President Bush may reduce amount of money families can send to Cuba

[Judi Lynn]

President Bush may reduce amount of money families can send to Cuba

By Rafael Lorente
Washington Bureau
Posted April 23 2004

WASHINGTON · The Bush administration is considering making significant cuts in the amount of money Americans are allowed to send to family and others in Cuba, according to sources familiar with the discussions of the president's Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba.

One proposal under review would temporarily freeze all remittances -- possibly for six months -- after which the administration would reinstate them at much lower levels than currently allowed.

"We're not going to make any comment on that," said Gonzalo Gallegos, spokesman for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs in the State Department, when asked about the proposal earlier this week.

Remittances are controversial among Cuban-Americans, with some arguing they help prop up the government of Cuban President Fidel Castro by pumping money into the island's economy. Others, though, say they must send money to help their relatives get by. Restricting remittances would likely be seen favorably by some Cuban-Americans who would like to see the Bush administration do more to isolate the communist government.
(snip/...)

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-acuba23apr23,0,4230333.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines

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

South Florida DU'ers, like Mika, since I don't live there, I don't know the complete story on this, but isn't it safe to say the Miami Cuban "exiles" are going to be furious about this?

Is _Bush kissing his behind "goodbye" with this move?

[Vogon_Glory]

1. Remittances and Shrub's Political Calculus

I'm not sure what sort of thinking is propelling this sort of casual meanness. I don't know if this is some idea that Otto Reich or Roger Noriega whispered in Dubya's ear or this is just Election Year nastiness. I can guess at least two groups within the Boosh camp are for this: older right-wing Cuban exiles and also native-born Anglo Commie-bashers like Tom DeLay. I'd bet that the CREEPies in the Boosh re-election campaign are gambling that the people most likely to send remittances to Cuba are those who came more recently and who haven't become US citizens.

Considering the sorts of delusions this administration is operating under, I shouldn't be surprised if Dubya has now convinced himself that if he cuts off remittances from the US, the Castro regime will fall.

Whatever happens, I think that Dubya has successfully moved post-Castro Cuba from becoming a US economic satellite once again to being a trading partner with the European Union.

[Mika]

2. This has the Miami Cuban community UP IN ARMS.

This has the Miami Cuban community UP IN ARMS.

They are saying that Clinton was better at gittin tough on evil Castro than Bush is.

On Miami exile radio, they are just begging for John Kerry to come on strong with some threats and lies agin evildoer Castro.

Maybe Kerry can accuse Castro of bio weapons, or promise sign Title III of the Helms-Burton law, or promise millions more of our tax dollars to support the "dissidents"....... yeah.... that'll do it. Just like Clinton/Gore/Lieberman did.





President Bush may reduce amount of money families can send to Cuba
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-acuba23apr23,0,4230333.story?coll=sfla-news-sfla

WASHINGTON · The Bush administration is considering making significant cuts in the amount of money Americans are allowed to send to family and others in Cuba, according to sources familiar with the discussions of the president's Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba.

One proposal under review would temporarily freeze all remittances -- possibly for six months -- after which the administration would reinstate them at much lower levels than currently allowed.

-

President Bush, who will be in Coral Gables today for a fund-raiser, has been criticized by some Cuban-Americans who say he has not lived up to campaign promises to take a harder line on Castro.

Estimates of the amount of money sent each year to Cuba range from $100 million to five or even 10 times that much. Experts say remittances and tourism are the two largest sources of cash for the Cuban government.

Kerry needs git to Miami to spread the hardline Dem message to the exiles - USA = good | Cuba = bad........ yeah.... that'll do it.

---

... because our Bonesman is better than their Bonesman

[Say_What]

10. Miami Repuke Ditzy-Balistic was HECKLED in the Colombian Congress

The letter that they refer to here was sent by a DU reader and former CNN Cuba board poster :hi: who is from Colombia.

Speculation on Colombia and Venezuela boards is that Fidel's favorite nephew is part of a campaign to provoke a war between Colombia and Venezuela.


<clips>

Objections to Colombian Congress medal for gung-ho US Congressman
Diaz-Baralt

Colombian political and trade union organizations have rejected
outright a Colombian Congress decision to honor controversial US
Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart with a medal.

Prensa Latina press agency reports that a letter had been sent to
Colombian Congress president, Senator German Vargas and read out by in
the House by Congressman Wilson Borja, stating that the US Cuban
Congressman does not have sufficient merit to receive a congressional
medal.

The dissidents argue that Diaz-Balart is a well-known terrorist, who
incited the assassination of a Head of State and ousting of a
legitimately elected government ... "it's a shame to see Colombian
Congressmen lending themselves to such an act."

Diaz-Balart is accused of manipulating a law draft to solve
immigration problems for many Colombians in the USA as a political
maneuver to secure Hispanic votes for George W. Bush and moreover, the
dissidents claim that the visiting Congressmen contributed to
electoral fraud in Florida that got Bush through to the Presidency.

* Signatories in Cali (Colombia) reject the Congressman's support for
continuing the economic blockade on Cuba.

"The origin of such strange conduct on the part of the Colombian
Congress could be due more to pressure from the Miami-based violent
organizations and pressure from the USA government's commitment to
Miami Cubans, as well as the increasing intervention of the USA in
Colombia's internal affairs."

During the medal ceremony, hecklers in Congress shouted slogans
against Diaz-Balart, who is on an official visit to Colombia and will
hold talks with President Alvaro Uribe and Defense Minister Jorge
Alberto Uribe.

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=17551

[walmartsucks]

3. With all the recent condemnation of offshoring jobs

I thought this would be met with great fanfare. Sending money to another country is worse than sending jobs. At least with jobs the parent corporation still pays taxes on the increase in profits, pays dividends to shareholders, etc. Once the money is sent overseas it is out of the U.S. economy permanently.

[jmowreader]

4. These "remittances" aren't government monies

This is Raul Gonzalez sending money to his mom in Cardenas, and it's what Bush wants to eliminate.

Bush just converted a lot of Cuban votes to Democratic ones.

[Mika]

5. Yep. Just ripe for the pickin'

n/t

[walmartsucks]

6. Neither are jobs going overseas

Jobs going overseas produce wages for people who could've used that money to by goods in the U.S., but instead the money is in a foreign country. The money sent to Cuba could be spent in the U.S., helping businesses large and small, in turn causing more people to be hired. Instead, the money is in a foreign country. Perhaps the software programmers in India want to help their mothers with their wages as well. How is one bad and the other good? The two are one in the same.

[Say_What]

9. Cubans send home an estimated $100 million/yr. LatAms $20 BILLION

In a recent poll conducted for the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and WTVJ Channel 6 by Florida International University, 54 percent of Cuban-Americans surveyed in Miami-Dade and Broward counties said they send money to Cuba. According to the survey, the average amount sent per household in 2003 was $387 for an estimated total of about $100 million annually from South Florida.

http://havanajournal.com/hispanics_comments/1557_0_24_0_C/

Despite low wages, Hispanic immigrants send about $20 billion a year home to Latin America -- half of it to Mexico.

http://www.adage.com/news.cms?newsId=40203

[Malva Zebrina]

7. Ain't he grand?

this is really funny to me.

This doofus of a man who calls himself a "war president" because unless HE calls himself that, no one else will, thereby diminishing his status and reputation,which he himself has given to himself, has made a declaration which I think he has not thought through to it's logical conclusion.

That he cannot think through ANYTHING to it's logical conclusion means not a thing to those who would portray him as a visionary, a saint who gets messages from a god in the sky or as a unrefutable born again Christian, now obsessed with the god who talks tohim and tells his what to do--and most of the time, that god is telling hin to kill Muslims!
\

To him the "common man" means the person who was hired by his ugly , self absorbed wannabe in society but never making it, Mom as the cook, or the "cleaning lady" or the "nanny" who cared for the brats she spawned.

He knows not a scintilla of the plight of the common man or what he has, by his policies, the suffering he has caused to the common man

He will be really flabbergasted when this "common man" rises up in agonizing protests against this little, let's pretend, AWOL coward of a rich boy and his banal stupid, frump who is being manufactured into a person she is not by his PR people, and his spoiled , unconcerned , spoiled, sullen, twin daughters, who, in their own self adoration, deck themselves out in outrageously expensive, but trashy looking costumes that look as though they came from the sewing machines of a quilter who is trying to make the best out of all the little mistakes in fabric and trying desperately to make into something unique.

It has failed . He has failed. Laura has failed. Big Barb the gargoyle has failed, and daddy, the dumb, has also failed

What they all wanted was a legacy of the Bush family--you know, like the Kennedy legacy

They cannot do it and they do not understand why they cannot do it. They cannot understand that liberalism, loving your fellow human beings, no matter where their position on the econimic scale, is what elevates the human condition

They think it is MONEY that does that!!!

Those of us who have lived a certain amount of years know, that is NOT the case.

LOL

[Say_What]

8. Cuban American Alliance Educational Fund (CAAEF) already made a formal

statement earlier this week:

<clips>

Washington, D.C. April 19, 2004. As Cuban-Americans we
yearn for a normal relationship with our country of origin.
We have families on the island that we desire to visit and
help on a regular basis. U.S. laws severely limit our
ability to visit and to send remittances to our loved ones
in Cuba, and the Bush Administration's recent suspension of
the U.S./Cuba migration conversations threaten to further
isolate us from our families.

We are now permitted only one family visit to Cuba within a
twelve-month period, and our remittances are limited to
only $1200 per family per year.

It is immoral to premise our foreign policy toward Cuba on
isolating the Cuban people from their loved ones and
causing unnecessary economic hardship to our families
there. Moreover, we have a constitutional right to travel
to Cuba to visit our families, and we have a constitutional
right to send remittances without any arbitrary
restrictions imposed on us by the United States government.

The U.S. Interests Section in Havana routinely denies
visitors' visas to our families in Cuba, because of
concerns that under the terms of the Cuban Adjustment Act
any Cuban who touches U.S. soil is eligible to remain as a
lawful permanent resident. As a result, Cubans risk their
lives by trying to cross the dangerous Florida straights on
flimsy rafts in an often fatal effort to reach U.S. shores.
Many Cuban men, women and children have lost their lives
trying to cross those shark-infested waters.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/message/24981