Chris Dodd: “This amendment is about the establishment of a commission on U.S. Cuban policy. This commission was recommended by…”

“This amendment is about the establishment of a commission on U.S. Cuban policy. This commission was recommended by Howard Baker, Frank Carlucci, Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Malcolm Wallop, and William Rogers. This is not lifting sanctions. This is not taking a position where we have endorsed free travel or somehow sanctioned what the Castro government is doing. It is a commission. It is a commission to analyze U.S. policy. That is all it is. It is pathetic to hear the opposition discussing the issue. Have we reached a point where we can't even discuss United States policy with regard to Cuba? If we had followed that policy, Nixon never would have gone to China. We never would have established a roadmap of Vietnam. President Bush and President Carter wouldn't have been able to do anything in the Middle East. Ronald Reagan wouldn't have met with Gorbachev and Yeltsin. There is a long list. You can't even sit down and talk about this issue. I find it stunning, at the beginning of the 21st century, that we are so obsessed with this one individual that we are willing to squander building a relationship in a post-Castro period with 11 million people of Cuba. That is stunning to me. We have listened to Members of Congress. I argue the leading dissident in Cuba, who has done time in jail, has suffered, his family suffers; all of the things my colleague has talked about, this individual has suffered. Don't listen to me; listen to him.…”