I think it's amazing that Barack Obama is worried about an Arab Spring, he's worried about Tunisia, he's worried about Libya, he's worried about Egypt, he's worried about Syria, and he cannot bring himself to look south and imagine a Cuban Spring. And I would argue that we should have, as a stated explicit policy, that we want to facilitate the transition from the dictatorship to freedom. We want to bring together every non-military asset we have, exactly as President Reagan and Prime Minister Thatcher and Pope John Paul II did in Poland and in Eastern Europe.

They broke up the Soviet empire without a general war by using a wide range of things, one of which is just psychological, saying to the next generation of people in Cuba, the dictatorship is not going to survive. You need to bet to moving to freedom in order to have prosperity in Cuba, and we will help you get to that freedom.

“If there was a genuine, legitimate uprising, we would, of course, be on the side of the people… In that sense, I don't see why Cuba should be sacrosanct, and we should say, 'Oh, don't do anything to hurt' - you know, we're very prepared to back people in Libya. We may end up backing people in Syria. But now Cuba? Hands off Cuba. That's baloney. People of Cuba deserve freedom.”

“… Throughout my years of service in the United States Congress, I was a consistent and active supporter of efforts to isolate, destabilize and terminate the Castro dictatorship. As Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, I was proud to work with Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart to pass the 1996 Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act (Helms-Burton).

Let me assure the Cuban-American community, the captive Cuban people, and the Castro tyrants themselves, that a Newt Gingrich presidency will be committed to implementing a pro-active policy agenda to expedite a transition to democracy in Cuba…”