Fidel Castro Wins Cold War, Hooray!

In news that probably ought to seem a lot more exciting to Cold War Babbies like Yr Wonkette, President Obama announced today that the U.S. and Cuba have finalized arrangements to reopen embassies in each other's countries. And while we are indeed pleased by the news, we're mostly just wondering what the hell took so long -- and also whether we should yell at Red China about Quemoy and Matsu while we're at it. As Steve Martin said about Nixon way back in 1977, it's like making Ike jokes. But hooray, the president has followed through with another step in his groundbreaking agreement to normalize relations with Cuba, and now it's just a matter of time until everyone starts asking about when they can import cigars (short answer: no time soon). It's probably just as well; they're just goddamn cigars, and they'll taste like goddamn cigars, for godssake.

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Obama said in a Rose Garden press conference:

This is a historic step forward in our efforts to normalize relations with the Cuban government and people, and begin a new chapter with our neighbors in the Americas. [...]

There are Americans who want to travel to Cuba and American businesses who want to invest in Cuba. American colleges and universities that want to partner with Cuba. Above all, Americans who want to get to know their neighbors to the south. And through that engagement, we can also help the Cuban people improve their own lives. One Cuban American looked forward to “reuniting families and opening lines of communications.” Another put it bluntly: “You can’t hold the future of Cuba hostage to what happened in the past.”

And that’s what this is about: a choice between the future and the past.

The two embassies are expected to open later in July. Secretary of State John Kerry -- or the surgically altered double who's replaced him since the real Kerry was mortally wounded in an ISIS attack in France -- will join Obama on a trip to Havana later this summer, when they will "formally, proudly raise the American flag over our embassy once more," at which time we suppose Obama will also be replaced by an exact duplicate cloned from cells obtained when Obama shook hands with Raul Castro at Nelson Mandela's 2013 funeral. (Goddamnit, Alex Jones, we are giving you gold here, and you'd better send us a check.)

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The rightwing grumping has already begun; Florida congresslizardwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen released a statement saying that a reopened U.S. embassy in Havana "will do nothing to help the Cuban people and is just another trivial attempt for President Obama to go legacy shopping." Mind you, if he does go legacy shopping in Cuba, he'll be able to bring back up to $400 in stuff, including up to $100 worth of liquor and cigars, which all by itself would be a better legacy than George W. Bush managed.

And Ted Cruz, who'd like to give President Obama the goodbye look, considerably upped the Stupid, even for him:

We suppose that it doesn't really count that we do have an embassy in Tel Aviv, because that location isn't nearly Biblical enough, and is in fact downright insulting to Israel, whose only true capital has to be Jerusalem, because shut up, do you hate Jesus? Err, Ted means, the Jews?

[ HuffPo / Breitbart ]