owns in Ecuador, he is
competing for a contract to provide environmental consulting on a
400-room hotel project in the Cuban city.
The contract would be a small one. "This is more of an investment in the
future," said Donoso, president of Sumac, which specializes in energy
efficiency work. "Obviously we want to be there before anyone else."
United Airlines is pursuing government approval to launch service to
Cuba from hubs in Houston and Newark. The airline declined to comment on
whether it has plans for additional routes.
Meanwhile, Chicago-based consultant Charlie Serrano, who advises firms
on entering Cuba and who operates tours to Cuba, hopes to launch direct
charter flights from Chicago to Havana later this year.
And the Illinois Corn Marketing Board just returned from a trade mission
to Cuba, where its delegation of food producers met with staff members
in government ministries, with the goal of fostering future business ties.
"When tourists come to Cuba they will want high-quality food, and that
is what we can provide them, through pork, beef and chicken," said Don
Duvall, a fourth-generation farmer who owns a 1,000-acre spread near the
Wabash River in southeastern Illinois. He is export chairman for the
corn marketing board.
The corn, soybeans and wheat raised in fields just north of Shawnee
National Forest are shipped out on barges that push through the Wabash
River to the Ohio and then the Mississippi, ending up in New Orleans.
As close as that is to Cuba, Duvall said, "We should be the lowest-cost
provider."
Because of an array of banking and financing restrictions, however, that
is not the case. Illinois farmers, like those throughout the Midwest,
have seen exports to Cuba plummet since 2009.
"Cuba can buy from Brazil and pay those transportation costs, and it's
cheaper than getting it from 92 miles away," Duvall said. "That doesn't
make sense."
Caterpillar, too, sees promise as tourism rises.
"It will require more power generation and much better infrastructure,"
said Lane, who was part of a Caterpillar team that visited Cuba in
April, analyzing opportunities for its construction equipment, gas
turbine engines and mining trucks. The company is pushing for an end to
the embargo.
"One thing you realize when you've been down there is that just because
the U.S. has not been there in 54 years, it doesn't mean your
competitors have not been down there," Lane said.
As promising as Cuba sounds, no one knows whether the recent thaw in
U.S.-Cuban relations will deepen.
The Cuban "government remains wary of rapid shifts toward capitalism and
is prone to backtracking on measures to liberalize the economy," Moody's
Investors Service wrote in a June report.
And the trade ban appears unlikely to be lifted by Congress anytime
soon. Illinois firms, even those in sectors opened up by Obama's policy
changes, say it will be difficult to capture a share of the market
unless there is further loosening of trade restrictions, such as a
prohibition on extending credit to Cuban customers.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who supports an end to the embargo, thinks
that goal remains within reach. He cites recent polls showing younger
generations of Cuban-Americans are more open to engagement than their
parents or grandparents.
"If candidates for president see that," he said, "it will inspire them
to support open trade.'
On Cuban shores, Duvall saw evidence of shifting attitudes as well.
"People were moved by our visit," he said. "They were happy we were
there, particularly the younger people in the ministries. They
recognized that perhaps their system doesn't work and it's time to move on."
kbergen@tribpub.com
Twitter @kathy_bergen
Source: Illinois firms race to establish foothold in Cuba - Chicago
Tribune -
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/globalcity/ct-race-to-cuba-met-20150731-story.html#page=1
By Kathy Bergen
Chicago Tribune
When Cuba's foreign minister raised his nation's single-star flag
outside its newly opened embassy in Washington last month, construction
equipment giant Caterpillar did the same outside its Peoria headquarters.
Caterpillar is one of a growing number of Illinois and Chicago-area
companies, civic organizations and cultural institutions rushing into a
nationwide race to establish a foothold in the tiny communist country
just 90 miles off the Florida shore — a potential trove of new profits
on an island that has been off-limits, for the most part, for more than
a half-century.
"Just about everybody focuses on the tens of thousands of 60-year-old
cars that are on the streets, but for Caterpillar, we focus on the
60-year-old roads they are being driven on. That's where we see our
opportunity," said Bill Lane, the company's director of global
government affairs.
Illinois' own Havana dreams of linking arms with tropical counterpart
Though a 54-year-old embargo on trade and travel remains in place,
President Barack Obama last December began normalizing relations with
Cuba by easing trade restrictions on several sectors, including travel,
telecommunications, Internet services, building equipment, banking and
airlines. Exceptions for agricultural and medical products have been in
place since 2000 and 1992, respectively.
In May, the U.S. removed Cuba's designation as a state sponsor of
terrorism. And on July 20, both countries formally reopened their
embassies in Havana and Washington.
Now, in cities across the country, the race is on to stake a claim on
Cuba's future.
In Illinois, farms and food companies, medical device outfits and
construction firms are among those embarking on scouting missions. But
companies elsewhere are just as eager.
From the tech-heavy Bay Area, Airbnb established operations on the
island April 2, just four months after Obama and Cuban President Raul
Castro announced in mid-December that they would restore diplomatic
relations — one of the first U.S. companies to dive in. Google
executives visited in June to advocate for open Internet access.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo flew in for a 26-hour trade mission in April,
the first sitting U.S. governor to visit since the December
announcement. And in Tampa, Fla., once a fundraising hub for Cuban
independence hero Jose Marti, officials are pushing for a Cuban consulate.
Chicago businesses and investors "better learn, and we better learn
fast, because others are looking," said local attorney Patrick Croke,
who assists companies in entering Latin America. "I'm sure New York and
Miami will be all over this."
Entering the Cuban market remains a daunting task, even for businesses
with a presidential green light to proceed. Payment and shipping
restrictions, for instance, put U.S. firms and farmers at a disadvantage
to foreign rivals — a situation that has caused Illinois growers to lose
most of their Cuba export business to Asia and Brazil over the past decade.
And "at the end of the day, it's an island with 11 million residents
with limited spending capacity," said Matthew Aho, a consultant in the
Cuba practice of law firm Akerman. "It's important to remember Cuba is a
communist country in which the government controls the vast majority of
the economy, so it's a different operating environment, to say the least."
Still, getting in first is often critical to winning business in an
emerging market, said Aho, who assisted Airbnb on its entry into Cuba.
"I think we'll see a lot of jockeying by U.S. businesses now."
Many companies "want to push the envelope to see how far this
administration is willing to go," said Janet Kim, head of the
international trade practice at law firm Baker & McKenzie.
"Once you open Cuba, it becomes yet another entry point for South
America — and South America is a huge market for the Midwest," said
Theresa Mintle, president of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.
At the moment, Cuba is a small and shrinking slice of business for
Illinois, just $3 million in exports last year, mostly chicken parts.
But observers see potential for significant growth and say the state has
some competitive advantages.
While Florida is just 90 miles from Cuba and home to 70 percent of
Cuban-Americans, it also has an acrimonious history with its Caribbean
neighbor.
Illinois has a small Cuban-American population but "has long been at the
forefront of engagement," Aho said. "Since 2001, when food and
agriculture products were authorized for export, Illinois farmers and
farm exporters have been actively pursuing contracts in Cuba."
Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan led a delegation of government,
business and academic leaders there in 1999, the first sitting governor
to visit since revolutionary leader Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.
The push for business ties is widening now. Behind some of the efforts
is Chicago commercial real estate broker Ruben Ruban Jr., whose father
fled Cuba in 1967, at age 19, after stealthily making his way onto the
U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, a place of refuge.
"He's got scars all over his back, still, from (climbing through) the
barbed wire," Ruban said.
Asked how his father feels about his son's efforts to restore commercial
and cultural ties with communist Cuba, Ruban said, "He's actually very,
very happy. ... Anything I can potentially do to help out family and the
Cuban population at large, that's only a good thing."
Along with business consultant Paul Johnson, who heads a statewide group
focused on building ties with Cuba, Ruban is working on several
initiatives. Plans in the works include bringing in a Cuban delegation
to discuss cross-border commerce at a Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce
forum this fall; organizing an agriculture-oriented trade mission,
potentially led by Lt. Gov. Evelyn Sanguinetti and U.S. Reps. Rodney
Davis and Cheri Bustos in October; and crafting a telecommunications-
and medical-focused trade mission in December.
"In order for us to increase trade between both countries, we have to
compete with existing relationships that Cuba has … such as with Brazil,
Argentina, Canada, Russia and China," Johnson said.
Independently, a number of local companies and industries are joining
the race.
Burr Ridge-based Grafton Medical Alliance, which sells implants used in
spinal surgeries, plans a trip to Cuba this summer to meet with hospital
administrators and surgeons. The market's potential "is an eye-opener
for any entrepreneur," said Jim Henry, president of the firm, which
started in a garage four years ago and expects $12 million in sales this
year.
Meanwhile, American tourism is surging since Obama eased travel
restrictions late last year, rising 36 percent, to 51,458 visitors, from
Jan. 1 to May 9, according to The Associated Press. Plans for cultural
exchanges are on the rise, with groups such as the Chicago Children's
Choir planning a trip next year.
"We believe music is that cultural bridge," said Josephine Lee, the
choir's president and artistic director. Touring "is life-altering for
our kids and for the people they visit."
As Cuba prepares for the influx of tourists, Illinois businesses see
related opportunities, particularly if trade restrictions are eased further.
Roy Donoso, whose companies in Chicago and throughout Latin America
consult on construction projects, will trek to the Cuban city of
Trinidad next month. Through a company he owns in Ecuador, he is
competing for a contract to provide environmental consulting on a
400-room hotel project in the Cuban city.
The contract would be a small one. "This is more of an investment in the
future," said Donoso, president of Sumac, which specializes in energy
efficiency work. "Obviously we want to be there before anyone else."
United Airlines is pursuing government approval to launch service to
Cuba from hubs in Houston and Newark. The airline declined to comment on
whether it has plans for additional routes.
Meanwhile, Chicago-based consultant Charlie Serrano, who advises firms
on entering Cuba and who operates tours to Cuba, hopes to launch direct
charter flights from Chicago to Havana later this year.
And the Illinois Corn Marketing Board just returned from a trade mission
to Cuba, where its delegation of food producers met with staff members
in government ministries, with the goal of fostering future business ties.
"When tourists come to Cuba they will want high-quality food, and that
is what we can provide them, through pork, beef and chicken," said Don
Duvall, a fourth-generation farmer who owns a 1,000-acre spread near the
Wabash River in southeastern Illinois. He is export chairman for the
corn marketing board.
The corn, soybeans and wheat raised in fields just north of Shawnee
National Forest are shipped out on barges that push through the Wabash
River to the Ohio and then the Mississippi, ending up in New Orleans.
As close as that is to Cuba, Duvall said, "We should be the lowest-cost
provider."
Because of an array of banking and financing restrictions, however, that
is not the case. Illinois farmers, like those throughout the Midwest,
have seen exports to Cuba plummet since 2009.
"Cuba can buy from Brazil and pay those transportation costs, and it's
cheaper than getting it from 92 miles away," Duvall said. "That doesn't
make sense."
Caterpillar, too, sees promise as tourism rises.
"It will require more power generation and much better infrastructure,"
said Lane, who was part of a Caterpillar team that visited Cuba in
April, analyzing opportunities for its construction equipment, gas
turbine engines and mining trucks. The company is pushing for an end to
the embargo.
"One thing you realize when you've been down there is that just because
the U.S. has not been there in 54 years, it doesn't mean your
competitors have not been down there," Lane said.
As promising as Cuba sounds, no one knows whether the recent thaw in
U.S.-Cuban relations will deepen.
The Cuban "government remains wary of rapid shifts toward capitalism and
is prone to backtracking on measures to liberalize the economy," Moody's
Investors Service wrote in a June report.
And the trade ban appears unlikely to be lifted by Congress anytime
soon. Illinois firms, even those in sectors opened up by Obama's policy
changes, say it will be difficult to capture a share of the market
unless there is further loosening of trade restrictions, such as a
prohibition on extending credit to Cuban customers.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who supports an end to the embargo, thinks
that goal remains within reach. He cites recent polls showing younger
generations of Cuban-Americans are more open to engagement than their
parents or grandparents.
"If candidates for president see that," he said, "it will inspire them
to support open trade.'
On Cuban shores, Duvall saw evidence of shifting attitudes as well.
"People were moved by our visit," he said. "They were happy we were
there, particularly the younger people in the ministries. They
recognized that perhaps their system doesn't work and it's time to move on."
kbergen@tribpub.com
Twitter @kathy_bergen
Source: Illinois firms race to establish foothold in Cuba - Chicago
Tribune -
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/globalcity/ct-race-to-cuba-met-20150731-story.html#page=1
U.S. car collectors eager about Cuba trade deal, though most classics stripped of value
U.S. car collectors eager about Cuba trade deal, though most classics
stripped of value
By Francisco Alvarado Published July 31, 2015 Fox News Latino
MIAMI – Jose Felipe's left foot gently taps the accelerator of his 1956
Ford Fairline, its V8 engine growling like a Florida Panther lurking
through a swampy thicket. Sporting a showroom pristine white-and-salmon
color paint job, the four-door sedan slowly backs out of the carport
behind the Cuban American handyman's townhouse in Hialeah, Fla.
The Fairline was fully restored when he purchased it for $11,000 in 2008
from a seller in New York City he found online, Felipe relates. "I had
the exact same car in Cuba," Felipe says. "I sold it for $10,000 Cuban
pesos 20 years ago because I was leaving for Miami and not coming back."
The Ford Felipe left behind is among tens of thousands of American
vintage automobiles that have trekked Cuba's roads since before Fidel
Castro came into power in 1959. Yet, Felipe – who also owns a 1956
Mercury Montclair that cost him $25,000 to buy and restore – dismisses
the idea that one day he can go back home to reclaim his original
Fairline even as the U.S. and Cuba governments thaw more than five
decades of icy relations to reestablish diplomatic ties.
"It hurt when I sold my first Fairline," Felipe says. "But as a
collector, I wouldn't go to Cuba to find a car. Que va!"
Despite Cuba's bountiful inventory of classic rides, auto collectors
doubt the 1950s era Buicks, Chevys, DeSotos, Fords, Oldmobiles, and
Plymouths that remain on the island are worth the hassle of restoration
and dealing with the country's communist government.
Ted Vernon, owner of South Beach Classics, a vintage car dealership
based in Miami, said there are thousands of clunkers, many stripped of
original parts, for every hidden gem in Cuba.
"Most of the cars have been bastardized," Vernon says. "The motors have
been changed. The electrical systems have been changed. You pop the hood
and you could find parts from a Toyota in there."
As a result of the 56-year-old U.S. trade embargo with Cuba, vintage
cars are the only American-made mode of transportation on the island.
Anything on wheels post 1959 originates from the old Soviet Union and
former communist bloc satellite countries in Eastern Europe. American
cars in Cuba have gone through more than half-a-century of wear-and-tear
with owners unable to replace original parts as a result of the U.S.
government forbidding trade with Cuba.
Cuba's new car market is also tightly regulated and a brand new car can
cost more than $200,000. For many years, vehicles prior to the
revolution could be bought and sold freely, leaving many on the road.
Mechanics and car enthusiasts in Cuba were forced to come up with
inventive solutions to keep their vintage cars running, says Roland
Perez, president of Yesteryears Classic Car Club in Miami. For instance,
the original engines on many American cars in Cuba have been replaced
with diesel motors because of the cheaper fuel costs.
A mustachioed 56-year-old painting contractor who owns a restored 1957
Chevrolet Bel Air, Perez says Cubans have also made new windshields by
recycling old shattered ones and brake pads using asbestos-based
materials. "You have to hand it to them," Perez said. "Under 56 years of
communist rule, they've had to use real ingenuity to modify the cars."
The cleverness of Cuban mechanics and car specialists is the subject of
the first U.S. reality show to be filmed in the country. Producers of
Discovery's "Cuban Chrome" were granted unprecedented access to film
members of A Lo Cubano Car Club fixing up their antique autos. In one
episode, car club members resort to using a boat motor for a 1934 Model
A hot rod.
Nevertheless, the modified cars are a turn off for any true collector,
Perez explains.
"There would be interest in a car that has a solid body and doesn't show
any signs of rust," he said. "But those are very rare."
Perez also doesn't believe the Cuban government will make it easier for
its citizens to acquire true replacement parts for their American cars
despite the normalizing of relations with the U.S. And he expects the
Cuban government, which has banned the export of cars since 2010, to
make it even more difficult for collectors to take cars out of the country.
"The problem is the Cuban regime wants everything for themselves," Perez
says. "You have to pay the price the government sets, which will be a
ludicrous figure. I've tried to broker deals to get cars out through
Mexico or South American countries, but was unable to do so."
Still, some collectors see a future market for the classic cars in Cuba.
"It will be a long time before everything smooths out," says Bryan
Kinsley, vice-president of Yesteryears Classic Car Club. "But it will be
a lucrative business for the person who has contacts here and in Cuba."
Francisco Alvarado is a freelance journalist in South Florida.
Source: U.S. car collectors eager about Cuba trade deal, though most
classics stripped of value | Fox News Latino -
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/lifestyle/2015/07/31/us-car-collectors-eager-about-cuba-trade-deal-despite-gems-likely-scarce/
stripped of value
By Francisco Alvarado Published July 31, 2015 Fox News Latino
MIAMI – Jose Felipe's left foot gently taps the accelerator of his 1956
Ford Fairline, its V8 engine growling like a Florida Panther lurking
through a swampy thicket. Sporting a showroom pristine white-and-salmon
color paint job, the four-door sedan slowly backs out of the carport
behind the Cuban American handyman's townhouse in Hialeah, Fla.
The Fairline was fully restored when he purchased it for $11,000 in 2008
from a seller in New York City he found online, Felipe relates. "I had
the exact same car in Cuba," Felipe says. "I sold it for $10,000 Cuban
pesos 20 years ago because I was leaving for Miami and not coming back."
The Ford Felipe left behind is among tens of thousands of American
vintage automobiles that have trekked Cuba's roads since before Fidel
Castro came into power in 1959. Yet, Felipe – who also owns a 1956
Mercury Montclair that cost him $25,000 to buy and restore – dismisses
the idea that one day he can go back home to reclaim his original
Fairline even as the U.S. and Cuba governments thaw more than five
decades of icy relations to reestablish diplomatic ties.
"It hurt when I sold my first Fairline," Felipe says. "But as a
collector, I wouldn't go to Cuba to find a car. Que va!"
Despite Cuba's bountiful inventory of classic rides, auto collectors
doubt the 1950s era Buicks, Chevys, DeSotos, Fords, Oldmobiles, and
Plymouths that remain on the island are worth the hassle of restoration
and dealing with the country's communist government.
Ted Vernon, owner of South Beach Classics, a vintage car dealership
based in Miami, said there are thousands of clunkers, many stripped of
original parts, for every hidden gem in Cuba.
"Most of the cars have been bastardized," Vernon says. "The motors have
been changed. The electrical systems have been changed. You pop the hood
and you could find parts from a Toyota in there."
As a result of the 56-year-old U.S. trade embargo with Cuba, vintage
cars are the only American-made mode of transportation on the island.
Anything on wheels post 1959 originates from the old Soviet Union and
former communist bloc satellite countries in Eastern Europe. American
cars in Cuba have gone through more than half-a-century of wear-and-tear
with owners unable to replace original parts as a result of the U.S.
government forbidding trade with Cuba.
Cuba's new car market is also tightly regulated and a brand new car can
cost more than $200,000. For many years, vehicles prior to the
revolution could be bought and sold freely, leaving many on the road.
Mechanics and car enthusiasts in Cuba were forced to come up with
inventive solutions to keep their vintage cars running, says Roland
Perez, president of Yesteryears Classic Car Club in Miami. For instance,
the original engines on many American cars in Cuba have been replaced
with diesel motors because of the cheaper fuel costs.
A mustachioed 56-year-old painting contractor who owns a restored 1957
Chevrolet Bel Air, Perez says Cubans have also made new windshields by
recycling old shattered ones and brake pads using asbestos-based
materials. "You have to hand it to them," Perez said. "Under 56 years of
communist rule, they've had to use real ingenuity to modify the cars."
The cleverness of Cuban mechanics and car specialists is the subject of
the first U.S. reality show to be filmed in the country. Producers of
Discovery's "Cuban Chrome" were granted unprecedented access to film
members of A Lo Cubano Car Club fixing up their antique autos. In one
episode, car club members resort to using a boat motor for a 1934 Model
A hot rod.
Nevertheless, the modified cars are a turn off for any true collector,
Perez explains.
"There would be interest in a car that has a solid body and doesn't show
any signs of rust," he said. "But those are very rare."
Perez also doesn't believe the Cuban government will make it easier for
its citizens to acquire true replacement parts for their American cars
despite the normalizing of relations with the U.S. And he expects the
Cuban government, which has banned the export of cars since 2010, to
make it even more difficult for collectors to take cars out of the country.
"The problem is the Cuban regime wants everything for themselves," Perez
says. "You have to pay the price the government sets, which will be a
ludicrous figure. I've tried to broker deals to get cars out through
Mexico or South American countries, but was unable to do so."
Still, some collectors see a future market for the classic cars in Cuba.
"It will be a long time before everything smooths out," says Bryan
Kinsley, vice-president of Yesteryears Classic Car Club. "But it will be
a lucrative business for the person who has contacts here and in Cuba."
Francisco Alvarado is a freelance journalist in South Florida.
Source: U.S. car collectors eager about Cuba trade deal, though most
classics stripped of value | Fox News Latino -
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/lifestyle/2015/07/31/us-car-collectors-eager-about-cuba-trade-deal-despite-gems-likely-scarce/
Politicians still naive, or manipulative, on Cuba
Politicians still naive, or manipulative, on Cuba
BY FABIOLA SANTIAGO
fsantiago@MiamiHerald.com
"I wish every Cuban back in Cuba could spend a day walking around Miami
and see what you have built here, how you have turned this city into a
dynamic global city. … It would not take them long to start demanding
similar opportunities and achieving similar success back in Cuba." —
Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, on Friday in Miami-Dade.
I know naïveté when I hear it — and although Hillary Clinton's campaign
speech Friday in Miami eloquently supported engagement and argued for
the United States to lift the 54-year-old embargo on Cuba, it also was a
window into how easily Americans misfire on Cuban issues.
For decades, Cubans on the island have come in droves, seen Miami, liked
it — and stayed.
Their aspiration when they see our glitzy skyline, hear homey Spanish
chatter on the streets, feel the vibe of their culture in our
Americanized hands, is not to return to Cuba carrying entrepreneurship
and civic lessons with fight in their hearts.
It's to become part of the mosaic that makes this the most unique city
in America.
A recent American poll taken on the island would back me up on that:
Most Cubans said that if they had a choice, they'd rather live in the
United States more than any place else in the world.
Can we keep the conversation on U.S.-Cuba policy real, please?
Ignorance gives me the shivers, makes me remember horrible things like
the taking of a 6-year-old child at gun-point from a home in Little
Havana, as if there had been no other way to return a boy to his father
in Cuba.
Not that I want to look backward to the Bill Clinton years of Cuba
policy, but there's much to be learned from that era.
There is much to like in Hillary Clinton's speech. She didn't give the
Castros an inch, condemning human-rights violations. And her theory on
the merits of lifting the embargo is as good as any and a testament to
her on-the-job experience as secretary of state.
It is, however, missing the Cuban reaction factor.
So far, the most assured response from Cuba since President Barack
Obama's historic policy shift in December has been more Cubans leaving
the island — not exactly the vote of confidence Americans were expecting.
Not a week goes by that a raft or a boat doesn't wash ashore somewhere
in South Florida or is interdicted by the Coast Guard at sea. Cubans
also are crossing the Mexican border in record numbers. Large groups
recently have been caught and arrested in Central America trying to make
the seven-country cross from Ecuador to Texas. Half the Cuban hockey
team defected in Canada last week. Talk about historic: that would be
the largest group of athletes to ever do so.
I don't hear Cuban leader Raúl Castro complaining; he just looks the
other way as more of the disaffected choose to leave rather than see
what rapprochement might mean to them.
It should all sound familiar to Clinton, who was in the White House in
1994-95: 35,000 Cubans at sea; Guantánamo tent-cities; wet-foot,
dry-foot policy; Elián.
None of that was addressed, but it should have been. That history is the
backdrop to the new times.
Lucky for her candidacy, the potholes on American policy toward Cuba are
bipartisan.
Democrat or Republican, anti or pro embargo, not one politician manages
to hit a balanced note that rings true in Cuban Miami, a city where
people experience the immediate repercussions of whatever is afoot in Cuba.
Presidential candidate Jeb Bush, reacting to Clinton's embargo speech on
Friday, only added a terrible footnote, worse than anything Clinton said
in her speech.
"It's insulting to many Miami residents for Hillary to come here to
endorse a retreat in Cuba's struggle for democracy," Bush said in a
statement. "This city has become a home and a refuge to thousands and
thousands of Castro's victims."
The struggle for democracy is at the heart of the rapprochement policy
that a growing number of Cuban Americans, including Republicans, do
support. So that statement is a pants-on-fire lie. But what's even more
unacceptable to freedom-loving Cuban Americans is Bush's implication
that Miamians can't be open to hearing a different point of view.
Clinton may have selective memory. But Bush pulls the old, ugly
emotional chain of all the former Bush eras. No results, only rhetoric
to keep the wound of loss open — and the Republican votes coming.
We might not be able to change Cuba, but Miami has changed.
The Cuban palm trees were transplanted long ago, and they've flourished
here in excess, lining more acreage than they ever did in Cuba's famed
Palmar de Junco. But Miami, misunderstood and miscast as it is, is still
a part of the United States — and the principles of free speech apply
here, too.
Demagogues need not exempt us.
Source: Fabiola Santiago: Politicians still naive, or manipulative, on
Cuba | Miami Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/fabiola-santiago/article29708983.html
BY FABIOLA SANTIAGO
fsantiago@MiamiHerald.com
"I wish every Cuban back in Cuba could spend a day walking around Miami
and see what you have built here, how you have turned this city into a
dynamic global city. … It would not take them long to start demanding
similar opportunities and achieving similar success back in Cuba." —
Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, on Friday in Miami-Dade.
I know naïveté when I hear it — and although Hillary Clinton's campaign
speech Friday in Miami eloquently supported engagement and argued for
the United States to lift the 54-year-old embargo on Cuba, it also was a
window into how easily Americans misfire on Cuban issues.
For decades, Cubans on the island have come in droves, seen Miami, liked
it — and stayed.
Their aspiration when they see our glitzy skyline, hear homey Spanish
chatter on the streets, feel the vibe of their culture in our
Americanized hands, is not to return to Cuba carrying entrepreneurship
and civic lessons with fight in their hearts.
It's to become part of the mosaic that makes this the most unique city
in America.
A recent American poll taken on the island would back me up on that:
Most Cubans said that if they had a choice, they'd rather live in the
United States more than any place else in the world.
Can we keep the conversation on U.S.-Cuba policy real, please?
Ignorance gives me the shivers, makes me remember horrible things like
the taking of a 6-year-old child at gun-point from a home in Little
Havana, as if there had been no other way to return a boy to his father
in Cuba.
Not that I want to look backward to the Bill Clinton years of Cuba
policy, but there's much to be learned from that era.
There is much to like in Hillary Clinton's speech. She didn't give the
Castros an inch, condemning human-rights violations. And her theory on
the merits of lifting the embargo is as good as any and a testament to
her on-the-job experience as secretary of state.
It is, however, missing the Cuban reaction factor.
So far, the most assured response from Cuba since President Barack
Obama's historic policy shift in December has been more Cubans leaving
the island — not exactly the vote of confidence Americans were expecting.
Not a week goes by that a raft or a boat doesn't wash ashore somewhere
in South Florida or is interdicted by the Coast Guard at sea. Cubans
also are crossing the Mexican border in record numbers. Large groups
recently have been caught and arrested in Central America trying to make
the seven-country cross from Ecuador to Texas. Half the Cuban hockey
team defected in Canada last week. Talk about historic: that would be
the largest group of athletes to ever do so.
I don't hear Cuban leader Raúl Castro complaining; he just looks the
other way as more of the disaffected choose to leave rather than see
what rapprochement might mean to them.
It should all sound familiar to Clinton, who was in the White House in
1994-95: 35,000 Cubans at sea; Guantánamo tent-cities; wet-foot,
dry-foot policy; Elián.
None of that was addressed, but it should have been. That history is the
backdrop to the new times.
Lucky for her candidacy, the potholes on American policy toward Cuba are
bipartisan.
Democrat or Republican, anti or pro embargo, not one politician manages
to hit a balanced note that rings true in Cuban Miami, a city where
people experience the immediate repercussions of whatever is afoot in Cuba.
Presidential candidate Jeb Bush, reacting to Clinton's embargo speech on
Friday, only added a terrible footnote, worse than anything Clinton said
in her speech.
"It's insulting to many Miami residents for Hillary to come here to
endorse a retreat in Cuba's struggle for democracy," Bush said in a
statement. "This city has become a home and a refuge to thousands and
thousands of Castro's victims."
The struggle for democracy is at the heart of the rapprochement policy
that a growing number of Cuban Americans, including Republicans, do
support. So that statement is a pants-on-fire lie. But what's even more
unacceptable to freedom-loving Cuban Americans is Bush's implication
that Miamians can't be open to hearing a different point of view.
Clinton may have selective memory. But Bush pulls the old, ugly
emotional chain of all the former Bush eras. No results, only rhetoric
to keep the wound of loss open — and the Republican votes coming.
We might not be able to change Cuba, but Miami has changed.
The Cuban palm trees were transplanted long ago, and they've flourished
here in excess, lining more acreage than they ever did in Cuba's famed
Palmar de Junco. But Miami, misunderstood and miscast as it is, is still
a part of the United States — and the principles of free speech apply
here, too.
Demagogues need not exempt us.
Source: Fabiola Santiago: Politicians still naive, or manipulative, on
Cuba | Miami Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/fabiola-santiago/article29708983.html
Clinton calls for lifting Cuba embargo, says GOP critics have 'it backwards'
Clinton calls for lifting Cuba embargo, says GOP critics have 'it backwards'
Published July 31, 2015 Associated Press
Drawing a sharp distinction with her main Republican rivals in Florida,
Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday called on the GOP-run Congress to end
the trade embargo the U.S. has imposed on Cuba since 1962.
The Democratic presidential favorite said an open economic relationship
would do more to bring "dignity and democracy" to the island nation than
continuing the hardline isolationism that lasted through five decades of
Republican and Democratic administrations, including her husband's two
terms.
President Barack Obama has normalized diplomatic relations with Cuba and
has called for Congress to lift the economic embargo, as well.
Clinton acknowledged that she previously supported sanctions in Cuba,
but she told an auditorium of students, faculty and others at Florida
International University that she changed her views during four years as
Obama's secretary of state. During that time, there also has been a
softening of public opinion among the million-plus Cuban-Americans who
hold considerable sway in Florida voting.
Clinton accused Republican presidential candidates -- without calling
them by name -- of approaching Cuba and Latin America "through a Cold
War prism."
"They have it backwards: Engagement is not a gift to the Castros; it's
a threat to the Castros," Clinton said. "An American embassy in Havana
isn't a concession; it's a beacon. Lifting the embargo doesn't set back
freedom; it advances freedom."
She framed their stance on the embargo as part of broader foreign
affairs errors.
She didn't name any Republican presidential contenders, including
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, both vocal
critics of Obama's December decision to establish diplomatic relations
with Cuba.
But she said, "We cannot afford to let out-of-touch, out-of- date,
partisan ideas and candidates rip away all the progress we've made."
Bush, who earlier shared a stage with Clinton at a National Urban League
conference in nearby Fort Lauderdale, embraced their disagreement,
saying it was "insulting to many residents of Miami for Hillary Clinton
to come here to endorse a retreat in the struggle for democracy in Cuba."
Rubio had pre-emptively criticized Clinton, issuing a statement before
her speech. "President Obama and Secretary Clinton must learn that
appeasement only emboldens dictators and repressive governments and
weakens America's global standing in the 21st century," he said.
U.S.-Cuba relations have long been a flashpoint in Florida politics. The
generations of Cuban-Americans who were born in Cuba and fled shortly
after the Castro-led revolution in the late 1950s generally supported a
hard line, including the embargo that keeps American businesses from
trading with Cuba and blocks Americans from traveling in the country and
spending money there as tourists.
For decades, south Florida politicians and presidential candidates vying
for the state's electoral votes reflected those views, regardless of
party. Clinton's husband was among them, even as he quietly attempted to
engage Fidel Castro in the 1990s.
Now, says Florida pollster Fernand Amandi, an expert on Cuban-American
public opinion, that once solid voting bloc is "a community in
transition," giving Clinton an opening.
U.S.-born Cuban-Americans, Amandi said, are consistently more supportive
of normalized relations than their Cuban-born parents and also are less
likely to consider themselves one-issue voters. "The younger generations
are more like any other immigrants -- they care about pocketbook issues,
jobs, their kids' educations," he said.
In addition, Cuba-born immigrants in the past few decades "lived under
the sanctions and concluded that it just emboldened the Castro regime,"
he said. "So think after 55 years of failure, it's time for something else."
Beyond the Cuban-American community, a majority of adults in the U.S.
support normalizing relations with Cuba. A Pew Research Center survey
conducted July 14-20 found that nearly 73 percent of Americans approve
of establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba, while 72 percent support
ending the trade embargo, both double-digit percentage increases from
January, immediately after Obama's decision.
Pew found the same trends though lower numbers among Republicans, with
56 percent of such voters backing a diplomatic bond and 59 percent
supporting an economic relationship.
Source: Clinton calls for lifting Cuba embargo, says GOP critics have
'it backwards' | Fox News -
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/07/31/in-miami-clinton-set-to-call-for-lifting-cuba-embargo/
Published July 31, 2015 Associated Press
Drawing a sharp distinction with her main Republican rivals in Florida,
Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday called on the GOP-run Congress to end
the trade embargo the U.S. has imposed on Cuba since 1962.
The Democratic presidential favorite said an open economic relationship
would do more to bring "dignity and democracy" to the island nation than
continuing the hardline isolationism that lasted through five decades of
Republican and Democratic administrations, including her husband's two
terms.
President Barack Obama has normalized diplomatic relations with Cuba and
has called for Congress to lift the economic embargo, as well.
Clinton acknowledged that she previously supported sanctions in Cuba,
but she told an auditorium of students, faculty and others at Florida
International University that she changed her views during four years as
Obama's secretary of state. During that time, there also has been a
softening of public opinion among the million-plus Cuban-Americans who
hold considerable sway in Florida voting.
Clinton accused Republican presidential candidates -- without calling
them by name -- of approaching Cuba and Latin America "through a Cold
War prism."
"They have it backwards: Engagement is not a gift to the Castros; it's
a threat to the Castros," Clinton said. "An American embassy in Havana
isn't a concession; it's a beacon. Lifting the embargo doesn't set back
freedom; it advances freedom."
She framed their stance on the embargo as part of broader foreign
affairs errors.
She didn't name any Republican presidential contenders, including
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, both vocal
critics of Obama's December decision to establish diplomatic relations
with Cuba.
But she said, "We cannot afford to let out-of-touch, out-of- date,
partisan ideas and candidates rip away all the progress we've made."
Bush, who earlier shared a stage with Clinton at a National Urban League
conference in nearby Fort Lauderdale, embraced their disagreement,
saying it was "insulting to many residents of Miami for Hillary Clinton
to come here to endorse a retreat in the struggle for democracy in Cuba."
Rubio had pre-emptively criticized Clinton, issuing a statement before
her speech. "President Obama and Secretary Clinton must learn that
appeasement only emboldens dictators and repressive governments and
weakens America's global standing in the 21st century," he said.
U.S.-Cuba relations have long been a flashpoint in Florida politics. The
generations of Cuban-Americans who were born in Cuba and fled shortly
after the Castro-led revolution in the late 1950s generally supported a
hard line, including the embargo that keeps American businesses from
trading with Cuba and blocks Americans from traveling in the country and
spending money there as tourists.
For decades, south Florida politicians and presidential candidates vying
for the state's electoral votes reflected those views, regardless of
party. Clinton's husband was among them, even as he quietly attempted to
engage Fidel Castro in the 1990s.
Now, says Florida pollster Fernand Amandi, an expert on Cuban-American
public opinion, that once solid voting bloc is "a community in
transition," giving Clinton an opening.
U.S.-born Cuban-Americans, Amandi said, are consistently more supportive
of normalized relations than their Cuban-born parents and also are less
likely to consider themselves one-issue voters. "The younger generations
are more like any other immigrants -- they care about pocketbook issues,
jobs, their kids' educations," he said.
In addition, Cuba-born immigrants in the past few decades "lived under
the sanctions and concluded that it just emboldened the Castro regime,"
he said. "So think after 55 years of failure, it's time for something else."
Beyond the Cuban-American community, a majority of adults in the U.S.
support normalizing relations with Cuba. A Pew Research Center survey
conducted July 14-20 found that nearly 73 percent of Americans approve
of establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba, while 72 percent support
ending the trade embargo, both double-digit percentage increases from
January, immediately after Obama's decision.
Pew found the same trends though lower numbers among Republicans, with
56 percent of such voters backing a diplomatic bond and 59 percent
supporting an economic relationship.
Source: Clinton calls for lifting Cuba embargo, says GOP critics have
'it backwards' | Fox News -
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/07/31/in-miami-clinton-set-to-call-for-lifting-cuba-embargo/
Could presidential politics screw up America’s engagement with Cuba?
Could presidential politics screw up America's engagement with Cuba?
Tim Fernholz
July 31, 2015
Hillary Clinton went to Florida today and blasted her Republican
opponents in the US presidential race for their support of an embargo
and travel ban on Cuba—a move that might complicate efforts to end the
island nation's American ostracization.
"The Cuban people have waited long enough for progress to come," she
said in a speech to college students in Miami. "Even many Republicans on
Capitol Hill are starting to recognize the urgency of moving forward.
It's time for their leaders to either get on board or get out of the
way. The Cuba embargo needs to go, once and for all."
Indeed, support for ending the five decade embargo on Cuba is broad in
the US, including 47% of Republican voters. Many interest groups that
often line up with Republican politicians—including the business
community and farmers—support lifting the embargo as well. Amendments to
temporarily lift the embargo handily passed the Republican-dominated
Senate appropriations committee this week.
That kind of comity hasn't always been the case. As Republican contender
Jeb Bush's campaign immediately pointed out, Clinton supported the
embargo in the past. But the change in public opinion on the issue gives
Clinton—and other politicians—space to reconsider their views of a US
policy that has yet to change Cuba's repressive political regime. Many
Republican leaders in Congress haven't veered from their position,
however; nor have their presidential candidates, besides the libertarian
outlier Rand Paul.
"The Obama-Clinton policy is rooted in a false narrative that paints the
embargo as a relic of the Cold War," Bush, the former Florida
governor—who has received millions in campaign funds from pro-embargo
donors—said in a statement. "They claim to want to free Cuba from the
past, but they misunderstand the present. The Cuban people are not
imprisoned by the past, they are imprisoned by the Castro regime."
The danger for Democrats is that if Cuban relations get caught between
the two parties during a presidential race, Republicans who are
sympathetic to lifting the embargo may have a change of heart—just as
conservative policy ideas became anathema to the GOP after they were
endorsed by US president Barack Obama. In other words, if Clinton is for
it, the GOP base might turn against it.
Engage Cuba, a bipartisan group of political operatives lobbying for
normalization of US relations with Cuba on behalf of US business, is
ground-zero for this kind of conflict. One of its founders is Luis
Miranda, a Democratic operative who helped roll out Obama's policy as a
White House spokesperson; another senior adviser is Stephen Law,
formerly the top staff to Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell. Law
runs a "Super PAC" that will spend millions in support of Republican
candidates this year.
"We obviously can't control what campaigns do on this issue, but at
Engage Cuba we believe a positive, bipartisan approach has the best
potential to neutralize opposition and move the normalization process
forward," Law tells Quartz.
The fear? That a negative, partisan approach could lead to gridlock, or,
worse, roll back this historic opening entirely.
Source: Could presidential politics screw up America's engagement with
Cuba? - Quartz -
http://qz.com/469292/could-presidential-politics-screw-up-americas-engagement-with-cuba/
Tim Fernholz
July 31, 2015
Hillary Clinton went to Florida today and blasted her Republican
opponents in the US presidential race for their support of an embargo
and travel ban on Cuba—a move that might complicate efforts to end the
island nation's American ostracization.
"The Cuban people have waited long enough for progress to come," she
said in a speech to college students in Miami. "Even many Republicans on
Capitol Hill are starting to recognize the urgency of moving forward.
It's time for their leaders to either get on board or get out of the
way. The Cuba embargo needs to go, once and for all."
Indeed, support for ending the five decade embargo on Cuba is broad in
the US, including 47% of Republican voters. Many interest groups that
often line up with Republican politicians—including the business
community and farmers—support lifting the embargo as well. Amendments to
temporarily lift the embargo handily passed the Republican-dominated
Senate appropriations committee this week.
That kind of comity hasn't always been the case. As Republican contender
Jeb Bush's campaign immediately pointed out, Clinton supported the
embargo in the past. But the change in public opinion on the issue gives
Clinton—and other politicians—space to reconsider their views of a US
policy that has yet to change Cuba's repressive political regime. Many
Republican leaders in Congress haven't veered from their position,
however; nor have their presidential candidates, besides the libertarian
outlier Rand Paul.
"The Obama-Clinton policy is rooted in a false narrative that paints the
embargo as a relic of the Cold War," Bush, the former Florida
governor—who has received millions in campaign funds from pro-embargo
donors—said in a statement. "They claim to want to free Cuba from the
past, but they misunderstand the present. The Cuban people are not
imprisoned by the past, they are imprisoned by the Castro regime."
The danger for Democrats is that if Cuban relations get caught between
the two parties during a presidential race, Republicans who are
sympathetic to lifting the embargo may have a change of heart—just as
conservative policy ideas became anathema to the GOP after they were
endorsed by US president Barack Obama. In other words, if Clinton is for
it, the GOP base might turn against it.
Engage Cuba, a bipartisan group of political operatives lobbying for
normalization of US relations with Cuba on behalf of US business, is
ground-zero for this kind of conflict. One of its founders is Luis
Miranda, a Democratic operative who helped roll out Obama's policy as a
White House spokesperson; another senior adviser is Stephen Law,
formerly the top staff to Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell. Law
runs a "Super PAC" that will spend millions in support of Republican
candidates this year.
"We obviously can't control what campaigns do on this issue, but at
Engage Cuba we believe a positive, bipartisan approach has the best
potential to neutralize opposition and move the normalization process
forward," Law tells Quartz.
The fear? That a negative, partisan approach could lead to gridlock, or,
worse, roll back this historic opening entirely.
Source: Could presidential politics screw up America's engagement with
Cuba? - Quartz -
http://qz.com/469292/could-presidential-politics-screw-up-americas-engagement-with-cuba/
US envoy to UN visits Cuba's UN Mission, a first in decades
US envoy to UN visits Cuba's UN Mission, a first in decades
BY EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS
Samantha Power made the first visit by an American ambassador to the
United Nations to Cuba's U.N. Mission in over a half-century on Friday.
U.S. Mission spokeswoman Hagar Chemali said Power discussed the
normalization of relations between the two countries and priorities at
the United Nations during her first-ever meeting with Cuba's U.N.
Ambassador Rodolfo Reyes Rodriguez.
Cuba and the United States broke off diplomatic relations in 1961 during
tense Cold War times. After almost 54 years of hostilities, U.S.
President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced on Dec.
17 that they would negotiate a restoration of ties. That happened on
July 20 when the two countries formally re-established diplomatic relations.
"President Obama reversed 50 years of policy on Cuba because he
believed, as do I, that we can do more to support the Cuban people and
promote our values through engagement," Power said in a statement.
"Isolation has not worked," she said.
Power said ending that isolation whether by restoring diplomatic
relations, Obama's first meeting with Raul Castro, Secretary of State
John Kerry's upcoming visit to Havana, "or the simple act of going down
the street to visit the Cuban U.N. ambassador for the first time in a
half-century — these are the measures that open dialogue and give us the
opportunity to stand up for our values, including human rights and human
dignity."
She said this "will ultimately do more to help the Cuban people than the
outdated policy of the past."
Power has set a personal goal of visiting the U.N. mission of every
country that the U.S. has diplomatic relations with and according to
U.S. officials Cuba was the 127th. There are 193 U.N. member states and
the U.S. has no relations with several including North Korea and Iran.
Source: US envoy to UN visits Cuba's UN Mission, a first in decades |
Miami Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article29709673.html
BY EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS
Samantha Power made the first visit by an American ambassador to the
United Nations to Cuba's U.N. Mission in over a half-century on Friday.
U.S. Mission spokeswoman Hagar Chemali said Power discussed the
normalization of relations between the two countries and priorities at
the United Nations during her first-ever meeting with Cuba's U.N.
Ambassador Rodolfo Reyes Rodriguez.
Cuba and the United States broke off diplomatic relations in 1961 during
tense Cold War times. After almost 54 years of hostilities, U.S.
President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced on Dec.
17 that they would negotiate a restoration of ties. That happened on
July 20 when the two countries formally re-established diplomatic relations.
"President Obama reversed 50 years of policy on Cuba because he
believed, as do I, that we can do more to support the Cuban people and
promote our values through engagement," Power said in a statement.
"Isolation has not worked," she said.
Power said ending that isolation whether by restoring diplomatic
relations, Obama's first meeting with Raul Castro, Secretary of State
John Kerry's upcoming visit to Havana, "or the simple act of going down
the street to visit the Cuban U.N. ambassador for the first time in a
half-century — these are the measures that open dialogue and give us the
opportunity to stand up for our values, including human rights and human
dignity."
She said this "will ultimately do more to help the Cuban people than the
outdated policy of the past."
Power has set a personal goal of visiting the U.N. mission of every
country that the U.S. has diplomatic relations with and according to
U.S. officials Cuba was the 127th. There are 193 U.N. member states and
the U.S. has no relations with several including North Korea and Iran.
Source: US envoy to UN visits Cuba's UN Mission, a first in decades |
Miami Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article29709673.html
Hillary Clinton in Miami - Lift the embargo against Cuba
Hillary Clinton in Miami: Lift the embargo against Cuba
BY MICHAEL VASQUEZ AND JENNY LUNA
mvasquez@MiamiHerald.com
Saying "America's approach to Cuba is at a crossroads," Democratic
presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton called for an end to the
53-year-old Cuban trade embargo in Miami on Friday.
The former secretary of state's chosen location of Florida International
University was significant for two reasons: Clinton delivered the
message in the heart of the Cuban exile community, which is divided over
the issue, and did it at a college campus, where the crowd tilted
younger and, according to polls, more likely to support lifting the
controversial measure.
Hillary Clinton delivers a Cuba policy speech at Florida International
University Friday, July 31, 2015. PETER ANDREW BOSCH MIAMI HERALD STAFF
Her position would have elicited public outcry in the Miami of a
not-so-distant past. But times have changed: Protests against Clinton
were contained to a handful of people, many of them with the local
Republican Party, outside the auditorium.
In her remarks, Clinton said her campaign is about bringing prosperity
to the U.S. — but also to the citizens of Cuba, and "for the young
entrepreneur in Little Havana, who dreams of expanding to old Havana."
Though only Congress can lift the embargo, Clinton promised, if elected,
to act on Cuba even if Congress doesn't, by using her executive
authority to loosen travel and other economic restrictions, including on
telecommunications.
The invitation-only crowd of more than 200 greeted Clinton with a
standing ovation, and gave her another as she wrapped up her roughly
30-minute speech.
Clinton's call for Congress to end the embargo comes about a month after
President Barack Obama did the same. But even with the current warming
of relations between Washington and Havana, human-rights violations
continue on the communist island.
Republicans were quick to attack Clinton's position as further enabling
the Castro regime — even before the speech began. Minutes before the
start, former Florida governor and presidential candidate Jeb Bush took
to Twitter: "It's insulting to many Miami residents for Hillary to come
here to endorse a retreat in Cuba's struggle for democracy."
Cuban-American presidential candidate Marco Rubio tweeted a photo of
Clinton accepting a red button from Vladimir Putin — only Putin had
Cuban leader Raúl Castro's face PhotoShopped on it instead. "After
Clinton's failed 'reset' with Putin, now she wants to do a 'reset' with
Castro," Rubio posted. "She is making another mistake."
In her speech, Clinton said "engagement is not a silver bullet, but
again and again we see that it is more likely to hasten change, not hold
it back."
She also noted that a member of the Ladies in White, a Cuban dissident
group, was in attendance at her event.
Clinton said her feelings on the embargo have evolved since the 1990s,
when former President Bill Clinton signed the Helms-Burton Act, which
further strengthened the Cuban embargo.
She told the FIU crowd that her former support for the embargo was
influenced by the Cuban government's shooting down of two Brothers to
the Rescue aircraft over the Florida Straits in 1996. Cuba's act of
aggression, which killed four, led to Congress passing the Helms-Burton Act.
Regarding her new anti-embargo stance, Clinton said "I did not come to
this position lightly; I well remember what happened to previous
attempts at engagement in the 1990s."
But today, Clinton said the embargo has become "an albatross around our
necks" when it comes to U.S.-Cuba policy. And it wasn't working, she said.
"The Castros were able to blame all of the island's woes on the U.S.
embargo… and delaying their day of reckoning with the Cuban people," she
added.
Clinton said the Obama administration's loosening of travel restrictions
helped convince her it is time for a change in course.
"I remember seeing a CNN report that summer about a Cuban father living
and working in the United States who hadn't seen his baby boy," she
said. "Our reforms made it possible for that father and son to finally
reunite."
"It felt like the start of something important," she said.
The Democratic-leaning crowd, many of them Cuban-Americans, responded
with enthusiasm.
Susy Ribero-Ayala, a criminal defense attorney in Coral Gables, hasn't
been to Cuba since her great uncle — the last democratically elected
president of the country — left the island.
Ribero-Ayala said she went from from "supporter" of Clinton to "major
supporter" after her speech, touting her mention of the need for
human-rights action in Cuba and the ease for American travel to the island.
"It is going to move away from the regime, and they're going to have no
choice but to adapt to the changes," Ribero-Ayala said.
On a patch of grass across from the auditorium, about 40 protesters came
to show just how much they disagree with Clinton's call to lift the
embargo. Students from FIU College Republicans and the Cuban Democratic
Directorate stood outside the auditorium waving flags.
Rey Anthony, a political science and Cuban studies major at FIU called
Clinton's visit "a slap in the face."
"To us it's an insult that Hillary Clinton has come to the heart of our
community at an institution that has opened its doors to so many exiles
to ask us to remove sanctions," Anthony said.
The third-generation Cuban American wants to one day be a professor,
just like the man who taught his Florida Politics course at FIU last
semester: Marco Rubio.
Source: Hillary Clinton in Miami: Lift the embargo against Cuba | Miami
Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/elections-2016/article29656990.html
BY MICHAEL VASQUEZ AND JENNY LUNA
mvasquez@MiamiHerald.com
Saying "America's approach to Cuba is at a crossroads," Democratic
presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton called for an end to the
53-year-old Cuban trade embargo in Miami on Friday.
The former secretary of state's chosen location of Florida International
University was significant for two reasons: Clinton delivered the
message in the heart of the Cuban exile community, which is divided over
the issue, and did it at a college campus, where the crowd tilted
younger and, according to polls, more likely to support lifting the
controversial measure.
Hillary Clinton delivers a Cuba policy speech at Florida International
University Friday, July 31, 2015. PETER ANDREW BOSCH MIAMI HERALD STAFF
Her position would have elicited public outcry in the Miami of a
not-so-distant past. But times have changed: Protests against Clinton
were contained to a handful of people, many of them with the local
Republican Party, outside the auditorium.
In her remarks, Clinton said her campaign is about bringing prosperity
to the U.S. — but also to the citizens of Cuba, and "for the young
entrepreneur in Little Havana, who dreams of expanding to old Havana."
Though only Congress can lift the embargo, Clinton promised, if elected,
to act on Cuba even if Congress doesn't, by using her executive
authority to loosen travel and other economic restrictions, including on
telecommunications.
The invitation-only crowd of more than 200 greeted Clinton with a
standing ovation, and gave her another as she wrapped up her roughly
30-minute speech.
Clinton's call for Congress to end the embargo comes about a month after
President Barack Obama did the same. But even with the current warming
of relations between Washington and Havana, human-rights violations
continue on the communist island.
Republicans were quick to attack Clinton's position as further enabling
the Castro regime — even before the speech began. Minutes before the
start, former Florida governor and presidential candidate Jeb Bush took
to Twitter: "It's insulting to many Miami residents for Hillary to come
here to endorse a retreat in Cuba's struggle for democracy."
Cuban-American presidential candidate Marco Rubio tweeted a photo of
Clinton accepting a red button from Vladimir Putin — only Putin had
Cuban leader Raúl Castro's face PhotoShopped on it instead. "After
Clinton's failed 'reset' with Putin, now she wants to do a 'reset' with
Castro," Rubio posted. "She is making another mistake."
In her speech, Clinton said "engagement is not a silver bullet, but
again and again we see that it is more likely to hasten change, not hold
it back."
She also noted that a member of the Ladies in White, a Cuban dissident
group, was in attendance at her event.
Clinton said her feelings on the embargo have evolved since the 1990s,
when former President Bill Clinton signed the Helms-Burton Act, which
further strengthened the Cuban embargo.
She told the FIU crowd that her former support for the embargo was
influenced by the Cuban government's shooting down of two Brothers to
the Rescue aircraft over the Florida Straits in 1996. Cuba's act of
aggression, which killed four, led to Congress passing the Helms-Burton Act.
Regarding her new anti-embargo stance, Clinton said "I did not come to
this position lightly; I well remember what happened to previous
attempts at engagement in the 1990s."
But today, Clinton said the embargo has become "an albatross around our
necks" when it comes to U.S.-Cuba policy. And it wasn't working, she said.
"The Castros were able to blame all of the island's woes on the U.S.
embargo… and delaying their day of reckoning with the Cuban people," she
added.
Clinton said the Obama administration's loosening of travel restrictions
helped convince her it is time for a change in course.
"I remember seeing a CNN report that summer about a Cuban father living
and working in the United States who hadn't seen his baby boy," she
said. "Our reforms made it possible for that father and son to finally
reunite."
"It felt like the start of something important," she said.
The Democratic-leaning crowd, many of them Cuban-Americans, responded
with enthusiasm.
Susy Ribero-Ayala, a criminal defense attorney in Coral Gables, hasn't
been to Cuba since her great uncle — the last democratically elected
president of the country — left the island.
Ribero-Ayala said she went from from "supporter" of Clinton to "major
supporter" after her speech, touting her mention of the need for
human-rights action in Cuba and the ease for American travel to the island.
"It is going to move away from the regime, and they're going to have no
choice but to adapt to the changes," Ribero-Ayala said.
On a patch of grass across from the auditorium, about 40 protesters came
to show just how much they disagree with Clinton's call to lift the
embargo. Students from FIU College Republicans and the Cuban Democratic
Directorate stood outside the auditorium waving flags.
Rey Anthony, a political science and Cuban studies major at FIU called
Clinton's visit "a slap in the face."
"To us it's an insult that Hillary Clinton has come to the heart of our
community at an institution that has opened its doors to so many exiles
to ask us to remove sanctions," Anthony said.
The third-generation Cuban American wants to one day be a professor,
just like the man who taught his Florida Politics course at FIU last
semester: Marco Rubio.
Source: Hillary Clinton in Miami: Lift the embargo against Cuba | Miami
Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/elections-2016/article29656990.html
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