Double Standard

For as long as I’ve lived, Fidel Castro, the western hemisphere’s arch-enemy of capitalism and democracy – and therefore all that’s great and wonderful about the USA – has ruled Cuba as a caricature in fatigues, smoking a big cigar. Why can patriotic Americans travel and do lots (and lots) of business with China but not Cuba? Because Cuba is a communist country? Because of Cuba’s consistent human rights violations? Its crackdown on dissidents? Its suppression of free press? Oh, wait … that’s China. Maybe it’s because Fidel Castro kicked our CIA-backed ass at The Bay of Pigs in 1961. And while Europeans, Canadians, Mexicans and citizens of most freedom-loving democracies are free to visit Cuba, don’t you think 50 years is long enough for Uncle Sam to carry a grudge?