President Obama issued an executive order deeming Venezuela an "extraordinary threat" to the US, which allowed him to impose sanctions on the country. Meanwhile he recently took steps toward normalizing relations with Cuba, where a 50 year sanctions policy has been a total failure. Why the disconnect? Also, Sen. (and presidential candidate) Marco Rubio claims to bring new, fresh, young ideas into the campaign -- so why is he pushing hard to retain the failed 50 year Cuba embargo? That doesn't sound like new ideas!
President Obama issued an executive order deeming Venezuela an "extraordinary threat" to the US, which allowed him to impose sanctions on the country. Meanwhile he recently took steps toward normalizing relations with Cuba, where a 50 year sanctions policy has been a total failure. Why the disconnect? Also, Sen. (and presidential candidate) Marco Rubio claims to bring new, fresh, young ideas into the campaign -- so why is he pushing hard to retain the failed 50 year Cuba embargo? That doesn't sound like new ideas!
President Obama issued an executive order deeming Venezuela an "extraordinary threat" to the US, which allowed him to impose sanctions on the country. Meanwhile he recently took steps toward normalizing relations with Cuba, where a 50 year sanctions policy has been a total failure. Why the disconnect? Also, Sen. (and presidential candidate) Marco Rubio claims to bring new, fresh, young ideas into the campaign -- so why is he pushing hard to retain the failed 50 year Cuba embargo? That doesn't sound like new ideas!
Hello, everybody, and thank you for joining the Ron Paul Liberty Report.
Today with me is Daniel McAdams, who is the Executive Director of the Institute for Peace and Prosperity.
Daniel, good to have you with us today again, as usual, as our co-host.
Thank you.
Good.
I wanted to talk a little bit about what was going on in Panama recently.
There was a big meeting of the American states, the states of South America and Central America.
And they were having a couple complaints against us, which doesn't surprise me at all, because not too long ago, the president issued an executive order in March dealing with some sanctions because we were unhappy with some of the things they were doing there, which we hardly would endorse.
But once again, you know, they did it by executive orders, and I got to wondering.
It doesn't seem like anybody's complaining or demanding that they get to review this particular executive order.
But I think that, you know, the Institute had a very good article about this, and you've looked into this.
Tell us a little bit about what's going on.
Sure, we ran a great article by Ava Gollinger, who's written a lot about U.S. policy in Latin America and also about U.S. interventionism and lack of respect for sovereignty.
And as you say, it doesn't mean we endorse everything that happens in these countries.
But, you know, it almost became sort of a joke because the president issued such a strong-sounding executive order.
And I just want to read it, if you don't mind, because it's almost, you almost can't help it.
You sure I'm not going to get nervous about the danger?
I think they have 100,000 in their entire army, the Venezuelans.
It says he issued an executive order, quote, declaring a national emergency with respect to the unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States posed by the situation in Venezuela.
You know, what's interesting, somebody in the administration was asked by media about, you know, is it really that bad?
They say, oh, no, it's not really that bad.
But we have to use that language because legally, if we say this, the Congress says you can put on sanctions on various individuals and companies if you justify it by saying this.
So they themselves admit it that we don't have to worry.
So people don't worry the Venezuelans aren't going to invade.
Besides, I think we do a little bit of trade with Venezuela.
We buy some oil and they like to buy our goods and service.
I wonder why we do this to ourselves.
They're actually, we're the number one trading partner of Venezuela.
So it's a hugely important market for them and for us.
But, you know, as you point out, they had to say this to be able to justify the sanctions.
And what the U.S. was so upset about, they say, was that there was some, the U.S. claims there are some human rights abuses inside of Venezuela.
That may well be true, but as you often point out, we don't have a perfectly clean record when it comes to that here either.
No, and I'm no fan of sanctions for sure.
I think sanctions in a war, you know, that's the first thing you do, is you blockade and keep important substances getting into the country that you have declared war against.
But this is a lot different.
I mean, this is sort of tokenism, but so often it backfires on us.
There's blowback on it, unintended consequences.
We end up suffering more than they do.
And so I'm not too happy with this.
But, you know, this whole idea about sanctions, we had a new candidate, Republican candidate, just entered the race recently, and he talks about sanctions.
And that's the senator from Florida.
And one thing that Mr. Rubio mentioned was that it's time for a new generation to come forth and lead the charge.
He's 43 years old.
Oh, that's great.
They claim I have an appeal to young people.
He must be part of the new generation.
And yet, he condemns others in the campaign as being old-fashioned and older, and it's time to have this new generation.
But it looks like he's latched on to an old idea.
It's been 50 years that we've had sanctions on Cuba and has done essentially no good whatsoever, and it's done harm by really solidifying the power of the Castros.
And as you pointed out when we started, there was a historic meeting in Panama.
The U.S. was criticized for this silly move on Venezuela.
But for the first time in 50 years, a U.S. president sat down with the leader of Cuba.
They shook hands.
They discussed ways to improve their relations, something that we didn't think we'd be seeing.
But what really bugs me, though, is the flip-flopping and the inconsistency.
So we have a president that has done two things that we sympathize with.
You know, opening up the door to talks with Cuba and also Iran.
And yet he gets condemned by the neoconservatives for that.
But didn't we talk to the Soviets in terrible times and the Chinese?
And we opened up the doors and it killed 100-plus million people.
And now people get hysterical after 50 years that we even talk to individuals like this.
But at the same time, the president has done these things and we'd like to encourage him when we think he's moving in the right direction.
But at the same time, he said, we're going to have regime change in Syria.
Well, he did get the regime change.
It looks like ISIS is going to take over before it's all over.
But then he goes and puts all these sanctions on Russia and stirs up a battle with Russia.
That part, even though I was in politics for a while and I tried to understand people and be sympathetic and sort of try to figure out what moves them, but it's pretty hard to understand this.
But I think one thing is there is no desire whatsoever to have a concise, consistent policy that makes sense.
Inconsistencies In Policy Making00:01:02
Exactly.
And, you know, going back to Senator Rubio, you pointed out he's putting himself forward as a new generation of leaders with a new policy, but endorsing the same old thing of sanctions.
You know, we looked up, we talked about before we started recording is the young people, young Cuban Americans, the most recent poll showed that 90% of young Cuban Americans want to have normal relations with Cuba.
So who's doing the old-fashioned policy?
It's so bizarre.
And of course, I think Hillary's closer to our position on this.
She's probably more open to getting rid of it.
And yet we were able to criticize her a little bit for her addressing the middle class, which her policies haven't really helped.
So I think that, you know, the inconsistencies all around.
And unfortunately, they're going to be with us for a long time to come.
And it will continue, I guess, in the presidential race as well.