Obama’s Cuba Policy: Putting the 'Castro' Back into 'Catastrophe'

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THE EDITORS: A bad day overall. Obama Acts on Cuba.

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Democrats are hypocritically silent about Obama's policy of targeted assassinations. Are Drone Strikes More Defensible than Torture?

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SLIDESHOW: Recreating WWII.

Morning Jolt
. . . with Jim Geraghty

December 18, 2014

I hope your holiday season is happy. Unfortunately, I'll bet the Castro brothers, Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un are having a better holiday season than you.

Obama's Cuba Policy: Putting the 'Castro' Back into 'Catastrophe'

Ah, the Obama administration. A short while after insisting that their latest round of economic sanctions will put a halt to Vladimir Putin and Russia's aggression in Ukraine, they turn around and normalize relations with Cuba because the embargo "hasn't worked."

To get Bowe Bergdahl back, the United States took five of the worst captured killers in Guantanamo Bay and released them to Qatar. To get the release of Alan Gross, an American aid worker illegally detained in 2009, Obama normalized relations with Cuba. Do you notice that Obama's "concessions" to get prisoners back always involve him doing something he wanted to do anyway?

I keep hearing the embargo "didn't work." What U.S. policy has generated exactly the result we wanted when we started? Has our absolute isolation of North Korea "worked" the way we wanted? How about our extensive trade with China? Or our increasing engagement with Vietnam? How about our outreach and endless negotiations with Iran? Is the lesson from Cuba that "embargos don't work" or is it really that "it's hard to change the behavior of brutal regimes that don't care about the people they rule"?

It would be easier to support this move if there was a way to see how this would help the average Cuban, instead of further lining the pockets of the Castro brothers.

Marco Rubio spits hot fire:

"The President's decision to reward the Castro regime and begin the path toward the normalization of relations with Cuba is inexplicable. Cuba's record is clear. Just as when President Eisenhower severed diplomatic relations with Cuba, the Castro family still controls the country, the economy and all levers of power. This administration's attempts to loosen restrictions on travel in recent years have only served to benefit the regime. While business interests seeking to line their pockets, aided by the editorial page of The New York Times, have begun a significant campaign to paper over the facts about the regime in Havana, the reality is clear. Cuba, like Syria, Iran, and Sudan, remains a state sponsor of terrorism. It continues to actively work with regimes like North Korea to illegally traffic weapons in our hemisphere in violation of several United Nations Security Council Resolutions. It colludes with America's enemies, near and far, to threaten us and everything we hold dear. But most importantly, the regime's brutal treatment of the Cuban people has continued unabated. Dissidents are harassed, imprisoned and even killed. Access to information is restricted and controlled by the regime. That is why even more than just putting U.S. national security at risk, President Obama is letting down the Cuban people, who still yearn to be free.

"I intend to use my role as incoming Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Western Hemisphere subcommittee to make every effort to block this dangerous and desperate attempt by the President to burnish his legacy at the Cuban people's expense. Appeasing the Castro brothers will only cause other tyrants from Caracas to Tehran to Pyongyang to see that they can take advantage of President Obama's naiveté during his final two years in office. As a result, America will be less safe as a result of the President's change in policy. When America is unwilling to advocate for individual liberty and freedom of political expression 90 miles from our shores, it represents a terrible setback for the hopes of all oppressed people around the globe."

Is the idea that we'll influence the island nation so that the average Cuban will be as free as the average Chinese?

Sean Davis points out why those incoming American dollars won't go anywhere near the average Cuban:

When an American goes down there, he buys things with either the dollar, or the Cuban version of the dollar (CUC), which generally has a 1:1 conversion ratio. Cubans are forced to use only the peso (CUP), which has roughly a 25:1 conversion ratio to the dollar (for every 25 CUP, you get one dollar; or for every 1 CUP, you get about $0.04). That rate is set by the Cuban government. That leaves Cuban vendors who accept dollars with only two ways of using those dollars to get the things they need to survive: 1) purchase them on the black market using dollars, a risky proposition for obvious reasons, or 2) exchange the dollars for CUP.

There's no trading the CUP on the open currency market. Apart from sentimental souvenir value, it's worthless everywhere else in the world. Whenever a Cuban gets his hand on a dollar, he either has to put himself at risk by using it on the black market, or he has to turn the dollar into the government in order to receive a pittance which he can use to buy food for his family.

There were a few free-trade minded voices on the right who applauded the change in policy. Ace is "meh" on the move:

I'm not sure I really care. The previous policy, whether the right policy or not, has not yet toppled the Castro regime. I think this new policy will almost certainly increase the chances the Castro regime continues, near to mid-term, but I think we're talking about increasing the chances from 98% to 98%, so I'm not especially bothered.

I supported the anti-Castro plank because the Republican-voting Cuban exiles in Florida wanted me to. But lately, they seem to voting for Democrats, and they don't seem to care about the Cuba embargo as much.

So I guess I don't really have any incentive to continue to support a policy I was only supporting as a favor to a political ally.

Even if you thought the embargo was ineffective, it is exceptionally dangerous for the United States to give a hostile regime everything it wants for releasing an American.

How many Americans are being held hostage abroad? Nobody's sure of the exact number, and our government won't tell us, according to this September report:

Gross is one of possibly hundreds of Americans being held abroad by hostile regimes, terrorist groups and criminal organizations that don't provide due process, according to the David House Agency, a Los Angeles-based international crisis resource agency. Given the U.S. government's longstanding policy of not negotiating with terrorist groups and its lack of formal diplomatic relations with countries like Cuba, Iran, and North Korea, getting Americans out of trouble and back onto U.S. soil can be complicated or even impossible.

"It's not just a global problem. It's an international reality," said Eric Volz, managing director for the agency. "Institutional kidnappings are at a rate never seen before. More Americans are traveling internationally and doing mission work. That's why we are seeing it at a higher rate."

"It's reaching a tipping point," he added. "These are just not isolated incidents."

State Department officials declined to comment on any Americans being held captive overseas citing "privacy issues." The department has reportedly told families of hostages held by terror groups not to publicize their plight, warning that it could put them in greater jeopardy. But the families of journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, both of whom were beheaded in recent weeks by an Islamic State extremist in videos released on the Internet, have angrily denounced the U.S. government for not doing more to help free the men.

These concessions make us less safe.

Pyongyang Defeats Hollywood

Elsewhere in "unconditional surrender" news…

Hours after an announcement that U.S. authorities determined North Korea was behind the recent cyber-attack on Sony Pictures, the entertainment company announced it was pulling the release of the film The Interview.

The comedy about journalists who score an interview with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un was scheduled for a Dec. 25 release.

"Sony Pictures has no further release plans for the film," according to a statement from the company.

Sony also removed any mention of the movie from its website by Wednesday afternoon.

Earlier Wednesday, a federal law enforcement official offered the news about North Korea.

The official, who is not authorized to comment publicly, said a formal announcement of attribution by the U.S. government could come as soon as Thursday.

U.S. investigators believe the attacks originated outside North Korea, but they have determined that the actions were sanctioned by North Korean leaders, a second U.S. official said Wednesday.

The U.S. government is not prepared to issue formal charges against North Korea or its leadership, but the official, who is not authorized to comment publicly, said a lesser statement of attribution is expected.

They get veto power over our films, now.

No formal charges? How about a cyber-counterattack?

This is one of those days where Hollywood stars are on our side:

Rob Lowe just blasted Sony, calling the movie company a spineless sellout and comparing it to the famous British Prime Minister who caved in to Hitler.

Lowe reacted to Sony's decision to pull "The Interview," saying, "Saw @Sethrogen at JFK. Both of us have never seen or heard of anything like this. Hollywood has done Neville Chamberlain proud today."

Chamberlain famously conceded Czechoslovakia to the Nazis in 1938. His policy of appeasement became synonymous with cowardice.

So far no word from Seth Rogen on whether he embraces Rob's statement.

Jimmy Kimmel tweeted, "An un-American act of cowardice that validates terrorist actions and sets a terrifying precedent."

And Newt Gingrich got into the act, tweeting "@RobLowe, No one should kid themselves. With the Sony collapse America has lost its first cyberwar. This is a very very dangerous precedent."

To which Rob retweeted "It wasn't the hackers who won, it was the terrorists and almost certainly the North Korean dictatorship, this was an act of war."

Michael Moore just fired his own salvo saying, "Dear Sony Hackers: now that u run Hollywood, I'd also like less romantic comedies, fewer Michael Bay movies and no more Transformers."

You're not allowed to see this movie. Kim Jong Un says so.

ADDENDA: Careful, the Democrats are starting to notice their position:

Bill Burton, a former top campaign and White House spokesman for Obama, said he is also concerned about the Democratic Party's relationship with white working-class voters. "Democrats are not worried enough about [them]," he said.

"If we're not attentive to the fact that we have a massive problem with middle-class white voters, we're not going to solve our problem," Burton said. "I'm worried that Democrats don't see the problem. . . . The Republican coalition doesn't look like America. It's mostly just white people. But the Democratic one isn't looking like America either, because there aren't a lot of white people."

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Obama’s Cuba Policy: Putting the 'Castro' Back into 'Catastrophe'

Obama's Cuba Policy: Putting the 'Castro' Back into 'Catastrophe'

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