Cuba Adjusting to Trump

Confusion Plus Unknowns!
{Thursday, December 7th, 2017}

      The Reuters and Voice of America news agencies yesterday used the above Reuters photo of two tourists to illustrate an article entitled: "China's Exports to Cuba Slump as Island's Cash Crunch Deepens." That's good news for Marco Rubio and the Counter Revolutionaries in the U. S. trying to strangle Cuba once-and-for-all, but bad news for Cubans on the island. The article pointed out that Cuba is being hit by the perfect storm -- the U. S. transition from Obama-to-Trump; Venezuela's drastic economic troubles; a prolonged drought; devastating hurricanes; etc. Chinese exports to Cuba, the article reported, "slumped 29.8 percent down to $1 billion from January through October this year. Cuba's trade in goods last year was $12.6 billion, compared with $15 billion in 2015, but more than 80 percent is in imports, not in exports."

      The Desmond Boylan/Associated Press photo above was used in various reports yesterday and today to update the mysterious sonic attacks against U. S. embassy workers in Havana that are being used by Rubio and the Counter Revolutionaries as the latest excuse to attack the island with a new barrage of economic sanctions. The Washington Post's update concluded, "What exactly happened to two dozen Americans in Cuba remains a mystery to Cuba, science, and FBI investigators."

     The AP reported yesterday that the mysterious acoustical assaults...or whatever it was...on 24 Americans "has caused anomalies in white brain tissue" according to the U. S. but the report also stated that "most of the victims have fully recovered." That latter revelation is also a mystery, I reckon. Meanwhile, Cuba is being punished by gleeful Rubio-led anti-Cuban extremists in Washington with Trump-mandated new sanctions that continue to reverse former President Obama's decent Cuban policies.

      Interspersed among the newly punitive 180 measures the Trump administration issued on Nov. 9-2017 against Cuba are United States business interests trying to sneak into the crevices as Cuba itself adjusts to America's post-Obama Cuban policies. The Royal Caribbean Cruise Line is adding its 2,350-passenger Majesty of the Seas to its regular sailings to Cuba. The magnificent ship will begin sailing to Cuba from Tampa in April. The Royal Caribbean's 1,160-passenger Empress of the Seas is already sailing to Cuba from Miami. Royal Caribbean, in addition to Havana, is adding the Cuban ports of Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba to its itinerary. Later this month Holland America will become the 6th cruise line to have Cuban cruises.

     The new wave of extremely punitive Trump measures against Cuba announced on Nov. 9-2017 were orchestrated by Miami's Counter Revolutionaries in Congress led by Senator Marco Rubio, which is well-known in Washington. But significantly, Rubio complained loudly about a liberal contingent that prevented his assaults from being even MUCH MORE punitive. So Rubio apparently is unhappy with Florida ports -- Tampa, Miami & Fort Lauderdale  -- engaging in Cuban commerce.

      It appears that Trump's latest assault on Cuba is the selection of Philip Goldberg as the Top Man at the U. S. Embassy in Havana. In his last two ambassadorial assignments -- in Bolivia and the Philippines -- Goldberg has feasted on spats and entanglements. Apparently, Goldberg's antipathy towards Cuba and his combativeness earned him his new assignment in Havana...for what it's worth. After President Obama reopened the U. S. Embassy in Havana for the first time since 1961, the Trump presidency has sufficiently gutted it and the Cuban embassy in Washington. So an antagonistic charge d'affaires -- or Top Man -- like Goldberg in Havana will likely add to the bickering and hostility at the U. S. embassy in Havana.

      Of course, Jeffrey DeLaurentis was President Obama's Top Man at the real U. S. embassy in Havana. DeLaurentis was also Obama's choice to be the U. S. Ambassador to Cuba but just one man in Congress, Senator Rubio, blocked the DeLaurentis appointment from even coming before the Senate for a vote.

      As far as is known, every unbiased source in Washington believed the highly respected Jeffrey DeLaurentis was the perfect person to be the United States Ambassador to Cuba. But when a mere handful of self-serving, revengeful Counter Revolutionaries like Rubio can made America's decisions regarding Cuba, everyone else -- including Cubans, Americans, and Cuban-Americans -- suffer. So, as the Obama-to-Trump transition closes out the first week of December-2017, America does not have a decent and extremely capable man, Jeffrey DeLaurentis, as its badly needed Ambassador to Cuba. Instead, the United States has a volatile anti-Cuban Top Man, Philip Goldberg, at a Rubio-gutted and totally dysfunctional U. S. embassy building in Havana. From Obama-to-Trump and from DeLaurentis-to-Goldberg is what the American people are left with...and probably deserve for not caring enough about their democracy to let it descend into a disastrous Trump-Rubio-Goldberg morass.

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