Cuban “Normalization” Starts Now
Questions surface as diplomats head to Havana
On January 21, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson will be the first diplomat since the Carter administration to set foot on Cuban soil with the goal of restoring diplomatic relations that haven’t existed since the height of the Cold War.
From Bloomberg:
Jacobson’s arrival will kickstart negotiations that could eventually expand to include everything from demands for compensation by Cuban-American exiles and U.S. companies to improved human rights. While the U.S. and Cuba have met for years to discuss lower-level issues such as counter-narcotics and migration, her visit is the first to test Obama and Castro’s pledges to bolster relations.
The U.S. will review Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of terror and make a decision within six months of the Dec. 17 announcement that relations would be normalized, an administration official said in advance of the trip, speaking on the condition of not being identified because of diplomatic protocol. The State Department will review evidence and intelligence to determine if Cuba is sponsoring terrorism, though the determination won’t impede normalization, regardless of the outcome, the official said.
Although formal ties were severed in 1961, the U.S. maintained its old embassy as a way of maintaining communications with the Castro regime. President Obama has plans to reopen the embassy, but will have to secure funding from Congress to do so.
Cuba’s status as a state sponsor of terrorism tops the list of concerns for American lawmakers who oppose the normalization plan. State Department officials have said that determinations regarding Cuba’s terror listing “will have no impact” on the administration’s efforts to reestablish diplomatic relations, and that the two issues “are proceeding on separate tracks.”
In a recent interview with Katie Couric, Senator Marco Rubio laid out his concerns about Cuba’s status as a security threat, and a state sponsor of terror:
Lawmakers like Rubio may be ready to fight normalization, but the American people as a whole are not. According to a recent survey by Pew, over 60% of Americans support both closer relations with Cuba, and ending the embargo.
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“The State Department will review evidence and intelligence to determine if Cuba is sponsoring terrorism, though the determination won’t impede normalization, regardless of the outcome, the official said.”
And THAT, right there, is WHY we will continue to be successfully targeted by terrorist and will have less success in defeating them.
What a perfectly idiotic thing to say…much less think!
It sends EVERY POSSIBLE wrong message around to world to terrorist regimes of all stripes, but first to the Castros.
As to that Peeee-eww poll, let me have a few weeks to tell the story of the Castros, Cuba under them, and how NOTHING we propose doing will or can make the least difference to every-day Cubans, and then let’s do the polling again.
Again, NOBODY is this incompetent. This kind of debacle can only come by design.
“Lawmakers like Rubio may be ready to fight normalization, but the American people as a whole are not. According to a recent survey by Pew, over 60% of Americans support both closer relations with Cuba, and ending the embargo.”
60% now constitutes ‘the American people as a whole’?
Change the wording of the Q in the poll and you can get 40/60 the other way, or 50/50, or whatever you want.
‘Normalization’. The current relationship with Cuba is ‘normal’ given Cuba is a communist state ruled by a dictator and a sponsor of terrorist acts. What Obama wants is an abnormalization of our diplomatic status with Cuba.
I was born and raised in communist Cuba.
I could spend not weeks, but years telling you all about all kinds of horrors, and about every tiny little thing you should not take for granted.
Instead I will only tell you about Cuban schools and what they teach children.
1- ALL schools are run by the government. Private schools are against the law.
2- ALL schools are required to teach HATE towards the United States.
What is the “normal” relationship with somebody who hates you, and makes it a priority to spread and perpetuate hate against you?
I wonder whether State will bother to sweep for hidden microphones or not.