I like that secularists in Turkey are keeping their country secular. God knows we have suffered and will probably suffer from governments, leaders and religious people trying to insert God directly into politics instead of just considering religion as a source of shared values. During my teaching here at Princeton, and during some of my travels in the U.S., I have found that people have some doubts about the principle of separation of church and state (it applies to all religions.) Indeed, they were surprised when I told them that this is one area in which many true democrats look favorably at the U.S. and the west.

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The Current Discussion: With Castro gone, will Cuba become America's 51st state?

It is a shame that Cuban-U.S. relations have taken such a partisan direction, but the future of Cuban-American relations are certainly going to be better than the past. We are sure of one thing this year: whoever wins the White House will certainly not be a radically anti-Cuba conservative. While U.S. policy against Cuba might have had some logic to it years back, there is no logic to it now.

While change is certain to take place in 2009 due to the new president and the absence of Castro, it is unlikely that that change will be major. Cubans will not change their policies quickly and neither will the American establishment. A lot of what will happen after the inauguration in 2009 will depend on the attitudes of the small group of radical American-Cuban Republicans who have been holding Washington hostage to their extremely radical anti-Castro policies.
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