What about Cuba

 *  Beginning with the Cuban revolution, I have contemplated a counterfactual history better than the actual one.  For example, could Castro have turned to democracy had we respected the revolution?  Could we have respected the revolution had our relations been lawful and altruistic?  Would this have been better for average Cubans?
 *  Two decades ago the Cuba embargo ceased to be justified by our national security, and I hoped that President Clinton would begin lifting prohibitions and special immigration rules.  At that time, Latin-American socialist countries were no threat to us.  Now, President Obama has the wisdom and courage to begin normalizing Cuban-American relations.
 *  My enthusiasm for opening up US-Cuba relations is somewhat dampened by the possibility that Cuba might be better off without US investment, trade and influence.  Specifically, isolation from us probably preserved Cuba from capitalistic over-exploitation of their resources, including recreational and agricultural ones; and it probably protected Cuba from the corrupting effect of American dominance, including New-York-mafia influence.
 *  The supposition that life of an average Cuban citizen under communism was very restricted, deprived and slavish, and that liberation by us would be good for the Cuban populace seems questionable.  When one considers the large proportion of our citizens who are uneducated, impoverished, isolated, bored, depressed, disappointed, excluded, invisible, hopeless, disaffected and/or incarcerated, then the average Cuban condition may not be worse than the average American condition.  Cuba and its people fared better than many non-communist island nations, eg Haiti and Puerto Rico, possibly Philippines.
 *  American life looks great from afar because only rich or celebrity Americans were traditionally exposed internationally.  Average Americans were not.  Moreover, material wealth is not the only wealth.  The security and prestige sought by most in the capitalist rat race are elusive.  Last week driving home, I was detoured into a neighborhood of  houses fit for royalty.  I couldn’t help wondering whether the satisfactions sought by the planners and owners of those houses would ever materialize.  If not, then they were little happier than average Cubans over the past half century.
 *  Finally, I would vouchsafe that the average Cuban’s ratio of happiness to environmental destruction is far higher than the average American’s.
 *  US-Cuba dynamics were addressed in this blog near its beginning, Feb 28, 2007.