Listen to Cuba’s dissidents

Miami Herald: The Obama administration is dropping broad hints of possible changes in U.S. policy toward Cuba. Any change should come with a cautionary note: Watch what Cuba’s leaders do to dissidents and the average citizen alike, not what they say about “modernizing” Cuba.

It’s encouraging to hear that the administration is thinking about how to move the needle on Cuba, as President Obama told an audience in Miami recently. Too often Cuban issues are deemed politically risky and shoved aside.

But policy toward Cuba should not be forged in a vacuum. Ra ∫l Castro and his octogenarian colleagues show that they’re determined to hang onto power. They’re not interested in genuine democracy and they’re not about to tolerate any changes that could threaten their survival.

President Obama sparked speculation about upcoming changes in U.S. policy toward Cuba when he told a private Democratic Party fundraiser here that “we have to continue to update our policies” toward that beleaguered nation. Last week, Secretary of State John Kerry repeated those same words in a major speech on Latin America.

Kerry properly noted changes in Cuba that make life a bit easier for people by allowing more Cubans to travel freely and work for themselves. But such changes ... don’t portend a change in the nature of the regime.