Republicans and Cuba
Not all of the Republicans agree with the House Speaker, or Mark Rubio. But I don’t understand their objections. We have relations with all sorts of countries, including China. And China doesn’t have a free press, or free elections, etc. either. And we also have relations with Saudi Arabia. The list goes on.
Besides, some groups which usually are aligned with the Republicans are in favor of the change. For example, the Chamber of Commerce, and US farmers.
It’s just a natural change in the course of history.
And it’s not like the last 50+ years have accomplished anything. These Republicans seem to be saying, let’s take a tried and true failure and continue it.
I find that pretty puzzling – typically the Republican party is most interested in what’s good for big business and certainly normalizing trade with Cuba would seem to fall into that category. Perhaps they’re thinking that opposing this move would generate support from Hispanics? That might be true to some small extent, but only a tiny minority of Hispanics in the US are of Cuban ancestry.
Personally I’m on board, the whole thing has been just silly for decades and the notion that our allies have to be democracies flies in the face of reality (ask any woman in Saudi Arabia!). I’m looking forward to being a tourist there in a few years.
Rubio might think his position plays well for Republican presidential primary politics, but I think he’s going to find out he’s made a historic misunderstanding of the electorate’s sentiment on this.
doug