I. Cuba is a country just 90 miles off the coast of Florida. Since 1962 there has been an embargo between the United States and Cuba. This embargo consists of economic sanctions against Cuba and restrictions on Cuban travel and commerce for all people and companies under US jurisdiction. The Cuban embargo should be lifted.
a. The embargo harms the US economy.
b. The United States should end the Cuba embargo because its 50-year policy has failed to achieve its goals.
c. If the embargo were lifted, the Cuban people would be a bit less deprived and Castro would have no one else to blame for the shortages.
d. Having said this, there are many details to support this.
II. The embargo harms our economy.
a. Cuban families are not the only victims of the embargo. Many of the dollars Cubans could earn from U.S. tourists if the embargo were lifted would come back to the United States to buy American products, especially farm goods.
b. If the embargo were lifted, the average American would feel a difference in his or her life within two to three years.
c. A study by Texas A&M University calculated that removing the restrictions on agricultural exports and travel to Cuba could create as many as 6,000 jobs in the US.
d. This would help strengthen our economy tremendously.
III. If the embargo were lifted, the Cuban people would be a bit less deprived and Castro would have no one else to blame for the shortages.
a. As a foreign policy tool, the embargo actually enhances Castro’s standing by giving him a handy excuse for the failures of his homegrown Caribbean socialism. He can go on for hours about the suffering the embargo inflicts on Cubans, even though the damage done by his domestic policies is far worse.
b. Cuban officials have not been forced to take responsibility for problems such as a failing health care system, lack of access to medicine, the decline of the sugar industry, crumbling plumbing systems and water pollution because they use the embargo as a scapegoat.
c. The Cuban Minister of Foreign Affairs reportedly blamed the embargo for a total of $1.66 billion in damage to the Cuban economy.
d. Lifting the embargo would put pressure on Cuba to address problems that it had previously blamed on US sanctions.
IV. If the goal of U.S. policy toward Cuba is to help its people achieve freedom and a better life, the economic embargo has completely failed.
a. Its economic effect was to make the people of Cuba worse off by depriving them of lower-cost food and other goods that could be bought from the United States. It means less independence for Cuban
