THEHAVANANOTE: “Obama owes Jonathan Farrar a defense”, por Arturo López-Levy

The political battle over the designation of Jonathan Farrar as US ambassador to Nicaragua is a test of whether the Obama Administration lacks any genuine conviction about its foreign policy. Farrar is a professional diplomat with an impeccable thirty years diplomatic career who served a recent term as the Chief of the US Interest Section in Cuba. As a result he became the perfect target of Cuban American hardliners for one, and only one, reason: he implemented Obama’s policy in Havana. Unfortunately for Farrar, the president’s policy is anathema to two Cuban-American Senators: Robert Menendez and Marco Rubio.

The American people voted for president Obama because he promised not to be paralyzed by the ideological battles of the past and to instead bring a pragmatic post-Cold War vision to the White House.