Cuba

For weeks now, the Obama administration has been leaking to reporters its intention to modify U.S. travel regulations to Cuba. Reportedly, the administration will announce the policy change during the current congressional recess to avoid political blowback (so much for the courage of their convictions.)

As a policy matter, the move simply returns U.S. travel policy to that which existed under the Clinton administration, fostering "people-to-people" contacts by liberalizing categories of citizens' groups that can legally travel to Cuba. While religious, cultural, and artistic groups will now find it easier to visit Cuba, the changes most assuredly do not open Cuba up to unregulated tourist travel, which is the current Holy Grail of the noisy anti-embargo lobby.

In short, the new policy won't move the needle much on U.S.-Cuba relations or in Cuba itself. It won't translate into an economic windfall the Castro regime desperately needs nor are visits to Cuba by the American Ballet Theater likely to embolden ordinary Cubans to pressure for internal change anytime soon.

US policy in regard to Cuba has never seemed reasonable to me.  We treat them worse than countries with whom we have actually been at war.  For example, the United States is Vietnam’s largest export market and in 2009 was its largest source of foreign direct investment, yet we continue to embargo Cuba while even giving Communist China most-favored-nation trading status.

To me, that only makes sense if we are the fifth grade bully who torments the third graders while sucking up to the kids from junior high.