Pen-Elayne on the Web

Talking Baseball, Again!

Apparently the fellow who used to be part-owner of the Texas Rangers has done something sort-of right for a change - he got directly involved in the controversy over the Cuban baseball team being denied entrance to the US to compete in the World Baseball Classic this March, and the decision has now been reversed by Treasury - so long as no money exchanges hands, apparently (i.e., dollars officially flowing from the US to Cuba). It's far from ideal, but it's better than I'd hoped. The MLB site notes:

Cuba is the preeminent baseball power on the international scene and the winner of three of the four Olympic gold medals since baseball became a medal sport in 1992. They were the winners of the gold medal at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece, and the 2004 International Baseball Federation World Cup in the Netherlands. The Cubans have won the latter tournament 25 times since its inception in 1938. The IBAF World Cup is now played on a bi-annual basis and Cuba has won 12 of the last 13 gold medals dating back to 1976 (South Korea won in 1982). Cuba has never competed against MLB players at the international tournament level and this is the first one that will include Major League players.

If this decision hadn't been reversed, it would have made us look even more incredibly petty than we already look on the international scene. Moreover, it would have made us look like cowards, which I'm sure factored into Bush's decision much more than the pettiness thing.

Update: It hadn't even occurred to me that the reason this whole thing seemed to weird to me was that Cuba isn't a capitalist country, so it didn't make sense why money could possibly have been a sticking point. Eli has more, including a link to this Granma article which ran the letter from the president of the Cuban Baseball Federation to MLB volunteering to direct the money it would have received from participation towards Katrina victims.