Cuba spy cited as a reason for upholding the travel ban gets life in prison

Thirty years of spying for Cuba will send a retired State Department official to prison for life after he and his wife pleaded guilty Friday to sending secrets to the United States' longtime antagonist.

Walter Kendall Myers, 72 -- known to his Cuban handlers as ``Agent 202'' -- agreed to a life sentence without parole and to cooperate with the federal government in a deal with prosecutors that offered a much lighter sentence for his wife.

Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 71 -- known as ``Agent 123'' and ``Agent E-634'' -- had faced as long as 20 years in prison. Under the plea deal, she now could serve between 6 and 7 ½ years. She, too, agreed to cooperate fully with investigators.

The case comes as President Barack Obama has sought to improve relations with Havana and lawmakers have pushed to open up the island to U.S. tourists. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen invoked Kendall Myers' name Thursday as she criticized a congressional effort aimed at lifting the ban on travel to Cuba.

"Given the success of Cuban intelligence in recruiting'' spies like Myers, the Miami Republican said, "`why would we want to facilitate such potential espionage activities by allowing unfettered travel to Cuba?''

President Obama responds to Cuban blogger as members of Congress cite her name in effort to lift travel ban

Cuba's celebrated and increasingly brassy blogger Yoani Sánchez is emerging as a player in U.S.-Cuba relations, scoring a lengthy reply from President Barack Obama to her questions and playing a starring role in a congressional hearing on efforts to let American tourists visit Cuba.

Sánchez's blog, Generación Y, posted Obama's responses to seven pointed questions she asked him in what she describes as a foray into "popular diplomacy.'' She also queried Cuban leader Raúl Castro -- but he hadn't replied as of late Thursday. Obama broke little new ground in his responses, largely reiterating his administration's stance on Cuba: a desire for more contact between the two governments and its peoples, while insisting that Cuba improve its human rights record.

In Congress, as critics and supporters of the decades-old travel ban used Sánchez's recent beating, presumably at the hands of Cuban security forces, to criticize the Castro regime and make their case, House Foreign Affairs chairman Howard Berman read an essay Sánchez wrote in support of lifting the ban.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen argued against easing sanctions, noting that Europeans and tourists "from around the world'' have been going to Cuba "for rum, music, sex, cigars and sun for years.''

"Have they brought about democratic reform and change?'' Ros-Lehtinen asked.

LeMieux's Brazil block draws praise

George LeMieux's controversial effort to block the nomination of Thomas Shannon, the incoming US ambassador to Brazil, has gained him support from some fellow Florida lawmakers -- including Cape Coral Republican Connie Mack, who says he's got "serious concerns with the Obama administration's approach to Latin America and its relationship with Cuba and Venezuela."

Mack says his problems with Shannon predate the Obama administration: "When Mr. Shannon was the former Assistant Secretary of State for President Bush, I expressed concerns then about the Administration’s ‘hands-off’ approach to Latin America," Mack said. "Since President Obama took office in January, the administration has taken a different approach, agreeing to a path for Cuba’s admittance to the OAS and refusing to recognize the sovereignty of a democratic Honduras."

Sorta damned if you do, damned if you don't. Mack today branded a congressional effort to allow American tourists to travel to Cuba, a "Castro bailout, a bailout for beatings, oppression, rape, torture, corruption and tyranny."

Ros-Lehtinen enlivens Cuba hearing with a dustup with a retired military general

Today's House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing was a highly-charged event -- but the real sparks flew when Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen tussled with retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey.

McCaffrey raised the Miami Republican's hackles with his testimony that Cuba represents no risk to national security and the travel ban should be scrapped since it hurts longtime U.S. interests.

But during questioning, he took exception to Ros-Lehtinen, whom he said appeared to question his national security credentials and called him "Mr. McCaffrey,'' rather than "General.''

"To refute the argument that I had offered to the committee, she seemed to be implying my lack of commitment to U.S. national security, which is a silly thing for her to do,'' McCaffrey told reporters after the hearing. "She stated a very carefully chosen way to denigrate my military credentials, which she is not authorized to do.''

Ros-Lehtinen -- who often notes she has family members in the service -- said she disagreed with McCaffrey's stance on Cuba, but "did not mean in any way to not respect his service by calling him Mr. and not General.''

She said she had written down the questions she wanted to pose to McCaffrey and that "General'' appears in her handwritten notes.

LeMieux's first foreign relations foray draws a rebuke

New Florida Sen. George LeMieux's first foray into foreign relations has drawn brickbats from former high-ranking State Department officials who say his effort to block the Obama administration's new ambassador to Brazil is damaging U.S. relations with Latin America.

"This continuing, prolonged vacancy sends an unintended signal that the United States does not consider Brazil an important relationship,'' the nine former assistant secretaries of state wrote in a letter to LeMieux, urging him to lift his opposition to nominee Tom Shannon.

Shannon had triggered the ire of South Florida Cuban Americans who believed he wasn't tough enough on the Castro regime during his tenure as a former assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs under President George W. Bush.

Senate staffers suggested Wednesday that LeMieux -- who was appointed by Gov. Charlie Crist to fill the seat vacated by Mel Martinez -- could be trying to burnish his Cuba credentials to help Crist, who faces a Cuban-American opponent in the Republican primary for the Senate seat.

LeMieux said it was his responsibility as Florida's senator to vet the nominee, noting that he had heard concerns about Shannon's record from constituents and fellow members of Congress.

"I feel like I have a role and a responsibility far greater than other senators do in terms of anything that deals with Latin America, and I take that job seriously,'' said LeMieux, who will be a "special guest" at a DC fundraiser Friday for Crist. "This is about the entire hemisphere. This is about Venezuela, El Salvador, Bolivia, Colombia and Brazil and Cuba and the role that Mr. Shannon played . . . and the role he will play. We are burning the midnight oil here to make sure I'm doing the best job I can for 18 million Floridians, and that's my motivation.''

Bloomberg News reports the extended hold could cost Boeing Inc. up to $7.5 billion.

Cuba: It ought to be called the "democracy of money"

The Cuban Interests Section -- Havana's defacto embassy in Washington -- says a recent report tying campaign contributions to U.S.-Cuba policy "reveals the tip of the iceberg of what moves behind U.S. policy toward Cuba.

"It also shows how money rules policy toward Cuba, not principles, ethics, justice and morality," the press office's Alberto González said in an e-mail. "The right of Americans to travel to Cuba does not constitute a 'gesture toward Cuba' but a constitutional right of American citizens. However, it is remarkable how these
legislators accept money for something that goes against the very constitutional rights of the American people."

The report found supporters of the embargo had contributed more than $11 million to fend off efforts to weaken sanctions against the government.

Top House Dem: "Let's travel to Cuba"

Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, says in an op-ed in today's Herald that the U.S. should allow Americans to travel to Cuba.

"U.S. law lets American citizens travel to any country on earth, friend or foe -- with one exception: Cuba. It's time for us to scrap this anachronistic ban, imposed during one of the chilliest periods of the Cold War," he and Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Indiana, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote.

The op-ed comes as Berman on Thursday convenes a hearing on House legislation to lift the ban, which the pair says has "prevented contact between Cubans and ordinary Americans, who serve as ambassadors for the democratic values we hold dear. Such contact would help break Havana's chokehold on information about the outside world."

Miami Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is planning a counter offensive to the hearing. She's holding a briefing Wednesday for House members to discuss "how U.S. national security interests continue to be directly targeted and threatened by the sinister Cuban regime."

She says easing travel restrictions won't "bring freedom to the island, but will only perpetuate the dictatorship's hold on power and its ability to go after the U.S."

Report: Campaign contributions influence Cuba policy

Supporters of the U.S. embargo against Cuba have contributed almost $11 million to members of Congress since 2004 in a largely successful effort to block efforts to weaken sanctions against the island, a new report shows.

In several cases, according to the report by the nonpartisan group Public Campaign, members of Congress who had supported easing sanctions against Cuba changed their positions -- and then got donations from the U.S.-Cuba Democracy Political Action Committee and its donors.

All told, the political action committee that champions the embargo and its contributors have given $10.77 million nationwide to almost 400 candidates and members of Congress, the report says.

Dems tell Pelosi they support ban on travel to Cuba

More than 50 House Democrats -- including Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Kendrick Meek, Alcee Hastings and Ron Klein --- sent a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi supporting current Cuba policy, which embargo-supporters say effectively squashes efforts to lift a ban on travel to Cuba.

The letter is aimed at blunting the momentum proponents of lifting the travel ban have claimed under a Democratic president and Democratic-led Congress.

"We felt it was important to show that when push comes to shove, the votes aren't there,'' Wasserman Schultz said.Proponents of lifting the travel ban, however, said they've got 180 sponsors to repeal the decades-old ban and said the letter doesn't change the outlook for getting the bill passed.

DC's Cuba embassy springs a leak

According to a report on the blog, dcist, a gas leak Thursday at the Cuban Interests Section of the Swiss Embassy caused a partial road closing.

The blog notes that "as happens so often when emergency situations arise at sensitive ambassadorial facilities, D.C. Fire/EMS crews were somewhat restricted when they showed up to respond to the call.

"They met our guys at the gate," spokesperson Pete Piringer told DCist. "We had about 15 people ready to go in, and they selected a small group, and the firefighters were escorted in."

The blog notes that the firefighters who were granted entry helped the Cubans partially evacuate and air out the building. But Piringer said it appeared that some parts of the facility were not made available to the firefighters.

The defacto embassy last appeared in the news when a judge refused to release two accused Cuban spies from custody for fear they could seek refuge in the interests section.