FRAMEWORK

A. Our interpretation is that the negative should be able to weigh the advantages of the plan against the AFF, which must be enacted by the United States federal government.

B. Violation – they don’t let us weigh the Neg

C. Vote Neg

1) topic focus – our framework ensures a stable locus for links and the comparison of alternatives. The affs framework does not ensure that the topic is the starting-point of the debate makes confusion and judge intervention inevitable.

2) Ground – there are an infinite number of unpredictable critical frameworks, links, and impacts. Forcing the neg to debate in the critical framework moots the 1NC. Because the aff could literally be about anything, their so-called framework destroys NEG ground because we can never predict what we’ll have to compare our plan to. Even if there’s some ground for us to respond to their arg, it’s not good or predictable and losing the 1AC puts us at an inherent disadvantage.

3) Topic-specific education – only debates about the plan translate into education about the topic. There would be no reason to switch topics every year if not for plan-focus debate. K frameworks encourage ultra-generics like the ‘state bad’ K that are stale and uneducational.

Policy involvement is inevitable- we need to proactively engage in the language of policy making for movements to be effectiveMakani 2k Themba-Nixon, Executive Director of The Praxis Project, Former California Staffer, Colorlines. Oakland: Jul 31, 2000.Vol.3, Iss. 2; pg. 12

The flourish and passion with which she made the distinction said everything. Policy is for wonks, sell-out politicians, and ivory-tower eggheads. Organizing is what real, grassroots people do. Common as it may be, this distinction doesn't bear out in the real world. Policy is more than law. It is any written agreement (formal or informal) that specifies how an institution, governing body, or community will address shared problems or attain shared goals. It spells out the terms and the consequences of these agreements and is the codification of the body's values-as represented by those present in the policymaking process. Given who's usually present, most policies reflect the

political agenda of powerful elites. Yet, policy can be a force for change -especially when we bring our base and

community organizing into the process. In essence, policies are the codification of power relationships and resource allocation. Policies are the rules of the world we live in. Changing the world means changing the rules. So, if organizing is about changing the rules and building power, how can organizing be separated from policies? Can we really speak truth to power, fight the right, stop corporate abuses, or win racial justice without contesting the rules and the rulers, the policies and the policymakers? The answer is no-and double no for people of color. Today, racism subtly dominates nearly every aspect of policymaking. From ballot propositions to city funding priorities, policy is increasingly about the control, de-funding, and disfranchisement of communities of color. What Do We Stand For?

Take the public conversation about welfare reform, for example. Most of us know it isn't really about putting people to work. The right's message was framed around racial stereotypes of lazy, cheating "welfare queens" whose poverty was "cultural." But the new welfare policy was about moving billions of dollars in individual cash payments and direct services from welfare recipients to other,

more powerful, social actors. Many of us were too busy to tune into the welfare policy drama in Washington,

only to find it washed up right on our doorsteps. Our members are suffering from workfare policies, new regulations,

and cutoffs. Families who were barely getting by under the old rules are being pushed over the edge by the new policies. Policy doesn't get more relevant than this. And so we got involved in policy-as defense. Yet we have to do more than block their punches. We have to start the fight with initiatives of our own. Those who do are finding offense a bit more fun than defense alone. Living wage ordinances, youth development initiatives, even gun control and alcohol and tobacco policies are finding their way onto the public agenda, thanks to focused community organizing that leverages power for community-driven initiatives. - Over 600 local policies have been passed to regulate the tobacco industry. Local coalitions have taken the lead by writing ordinances that address local problems and organizing broad support for them. - Nearly 100 gun control and violence prevention policies have been enacted since 1991. - Milwaukee, Boston, and Oakland are among the cities that have passed living wage ordinances: local laws that guarantee higher than minimum wages for workers, usually set as the minimum needed to keep a family of four above poverty. These are just a few of the examples that demonstrate how organizing for local policy advocacy has made inroads in areas where positive national policy had been stalled by conservatives. Increasingly, the local policy arena is where the action is and where activists are finding success. Of course, corporate interests-which are usually the target of these policies-are gearing up in defense. Tactics include front groups, economic pressure, and the tried and true: cold, hard cash. Despite these barriers, grassroots organizing can be very effective at the smaller scale of local politics. At the local level, we have greater access to elected officials and officials have a greater reliance on their constituents for reelection. For example, getting 400 people to show up at city hall in just about any city in the U.S. is quite impressive. On the other hand, 400 people at the state house or the Congress would have a less significant impact. Add to that the fact that all 400 people at city hall are usually constituents, and the impact is even greater. Recent trends in government underscore the importance of local policy. Congress has enacted a series of measures devolving significant power to state and local government. Welfare, health care, and the regulation of food and drinking water safety are among the areas where states and localities now have greater rule. Devolution has some negative consequences to be sure. History has taught us that, for social services and civil rights in particular, the lack of clear federal standards and mechanisms for accountability lead to uneven

enforcement and even discriminatory implementation of policies. Still, there are real opportunities for advancing progressive initiatives in this more localized environment. Greater local control can mean greater community power to shape and implement important social policies that were heretofore out of reach. To do so will require careful attention to the mechanics of local policymaking and a clear blueprint of what we stand for. Getting It in Writing Much of the work of framing what we stand for takes place in the shaping of demands. By getting into the policy arena in a proactive manner, we can take our demands to the next level. Our demands can become law, with real consequences if the agreement is broken. After all the organizing, press work, and effort, a group should leave a decisionmaker with more than a handshake and his or

her word. Of course, this work requires a certain amount of interaction with "the suits," as well as struggles with the bureaucracy, the technical language, and the all-too-common resistance by decisionmakers. Still, if it's worth demanding, it's worth having in writing-whether as law, regulation, or internal policy. From ballot initiatives on rent control to laws requiring worker protections, organizers are leveraging their power into written policies that are making a real difference in their communities. Of course, policy work is just one tool in our organizing arsenal, but it is a tool we simply can't afford to ignore. Making policy work an integral part of organizing will require a certain amount of retrofitting. We will need to develop the capacity to translate our information, data, and experience into stories that are designed to affect the public conversation. Perhaps most important, we will need to move beyond fighting problems and on to framing solutions that bring us closer to our vision of how things should be. And then we must be committed to making it so.

Critical discourse doesn’t cause change – empirically provenMearshheimer 09Professor of Political Science and the co-director of International Security Policy at the University of Chicago (John J. Mearsheimer, “Reckless States and Realism” 2009, http://mearsheimer.uchicago.edu/pdfs/A0048.pdf)

Second, a close look at the international politics of the feudal era reveals scant support for the claims of critical theorists. Markus Fischer has done a detailed study of that period, and he finds "that feudal discourse was indeed distinct,

prescribing unity, functional cooperation, sharing, and lawfulness."166 More importantly, however, he also finds "that while feudal actors observed these norms for the most part on the level of form, they in essence behaved like modern states." Specifically, they "strove for exclu sive territorial control, protected themselves by military means, subjugated each other, balanced against power, formed alliances and spheres of influence, and resolved their conflicts by the use and threat of force." 167 Realism, not critical theory, appears best to explain international politics in the five centuries of the feudal era.

Failure to engage the political process turns the affirmative into spectators who are powerless to produce real change.Rorty 98 (prof of philosophy at Stanford, Richard, 1998, “achieving our country”, Pg. 7-9)JFS

Such people find pride in American citizenship impossi ble, and vigorous participation in electoral politics pointless. They associate American patriotism with an endorsement of atrocities: the importation of African slaves, the slaughter of Native Americans, the rape of ancient forests, and the Vietnam War. Many of them think of national pride as appropriate only for chauvinists: for the sort of American who re-joices that America can still orchestrate something like the Gulf War, can still bring deadly force to bear whenever and wherever it chooses. When young intellectuals watch John Wayne war movies after reading Heidegger, Foucault, Stephenson, or Silko, t hey often become convinced that they live in a violent , inhuman, corrupt country. They begin to think of themselves as a saving remnant-as the happy few who have the insight to see through nationalist rhetoric to the ghastly reality of contemporary America. But this insight does not move them to formulate a legislative program, to join a political movement, or to share in a national hope. The contrast between national hope and national self-mockery and self-disgust becomes vivid when one compares novels like Snow Crash and Almanac of the Dead with socialist novels of the first half of the century-books like The Jungle, An American Tragedy, and The Grapes of Wrath. The latter were written in the belief that the tone of the Gettysburg Address was absolutely right, but that our country would have to transform itself in order to fulfill Lincoln's hopes. Transfor mation would be needed because the rise of industrial capitalism had made the individualist rhetoric of America's first century obsolete. The authors of these novels thought that this rhetoric should be replaced by one in which America is destined to become the first cooperative commonwealth, the first classless society. This America would be one in which income and wealth are equitably distributed, and in which the government ensures equality of opportunity as well as individual liberty. This new, quasi-communitarian rhetoric was at the heart of the Progressive Movement and the New Deal. It set the tone for the American Left during the first six decades of the twentieth century. Walt Whitman and John Dewey, as we shall see, did a great deal to shape this rhetoric. The difference between early twentieth-century leftist in tellectuals and the majority of their contemporary counter parts is the difference between agents and spectators. In the early decades of this century, when an intellectual stepped back from his or her country's history and looked at it through skeptical eyes, the chances were tha t he or she was about to propose a new political initiative. Henry Adams was, of course, the great exception-the great abstainer from ·politics. But William James thought that Adams' diagnosis of the First Gilded Age as a symptom of irreversible moral and political decline was merely perverse. James's pragmatist theory of truth was in part a reaction against the sort of detached spectators hip which Adams affected. For James, disgust with American hypocrisy and self-deception was pointless unless accompanied by an effort to give America reason to be proud of itself in the future. The kind of proto- Heideggerian cultural pessimism which Adams cultivated seemed, to James, decadent and cowardly. "Democracy," James wrote, "is a kind of religion, and we are bound not to admit its failure. Faiths and utopias are the noblest exercise of human reason, and no one with a spark of reason in him will sit down fatalistically before the croaker's picture. "2

Inherent equality of all beings requires utilitiarianismCummiskey 1996 (David, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Bates College and Ph.D. from UM, “Kantian Consequentialism”, p. 145-146)In the next section, I will defend this interpretation of the duty of beneficence. For the sake of argument, however, let us first simply assume that beneficence does not require significant self-sacrifice and see what follows. Although Kant is unclear on this point, we will assume that significant self-sacrifices are supererogatory.11 Thus, if I must harm one in order to save many, the individual whom I will harm by my action is not morally required to affirm the action. On the other hand, I have a duty to do all that I can for those in need. As a consequence I am faced with a dilemma: If I act, I harm a person in a way that a rational being need not consent to; if I fail to act, then I do not do my duty to those in need and thereby fail to promote an objective end. Faced with such a choice, which horn of the dilemma is more consistent with the formula of the end-in-itself? We must not obscure the issue by characterizing this type of case as the sacrifice of individuals for some abstract "social entity." It is not a question of some persons having to bear the cost for some elusive "overall social good." Instead, the question is whether some persons must bear the inescapable cost for the sake of other persons . Robert Nozick, for example, argues that "to use a person in this way does not sufficiently respect and take account of the fact that he is a separate person, that his is the only life he has."12 But why is this not equally true of all those whom we do not save through our failure to act? By emphasizing solely the one who must bear the cost if we act, we fail to sufficiently respect and

take account of the many other separate persons , each with only one life, who will bear the cost of our inaction . In such a situation, what would a conscientious Kantian agent, an agent motivated by the unconditional value of rational beings, choose? A morally good agent recognizes that the basis of all particular duties is the principle that "rational nature exists as an end in itself" (GMM 429). Rational nature as such is the supreme objective end of all conduct. If one truly believes that all rational beings have an equal value, then the rational solution to such a dilemma involves maximally promoting the lives and liberties of as many rational beings as possible (chapter 5). In order to avoid this conclusion, the non-consequentialist Kantian needs to justify agent-centered constraints. As we saw in chapter 1, however, even most Kantian deontologists recognize that agent-centered constraints require a non-value-based rationale. But we have seen that Kant's normative theory is based on an unconditionally valuable end. How can a concern for the value of rational beings lead to a refusal to sacrifice rational beings even when this would prevent other more extensive losses of rational beings? If the moral law is based on the value of rational beings and their ends, then what is the

rationale for prohibiting a moral agent from maximally promoting these two tiers of value? If I sacrifice some for the sake of others, I do not use them arbitrarily, and I do not deny the unconditional value of rational beings . Persons

may have "dignity, that is, an unconditional and incomparable worth" that transcends any market value (GMM 436), but persons also have a fundamental equality that dictates that some must sometimes give way for the sake of others

(chapters 5 and 7). The concept of the end-in-itself does not support the view that we may never force another to bear some cost in order to benefit others. If one focuses on the equal value of all rational beings, then equal

consideration suggests that one may have to sacrifice some to save many.

Turn—rejecting strategic predictions of threats makes them inevitable—decision-makers will rely on preconceived conceptions of threat rather than the more qualified predictions of analystsFitzsimmons 2007 [Michael, Washington DC defense analyst, “The Problem of Uncertainty in Strategic Planning”, Survival, Winter 06-07, online]

But handling even this weaker form of uncertainty is still quite challenging. If not sufficiently bounded, a high degree of variability in planning factors can exact a significant price on planning. The complexity presented by great variability strains the cognitive abilities of even the most sophisticated decision- makers .15 And even a robust decision-making process sensitive to cognitive limitations necessarily sacrifices depth of analysis for breadth as variability and complexity grows. It should follow,

then, that in planning under conditions of risk, variability in strategic calculation should be carefully tailored to available analytic and decision processes. Why is this important? What harm can an imbalance between complexity and

cognitive or analytic capacity in strategic planning bring? Stated simply, where analysis is silent or inadequate , the personal beliefs of decision-makers fill the void . As political scientist Richard Betts found in a study of strategic sur- prise, in ‘an environment that lacks clarity, abounds with conflicting data, and allows no time for rigorous assessment of sources and validity, ambiguity allows intuition or wishfulness to drive interpretation ... The greater the ambiguity, the greater the impact of preconception s .’16 The decision-making environment that Betts

describes here is one of political-military crisis, not long-term strategic planning. But a strategist who sees uncertainty as the central fact of his environ- ment brings upon himself some of the pathologies of crisis decision-making. He invites ambiguity, takes conflicting data for granted and substitutes a priori scepticism about the validity of prediction for time pressure as a rationale for discounting the importance of analytic rigour . It is important not to exaggerate the extent to which data and ‘rigorous assessment’ can illuminate strategic choices. Ambiguity is a fact of life, and scepticism of analysis is necessary. Accordingly, the intuition and judgement of decision-makers will always be vital to strategy, and attempting to subordinate those factors to some formulaic,

deterministic decision-making model would be both undesirable and unrealistic. All the same, there is danger in the opposite extreme as well. Without careful analysis of what is relatively likely and what is relatively unlikely, what will be the possible bases for strategic choices? A decision-maker with no faith in prediction is left with little more than a

set of worst-case scenarios and his existing beliefs about the world to confront the choices before him. Those beliefs may be more or less well founded, but if they are not made explicit and subject to analysis and debate regarding their application to particular strategic contexts, they remain only beliefs and premises, rather than rational judgements. Even at their best, such decisions are likely to be poorly understood by the organisations charged with their implementation . At their worst, such decisions may be poorly understood by the decision-makers themselves.

Radical opposition to the system affirms its existence. Opposing discourses allow the system to simulate its own death and delay its collapse. Baudrillard in 81 [Jean, “Simulacra and Simulation” p. 18-19

Conjunction of the system and of its extreme alternative like the two sides of a curved mirror, a "vicious" curvature of a political space that is henceforth magnetized, circularized, reversibilized from the right to the left, a torsion that is like that of the evil spirit of commutation, the whole system, the

infinity of capital folded back on its own surface: transfinite? And is it not the same for desire and the libidinal space? Conjunction of desire and value, of desire and capital. Conjunction of desire and the law, the final pleasure as the metamorphosis of the law (which is why it is so widely the order of the day): only capital takes pleasure, said Lyotard, before thinking that we now take pleasure in capital. Overwhelming versatility of desire in Deleuze, an enigmatic reversal that brings desire "revolutionary in itself, and as if involuntarily, wanting what it wants," to desire its own repression and to invest in paranoid and fascist systems? A malign torsion that returns this revolution of desire to the same fundamental ambiguity as the other, the historical revolution. All the referentials combine their discourses in a circular, Mobian compulsion. Not so long ago, sex and work were fiercely opposed terms; today both are dissolved in the same type of demand. Formerly the discourse on history derived its power from violently opposing itself to that of nature, the discourse of desire to that of power-today they exchange their signifiers and their scenarios. It would take too long to traverse the entire range of the operational negativity of all those scenarios of deterrence, which, like Watergate, try to regenerate a moribund principle through simulated scandal, phantasm, and murder-a sort of hormonal treatment through

negativity and crisis. It is always a question of moving the real through the imaginary, proving truth through scandal, proving the law through transgression, proving work through striking, proving the system through crisis, and capital through revolution, as it is elsewhere (the Tasaday) of proving ethnology through the dispossession of its object-without taking into account: the proof of theater through antitheater; the proof of art through antiart; the proof of pedagogy through antipedagogy; the proof of psychiatry through antipsychiatry, etc. Everything is

metamorphosed into its opposite to perpetuate itself in its expurgated form. All the powers, all the institutions speak of themselves through denial, in order to attempt, by simulating death , to escape their real death throes. Power can stage its own murder to rediscover a glimmer of existence and legitimacy Such was the case with some American presidents: the Kennedys were murdered because they still had a political dimension. The others, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, only had the right to phantom attempts, to simulated murders. But this aura of an artificial menace was still necessary to conceal that they were no longer anything but the mannequins of power. Formerly, the king (also the god) had to die, therein lay his power. Today, he is miserably forced to

feign death, in order to preserve the blessing of power. But it is lost. To seek new blood in its own death, to renew the cycle through the mirror of crisis, negativity; and antipower: this is the only solution-alibi of every power , of every institution attempting to break the vicious circle of its irresponsibility and of its fundamental nonexistence, of its already seen and of its already dead .

T

A. Interpretation - Economic engagement includes economic incentives such as investment, aid, loans, tech transfer, removal of sanctions, etc.

Haass 2k(Robert N. Haass, Director of Foreign Policy Studies, Brookings 2k, Survival, Vol 42, no. 2, Summer, p. 114-115, JD)

Architects of engagement strategies can choose from a wide variety of incentives. Economic engagement might offer tangible incentives such as export credits, investment insurance or promotion, access to technology, loans or economic aid. Other equally useful economic incentives involve the removal of penalties such as trade embargoes, investment bans or high tariffs, which have impeded economic relations between the United States and the target country. Facilitated entry into the global economic arena and the institutions that govern it rank among the most potent incentives in today’s global market. Similarly, political engagement can involve the lure of diplomatic recognition, access to regional or international institutions, the scheduling of summits between leaders – or the termination of these benefits.

B. Violation – affirmative only removes Cuba from the terror list which is not a form of economic engagement

C. Standards:

1) Ground- allowing cultural engagement explodes the topic which limits neg ground. It allows an unlimited number of affs and prevents generics.

2) Bright line- our interpretation sets a clear line on what is and is not topical.

3) Limits- our interp is key to limiting the topic. It defines what is and is not topical and sets up predictable limits for the resolution

D. Topicality is a voting issue for competitive equity and fairness

1. Predictable Limits – research focus is on economic policies towards topic countries. Including non-economic engagement explodes these limits. Limits key to neg prep and clash

2. Ground – All DA and K links are based on economic engagement. Non-economic engagement should be reserved as key neg cp ground. Gound key to in-depth debates and education

3. Effects T – at best the aff can win that removing Cuba from the terror list might result in economic engagement, but its not a direct result of the plan. Effects T is an independent voter because it makes the aff a moving target and explodes limits

POl

Obama’s push ensures compromise to avoid default Kuhnenhenn 9/8Jim, “Issues test Obama’s persuasion, mobilizing skills”, http://www.salon.com/2013/09/08/issues_test_obamas_persuasion_mobilizing_skills/, MCR

Win or lose, Obama and lawmakers then would run headlong into a debate over the budget.¶ Congress will have a limited window to continue government operations before the new budget year begins Oct. 1.¶ Congressional leaders probably will agree to hold spending at current budget levels for about two months or three months. That would delay a confrontation with the White House and pair a debate over 2014 spending levels with the government’s need to raise its current $16.7 trillion borrowing limit. The Treasury says the government will hit that ceiling in mid-October.¶ Obama has been adamant that he will not negotiate over the debt limit. He says a similar faceoff in 2011 hurt the economy and caused Standard & Poors to lower its

rating of the nation’s debt, which made it more expensive to borrow.¶ White House officials say they ultimately have leverage because they believe Republicans would be punished politically for playing brinkmanship and threatening the nation with a default.¶ The White House is counting on pressure from traditional Republican allies, particularly in the business sector. “It is insane not to raise the debt ceiling,” U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Thomas Donohue said last week on C-SPAN. Donohue pledged to find primary challengers against lawmakers who threaten a default.

Syria speech freed up Obama’s attention for debt talks – PC is key and finite Bohan 9/11 Caren, “Delay in Syria vote frees Obama to shift to hefty domestic agenda”, http://carnegieeurope.eu/strategiceurope/?fa=52932, MCR

(Reuters) - Putting off a decision on military strikes on Syria allows President Barack Obama to shift his attention back to a weighty domestic agenda for the fall that includes budget fights, immigration and

selecting a new chairman of the Federal Reserve.¶ Obama and his aides have immersed themselves for a week and a half in an intensive effort to win support in Congress for U.S. military action in Syria after a suspected chemical weapons attack last month killed more than 1,400 people.¶ But the effort, which included meetings by Obama on Capitol Hill on Tuesday followed by his televised speech to Americans,

seemed headed for an embarrassing defeat, with large numbers of both Democrats and Republicans expressing opposition.¶ T he push for a vote on Syria - which has now been delayed - had threatened to crowd out the busy legislative agenda for the final three months of 2013 and drain Obama's political clout , making it harder for him to press his

priorities.¶ But analysts said a proposal floated by Russia, which the Obama administration is now exploring, to place Syria's

weapons under international control may allow Obama to emerge from a difficult dilemma with minimal political damage .¶ " He dodges a tough political situation this way ," said John Pitney, professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College in California.¶ Pitney said the delay in the Syria vote removes a big burden for Obama, given that Americans, who overwhelmingly opposed military intervention in Syria, will now be able to shift their attention to other matters.¶ He said Obama could suffer some weakening of his leverage with Congress. The administration's "full court press" to try to persuade lawmakers to approve military force on Syria was heavily criticized and did not yield much success.¶ "He probably has suffered some damage in Congress because there are probably many people on (Capitol Hill) who have increasing doubts about the basic competence of the administration and that's a disadvantage in any kind of negotiation,"

Pitney said.¶ BUDGET BATTLES¶ Among Obama's most immediate challenges are two looming budget fights. By September 30, Congress and the president must agree on legislation to keep federal agencies funded or face a government shutdown.¶ Two

weeks later, Congress must raise the limit on the country's ability to borrow or risk a possible debt default that could cause chaos in financial markets.¶ On the first budget showdown, Obama may be at a strategic advantage because of divisions among opposition Republicans about whether to use the spending bill to provoke a fight over Obama's signature health care law, known as Obamacare.¶ House Republican leaders are trying to rally the party around a temporary spending

measure that would keep the government funded until December 15 but are facing resistance within their own caucus from some

conservatives who want to cut off funding for Obamacare, even if it means a government shutdown.¶ The debt limit fight could end up going down to the wire and unnerving financial markets. Republicans want to use that standoff to extract concessions

from the Democratic president, such as spending cuts and a delay in the health law. But Obama has said he has no intention of negotiating over the borrowing limit .

Drains capital – Backlash and hostage taking on unrelated priority legislation is empirically proven, likely in future and specifically true for Rubio – Cuba policy is totally unique – this is the best link card you will ever readLeoGrande, 12William M. LeoGrande School of Public Affairs American University, Professor of Government and a specialist in Latin American politics and U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America, Professor LeoGrande has been a frequent adviser to government and private sector agencies, 12/18/12, http://www.american.edu/clals/upload/LeoGrande-Fresh-Start.pdf

The Second Obama Administration Where in the executive branch will control over Cuba policy lie? Political considerations played a major role in Obama's Cuba policy during the first term , albeit not as preeminent a consideration as they were during

the Clinton years. In 2009, Obama's new foreign policy team got off to a bad start when they promised Senator Menendez that they would consult him before changing Cuba policy. That was the price he extracted for

providing Senate Democrats with the 60 votes needed to break a Republican filibuster on a must-

pass omnibus appropriations bill to keep the government operating. For the next four years, administration officials worked more closely with Menendez, who opposed the sort of major redirection of policy Obama had promised, than they did with senators like John Kerry (D-Mass.), chair of the Foreign Relations Committee,

whose views were more in line with the president's stated policy goals. At the Department of State, Assistant Secretary

Arturo Valenzuela favored initiatives to improve relations with Cuba, but he was stymied by indifference or

resistance elsewhere in the bureaucracy . Secretary Hillary Clinton, having staked out a tough position Cuba during the

Democratic primary campaign, was not inclined to be the driver for a new policy. At the NSC, Senior Director for the Western

Hemisphere Dan Restrepo, who advised Obama on Latin America policy during the 2008 campaign, did his best to avoid

the Cuba issue because it was so fraught with political danger. When the president finally approved the resumption of people-to-people travel to Cuba, which Valenzuela had been pushing, the White House political team delayed the announcement for several months at the behest of Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Any easing of

the travel regulations, she warned, would hurt Democrats' prospects in the upcoming mid-term elections.43 The White House shelved the new regulations until January 2011, and then announced them late Friday before a holiday weekend.

Then, just a year later, the administration surrendered to Senator Rubio's demand that it limit the licensing of

travel providers in exchange for him dropping his hold on the appointment of Valenzuela's replacement.44 With

Obama in his final term and Vice-President Joe Biden unlikely to seek the Democratic nomination in 2016 (unlike the situation Clinton and Gore faced in their second term), politics will presumably play a less central role in deciding Cuba policy over the next four years. There will still be the temptation, however, to sacrifice Cuba policy to mollify congressional conservatives , both

Democrat and Republican, who are willing to hold other Obama initiatives hostage to extract

concessions on Cuba . And since Obama has given in to such hostage-taking previously, the hostage-

takers have a strong incentive to try the same tactic again . The only way to break this cycle would be for the president

to stand up to them and refuse to give in, as he did when they attempted to rollback his 2009 relaxation of restrictions on CubanAmerican travel and remittances. Much will depend on who makes up Obama's new foreign policy team, especially at the Department of State.

John Kerry has been a strong advocate of a more open policy toward Cuba, and worked behind the scenes with the State Department and USAID to clean up the "democracy promotion" program targeting Cuba, as a way to win the release of Alan Gross. A new secretary is likely to

bring new assistant secretaries, providing an opportunity to revitalize the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, which has been thoroughly cowed by congressional hardliners . But even with new players in place, does Cuba

rise to the level of importance that would justify a major new initiative and the bruising battle with

conservatives on the Hill? Major policy changes that require a significant expenditure of political

capital rarely happen unless the urgency of the problem forces policymakers to take action.

Removing cuba from terror list will drain obama’s political capitalWilliams 13(Carol J. Williams, LA Times, May 3 2013, http://www.latimes.com/news/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-cuba-us-terror-list-20130502,0,2494970.story, Accessed July 22, 2013, JD)Politicians who have pushed for a continued hard line against Cuba cheered their victory in getting the Obama administration to keep Cuba on the list . U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a South Florida Republican whose efforts to isolate and punish the Castro regime have been a central plank of her election strategy throughout her 24 years in Congress, hailed the State Department decision as “reaffirming the threat that the Castro regime represents.”¶ Arash Aramesh, a national security analyst at Stanford Law School, blamed the continued branding of Cuba as a terrorism sponsor on politicians “pandering for a certain political base.” He also said President Obama and Secretary of State John F. Kerry have failed to make a priority of removing the impediment to better relations with Cuba.¶ “As much as I’d like to see the Castro regime gone and an open and free Cuba, it takes away from the State Department’s credibility when they include countries on the list that aren’t even close” to threatening Americans, Aramesh said.¶ Political considerations also factor into excluding countries from the “state sponsor” list, he said, pointing to Pakistan as a prime example. Although Islamabad “very clearly supports terrorist and insurgent organizations,” he said, the U.S. government has long refused to provoke its ally in the region with the official censure.¶ The decision to retain Cuba on the list surprised some observers of the long-contentious relationship between Havana and Washington. Since Fidel Castro retired five years ago and handed the reins of power to his younger brother, Raul, modest economic reforms have been tackled and the government has revoked the practice of requiring Cubans to get “exit visas” before they could leave their country for foreign travel.¶ There was talk early in Obama’s first term of easing the 51-year-old embargo, and Kerry, though still in the Senate then, wrote a commentary for the Tampa Bay Tribune in 2009 in which he deemed the security threat from Cuba “a faint shadow.” He called then for freer travel between the two countries and an end to the U.S. policy of isolating Cuba “that has manifestly failed for nearly 50 years.”¶ The political clout of the Cuban American community in South Florida and more recently Havana’s refusal to release Gross have kept any warming between the Cold War adversaries at bay.¶ It’s a matter of political priorities and trade-offs, Aramesh said. He noted that former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton last year exercised her discretion to get the Iranian opposition group Mujahedeen Khalq, or MEK, removed from the government’s list of designated terrorist organizations. That move was motivated by the hopes of some in Congress that the group could be aided and encouraged to eventually challenge the Tehran regime.¶ “It’s a question of how much political cost you want to incur or how much political capital you want to spend,” Aramesh said. “President Obama has decided not to reach out to Cuba, that he has more important foreign policy battles elsewhere.”4 4

Failure to raise debt ceiling collapses military effectiveness and hegMasters 1/2/13 (Jonathan, Deputy Editor for the Council on Foreign Relations, “US Debt Ceiling Costs Consequences,” http://www.cfr.org/international-finance/us-debt-ceiling-costs-consequences/p24751)The government must be able to issue new debt as long as it continues to run a budget deficit. The debt limit, or "ceiling," sets the maximum amount of outstanding federal debt the U.S. government can incur by law . As of January 2013, this number stands at $16.39 trillion. Increasing the debt limit does not enlarge the nation's financial commitments, but allows the government to fund obligations already legislated by Congress. Hitting the debt ceiling would hamstring the government's ability to finance its operations, like providing for the national defense or funding entitlements such as Medicare or Social Security. Under normal circumstances, the government is able to auction off new debt (typically in the

form of U.S. Treasury securities) in order to finance annual deficits. However, the debt limit places an absolute cap on this borrowing, requiring congressional approval for any increase (or decrease) from this statutory level.

US hegemony is vital to preventing every major impact. Decline will trigger a catastrophic collapse of the global order. History is on our side Thayer 6 [Professor of Defense and Strategic Studies @ Missouri State University [Thayer, Bradley A., "In Defense of Primacy.," National Interest; Nov/Dec2006 Issue 86, p32-37]U.S. primacy--and the bandwagoning effect --has also given us extensive influence in international politics , allowing the United States to shape the behavior of states and international institutions . Such influence comes

in many forms, one of which is America's ability to create coalitions of like-minded states to free Kosovo, stabilize Afghanistan, invade Iraq or to stop proliferation through the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI). Doing so allows the United States to operate with allies outside of the UN, where it can be stymied by opponents. American-led wars in Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq stand in contrast to the UN's inability to save the people of Darfur or even to conduct any military campaign to realize the goals

of its charter. The quiet effectiveness of the PSI in dismantling Libya's WMD programs and unraveling the A. Q. Khan proliferation network are in sharp relief to the typically toothless attempts by the UN to halt proliferation. You can count with one hand countries opposed to the United States. They are the "Gang of Five": China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Venezuela. Of course, countries like India, for example, do not agree with all policy choices made by the United States, such as toward Iran, but New Delhi is friendly to Washington. Only the "Gang of Five" may be expected to consistently resist the agenda and actions of the United States. China is clearly the most important of these states because it is a rising great power. But even Beijing is intimidated by the United States and refrains from openly challenging U.S. power. China proclaims that it will, if necessary, resort to other mechanisms of challenging the United States, including asymmetric strategies such as targeting communication and intelligence satellites upon which the United States depends. But China may not be confident those strategies would work, and so it is likely to refrain from testing the United States directly for the foreseeable future because China's power benefits, as we shall see, from the international order U.S. primacy creates. The other states are far weaker than China. For three of the "Gang of Five" cases--Venezuela, Iran, Cuba--it is an anti-U.S. regime that is the source of the problem; the country itself is not intrinsically anti-American. Indeed, a change of regime in Caracas, Tehran or Havana could very well reorient

relations. THROUGHOUT HISTORY , peace and stability have been great benefits of an era where there was a dominant power --Rome, Britain or the United States today. Scholars and statesmen have long recognized the irenic effect of power on the anarchic world of international politics. Everything we think of when we consider the current international order-- free trade , a robust monetary regime , increasing respect for human rights , growing democratization -- is directly linked to U.S. power . Retrenchment proponents seem to think that the current system can be maintained without the current amount of U.S. power behind it. In that they are dead wrong and need to be reminded of one of history's most significant lessons: Appalling things happen when international orders collapse. The Dark Ages followed Rome's collapse. Hitler succeeded the order established at Versailles. Without U.S. power , the liberal order created by the United States will end just as assuredly . As country and western great Ral Donner sang: "You don't know what you've got (until you lose it)." Consequently, it is important to note what those good things are. In addition to ensuring the security of the United States and its allies, American primacy within the international system

causes many positive outcomes for Washington and the world. The first has been a more peaceful world. During the Cold War, U.S. leadership reduced friction among many states that were historical antagonists, most notably France

and West Germany. Today, American primacy helps keep a number of complicated relationships aligned-- between Greece and Turkey , Israel and Egypt , South Korea and Japan , India and Pakistan , Indonesia and Australia. This is not to say it fulfills Woodrow Wilson's vision of ending all war. Wars still occur where Washington's interests are not

seriously threatened, such as in Darfur, but a Pax Americana does reduce war's likelihood , particularly war's worst form:

great power wars . Second, American power gives the U nited States the ability to spread democracy and other elements of its ideology of liberalism: Doing so is a source of much good for the countries concerned as well as the United States because, as John Owen noted on these pages in the Spring 2006 issue, liberal democracies are more likely to align with the United States and be sympathetic to the American worldview.( n3) So, spreading democracy helps maintain U.S. primacy. In addition, once states are governed democratically, the likelihood of any type of conflict is significantly reduced . This is not

because democracies do not have clashing interests. Indeed they do. Rather, it is because they are more open, more transparent and more likely to want to resolve things amicably in concurrence with U.S. leadership. And so, in general, democratic states are good for their citizens as well as for advancing the interests of the United States. Critics have faulted the Bush

Administration for attempting to spread democracy in the Middle East, labeling such aft effort a modern form of tilting at windmills. It is the obligation of Bush's critics to explain why :democracy is good enough for Western states but not for the rest, and, one gathers from the argument, should not even be attempted. Of course, whether democracy in the Middle East will have a peaceful or stabilizing influence on America's interests in the short run is open to question. Perhaps democratic Arab states would be more opposed to Israel, but nonetheless, their people would be better off. The United States has brought democracy to Afghanistan, where 8.5 million Afghans, 40 percent of them women, voted in a critical October 2004 election, even though remnant Taliban forces threatened them. The first free elections were held in Iraq in January 2005. It was the military power of the United States that put Iraq on the path to democracy. Washington fostered democratic governments in Europe, Latin America, Asia and the Caucasus. Now even the Middle East is increasingly democratic. They may not yet look like Western-style democracies, but democratic progress has been made in Algeria, Morocco, Lebanon, Iraq, Kuwait, the Palestinian Authority and Egypt. By all accounts, the march of democracy has been impressive. Third, along with the growth in the number of democratic states around the world has been the growth of the global economy. With its allies, the United States has labored to create an economically liberal worldwide network characterized by free trade and commerce, respect for international property rights, and mobility of capital and labor markets. The economic stability and prosperity that stems from this economic order is a global public good from which all states benefit, particularly the poorest states in the Third World. The United States created this network not out of altruism but for the benefit and the economic well-being of America. This economic order forces American industries to be competitive, maximizes efficiencies and growth, and benefits defense as well because the size of the economy makes the defense burden manageable. Economic spin-offs foster the development of military technology, helping to ensure military prowess. Perhaps the greatest testament to the benefits of the economic network comes from Deepak Lal, a former Indian foreign service diplomat and researcher at the World Bank, who started his career confident in the socialist ideology of post-independence India. Abandoning the positions of his youth, Lal now recognizes that the only way to bring relief to desperately poor countries of the Third World is through the adoption of free market economic policies and globalization, which are facilitated through American primacy.( n4) As a witness to the failed alternative economic systems, Lal is one of the strongest academic proponents of American primacy due to the economic

CP

Text: The IMF should provide assistance to Cuba through a trust fund.

IFIs solve Cuba’s economy – recent success in similar countries proves – unique ability to produce gradual change

French, 11 (Anya, 11/18http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/Latin-America-Monitor/2011/1118/How-the-IMF-and-World-Bank-could-save-Cuba-s-economy-defying-the-US-embargo/(page)/2)

Feinberg unravels the conventional wisdom that says Cuba and the IFIs would make unhappy bedfellows – Cuba withdrew from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund more than 40 years ago – by pointing to successful IFI engagement with nonmembers like Kosovo and South Sudan, and with proud and strong states like Daniel Ortega's Nicaragua and Vietnam, with which Cuba shares key similarities. The IFIs are more interested in “the long game,” Feinberg argues, and their willingness to take things step by step would fit nicely with Cuba’s (urgent) need for gradual changes. He talks to both sides, and a senior Cuban diplomat tells him that “Cuba has no principled position against” engagement with the IFIs – a statement Feinberg believes signals a real shift in Cuban policy (hopefully a Cuban official will field that question publicly in the not too distant future). Meanwhile, IFI experts are more than ready to engage Cuba, and Feinberg argues that US opposition to IFI assistance isn’t as insurmountable as it might seem. In particular, IFIs can work through trust funds and other donors can administer programs. Feinberg also sees a role for regional development banks such as the Inter-American Development Bank and the Andean Development Corporation, as the US isn’t a member.

CASE

Solvency

Due to separate sanctions, Cuba would not get access to more goods when removed from the SSTCarone, Executive Director of Cuba Democracy Advocates, 13[Mauricio Claver, 4-2-13, The American, “Cuba Sees an Opening,” http://www.american.com/archive/2013/april/cuba-should-remain-designated-as-a-state-sponsor-of-terrorism, accessed 6-26-13, PR]

Kerry supported unilaterally easing sanctions on Cuba during his Senate career, and speculation that the State Department is considering removing Cuba from the state sponsor list – which also includes Iran, Sudan, and Syria – has been spurred by news reports citing contradictory remarks from anonymous administration sources. Some high-level diplomats have suggested Cuba be dropped from the list, according to the Boston Globe. But the State Department's spokesperson Victoria Nuland clarified in late February that it had “no current plans” to change Cuba's designation as a state sponsor of terrorism. However, that has not slowed efforts by those seeking rapprochement with the Castro regime, as a final decision

will not be officially revealed until April 30. Cuba has been on the state sponsors of terrorism list since 1982 due to its

hostile acts and support of armed insurgency groups. While being on the list of terrorist sponsors imposes sanctions such as prohibiting the United States from selling arms or providing economic assistance, removing Cuba from that list would have little effect on these sanctions, as these were separately codified in 1996. However, it would certainly hand the Castro brothers a major – and unmerited – diplomatic victory. The Castros have long protested and sought to escape the ostracism associated with the terrorism listing, while refusing to modify the egregious behavior that earned them the designation. They are also hoping the change could improve their standing among otherwise reluctant members of Congress and lead to an unconditional lifting of sanctions in the near future.

They don’t solve—even if the FSIA is repealed, Helms-Burton ensures IFI loans to CubaFeinberg, former Senior Director for Inter-American Affairs at the National Security Council, 11[Richard E., November 2011, “The International Financial Institutions and Cuba: Relations with Non-Member States,” Cuba in Transition, Volume: 22, p. 56, http://www.ascecuba.org/publications/proceedings/volume22/pdfs/feinberg.pdf, date accessed 6/27/13, YGS]

The U.S. Congress, nevertheless, has passed legislation that conditions U.S. policies toward Cuban admission to, and receipt of resources from, the IFIs.¶ These bills include the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996 (“Helms-Burton”) and¶ legislation concerning international terrorism, expropriation, and trafficking in persons.¶ The most prominent of these legislative mandates,¶ Helms-Burton, instructs the U.S. Executive Directors in the IFIs “to oppose the admission of Cuba as a¶ member of such institution until the President submits a determination that a democratically elected¶ government in Cuba is in power” (Public Law 104–¶ 114 (1996), Section 104). The bill continues: “If any¶ international financial institution approves a loan or¶ other assistance to the Cuban government over the opposition of the United States, then the Secretary of¶ the Treasury shall withhold from payment to such¶ institution an amount equal to the amount of the¶ loan or other assistance” with respect to either the¶ paid-in or callable portion of the increase in the institution’s capital stock.

The plan is ineffective—Cuba will reject the US attempts at normalizationLopez, Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies research associate, 13

[Vanessa, 3-25-13, Institution for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies @ the University of Miami, “The Failure of U.S. Attempts at Unilateral Rapprochement with Cuba,” http://ctp.iccas.miami.edu/FOCUS_Web/Issue187.htm, accessed 6-29-13, YGS]

Nearly every U.S. President since John F. Kennedy has tried to improve U.S. relations with Cuba. Some administrations halted these efforts when it was clear the Castros were unwilling to take any action towards rapprochement. Other administrations unilaterally liberalized U.S.-Cuba policy. Yet, Communist Cuba has continually rejected these efforts, responding in ways injurious to U.S. interests.¶

Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford began secret talks with the Cuban government. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's negotiating philosophy was clear "we are moving in a new direction; we'd like to synchronize...steps will be unilateral, reciprocity is necessary." (1) The U.S. did not then set human rights and democratization preconditions. In March of 1975, Kissinger announced that the U.S. was "ready to move in a new direction" with Cuba and wanted to normalize relations with the island. However, the man who was able to bring rapprochement between the U.S. and China, was unable to do the same with Cuba. Cuba's unambiguous rejection came by way of Cuban troops being deployed to Angola. Ford announced that Cuban military intervention in Angola would prevent full diplomatic relations between Cuba and the U.S. Cuba responded by sending more troops to Angola.¶ In 1977, President Jimmy Carter was eager to normalize U.S.-Cuba policy and ignored Cuba's military presence in Angola. Carter liberalized travel by U.S. citizens to Cuba. and signed a maritime boundary and fishing rights accord. However, the State Department announced that Cuba's deployment of military advisers to Ethiopia would prevent further rapprochement. Carter continued, undeterred, and the two countries opened Interest Sections in Washington D.C. and Havana. Over the next few years, the Cuban government sent almost 20,000 troops to Ethiopia, demanded that the U.S. military leave Guantanamo Bay, supported the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and in April of 1980, launched the Mariel Boatlift into President Carter's lap.¶ The Reagan Administration came into office desiring improved relations with Cuba, but soon recognized the futility of trying to ingratiate itself to the Cuban government. Cuba continued to support insurgencies and terrorist groups around the world. Most notably, U.S. troops confronted Cuban troops in Grenada in 1983. The U.S. tightened its Cuba policy until President Bill Clinton entered office.¶ Clinton attempted to engage Cuba on bilateral issues such as counter-narcotics measures, establishing modern telecommunications links, and opening news bureaus on the island. Cuba responded by launching a Balsero Crisis. This forced the U.S. into negotiations with the Cuban government that led to a U.S.-Cuba Immigration Accord, allowing a minimum of 20,000 Cubans a year to enter the U.S. as permanent residents. The Wet-Foot, Dry-Foot policy followed. In February 1996, Cuban MiGs shot down two Brothers to the Rescue planes killing three U.S. citizens and one resident over international waters. The Clinton Administration halted its efforts at liberalization because of this unprecedented act of aggression and Congress passed the Helms-Burton Law, the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act in response. In 1999, Clinton unilaterally expanded travel to Cuba for U.S. residents and Cuban-American families, but given Cuba's lack of response, did not take further efforts at rapprochement.¶ President George W. Bush left U.S.-Cuba policy untouched until the Black Cuban Spring of 2003. Following the arrest and long sentences for 75 dissidents, Bush restricted travel and remittances to the island in 2004 and took no known efforts to liberalize relations. U.S.-Cuba policy stayed frozen until President Barack Obama came into office.¶ Obama entered the Oval Office having made promises to liberalize Cuba policy. His Administration swiftly lifted restrictions on Cuban-American travel to Cuba as well as remittances sent to the island. Cuba's response was to arrest a U.S. citizen. Alan Gross was working as a USAID subcontractor, providing Jewish groups in the island with communications equipment. He was tried and sentenced to 15 years in a Cuban jail. The U.S. government said Gross's incarceration would prevent further liberalization. Various notable personalities have travelled to Cuba seeking Gross's release, including President Jimmy Carter and

Governor Bill Richardson, but these efforts have all failed. Despite Gross’s continued incarceration, in 2011, Obama also liberalized “people-to-people” travel, allowing more university, religious, and cultural programs to travel to Cuba.¶ History demonstrates that unilateral U.S. efforts have had, and are having, no impact on Cuba's leadership. On the contrary, the Cuban government has interpreted U.S. openings towards Cuba as signs of weakness, which have resulted in Cuba's hostility towards the U.S. and in some instances, in reckless actions such as Mariel and the Balsero Crisis.¶ Improved relations between the U.S. and Cuba is a laudable goal, but to be successful, Cuba must be a willing participant. Cuba has an unambiguous pattern of harming U.S. interests when the U.S. has engaged in attempts of unilateral rapprochement. If the U.S. would like to protect its interests, it should demand that Cuba take the first step in any future efforts to improve relations between the two countries and offer irreversible concessions.

Critical terrorism studies portray orthodox studies incorrectly—status quo academia solvesHorgan, Professor at Penn State, and Boyle, Professor at University of St. Andrews, 08[John and Michael J., Critical Studies on Terrorism, Volume 1 Issue 1, “A case against ‘Critical TerrorismStudies’”, p. 52, accessed 6/28/13, VJ]As a matter of policy, neither of us believes that any form of intellectual enterprise should be discarded if it happens to run contrary to our interests or to challenge what we do. We welcome the contribution of CTS only if it helps to improve the analytic rigor of terrorism or open new avenues of research. We believe that – as Mao put it – that in academia it is always a good idea to let ‘a hundred flowers bloom; let a hundred schools of thought contend’. We say this as a prelude to qualifying the criticisms below, levelled at CTS (or at least its current incarnation) as a way of stimulating debate, not silencing it. The problems with CTS That said, and to begin the debate, let us summarize our reasons for supposing that existing work on CTS should be challenged: It overstates the novelty of its case, as scholars within terrorism studies have long acknowledged the deficiencies and limitations of current research, and have long sought to overcome them. • It overstates the case that terrorism studies is engaged in problem-solving and dependent on instrumental rationality. • It reinvents the wheel in some important respects, claiming to discover theoretical significance behind well-known observations, or assuming new or ‘innovative’ lines of inquiry that in fact already exist either in whole or in part. • In attempting to develop its case, it employs the development of a ‘straw man’ – ‘Orthodox Terrorism Studies’ – that in some cases unfairly portrays almost 40 years of multi- and interdisciplinary research. • It demonstrates a prima facie suspicion of academics engaged in policy-‘relevant’ research and in some extreme cases implies a kind of ‘bad faith’ among those who engage in that kind of work. • It has – rather ironically – created just the kind of dualism that critical theory was designed to challenge, and overlooked the fact that the same moral concerns underlying CTS are often at the heart of traditional terrorism studies. This is the summary of our position, so let us now turn to each of these criticisms.

Lifting the embargo wouldn’t help the Cuban people-internal blockades mean that no goods go to the peopleCarter, Washington Times Writer, 2k (Tom, Sept 21, 2000 Cubanet, “Doctors testify lifting Cuba sanctions would not help average citizens” http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y00/sep00/21e6.htm, accessed 7/9/13, KR)

Lifting the U.S. economic embargo to allow the sale of food and medicine to Cuba will do nothing to help the average Cuban, two doctors who recently defected from the island nation testified on Capitol Hill yesterday. ¶ "We consider that only cutting the umbilical cord that sustains [Cuban President Fidel Castro's] empire, and by this we mean suspending any external aid, we can suffocate the malignancy that is killing [the Cuban people] today," said Dr. Leonel Cordova, 31, a general practitioner from Havana, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.¶ Speaking as a doctor who served his patients, he said he believed no food or medicine sent from the United States would help the Cuban people if it went through a government organization.¶ "The U.S. embargo on Cuba does not affect the people of Cuba. The revolutionary leaders have everything, every kind of medicine from the United States," said Dr. Cordova, who defected in May while on a medical mission to Zimbabwe. "No food or medicine will reach the people. It is all funneled through the Cuban government for high-level Communist officials and tourists."¶ At a luncheon at the Heritage Foundation earlier, Dr. Noris Pena, a dentist who also defected in Zimbabwe, elaborated.¶ "It is not the external embargo that is the problem with Cuba's medical system, it is the internal blockade. With or without the U.S. embargo, the Cuban people will suffer," she said.