State Department official defends U.S. travel restrictions against Cuba

State Department official defends U.S. travel restrictions against Cuba
By GEORGE GEDDA Associated Press Writer
October 2, 2003

WASHINGTON- Cuba's military would benefit greatly from an easing of U.S. travel restrictions against the country because it controls 65 percent of Cuba's hotel rooms and would use the proceeds to suppress dissent, a State Department official said Thursday.

Assistant Secretary of State Roger Noriega defended the restrictions in the face of criticism from members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who said the policy is not working.

If Americans were free to travel to Cuba, the proceeds would be "funneled to the repressive apparatus of the state," Noriega said, alluding to Cuba's military establishment.

He said the 70 percent of Cuba's tourist hotels are in isolated enclaves so that they are invisible to ordinary Cubans who, in any case, are not authorized to patronize the hotels.

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http://www.tcpalm.com/tcp/home/article/0,1651,TCP_996_2317333,00.html

Roger Noriega's appearance before Lugar's committee yesterday was on C-Span overnight.

NO ONE'S going to accuse Noriega of being too damned smart for his own good.

These people are not only overfocused on destroying Cuba's 44-year old government, they are ignorant buttheads, as well.

Noriega actually seemed to NOT UNDERSTAND a lot of questions asked by various members of the committee. His excuse is not being foreign born,and insufficient in English. He was raised in Kahn-sas.

Florida's Democratic Senator Bill Nelson indicated he's just as damned stupid as Noriega, and the entire event got so hideous I had to turn it off. One has to know his/her limits.

My God.

The GOOD part is that someone I had seen as a hopeless cause, Richard Lugar, is coming around, and waking up on the Cuba issue!

Remember, the next couple of years are going to be truly stormy, as the right-wingers throw tantrums of unparalled childishness, and loudness, as they are approaching the time they are going to be LEFT BEHIND as our country moves to drop the embargo and the travel ban.
It's right around the corner.

It COULD happen while Bush is still in Gore's office, and it will undoubtedly happen when a Democrat is ELECTED.

In the meantime, _Bush is going to milk this Cuban issue for all it's worth, as the Cuban Mafia go for broke. We may not even recognize Cuba after his team of crack propagandists get up a bigger head of steam.


Little Cuban "exile" Otto Reich


Roger Noriega


John Bolton


_{Rep. Lincoln Diaz Balart}

The George Deucey-U Bush administration continues to profer the same old tired rationalizations for continuing the travel restrictions for US citizens wishing to go to Cuba.

Most of the reasons are as hollow as ever. While I don't admire Cuban-style Marxist--Leninist socialism, I seriously doubt that ending the restrictions would do the Castro regime as much good as the exiles (and the bearded guy) would like to think. US tourists, even in those "isolated" enclaves, do mingle with more ordinary Cubans and stuff does circulate. I know, because I've left clothes and books behind during my two legal visits to the island.

Both the exiles and the knee-jerk Castro apologists forget one thing--the effects of ideological erosion. Does anyone, even in South Florida ivory towers, seriously think that US tourism is going to build or even maintain support for Marxism--Leninism in the minds of the average Cuban?

Dems have a bipartisan majority handed to them on a silver platter and what are DUhers doing with it? Blowing it big time apparently!

.. for the years decades of pandering. Truly unDemocratic. :puke:

From the article:

...But Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., said the travel curbs play into the hands of Cuban President Fidel Castro.

Baucus, who is not a committee member and spoke from the witness chair, said there are indications the arrest and imprisonment of 75 Cuban dissidents in March was prompted by the Cuban government's fears about contacts between dissidents and Americans.

"If the Cuban government fears contact between the American and Cuban people, the answer is to send more Americans, not fewer," Baucus said.

Baucus, who traveled to Cuba recently, has introduced legislation to lift the embargo against Cuba and to ease travel restrictions.