Bush gives thanks at the expense of Cuba

While Americans looked forward to Thanksgiving this year, lawmakers were busy undermining the democratic process and bending to the will of the executive branch. In the 42nd year of the embargo on Cuba, Congress upheld the ban on travel to Cuba -- a measure that violates American freedom of travel and contributes to the systematic repression of Cubans. While lifting the travel ban passed in both houses with vast margins - 227-188 in the House and 59-36 in the Senate -- the amendment was stripped from an omnibus bill on Nov. 12 by Republican leadership. The Treasury and Transportation conference committee was decidedly mixed on whether to support the travel amendment, even amidst a threat of presidential veto. However, conferees never got a chance to vote on the amendment as it was stripped from the bill in what some opponents call "undemocratic measures."

Lifting the ban on travel holds many opportunities for both Americans and the future democratic development in Cuba. According to agribusiness statistics, lost trade with Cuba costs the US $3 billion annually. According to the Cuban Policy Foundation (CPF), the US energy sector could gain anywhere from $2 to $3 billion from lifting the embargo. And although lifting the ban on travel is an incremental step along the path of lifting the embargo, any movement in that direction only stands to benefit the US economy. Travel-related gains alone would result in gains up to $1.7 billion and a creation of 10,000 US jobs in an ever-unsteady economy (CPF statistics).

Contrary to Republican leadership belief, Cubans would be the true beneficiaries of a change in policy. American travel would increase "person to person" contact, the very contact Americans had with the people of the former Soviet Union that helped bring about its demise. Americans bring with them the very important concepts of democracy and freedoms that Castro presently blocks access to under his ruthless dictatorship. Travel would also stir the roots of free market reform and growth -- the very impetus for democratization. When hundreds of thousands of Americans travel to Cuba, it will exert pressure on the Cuban economy in the critical areas of the small business and self-employed sectors. Monetary freedom from the Communist party's political machine will allow Cubans to speak and organize freely against their government. Additionally, travel would raise scrutiny of human rights in Cuba, as seen during the Chinese liberalization in the 1980s.

All of these possible developments are ignored by the Bush administration in a strategic effort to appease the Cuban-American electorate. With an election year ahead and the critical importance of Florida duly noted, Bush made a speech in October vowing to continue to exert pressure on Castro, tighten travel restrictions on Cuba and veto any legislation that would liberalize US foreign policy on the island nation. Two weeks later, the Senate openly rebutted this idea by passing a lift on the travel ban with a comfortable majority. With both houses voting on the exact same language of the travel bill, the Administration vowed to veto it. The legislation, if it had reached his desk, would have placed Bush into a political conundrum. If he signed it, he would be going against his word and reaping controversy amidst the Cuban-American community. If he vetoed the bill, he would have vetoed a $90 billion dollar spending bill the travel amendment was attached to. It is easy to see why Bush flanked the leadership in Congress to strip the bill -- it saved his own political career.

All is not lost, however. The 108th Congress marked the fourth year in a row legislation was passed to lift the ban on travel to Cuba and the first in which it was passed in both houses. Legislators will seek floor action for the bill when Congress returns to session in February. If the bill makes it through both houses of Congress as an individual piece of legislation, Bush will be forced to either sign or veto the bill -- putting him in a precarious situation. Concerned advocates' most important role in all of this is to contact their representatives and urge them to support lifting the travel ban on Cuba. These actions could perhaps prevent a reoccurrence of Republicans pursuing undemocratic actions of stripping bill amendments to save their leader. Until then we can only hope that Castro will go belly up. Gobble, gobble.

Rachael Hereford is a junior majoring in political science.