A test of 'soft power'

March 22, 2016 - Daily News Briefing

The thaw between the US and Cuba won't lead to overnight change in the island nation. But in time, a freer Cuba is likely.

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Cuban President Raul Castro called on President Obama on Monday to lift longstanding US trade and other restrictions as he and Obama pledged to move forward with normalizing relations between Cuba and its longtime Cold War-era foe. "This is a new day," Obama said, standing alongside Castro after their meeting at Havana's Palace of the Revolution. In a history-making meeting in Havana, Castro praised Obama's recent steps to relax controls on Cuba as "positive," but deemed them insufficient. He called anew for the US to return its naval base at Guantanamo Bay to Cuba and to lift the US trade embargo.

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) said he plans to hold the state to stricter lead-level rules than required by federal regulations as the state government on Monday released goals to help the city of Flint recover from a lead-contamination crisis. The recovery plan for Flint targets four areas: water supply and infrastructure, health and human services, education, and economic development. The effort seeks to improve on current US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules, which state that a water system need only take steps to curb corrosion if lead concentrations surpass 15 parts per billion in more than 10 percent of taps sampled.

The US Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a case filed by the states of Nebraska and Oklahoma to have Colorado’s recreational marijuana laws declared unconstitutional. The justices have not commented on the decision to throw out the lawsuit, which Nebraska and Oklahoma filed directly in the Supreme Court against the neighboring state. The suit contends that Colorado’s law allowing adults recreational use of marijuana violates federal antidrug regulations. The two states further argue that Colorado-sourced pot is spilling over their borders, impeding their anti-drug efforts and eating into their resources.

Utah voters on Tuesday will navigate a new presidential caucus system that comes months earlier than last time and opens the Republican race to online voting with computers, smartphones or tablets. Unlike in some past presidential campaigns, the state of Utah is not paying for a primary election this year, leaving the parties to set up their own systems. Democrats are holding a traditional paper vote, but to boost participation, the Utah GOP is offering online voting in addition to the usual ballot. It's one of the first prominent uses in the country of online voting, which presents new security and privacy challenges for officials. State Republican officials say they're confident in their process because it's been used for national elections in other countries.

John Kasich, Ted Cruz, and Donald Trump, the final three Republican candidates running for president, began this month with drastically different campaign fortunes, new fundraising reports show. In one month, Cruz raised what Kasich has collected over the entire course of his long shot bid. Trump, a billionaire, has raised relatively little money as he "self-funds" his effort. On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders out-raised Hillary Clinton for the second month in a row. But the Vermont senator still started March with about half as much cash on hand as the former secretary of State.

Could raising taxes on the rich help fight poverty? A group of more than 40 millionaires in New York state say so, and they have written to Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) and other lawmakers proposing higher taxes for the top 1 percent of earners. The letter – obtained by the Associated Press and signed by Abigail Disney, Steven C. Rockefeller, and Leo Hindery, Jr., among others – says the effort would be crucial to addressing child poverty and homelessness, and rebuilding the nation’s aging infrastructure. The letter comes from a subset of the “Patriotic Millionaires,” a group of more than 200 US millionaires and billionaires calling for policies that benefit wage-earners and the majority of Americans over the wealthy elite.

West Virginia on Monday tested residents' tornado preparedness responses across the state. Indiana and Virginia will do the same on Tuesday, with many other states following over the course of the next month. Residents of these states will have a chance to practice their emergency plans in case of tornadoes, which do not have a specific season, unlike other storms, such as hurricanes.

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