Notable & Cheap: "Promise Us $2 Billion, Raúl, and We'll Call It a Deal"

"For the record I don't think Cuba will ever pay for the [$2 billion in] expropriations much less interest, but the Cuban government should acknowledge the debt and attempt to settle it like any debtor would. That's what China and Vietnam did under similar circumstances BEFORE the U.S. began wide-open trade with those countries. — Henry "Economist" Gómez, "Norm!" Babalú, February 29, 2006

If offered the opportunitry there is no doubt that Raúl Castro would jump at the chance of getting the trade embargo lifted for a promise to pay $2 billion in restitution for confiscated American assets. Hell, even if he had to make good on his promise, he would beg, borrow or steal the money, or, like Ceausescu, squeeze the very blood from his people to get it. As a last resort, he might even write a check for $2 billion from his personal Credit Suisse account because those $2 billion would return immediately untold dividends to him and the other "captains" of Cuban industry.

Yet that is all that Henry would require of him — Bill Gates' pocket change — for sanctions to be eliminated and "wide-open trade" to begin with "the Cuban government." By "wide open trade" we suppose that Henry means that Communist Cuba would not have to pay cash on the barrel for American goods anymore but would be extended credits and subsidies, for that is the only difference that exists at present between ongoing trade with Cuba and the "wide-open trade" which Henry "Economist" Gómez proposes for a mere promise of $2 billion.

Of course, we all know that Henry's idea of "freedom" for the Cuban people does not emanate from Martí's "Con todos y para el bien de todos," but from the "economic pragmatism" of the butchers of Tiananmen Square.