Sanctions have made Cubans more anti-American and have given Castro a scapegoat for his failed socialist policies. Only the U.S. and Israel were opposed. This is the most isolated Washington has ever been on Cuba. Now a group of conservative and moderate U.S. Senators, with the backing of former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and Lawrence Eagleburger and former Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, has urged President Clinton to create a bipartisan commission to review U.S. policy toward the island. Clinton is almost certain to approve it.
Commissions are a great American tradition.
U.S. warehouses are filled with such studies. Usually nothing happens. It takes creative ideas to shift debates. So when this Cuba group gathers, as it inevitably will, it should consider the Cuban statehood idea. There's scarcely a lobbying group or a political-action committee that would not go for it.