McCain celebrates Cuban independence with hard-line speech
MIAMI -- John McCain celebrated Cuba's Independence Day with a rousing declaration of solidarity with Miami’s Cuban exile community -- part Cold War pep rally, part policy address for economic integration across Latin America -- in which he challenged what he wryly called Barack Obama's "interesting perspective on Cuba."
"Senator Obama has shifted positions and says he only favors easing the embargo, not lifting it," McCain said to boos from a largely Cuban-American crowd at a hotel ballroom here. "He also wants to sit down unconditionally for a presidential meeting with Raul Castro."
It was a familiar critique of Obama's foreign policy -- in recent days, McCain has made similar claims about his likely opponent's willingness to pursue diplomatic relations with Iran -- but this time McCain addressed it directly at a vital swing-state constituency that was particularly responsive to a comparison with a time "Jimmy Carter went over and kissed Brezhnev."
"These steps would send the worst possible signal to Cuba's dictators -- there is no need to undertake fundamental reforms, they can simply wait for a unilateral change in U.S. policy. I believe we should give hope to the Cuban people, not to the Castro regime," McCain went on, to chants of "Libertad!"
Before he spoke, McCain, who has conceded only a modest familiarity with the Spanish language, tried gallantly to keep up with the words of Cuba's national anthem. He was preceded into the hotel ballroom by color guard worthy of a Pan-American Games opening ceremony, received with dead silence for the Peruvian flag and a warm welcome for those of Cuba and the United States.
McCain set himself apart from both Democratic and Republican administrations who he said treated Latin America as a "junior partner rather than as a neighbor." McCain promised new economic cooperation with the United States' "hemispheric partners" criticized both Obama and Hillary Clinton for opposing a free-trade agreement with Colombia, which he presented as a Democratic counterweight to Castro and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, whom McCain accused of "immature behavior."
"We will not abandon our partners to demagogues, drug lords, and despair, but expand the benefits of security, trade and prosperity to all," McCain said.
But the language of villainy came increasingly from the Cold War lexicon, as many of those who rose to address McCain enlisted the senator -- who spent nearly six years in Vietnam as a prisoner of war who claims he was beaten by a Cuban agent -- as a fellow "freedom fighter," as one woman put it. "The communists are well-known for their torture," explained Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart, who compared McCain's experience with that of political prisoners.
Warning McCain about the dangers of Obama, a woman who introduced herself as a psychologist offered Fidel Castro as cautionary example. Both appealed to "youth, entranced by empty words…nice music and empty promises," she said. "I see Cubans here who did not question a leader when we needed to question a leader with empty words."
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Karl Rove is called a "political wizard". However, Senator Obama will expose Rove and the GOP as Wizards (as in Oz) --illusionary figures masquerading behind a curtain of Deceit! The Republican Pretenders are skilled in rituals of smoke & mirrors - Experts in Demonizing and Belittling thier opponents through cleverly manipulation of words used to smear and distort. We, the American people, are tired of their trickery's and lies based on illusionary fear-mongering and not fact, and like the Wizard of Oz, when the curtain is pulled back by "the light of truth", they will be exposed as the fakers and the pretenders that they are -- with loud, silver-tounged voices filled with vinegar and no Real Power -- pulling strings of "make believe" to coverup their own innate weakness and Experienced villainy, an In-Experience and Naivite that Barack lacks, Barack's saving grace! This unveiling will enable us to finally get off this merry-go-round -- this "yellow-brick-road" of illusion and deceit perpetrated upon the American public by these ShapeShifters and Betrayers of the Public Good.
This massed negativity has been a real detriment to American economic progress and peace in Iraq. Such pretenders and shapeshifters are like a millstone around the neck of humanity, crippling true effort. They proclaim Family Values, yet do nothing but impede true progress while the American way-of-life is dying. Any bills offered by Democrats which will benefit the American families, the GOP votes NO! This massed, organized negativity has been what has enabled them to work so ruthlessly with power and success at the destruction of all that has attempted to get in the way of their projects, desires and greed. They refuse to recognize that humanity can solve its problems without aggression and force and instead use the energy of goodwill and diplomacy, sharing and cooperation.
If you disagree with the Pretenders' politics, however, (I do not say policies for they lack true policies) in unison they attack by subterfuge, distortion and lies to disquise their true intent --the control of money and power for the GOP family only (so much for family values). Masters in fear mongering and shapeshifting, they hope to incite fear in an unsuspecting and gullible American public and to get them to embrace thier plans out of fear and against their own common sense and good judgment! Only this time, we will dispell this Illusion and not be fooled again by these "fakers, con-artists and Pretenders", and our united House, born out of need and true change, will withstand the onslaught of this False, now Fleeting Wind that has devastated the American way of life, no more; their House of Cards are Falling!
Mc Cain is just pandering to the anti-Castro fanatics in Miami who still equate Democrats with communism. This tack has served the Diaz-Balart and Ross-Lethinen bunch well for the past few years.
Holding discussions with governments that do not agree with us instead of blowing each other up is what diplomacy is all about.
I am sick and tired of the neo-cons' cave man attitudes and their tendency to repeat a lie until the american "sheeple" allow it to become truth by not challenging it.
Neither the present administration or McCain have the moral standing in my view to tell us not to use diplomacy when Osama Ben Laden has been given a free ride while we went to war with a country that did not harm us on a lie.
Diplomacy is a good thing, it is part of being a CIVILIZED country where torture is not even considered.
Can't wait until our country is again respected and admired, not hated and despised because of our foreign policy and sense of entitlementl.
The hard line has worked just so well in changing Cuba. That communist dictatorship hardly lasted any time thanks to our approach.
Why is it okay to speak with brutal dictators in North Korea & China, but not in Iran & Cuba? I mean Reagan dealt with Iran. Kennedy, Nixon and Reagan all dealt with the Soviets...
The embargo only stifles democratic and economic progress for Cuba and the deserving Cuban residents who have sufferred enormously so politicians can appease ex Cubans. Americas double standard is so absurd. Time for change is now...
Wow. So now Obama is another Castro? That's some 'below the belt' analogy happening there.
I used to have high hopes for John McCain. I really thought he was different. But if he has thrown his lot in with Karl Rove my fingers won't be sullied pulling any 'republican' levers this year for sure. They will reap what they sow. And some former conservatives, like myself, may never be back.
Senator McCain, I believe it's admirable of your position, wanting to free political prisoners, encourage the democratic process, etc ... when it comes to Cuba. But answer me this: How you you effect your agenda toward Cuba without dialogue with it's government? Also, tell me this -- if there is nothing to distinguish your policy toward Cuba from the last 9 U.S. President, what makes you think there'll be substantial change based on your intended policies? I'm curious.
This shows just how much of an old, irrelevant fossil McCain actually is. Nobody in America, save for a few other old fossils, gives one "red" damn about Cuba...save for a few people rightfully upset that a lot of good business opportunities there are going to the Chinese.
It is hard to imagine what Senator McCain is morphing into. Will this be a hard-line militarist that wishes to hold sway over the rest of the world.
That was the neo-con agenda re: PNAC. What possible danger could Cuba represent to us. If we opened up all to them - Would that not essentially call Castro's bluff and begin a new line of thinking in Cuba?