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Clash of the featherweights | page 1, 2
Yet even if the embargo weren't so obviously useful to Castro, American policy ought to at least be consistent toward foreign regimes that violate human rights. The current contradiction mocks our responsibility to uphold liberty everywhere and undermines the credibility of the United States. American allies and adversaries alike wonder how Bush and Gore can claim that diplomatic engagement and open trade are good for China and bad for Cuba. They can do so only by selectively ignoring the facts contained in official U.S. publications and documents. As Gore knows very well, and as Bush may someday learn if he pays attention, Beijing's recent human rights record is no better than Havana's and isn't improving -- despite growing commercial and diplomatic contacts between China and the United States.
Joe Conason Joe Conason's column appears in Salon News every other Tuesday.
During the past year, both communist regimes have cracked down heavily on democracy and human rights activists, although according to independent human rights monitors, punishment of various kinds of "subversives" in China remains considerably more harsh than in Cuba. The most noticeable divergence between the two dictatorships lies in their attitudes toward religious freedom, an issue that presumably worries pious Christians like Bush and Gore. After severely curtailing religion for more than 30 years, Castro has reversed course during the past decade. This was officially acknowledged by the Clinton administration two years ago, when the State Department distributed "background notes" on the subject: "Since 1992, the Cuban government has eased the harsher aspects of its repression of religious freedom. In preparation for the visit of Pope John Paul II in January 1998, the government further relaxed its restrictions on religion, especially toward the Roman Catholic Church." The Chinese authorities, by contrast, have violently intensified their repression of all forms of religious and spiritual expression during the past year, without much regard for Western sensibilities. This year the Clinton administration endorsed a United Nations draft resolution voicing deep concern about "the severe measures taken [by Beijing] to restrict the peaceful activities of Buddhists, Muslims, Christians and others, including Falun Gong adherents," as well as "increased restrictions on the exercise of cultural, linguistic, religious and other freedoms of Tibetans." Cuba's human rights record is terrible, but China's is even worse. That is the grim truth Bush and Gore must choose to ignore in order to preserve a destructive double standard that has haunted U.S. foreign policy through six administrations. Their willingness to prolong this intellectual dishonesty does not bode well for the integrity of whichever administration comes to power next January.
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