The Bush Administration has just revoked the license of a Florida-based travel agency for arranging American tourists to visit Cuba.
Stop and think about this for a moment.
The democratically elected government of what is supposed to be the freest country on this planet is actually prosecuting people for traveling to a place they don’t want you to go. But that’s not all. In addition to suspending travel agency licenses, the government is also fining individuals up to $7500 for merely stepping foot in Cuba. In 2004 alone, when the Bush Administration stepped up efforts to curtail this “illegal” travel (and in the process, support Brother Jeb, governor of Florida), they fined 894 people a total of $1.5 million dollars for the heinous crime of vacationing on the Caribbean island.
The law that prevents Americans from traveling to Cuba is the Trading with the Enemy Act. Technically, one can still go to Cuba, but if more than $100 is spent while there, the person is financially supporting the enemy government of Cuba.
Oh come on!
Americans could travel to the Soviet Union and every other Warsaw Pact country during the height of the Cold War, they could travel to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya before we bombed them, and today can even travel to Iran, North Korea and every Middle Eastern country with whom America currently has problems. But, Americans can’t travel 50 miles off the coast of Florida to visit a harmless country of salsa-dancing, baseball-loving North Americans? Am I the only one that finds this crazy?
There certainly was a time when Cuba was a danger to the United States, but the Soviet Union is now dead and no longer supports Cuba with nukes, arms, fuel, and basic necessities. Today, Cuba is nothing but a destitute country desperately trying to survive on its own. Sure, there are horrible human rights violations occurring under the Castro regime, but the same abuses happened (and are still happening today in some cases), in every one of the countries listed above that Americans are free to visit and spend their dollars.
Preventing tourists from visiting Cuba isn’t going to bring down the Castro regime, nor is the economic blockade imposed by the United States (but virtually ignored by every other country in the world). No, the Castro regime will only fall when the locals get so fed-up they rebel. And what is the best way to sow such strong seeds of discontent? Look no further than East Germany. Overexposure to the West through relatives, tourists, and television broadcasts is what really taught East Germans how bad things really were. Otherwise, ignorance was bliss.
An invasion of Chatty American tourists is simply the best thing that can happen to Cuba. But in the meantime, don’t tread on my civil liberties and try to tell me where I can’t go.