Havana Thriftily, Legally, and On Your Own

So near - and now, just a tiny bit less far. The bizarre circus that swirled around poor young Eli n Gonzalez between Thanksgiving 1999 and Independence Day 2000 did have something of a silver lining: it's eased the travel climate toward a country that we Americans alone in all the world insist on "embargoing" despite nearly 40 years of proof that said embargo has failed miserably to spur positive change in Cuba (and in fact has only made things worse).

But another kind of change is afoot - most dramatically, lobbying from the conservative likes of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to ease sanctions, and even a vote by the House of Representatives this past summer to eliminate rules preventing most Americans from visiting Cuba. As of this writing, an end to the embargo was thought unlikely to immediately become law. But even so, there are ...