Short of receiving a blood transfusion from the medical center on the grounds of the Reagan Ranch here in California, we’re confident we will not be casting a vote for Barack Obama in the general election should he win the Democratic nomination.
However, we’re going to give the man his due for calling out the Bush Administration for imposing stricter enforcement of the Cuban embargo with respect to family travel to and from and sending money back to Cuba.
In a larger context, it seems peculiar these embargos and sanctions we have levied against other countries on the basis of backwards-assed Socialist economic policies and deplorable human rights conditions (those two are always snuggling and necking in the corner, it seems) because, well…. they don’t seem to work.
Cuba and North Korea are the two prime examples of how these embargos are counter-productive as they give the miserable tin-pot dictator running the show ammunition to play the “us against them” card with the added benefit of keeping the citizenry that is absent exposure to foreign trade and thus, democratizing culture and ideas, even more dependant on said bastard’s cult of personality.
Of course the Clinton administration turned this concept completely on its head by giving the Norks, nuclear technology. We won’t even build nuclear reactors in this country anymore but will give it up to North Korea because they need it to uhhhh… generate electricity for their people. No, really.
Only South Africa comes to mind as a country where sanctions worked and in that case it was to bring about the end of apartheid. But South Africa was a different situation altogether. Contrary to most other countries against whom embargos and sanctions are imposed, South Africa was an open, Western democracy and as such they were sensitive and responsive to shame and humiliation from the rest of the civilized world.
We’re hoping that the whole tired, played-out concept of embargos and sanctions receives an extensive overhaul or perhaps better, a scrapping altogether.
However, we’re going to give the man his due for calling out the Bush Administration for imposing stricter enforcement of the Cuban embargo with respect to family travel to and from and sending money back to Cuba.
In a larger context, it seems peculiar these embargos and sanctions we have levied against other countries on the basis of backwards-assed Socialist economic policies and deplorable human rights conditions (those two are always snuggling and necking in the corner, it seems) because, well…. they don’t seem to work.
Cuba and North Korea are the two prime examples of how these embargos are counter-productive as they give the miserable tin-pot dictator running the show ammunition to play the “us against them” card with the added benefit of keeping the citizenry that is absent exposure to foreign trade and thus, democratizing culture and ideas, even more dependant on said bastard’s cult of personality.
Of course the Clinton administration turned this concept completely on its head by giving the Norks, nuclear technology. We won’t even build nuclear reactors in this country anymore but will give it up to North Korea because they need it to uhhhh… generate electricity for their people. No, really.
Only South Africa comes to mind as a country where sanctions worked and in that case it was to bring about the end of apartheid. But South Africa was a different situation altogether. Contrary to most other countries against whom embargos and sanctions are imposed, South Africa was an open, Western democracy and as such they were sensitive and responsive to shame and humiliation from the rest of the civilized world.
We’re hoping that the whole tired, played-out concept of embargos and sanctions receives an extensive overhaul or perhaps better, a scrapping altogether.
Click here for story on Obama.
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