“I’m not interested in having battles that, frankly, started before I was born”.
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Obama’s visit starting Sunday marks a crowning moment for his ambitious diplomatic experiment with Cuba.
The White House has said that he will meet dissidents and entrepreneurs, as well as attend a state dinner at the Revolution Palace.
Margaret Pullés Machado is first generation Cuban-American and President & CEO of VamosGlobal which helps advance the historic opening to Cuba through cross-cultural missions and exchanges between Americans and Cubans. Obama has been easing restrictions on U.S.travel and commerce in Cuba.
“After decades of isolation some have greeted the news of Obama’s visit to Havana on March 20 with pleasure.”(It’s) gonna be good, for Cuba and the United States”, one elderly resident told our reporter.
“To this day, this is a regime that provides safe harbor to terrorists and to fugitives”, said House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. The yanks would invade Havana, as they had done many years before, and their greenbacks would breathe life into both private and State enterprises. Business people will also be tagging along in hopes of uncovering new economic opportunities.
“The joint regional mission confirmed my intuition that now is the time to solidify relationships with partners in Cuba”, said Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade Maurice Jones. Cuba stops putting people in jail for speaking out.
Direct postal service between the two countries was suspended at the height of the Cold War, meaning mail was re-routed through other countries – usually Mexico or Canada. It’s the first US presidential visit to the communist country in almost 90 years. Instead of indulging in romantic fantasies of visiting a Cuba that is “So Near and Yet So Foreign”, Americans need to welcome and support the changes that Cubans so crucially need and desire.
The Venezuelan leader, who arrived here in the early hours of Friday, took the order with “the commitment of loyalty to the ideas of the founding fathers, Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez”.
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Outside experts say while Cuba has made some positive moves, they’ve been small, and it’s not clear when – or even if – more progress will be achieved. And if we continue to think of Cuban civil society as a narrow group of people, we will not engage or encourage the broad sort of currents of people in the society who want to see change. “But so does a journey of a only few steps”. He knows that Obama’s “gestures” may last only as long as he’s in office.
