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This isn't much of a surprise poll if you are politically attuned. I haven’t the slightest of ideas why we still have trade embargoes and travel restrictions on Cuba. Although I'm certain that we might be able to tease out some DP posters who believe this is a bad idea.NYT said:After more than a half-century of official United States hostility toward Cuba punctuated by a comprehensive trade embargo, a majority of Americans — and an even greater majority of Floridians, home to this country’s largest Cuban-American population — now favor normalizing relations or engaging more directly with the Cuban government, according to a nonpartisan survey.
The results of the survey (pdf), commissioned by the Atlantic Council, a prominent Washington research institution, and released on Tuesday, were described by the group as an unprecedented reflection of shifting American attitudes toward Cuba that confound some long-held assumptions, particularly about Cuban-American antipathy toward the government of Raúl Castro.
The results also come against a backdrop of increasing sentiment in Florida and elsewhere that the American economic and political isolation of Cuba, one of the most enduring elements of United States foreign policy, not only has failed to satisfy its purpose of unseating the Castro government but may even be helping to perpetuate it.
“This survey shows that the majority of Americans on both sides of the aisle are ready for a policy shift,” Peter Schechter and Jason Marczak, the top two executives at the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center of the Atlantic Council, wrote in an introduction to the survey. “Most surprisingly, Floridians are even more supportive than an already supportive nation to incrementally or fully change course.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/11/w...mericans-favor-ties-with-cuba-poll-finds.html
My only concern is - as the NYT article mentions - human rights in Cuba. Yetl I find it strange that anyone would believe that the US (and Cubans) is better at increasing respect for human rights by isolating the Cuba. All that type [of diplomacy] achieves is an echo chamber for the Cuban government. Free trade, American tourist dollars and free movement are much better at spreading ideas and (given Cuban censorship) sharing restricted materials deemed to be dangerous.
Moreover, I'm jealous that only the Chinese and Venezuelans are able to sit on Cuban beaches sipping piña coladas.
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