Adventures of the Coconut Caucus

Yes mi gente… it is that time again to make sure that Cubans in Miami can violate their own embargo, and travel to Cuba to see every last cousin and bring them an newly authorized toaster (electricity not included)….

Senate Panel Approves Expanded Cuba Travel in Spending Bill

A Senate panel Wednesday approved a $44.8 billion fiscal 2009 spending bill, which includes a controversial provision to expand family travel to Cuba.

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I have barely had a minute this week to update everybody on the latest Hispanic happenings, because it turns out I DO have a life, so here goes our news sancocho roundup in bullet point form:

• Bill Richardson wants more aliens to land in New Mexico
• Hispanic representatives of Third World Country Miami want you to buy expensive gas

• Finally a Latino on PBS!!!!!!! and he is not on Sesame Street.

• Zero Rodríguez gets a sidewalk built!
• Bush had breakfast with the 3 Hispanics that still support him
• Hillary Clinton had lunch with Hispanics who all support her

Well I’m sure you are all just dying to know who is advising each of the candidates on how to deal with that muddled country area known as Latinoamérica, which, like Arabia–the country next to Caucasia–is just one big brown mess.

Here at the Coconut Caucus, we have the breakdown for you! From Panamanians to blonds to black men, they all turn to a team of semi-brown people for help. Some boring, some known, some unknown, here they are, in no particular order:

Some of Obama’s key Latin America policy advisors also come from the Clinton administration ranks,(ed. note: ouch, Hilaria) including Anthony Lake, Clinton’s former National Security Advisor, according to campaign insiders. The director of the State Department’s policy planning staff during the Carter administration, Lake authored a book critical of U.S. actions in Central America, Somoza Falling.

Clinton’s Latin American team includes Arturo Valenzuela, a Georgetown University professor and former senior director of the National Security Council for the Western Hemisphere in the Clinton White House. People familiar with his work say Valenzuela adheres to the Democratic mainstream, like conditioning free trade deals to higher labor standards.

Also listed: Thomas ”Mack” McLarty, a former special envoy to the region and a pro-NAFTA Democrat. Another centrist Democrat listed is Peter Romero, a former top State Department diplomat to the region.

The team also includes several former U.S. ambassadors in Latin America — Donna Hrinak (Brazil and Venezuela), James Jones (Mexico), Luis Lauredo (Organization of American States) and Charles Manatt (Dominican Republic) — and Dan Erikson, a young Cuba and Caribbean specialist with Inter-American Dialogue.

The group is coordinated by Julia Sweig, a senior fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations who last year penned a paper suggesting “an overhaul of U.S. policy may well relax the siege mentality that keeps Cuba’s own reforms muzzled — and recast U.S.-Cuba relations in a more normal light.”

Sweig’s writings don’t worry anti-Castro lobbyists (ed note: aka la Hilaria is going after the FL vote!!).

And now, surprise surprise! Guess which dynamic duo plus small wonder will advice our favorite Panamanian?

Sen. John McCain has skipped assembling a full-scale Latin American group for now but his website lists among his advisors the three Miami Republicans in Congress — Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and brothers Lincoln and Mario Diaz Balart.

Our power trio is definitely the bastion of the immigrant experience. Who needs other Latinos when you have Cubans?

In a totally NON-surprising move, the Balart´s reacted to a letter to the editor sent by their uncle… I will let you guess which statement is from Mario and which one is from Lincoln…

“As of this time, there is no change in Cuba. Fidel Castro may have “relinquished” some titles, but he is still the dictator and in control. True change will not begin in Cuba until all political prisoners are released, political parties, labor unions and free press are legalized, and the process of free, supervised, multi-party elections begin. We must continue to press for a democratic transition from this oppressive regime,” said Diaz-Balart.

AND not to be undone by his brother…

What we all need to be concentrating on is the urgent need for a democratic transition in Cuba, beginning with the liberation of all political prisoners, the legalization of all political parties, labor unions and the press, and the scheduling of free, multiparty elections. Let us not get confused with the dictator’s titles or lack of them. For now, nothing has changed in totalitarian Cuba. It is time for the international community to unite to press for freedom for all the political prisoners and for free elections in Cuba,” said Diaz-Balart.

Now if you guessed accurately, we have no prizes, but you obviously hang out at Versailles.

Okay, so I realize this deviates from our ongoing, super hardball political coverage, but this just caught my eye yesterday while watching a bunch of superbuff men fight over a ball:

Doesn’t this guy in this Superbowl ad totally look like half of our favorite Balart dynamic duo (the Mario half)??

I mean, it’s uncanny!

So now we’re reduced to bad, slightly racist cars.com commercials!

I guess things are really slow on the Hill for our Latino congresspeople as we all debate on whether to vote for a Panamanian, a Mexican-American, a woman, or a black man for the Casa Blanca…