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Cubans Still Fleeing Castro While They CanIf Cubans try to float to the U.S., they’re sent back. So they take a great circle route overland that eventually funnels them across the M

In the humid heat of Tapachula in southern Mexico, a group of 40 Cubans relax on a sea of mattresses in a migrant shelter usually filled with about 15 Central American migrants.

“Everything is so expensive. If you go to the store to buy something, your salary is not going to be enough,” said José Fernández Márquez. “Cuba doesn’t change. It’s always the same.”

U.S. Ends 'Wet Foot, Dry Foot' Policy for Fleeing Cubans

the White House announced Thursday

Obama administration ended the policy with immediate effect through an executive order, one which could be reversed by the incoming Trump administration.

Flights to nine destinations in Cuba, not including Havana, will be suspended by the Department of Transportation.The department issued a notice on Friday suspending US commercial flights from flying to the Cuban destinations.

The announcement is another step in the Trump administration's attempt to tighten the relationship between the US and Cuba in a direct reversal of President Barack Obama's Cuba policy.

"to further the Administration's policy of strengthening the economic consequences to the Cuban regime for its ongoing repression of the Cuban people and its support for Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela."

In the Face of Weighty Problems, Trump Focuses on Squabbles

The morning after North Korea launched a ballistic missile into the sea, apparently to test President Trump’s resolve in his first days in office, the new commander in chief wanted to make one thing very clear to the world: Mark Cuban, the billionaire Dallas Mavericks owner, was not smart enough to have his job.

“He backed me big-time but I wasn’t interested in taking all of his calls. He’s not smart enough to run for president!”

The Trump administration expanded on Wednesday its list of Cuban entities that Americans are banned from doing business with to include the financial corporation that handles U.S. remittances to the Communist-run country.

Military-owned Fincimex is the main Cuban partner of foreign credit card companies and money transfer firm Western Union, which Cubans in the United States have used for two decades to send money back to their loved ones on the Caribbean island.

Those remittances are all the more needed now as the coronavirus pandemic is worsening Cuba’s already grim economic outlook, grinding the key tourism industry to a halt.

Those issues relate to what another writer here, George Yancy, in writing about the Trayvon Martin case, referred to as a “white gaze” that renders all black bodies dangerous and deviant. Unless we dismantle this gaze and its centuries-strong cultural pillars, it will be difficult to go past the outrage on race.

 our unjust economic system. Under this system, people compete for basic goods and services in what seems to be a fair and non-discriminating market. But since they enter this market from vastly different social circumstances, competition is anything but fair. Those who already possess goods have a much better chance of renewing their access to them, whereas those who don’t have little chance of ever getting them.

an examination of the recent history of Cuba does in fact provide valuable lessons about the complex links between economic justice, access to basic goods and services, racial inequality, and what Gutting refers to as “continuing problems about race.”

Cuban President Raul Castro told President Barack Obama that normalizing relations between the two countries could best be achieved by returning land currently occupied by the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay and lifting economic sanctions, Cuban officials said on Tuesday.

The two leaders met with on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Tuesday — the first such sit-down between leaders of the two countries on American soil since the Cuban revolution.

In a statement the White House said the president "also highlighted steps the United States intends to take to improve ties between the American and Cuban peoples, and reiterated our support for human rights in Cuba."

tightening presidential

crucial swing state

often divided almost exactly in half

They itched to rectify a military balance that was tipped in favour of the US. The Cuban revolutionaries also approved. Nobody, however, asked Khrushchev what would happen if the Americans discovered the missiles en route to Cuba, before they were ready, or if they reacted violently to them once they were installed. There was no “plan B”.

This failure was compounded by sloppy Soviet planning. The head of the Strategic Missile Force, Marshal Sergei Biryuzov, promised Khrushchev that Americans would not discover Soviet missiles because palm trees would cover them. One expert, who knew Cuba’s vegetation better, wanted to object, only to have his superior press on his foot under the table, to make him shut up. The tradition of telling bosses what they wanted to hear while sweeping awkward realities under the rug is not Soviet-Russian monopoly. Yet tradition truly flourished under the Soviets, and warped their decision-making, even in life-and-death situations.

There is a whole library of excellent books by US historians on the Cuban missile crisis. Innumerable conferences, seminars and “games” have taken place in an attempt to learn the lessons. No wonder that Biden, his people and the US military no longer share the Kennedy-era “gung-ho” approach to nuclear war. On the contrary, they are extremely careful and attentive to the slightest dangers of escalation in Ukraine. And they are determined that a taboo on the use of nuclear weapons should be maintained.

But about 5,000 Cuban migrants have been stranded in Central America for the last month because two countries

Nicaragua and Guatemala, have refused to give them free transit through their territory.

Cuba has recently eased travel restrictions, allowing many in the island nation to travel for the first time in decades.

For generations, among Cuban-Americans, once a largely monolithic voting bloc, the embargo was a symbol of defiance in exile — more gospel than policy.

a growing number of seasoned politicians to call the embargo a failure and argue that ending America’s enmity with Cuba represents the best chance of encouraging positive change on the island.

. Mr. Obama supported repealing the embargo when he was running for the United States Senate in 2004 but backtracked as a presidential candidate, saying in 2008 that the embargo gave Washington leverage over the Cuban government.

The Cuban Revolution inspired political awareness in almost all the writers, activists and intellectuals of my generation.

Our university professors, contemporaries of Castro, saw in him the definitive vindication of “Our America” against the other, arrogant and imperialist, America.

The literary supplements and magazines we read — by Julio Cortázar, Mario Vargas Llosa, Gabriel García Márquez, Carlos Fuentes — celebrated the Revolution not only for its economic and social achievements, but also for the cultural renaissance it ushered in.

The most contested battles this year will take place in six states: Arizona, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Mr. Trump won some of them by razor-thin margins.

Within these states are 20 counties that will help decide who wins enough electoral votes to reach the White House.

It’s likely this year’s race will again be decided by a percentage point or two.

The sheer volume of conspiracy theories — including QAnon — and deceptive claims are already playing a role in stunting Biden’s growth with Latino voters, who make up about 17 percent of the state’s electorate.

“It’s difficult to measure the effect exactly, but the polling sort of shows it and in focus groups it shows up, with people deeply questioning the Democrats, and referring to the ‘deep state’ in particular — that there’s a real conspiracy against the president from the inside,” he said. “There’s a strain in our political culture that’s accustomed to conspiracy theories, a culture that’s accustomed to coup d'etats.”

Florida’s Latino community is a diverse mix of people with roots across Latin America. There’s a large population of Republican-leaning Cubans in Miami-Dade and a growing number of Democratic-leaning voters with Puerto Rican, Colombian, Nicaraguan, Dominican and Venezuelan heritage in Miami and elsewhere in the state. Many register as independents but typically vote Democratic