Cuban Clarity

Before President Bush flies off to Russia he is expected to make today two speeches regarding America's Cuban policy — one in Washington, and the other in Miami, home to the largest population of Cuban refugees in the United States —promising to support the embargo and demanding that Mr. Castro release all of his political prisoners. The second largest community of Cuban-Americans is right here, in the New York-New Jersey region, and to judge by the crowd at the Cuban Independence Day Parade, the local community wants Mr. Bush to stand strong against the rising tide of compromise talk that has erupted in the wake of President Carter's visit.

The notion that this is a partisan matter was dispelled for many at the local rally, as our R.H. Segar reports on page one. Congessman Robert Menendez of New Jersey, a Democrat, was caustically critical of Mr. Carter. "At a time when America is fighting terrorism around the world," he said, "the biggest terrorist in this hemisphere is Fidel Castro."

One gets the feeling about the drive for detente with Castro's regime that what is really going on here is an effort by its apologists to find some way to emerge with dignity from their decades of failure to deal honestly with Castro's crimes. But events such as the one in New Jersey Sunday remind us that the embargo of Cuba that has obtained for decades has its roots in a clearheadedness born of experience of hundreds of thousands who sought refuge in America.