Professor Carlos Alzugaray "the long reign of Miami's Castro-hating hardliners could be numbered"

Carlos Alzugaray is a professor of Cuban foreign policy and international relations at the University of Havana, who was quoted today in a post by Ray Suarez at the Huffington Post Blog.

Here is what the professor had to say:

"There is a sociological change in the composition of the Cuban American population in Miami, which has not had an immediate impact in the political configuration of South Florida," said Alzugaray, a visiting professor at Queens College in New York. "But that is bound to happen sooner or later."

"The newer arrivals and some of the second generation Cuban Americans do not have the attitudes so common among the older arrivals, which was basically a revenge culture," he continued. "They have more connections with their families and friends in Cuba. They visit more often."

The post by Mr. Suarez also reported the following:

Cubans are not only traveling back home in record numbers but are also sending remittances along with shipments of food, medicines and even electronic appliances via online companies such as HavanaMart.com and MallHabana.com.

"When you go to the airport and take one of these flights to Cuba, you realize the median age is no longer in their 60s or 70s," said Joe Garcia, a former chairman of the Miami Democratic Party. "These are people just trying to have a rational relationship with family in Cuba, understanding that 50 years of failure on Cuban policy is not their fault. They're not going to make themselves or their families martyrs for the point of view of someone else."

Miami has changed in other ways. Popular Cuban musicians once greeted with bomb threats and boisterous demonstrations now pack venues in the city. After the concerts, the artists gather at the homes of relatives and old friends in South Florida. A decade ago, many of the musicians would defect. Now most return to Cuba.

"I remember one particular concert by Manolin El Medico de la Salsa in Miami Beach where a Molotov cocktail was thrown at the venue," said Hugo Cancio, chief executive of Fuego Entertainment, a Miami firm that arranges many of the concerts. "We went ahead with the concert that evening. We used to have all kinds of threats and political pressure. Our dollars were not good for ads on radio or television or even the local papers."

Cancio was born in Cuba and came to Miami during the 1980 Mariel boat-lift, in which more than 100,000 Cubans arrived at U.S. shores. He was 16. In his more than three decades as an exile, he said, much has changed.

"It's not even close to where it was before," Cancio said. "This community has matured. I attribute that to the massive amount of Cubans that have arrived in the past 10 to 15 years. Although they may disagree on whether they left Cuba for economic reasons or to walk away from the government, they see the government as a separate issue from their families, their music, their culture."

------

JG: The White pro-Czar Russians who settled in New York after the Great October Revolution of 1917 never amounted to much. The same can be said about the pro-Kuomintang Chinese who fled to Taiwan, or the pro-Batista fascists who settled in Miami after the Glorious Cuban Revolution of 1953-1958.