Visits to Cuba by China’s President (seen here in 2004), Russia’s Prime Minister and Brazil’s President illustrate that the Obama Administration delays at its peril setting a bold new course on Cuba. Even the Bush Administration in its final months may be having second thoughts.

Reuters reports that during a two day stopover,

“Chinese President Hu Jintao agreed to put off some of Cuba's debt payments and gave the island $80 million for hospital modernization and other projects…China is Cuba's second largest trading partner after Venezuela at $2.3 billion in 2007.”

Next up in Havana is Russia's Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev who is reported by Reuters to have both economic and strategic goals, in part to counter the Bush Administration’s adventurist policies in countries that were part of or dominated by the former Soviet Union.

Closer to home,

“Brazil will offer Cuba financial aid for industry, energy and infrastructure projects during a December visit by communist President Raul Castro …We'll discuss the production of buses, building roads, as well as oil investments," Marco Aurelio Garcia, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's foreign policy adviser, told Reuters.

Obama might ponder the implications of a remark made during the recent visit to Cuba by Lula, our non-Chavez role model, about his invitation to Raul

"to participate in the first meeting of Latin American and Caribbean nations, without interference from any other power."

--John McAulliff