Change in Cuba Policy Floated

[Judi Lynn]

Change in Cuba Policy Floated
To prevent an influx, visas may be denied to those who try to enter illegally. Some say that could backfire on GOP.
By Carol J. Williams, Times Staff Writer
August 10, 2006


MIAMI — A Bush administration proposal to change current immigration practices for Cubans, aimed at discouraging a politically disastrous mass migration, could backfire, exiles and analysts say.

The policy changes under consideration by the Homeland Security Department propose to reject any visa applications from Cubans who attempt to enter the United States illegally. The draft document, obtained by the Associated Press earlier this week, also suggests accelerating visas for family members of U.S. residents — a registry of more than 10,000 who wait as long as a dozen years to be reunited with U.S. relatives.

Taken together, they promote safe, legal and orderly migration, while they also support the Cuban people in their aspiration for a free and prosperous society," the draft reads.

Encouraging Cubans to remain and work for change on the communist-ruled island echoes appeals by President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for pro-democracy demonstrations while Cuban leader Fidel Castro is incapacitated.
(snip)

But some Cuban Americans in South Florida say they are tired of being used by politicians who tailor important issues such as immigration to appease a hard-line minority of exiles in exchange for their electoral support.
(snip/...)

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-cubaimmig10aug10,1,4227994.story?coll=la-news-politics-national&track=crosspromo

[Akim]

1. Cuban-Americans — 5 Decades of Peonage to Republican Party

It is time for Cuban-Americans to free themselves from their peonage to the Republican Party. It is not "the party of Emancipation." Only the most deluded gusano detritus still believes their promises of "Next Year in Havana." More likely, next year at the White House, on May 20th, the gusano "Independence Day" when the neocolonial "Republic" was founded in 1902, to hear George Bush once again repeat the old mantra: "Viva Cuba Libre" (although in George's case he means the drink, not the country).

In fact, that annual celebration at the White House has become the social event of the year for Cuba's transplanted Batista aristocracy.

Do not delude yourselves that these people care about Cuba. They are far too cynical to harbor any sentiments of love for their country or its people. For them, Cuba is merely the goose that got away and which they are determined to recapture and domesticate under the American flag.

[Say_What]

2. Many Cuba-related articles at Francisco Aruca's Progreso Weekly website

http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=main_body&otherweek=1155186000

Including this Open letter to Señorita Condoleezza Rice:

<clips>

...Señorita Secretary, with regard to these two statements, permit me, with all due respect, to make two things known to you:

1) The overwhelming majority of the Cuban people – I am not exaggerating if I say 97% of them: 10,767,000 Cuban men and women – have no intention to leave Cuba, and we are conscious that we live in the midst of this revolutionary project of liberty, independence, and socialist democracy, which we are not going to renounce. We do not deny that the remaining 3% -- 333,000 citizens – could wish to leave Cuba, due to 333,000 different reasons. If you wish, you could double that number and say that there are 666,000; which wouldn't make any difference. At the same time, it is not we Cubans who have encouraged abandoning the Island in order to create difficulties for anyone, but rather, on the contrary, it is the United States which for decades, has stimulated this with its migratory policies, which favor Cubans for political reasons while discriminating against other nationalities.

I also want to make known to you that this Cuban who is writing to you, who lives on this Island, could have "various reasons" to leave the country and go live in your supposed paradise, because, after 40 years of working as a priest in the Episcopal Church of Cuba and receiving my retirement benefits from the Church Pension Fund in New York, your government has ordered that the payment of my retirement benefits be blockaded, for the sole reason that I live in Cuba, and is holding them in my name in a blocked bank account in New York, against every legal principle which states that retirement funds cannot be embargoed. But rather than thinking that this would be a reason to go live in the paradise of your country, among many other reasons this is one more reason to believe neither in your paradise nor in your democracy.

2) At the same time, Mr Tony Snow can save himself his absurd declarations made outside the Presidential ranch in Texas, to the effect that the United States does not have plans to invade Cuba, because we are a country that, absolutely, does not believe in the veracity of any declarations made by your Government, so that he himself should not believe what he is saying, and he should know that yes, we are preparing ourselves for "all options" from the United States. The only thing that Mr. Snow wasn't wrong about was in affirming that "Cubans will determine their own destiny" – but not in the way that he thinks.

Sincerely,



Pablo O. Marichal
Presbyter of the Episcopal Church of Cuba


http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Carta_abierta&otherweek=1155186000

[Judi Lynn]

3. What the rector of the Cuban Episcopal church writes is infuriating.

It shows the _Bush administration views illegal actions completely legitimate if they support the _Bush "vision."

So what's the man going to do who toiled his whole life for the Episcopal church, believing he would receive his pension at the end of his career, only to find out _{George W. Bush} is going to keep it, unless he moves to the United States.

What a despicable a-hole. Loathesome. Without honor. Dirty, dirty sneak and cheat.

Thanks for posting this message to Condoleeza Rice. Very much the eye-opener. I hope the Episcopal church will find a way to help him in his later years, regardless of the filthy trap _Bush has built to force him to leave his only homeland permanently in order to lay claim to the pension he has earned, or lose it.

Bya the way, people who claim Cubans don't get any news of the rest of the world (a preposterous, and impossible lie) might want to mull over the fact that there must be some reason to explain why it is this man of the Episcopal church in Cuba has any idea what Tony Snow said, and where and when he said it.

[Akim]

5. The Pastor's Pension Could End-Up in Some Gusano's Pocket

I am sure that neither the Cuban people nor their government will allow this noble pastor to starve. Bush may embargo his pension (finally a right context in which to use that "e" word), but the Cuban people will more than make-up the loss.

The most tragic thing, Judi, is that the pastor's pension money has now been lumped with all the other Cuban assets seized in 1962 and is now available for pillage by Miami gusanos. When "Brothers to the Rescue" sued the Cuban government in federal court, it was paid its bloodgelt from these seized accounts.

Yes, the pastor's hard-earned pension may end-up in the hands of some criminal gusano in Miami.

[Judi Lynn]

6. That would not, sadly, be a surprise, after all we've seen already.

Simply pathetic.

Here's a typical example of how everything they can grab results in profits for the gusano slimes in Miami:

CUBAN HIJACKER GIVEN ASYLUM & PLANE SOLD IN KEY WEST.

A stolen crop-duster biplane carrying eight passengers from Cuba landed in Key West, Florida, Nov. 11, escorted by Florida National Guard jet fighters. The passengers and pilot Nemencio Guerra were released to relatives in Miami and the plane impounded by US authorities and sold at auction. The release--in immigration terms a parole--is usually the first step in granting asylum and permanent residence.

The Cuban government promptly demanded the return of the plane and the emigrants. In a diplomatic note Nov. 12, the Foreign Ministry said the 1994 bilateral migratory agreement specifically calls for both countries to discourage dangerous departures from Cuba and commits the US to cease granting provisional admission to Cuban immigrants arriving by irregular means, including hijacked aircraft or boats.

Carlos Lage, vice president of the Cuban Council of State, accused the US of encouraging terrorism against Cuba by holding the plane in Key West and giving asylum to everyone on board. Although US practice is to give asylum to Cubans who set foot on dry land, Cuban authorities focused on the US refusal to punish any of them for hijacking.

"The crime of air piracy, which is recognized in all international conventions as an act of terrorism, is encouraged by the government of the United States in its war against Cuba," Lage said.

On Nov. 18, a Miami court approved an attorney's request to seize the plane and have it sold at auction with the proceeds turned over to Ana Margarita Martinez. In the Miami exile community, Martinez's former husband, Juan Pablo Roque, is believed to have been a Cuban intelligence agent who infiltrated Hermanos al Rescate prior to the 1996 shootdown of two Hermanos planes near Cuba (see NotiSur, 1996-03-01).
(snip/...)

http://www.allbusiness.com/periodicals/article/457979-1.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's hard to know how much money has been snagged by these witless idiots already. The very idea this woman" has hit the jackpot" by suing Cuba for a marriage she entered voluntarily is incomprehensible.

[Akim]

7. She Claimed Cuban Gov't "Alienated" Her Husband's Affections

She claimed the Cuban government had "alienated" her husband's affections.

[Judi Lynn]

8. Astonishing! Does she take us for idiots?

I just found a small slideshow of their wedding:



http://www.telemundo51.com/slideshow/cuba/8082801/detail.html

I noticed she was asked for a dance by former CIA operative, and terrorist, Jose Basulto! As you know, he was the head of the Brothers to the Rescue which had been terrorizing Cubans, which her husband had been determined to penetrate to see if they had any worse plans for Cubans in mind.

The desperately vile result, being thrown in prison, after he and his friends brought their evidence to the FBI, turning to them for help, is one of the filthiest things I've ever heard in this country. Truly dirty.

She really needs to be happy with her stolen windfall.

[murray hill farm]

9. Say-what! Would you please post this as

a seperate post/thread so that it can be seen by more folks. The minute u do it, i will recommend it. Thanks!

[Say_What]

10. Done--posted to Editorials

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x228414 :-)

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Judi Lynn]

11. Winds of change may sweep few exiles back to Cuba

Winds of change may sweep few exiles back to Cuba
Fri Aug 11, 2006 11:48am ET


MIAMI (Reuters) - A lot more than the treacherous Florida Straits separates Miami's Cuban exiles from their homeland just 90 miles off the southern tip of Florida.
But the handover of power by ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro has many thinking about change on the communist-ruled island and the day, perhaps soon, when barriers between Cubans and staunchly anti-Castro Cuban Americans may finally come tumbling down.
(snip)

But a 2004 poll by Florida International University showed that most exiles -- who may not be welcome back on the island -- would probably never return to Cuba to live. Even if it changed to a democracy, nearly 67 percent said they were unlikely to consider a permanent return.

That total was even higher than the 60 percent who said they favored military action, by the U.S. government or Cuban exiles, to overthrow Castro.
(snip)

Elena Freyre, a voice of moderation among Miami's often strident exiles, said Cuban Americans will play only a limited role in a post-Castro Cuba, and should not expect to be well received on the island due to their support for the U.S. economic embargo against it.

"Most of the people who speak the most about how much they miss the homeland haven't been there in over 40 years and have no clue what Cuba looks like today," she said.
(snip/...)

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-08-11T154729Z_01_N11208480_RTRUKOC_0_US-CUBA-EXILES.xml&pageNumber=2&imageid=&cap=&sz=13&WTModLoc=NewsArt-C1-ArticlePage2