Creating an embargo limits the exchange of cultural ideals. Why do you think it is that historically port cities have been the most "liberal" and "intellectually informed" throughout history? Embargoing a country simply limits this cultural exchange, and it might even make the regime that is in power stronger than weaken it. Hell, they could just lie to people about why the embargo is happening (like Jackson mentioned) or that there are even other countries out there by controlling the media and everything else that is produced in the country.
Its ludicrous that people who are so "pro-democracy" can be so "anti-market" when open markets can often be one of the most effective ways to reach democracy.
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
