Reply #8: I know DU'ers who keep up on news about Cuba will remember ANOTHER event:

[Judi Lynn]

Issue #18 The Long Arm of the Law
Feb 14, 2006

The Bush Administration voiced not a word of disapproval, but it sent an unmistakable signal to a recent conference held in Mexico City where American executives and Cuban officials discussed business opportunities in Cuba's energy sector. It found a way to use U.S. sanctions against Cuba to have the Cuban delegates thrown out of their hotel, the Sheraton Maria Isabel.

This action barely affected the conference, which covered a topic of increasing interest to both Cuba and the United States. It caused a large reaction in Mexico that continues to make news in Mexico and beyond. The press coverage is drawing attention to U.S. policy toward Cuba, highlighting not the Administration's grievances against Cuba, but rather its own "Three Stooges school of diplomacy," in the words of a Miami Herald editorial. "A friendly nation has been insulted," the editorial said, "U.S. businesses in Mexico are alarmed, and Cuba can once again paint itself as the aggrieved party in its dispute with the United States."

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Maybe the U.S. government would have banned the conference altogether, but American law does not block speech between Americans and Cubans, least of all on foreign territory.

However, U.S. law does control transactions between Americans and Cubans. Since the conference was held in a hotel owned by a U.S. corporation, and since U.S. subsidiaries have been banned from trading with Cuba since 1992, the Administration had a basis for threatening penalties for providing a service to Cubans in violation of U.S. law.

So on that Friday evening after the day's conference sessions had ended, Sheraton managers told the 16 Cuban attendees that due to an order from Washington, they had to leave the hotel immediately, they could consume no food or drink on the way out, and the money they had pre-paid for the final two nights of their stay would not be refunded.
(snip/...)

http://lexingtoninstitute.org/905.shtml

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What happened in 1992, to make this possible? The Torricelli Act. (You may remember Robert Torricelli, Democrat, unfortunately, was charged with corruption. Earlier in his career, he favored dropping the embargo, but the Cuban "exiles" got to him, and he accepted a ton of campaign contributions from them. His state, New Jersey, (Union City his district) has the country's 2nd largest Cuban population.) Between 1982 and 2000, Robert Torricelli received $255,000.00 from them for his campaigns. He is the 2nd largest recipient of their funding. The largest recipient of Cuban "exile" funding was Robert Graham, who came from the country's LARGEST Cuban "exile" population, in South Florida.

The Torricelli Act, passed in 1992, further strengthened the US blockade (see Embargo or Blockade?) on Cuba. It was signed into law by President George Bush, just before the presidential election.

Bush also pardoned Orlando Bosch that year, who was charged with killing 73 people through bombing a civilian aircraft, but escaped from his Venezuelan prison. In the 1992 election, Bush won the Florida electroal votes due to extensive support of anti-Castro exile groups.

The Torricelli Act made the economic blockade on Cuba more severe than it had previously been. It prevented food and medicine from being shipped to Cuba. The only exception was humanitarian aid.
(snip)

The original embargo didn't prevent food and medicine sales for the sake of appearing to be different than the Soviet blockade of West Berlin. The US heavily condemned this at the time, but now does the same thing. Now that capitalist propaganda is less important, this act can be passed without much concern.
(snip/)

http://library.thinkquest.org/18355/the_torricelli_act.html