California’s agriculture and food secretary, A. G. Kawamura is on a visit to fidel’s tropical workers’ paradise this week, and for a change, The Associated Press begins to see a bit of the apartheid:
California hopes it can carve out an upscale market for such goodies as pistachios, figs, kiwi fruit and wine in Cuba, the land of ration cards and rice and beans at nearly every meal.
What kind of upscale market exists in Cuba? First, the tyrants – raul, fidel and their bunch. Second is the upscale tourists who finance the dictatorship. As we’ve learned from The Real Cuba, all of those fancy tourist hotels and resorts are owned by what the Cuban government calls “the revolutionary armed forces.” Meaning the money the tourists pay the hotel for the upscale rooms and upscale food goes right into the hands of the Cuban military – and is used for oppression.
Kawamura follows agricultural secretaries from 18 other states who have visited Cuba in recent years, and acknowledged that California is behind many states in establishing major trade relationships here. Despite being America’s largest generator of agricultural trade, his state shipped only $735,000 worth of farm products to Cuba in 2006, largely powdered milk, rice and wine.
That’s right. As we’ve pointed out here many times, the United States is the largest provider of food to Cuba. That’s some embargo.