Cuban regime propped up by appeasers
Arecent headline summed it up neatly: "Canada talks softly on Cuba, while Bush prefers big tick."

The story that sparked the headline - just a couple of days after commemoration of the Day of Solidarity with the Cuban people - cited a comment from Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Maxine Bernier expressing the fond (and totally unrealistic) hop that the recent replacement of Fidel Castro as president by his brother Raul will lead to political and economic changes.

Fat chance. "Canada continues to monitor developments in Cuba closely," said Bernier, "and we are concerned about the plight of political prisoners, especially those suffering from poor health. It is our hope that recent shifts will open the way for the Cuban people to pursue a process of political and economic reform,."

The story - which cited, by way of contrast, U.S. President George Bush's description of Cuba as a "tropical gulag" - went on to say that Bernier's statement also acknowledged Canada's long-standing "links" with Cuba, dating back several decades.

Actually, they date back to Pierre Trudeau's shameless and very public catering to Castro, an unrepentant dictatorial tyrant - admired by the Canadian left because he's so anti-American - and manifests itself in Canadians consistently leading the world in tourism to the island state.

Last year, for example, more than 600,000 Canadian tourists visited Cuba, not only attracted by the beautiful beaches - which also exist in every other Caribbean country - but by the unmatched bargains, the cost of which are borne by the virtual slave labor provided by the Cuban state on behalf of our dutiful tourists.

Canadian industries and hotel chains also take advantage of property formerly owned by American interests but confiscated by Castro after the revolution, undaunted by the fact that most of the money they give to the government to pay for the staff in fact stays with the government. As for the staff, they too are forced to survive on slave wages, while Canadians bask on the beaches and live in hotels that the locals can't even afford to dream about sharing.

You can be sure if the Castros were right-wing dictators, as opposed to Communist dictators, Canada's squishy leftists and serial liberals would be marching in the streets demanding change.

Instead, boosted by widespread anti-Americanism in this country, Canadians have been among the most complicit in propping up one of the world's most vile regimes for several decades. Worse, we continue to celebrate that fact by blathering on about our "links" and our "solidarity" and, of course, by exploiting cheap labor imposed by the Castro regime on its own people.

This is a country that still does not allow its own people to organize, assemble and freely speak their minds; it does not allow anything close to a free press and it strictly enforces what academia can and cannot teach its' students.

It was just last December that armed Cuban authorities stormed into a Catholic Church, tear gassing the worshippers and dragging 18 of them out in what one Catholic official called "the worst attack against a church in 45 years."

And Bernier talks about "change." Oh, please.

Just a month ago, under the "new" and "improved" dictatorship of brother Raul - while thousands of Canadian tourists were lolling on the lovely beaches - Cuban police attacked, beat up and dragged away some of the "Ladies in White," a group who for years have been allowed to march peacefully each Sunday seeking freedom for their loved ones being held as political prisoners. Their crime? They tried to deliver a petition to the government asking for the release of political prisoners.

Apologists for the Castros in this country and elsewhere argue that the ongoing U.S. economic embargo hasn't worked, that only a policy of engagement will change things for the better there.

Nonsense.

The only reason Castro has been able to maintain his iron grip on Cuba is because his regime has been propped up by the appeasers - of which Canada, to its shame, leads the league.

Embargoes certainly ended the horrid apartheid regime in South Africa and Canada, to its credit, was a major player in organizing it.

Not so with Cuba. Instead, this country - and those 600,000 tourists who exploit Cuba - are the main reason why that country continues to oppress its own people and deny them the rights and freedoms that Canadian claim to value.