Riches For Cuba's Apparatchiks, None For The Peasants

One of the local news stations has a lawyer as a frequent guest. His name is Jeff Isaac, and his trademark is "The Lawyer In Blue Jeans." Isaac's firm, The Lawyer In Blue Jeans Group, seems to have a specialty in tax and estate planning, living trusts, and probate. I think that's just fantastic. Everybody with any real property should have a living trust.

Lately, Isaac has been on the morning news talking about how excited he is, that President Obama has relaxed trade restrictions on Cuba. The station ran a story on December 17, and said "...after all these decades, these people have taken enough for something they, the Cubans, were not part of. It was all about politics and all about government." Someone who has "visited the island nation more than 30 times" like Isaac rightfully has fallen in love with the Cuban people and their culture.

But President Obama has done the Cuban people no favors. Once again, the President negotiated with himself, and offered concessions to the tyrannical Castro regime, and got nothing in return. There were fifty-three political prisoners released, four days ago, but virtually all of them are under conditional release.

Cuba has been and remains a state sponsor of terrorism. The Center For Security Policy reports that "Cuban military officers are acting as liaison between Venezuelan military and the narco-guerrillas of the Colombian FARC." In addition, "Cuba directly and through Venezuela continues to provide intelligence to Hamas and Hezbollah."

I will never understand the soft spot in their heart so many liberals have for communists. I don't necessarily think Isaac feels that way. But there are people who wear Che Guevara shirts, and are likely unaware that he personally murdered dozens of men and boys, had homosexuals jailed, and loved executions so much that he had a window in his office overlooking the yard where the firing squads did their grisly work." Perhaps the most chilling quote of his is this: "If the nuclear missiles had remained (in Cuba) we would have fired them against the heart of the U.S. including New York City!”

If Jeff Isaac had signed a petition in favor of Proposition 8, motivated activists would be besieging this television station with demands he be taken off the air, and launching campaigns targeting the station's advertisers. Thankfully, I am not a motivated activist. Just a libertarian with a bug up my ass.

Opening Cuban markets to the United States will not free the Cuban peasant from poverty. It will only enrich the cadre and the apparatchiks. Cuba was already trading with every other country on earth, and nothing trickled down. I think points of view like Isaac's are patronizing, like, aren't the old cars they drive charming, and who wouldn't like to smoke Cuban cigars.

Maybe Isaac believes opening up Cuba for trade will present new markets for his services. Like I said, everybody who owns property should have a living trust. Too bad there is no such thing as private property in Cuba, huh, Jeff?