• Submitted by: manso
• Editorial Articles
• 08 / 03 / 2011

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Editorial.By TBO.COM. Published: August 03, 2011. The direct charter flights from Tampa to Havana that are to begin in September could signal a thawing of U.S. relations toward Cuba. The popularity of the flights also could help airlines see Tampa as a natural gateway to Latin America.

Joe Lopano, chief executive of Tampa International Airport, is right to want to land all the international flights that regional demand can support. Many local leaders think Tampa has been unfairly overlooked by airlines in favor of Miami and Orlando, and Lopano says research suggests that view.

He notes, for example, that a large number of international travelers drive from Tampa to the Orlando airport and are counted as Orlando passengers. Identifying and pointing out such statistics and aggressively promoting Tampa are good business strategies.

Tampa's growing Hispanic population should easily support the new charter service to Cuba. Unfortunately, the passenger list will be federally restricted to those traveling for an approved purpose. That purpose does not include tourism.

The travel door is merely cracked, not opened wide. The Obama White House has relaxed rules that were tightened by the former administration in 2003. Under the change, academic groups, church organizations, journalists and selected others can visit Cuba if they travel on licensed tours, on approved flights and for authorized reasons.

Cuban-Americans who obtain the proper visas are also allowed to travel to visit family.

Now on a typical evening at Tampa International, you hear announcements of flights arriving from Zurich, London, San Juan and Montreal. We believe to hear Havana among them every day would be a change worth trying. But that won't soon happen.

The very limited liberalization that allows a few more charter flights is being fought by some Cuban-Americans who favor a policy of stricter isolation of the communist government there. The Cold War mentality is understandable, but in 50 years it has not sparked the intended democratic coup. Meager reforms in the one-party state have come despite the embargo, not because of it.

Allowing restricted groups of ordinary citizens to visit is itself a compromise whose logic is hard to explain.

You can travel to visit museums and historic sites but not to the beach. You are supposed to stay busy doing organized "purposeful" activities and not just wander around Cuba on your own. You may eat in restaurants and spend a limited amount of money but cannot bring home a souvenir.

It is surprising that we freedom-loving Americans would tolerate such arbitrary, bureaucratic rules. The flights would undoubtedly build support for further relaxing of the embargo.

That could be why even this tightly regulated travel upsets many Cuban-Americans in Florida. Republican Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart is among them. He is proposing a return to the Bush policy of stricter controls. If his amendment passes in Congress, the charter flights would cease and Cuban-Americans would be allowed to visit their relatives only once every three years.

Source: www2.tbo.com/news/opinion/2011/aug/03/meopino1-to-cuba-and-beyond-ar-247926/