25 Jan 2012 By Jacob G. Hornberger When I heard what Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, and
Rick Santorum said about Cuba in last night's Florida
presidential debate, I felt like I was in a Cold War
time warp and that we were about to see flower
children, hippies, go-go girls, and CIA LSD
experiments once again appear before our eyes. Gingrich said that he wants the U.S. government to
engage in new regime-change operations with what he
calls "covert operations," those in which the U.S.
government keeps its role secret from the American
people and the people of the world. You know, sort of
like the CIA's invasion at the Bay of Pigs. Or maybe Gingrich was advocating more CIA
state-sponsored terrorism against Cuban businesses,
hotels, and enterprises. Or maybe just operations to
destroy Cuba's economy, much like the CIA did in Chile
prior to the U.S.-supported coup that ousted Chile's
democratically elected president and installed an
unelected military strongman in his place. Or maybe he was telling us that under a Gingrich
administration, the U.S. government's current
assassination program would be redirected toward Fidel
Castro as a follow-up to the unsuccessful attempts by
the CIA and Mafia, working together, to assassinate
Castro during the 1960s. Another fascinating aspect to this is that these
three presidential candidates obviously believe that
the Cuban people are eagerly waiting for the U.S.
State Department, CIA, and Pentagon to show up in Cuba
and declare, "We're from the U.S. government and we're
here to help you." At that point, their mindset goes,
the Cuban people will supposedly embrace the U.S.
government eagerly and enthusiastically. Is that delusional or what? In fact, correct me if
I'm wrong but wasn't that the type of delusional
thinking that went into the fiasco at the Bay of Pigs?
Weren't the CIA and every right-wing anti-communist in
America convinced that the Cuban people would rally to
the cause of the U.S. invaders and join them in their
quest to oust Castro from power? It didn't happen, and the reason it didn't happen
is that most Cubans were sick and tired of decades of
U.S. control over their island. That's what Gingrich,
Santorum, and Romney just don't get. The Cuban people
are not interested in another U.S.-installed regime in
their country. They're not interested in sacrificing
one bit of their hard-earned independence from U.S.
control, not even in exchange for millions of dollars
in U.S. foreign aid. What Gingrich, Santorum, and Romney fail to realize
in their Cold War la-la land is that while Cubans are
undoubtedly disenchanted with their socialist economic
system, they nonetheless revere Fidel Castro for
finally bringing Cuba independence from U.S.
government control. The irony of all this is that Gingrich, Santorum,
and Romney all support many of the socialist programs
that Castro has brought to Cuba. Social Security,
Medicare and Medicaid, free public education, income
taxation, a managed economy, a regulated economy. All
of them form the core of Cuba's socialist system, and
all of them are enthusiastically embraced by Gingrich,
Santorum, and Romney here at home. Let's not forget the cruel embargo that the U.S.
government has enforced against the Cuban people for
more than half-a-century, an embargo that Gingrich,
Romney, and Santorum wish to continue, no matter how
much suffering it has brought — and continues to bring
— to the Cuban people. In fact, it's funny to see Gingrich, Santorum, and
Romney professing to be so concerned about the
well-being of the Cuban people. The three of them know
that the U.S. embargo on Cuba has helped squeeze the
lifeblood out of the Cuban people, especially in
combination with Cuba's cruel socialist economic
system. Has all that suffering caused Gingrich, Santorum,
and Romney to call for an end to the embargo? Are you
kidding? Despite the fact that more than 50 years of
embargo has failed to achieve its goal of regime
change in Cuba, they want to continue it indefinitely
into the future. The Republicans who cheered Gingrich's, Santorum's,
and Romney's bellicose Cold War attitude toward Cuba
no doubt failed to recognize that they were cheering
infringements on their own economic liberty. After
all, don't forget how the embargo against Cuba (and
Iran) apply to the American people. The embargo is a
federal prohibition on Americans' spending their money
in the way they choose. If an American travels to Cuba
and spends his money there without official
permission, U.S. officials will prosecute, jail, and
fine him for doing so. How is that reconcilable with
such natural, God-given rights as freedom of travel,
freedom of association, and freedom of commerce?
Indeed, how is it different from the economic controls
that communist Castro imposes on his own people? In response to a hypothetical question about
Castro's dying, Gingrich responded, "I don't think
Fidel will meet his maker… He will go to another
place." I'm no theologian but that answer seems to be
inconsistent with the Catholic faith to which Gingrich
has converted. I thought that Catholicism holds that
God, not Gingrich or anyone else, will judge who goes
to Heaven and who goes to Hell and that every person
is capable of being saved, no matter the gravity of
his sins prior to death. But it's also curious as to which of Castro's sins
Gingrich was referring that caused him to conclude
that Castro is going to hell. If the sins to which
Gingrich was referring involve such things as murder,
assassination, torture, indefinite detention, or
killing during wars of aggression, Newt might want to
reflect on Matthew 7:1-3: Judge not lest ye be judged.
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the
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