Obama is allowing travel and money transfers to Cuba

Hehe, yes you are clearly very passionate about this topic!

I avoid Yahoo. However, any source is a good source to fuel an exploration of a topic... =) Just look for more credible sources.

I am passionate about this topic, and many others.

Actually, I have been recently noticing that Yahoo articles are often skewed or factually deficient...

I think I need to make more of an effort to find multiple sources and comparing them before posting things like this.

What do you mean? Responds how?

That article is skewed. It mentions the 30 cents on every US Dollar the Cuban government charges--but this is incorrect information. Either Obama and his advisers are misinformed or skewing the information to keep the embargo in place to appease Florida voters.

The United States placed el bloqueo, or the blockade against Cuba, remember?

A complete embargo, including all aspects of business and trade: commercial, economic and FINANCIAL. This has been in place since 1962. The U.S. stranglehold on Cuba's livelihood was tightened by the Helms-Burton Act which basically set into law the punishment, by fees or by withholding business, of foreign companies and countries that do business with Cuba.

If any country or foreign business does business with Cuba, they are not permitted to do business with the US for a period of six months. In addition, they can be sued or fined. This includes ships! Imagine if you are a poor country with very limited resources and you have one trading vessel. Imagine you need to stop by Cuba and do some trading or not--imagine you just need to dock at a Cuban port, since afterall they are in the most ideal location for ships, yes? Well, if you do you can be charged a fine and you may not dock at any U.S. port for the next six months--you may not even do business in the U.S. for the next six months.

This is nothing short of economic terrorism.

Now, back to the money and the charge on the U.S. Dollar by the Cuban Government.

Cubans use internal money since they had to rely on themselves due to being forced into an economic time-out by the U.S. They use the peso. For travelers they use the CUC (Cuban Convertible Peso).

During the Special Period, (89-early 2000's) after the fall of the Soviet Union, Cuba was suffering financially in a way few can comprehend. Cubans needed reprieve. They looked to tourism which in turn brought the U.S. dollar into Cuba and created a financial mess for them. What can Cuban merchants do with a U.S. dollar? Their banks can't exchange it with the U.S. banks--they are not permitted to do so.

They have to find other ways of converting the money to something they can use. This exchange inevitably requires a middle-man which does not come free. The Cuban Government must exchange this money with other countries and since doing any economic or financial exchange with Cuba was deemed illegal or economically dangerous by the Helms-Burton Act, other countries will need compensation to take such risks, yes?

This was not an issue before the Special Period because tourism was not their only economic means of survival. The US dollar is not legal tender in Cuba. Why would it be? CUC's are not legal tender here in the U.S. right?

Once tourism was introduced the U.S. dollar was legal to use but STILL not legal tender and still not easily exchanged. Thus, the monetary exchange problems began to arise. The Cuban Convertible Peso or the CUC was developed to deal with this monetary issue with foreign travelers. The CUC is used only by people visiting the country and is kept, in theory, entirely separate from the Cuban peso which is used by Cubans in Cuba. This measure was taken to protect the integrity of their own internal economy while providing for means of dealing with the external money flowing in--money they had to pay to exchange--thus losing money they could not afford to lose.

The U.S. dollar loses 7 cents when converted to the CUC according to the current official rate today (May 1st, 2009). Since the dollar is not legal tender in Cuba but foreign travelers use the dollar--the Cubans had to do something. They decided upon charging a 10% fee for conversion to the CUC. They have to pay for the price of exchange somehow. This is hardly the 30% noted in that article or other articles I've read.

Furthermore, it is estimated by the Inter-American Dialogue study that around 60% of money sent from the U.S. to Cuba is sent by electronic wire transfer. The rest comes in through the foreign travelers. The money that comes in peoples pockets is only charged the fee if they legally exchange the money--many do not. Of the money sent in through electronic wire transfer -- how much do you think is lost on fees? The U.S. Government takes 20% in wire fees to Cuba. That is twice the conversion fee charged by the Cuban Government.

How much does Western Union charge? And what of the other independent wire transfer places?

You can't get something for nothing. Hence, the U.S. has an embargo against Cuba and Cuba needs to exchange the dollars coming into their country at a cost to them. Thus, the TEN (10) percent, not 30%, conversion fee on every dollar.