Kerry: Comfortable with Castro

The plight of Cubans is a perennial topic of this blog. On June 15 I wrote about Oswaldo Payá , who heads the Varela Project in Cuba, a pro-democracy effort that David Brooks calls "one of the most inspiring democracy movements in the world today." Today Brooks, in one of his best columns in weeks, nails John Kerry's guiding vision of foreign policy by calling attention to a recent Kerry interview with the Miami Herald. Astonishingly, when asked about his opinion of the Varela Project, Kerry said it "'has gotten a lot of people in trouble . . . and it brought down the hammer in a way that I think wound up being counterproductive.'"

As Brooks argues, this comment from the man-who-would-be-president deals a crushing blow to dissidents in Cuba and around the globe. It demonstrates a callousness and cynicism toward captive peoples unworthy of any man seeking our highest office, but too common among Bush critics who'd rather bed down with dictators than lend moral and diplomatic support to democracy activists. Imagine, Brooks writes, "if in the 1980's Ronald Reagan had called Andrei Sakharov or Natan Sharansky or Lech Walesa or Vaclav Havel 'counterproductive' because, after all, what they did spawned crackdowns, too."

This is a recipe for strengthening dictatorships all over the globe: in China, Burma, Iran, Belarus, Zimbabwe, Sudan. It signals to Hugo Chavez that Venezuelan pro-democracy forces may be dealt with as he sees fit if a Kerry administration comes to power.

Of the realist school of foreign policy, Brooks writes: "[I]f we are going to turn realist, let's be clear about what that means in practice. It means worrying less about the nature of regimes and dealing with whoever happens to be in power. It means alienating people who dream of living in freedom while we luxuriate in ours. It means doing little to confront crimes against humanity; realism gives a president a thousand excuses for inaction. It means betraying people like Oswaldo Payá — again and again and again."

The moral bankruptcy of the left began years ago, and under Kerry its implosion is nearly complete. Oswaldo Payá and his fellow dissidents in the broader Cuban community should spread the word on Kerry's low opinion of dissidents. If he's elected, they're likely to continue to suffer under the boot heal of Castro.