The omnibus budget, better known as the pork budget (the bulk of which was actually pork free), that Obama signed, eases U.S. travel to Cuba:
CNN: The $410 billion budget President Obama signed Wednesday will make it easier for U.S. residents to travel to Cuba and to send money to family members on the island. It also could facilitate the sale of agricultural and pharmaceutical products to Cuba.
The residents of Havana, Cuba, often rely on bicycle taxis for transportation.
Three provisions attached to the omnibus spending bill loosened restrictions enacted by then-President George W. Bush after he came to office in 2001.
Analysts see the move as a way for the new Obama administration to start thawing relations with Cuba one month before the Fifth Summit of the Americas brings together the U.S. president and 33 other leaders from the Western Hemisphere in Trinidad and Tobago.
"[Cuba] is the issue of greatest symbolic importance," said Peter Hakim, president of the Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue policy institute. "It will be seen as a test of real U.S. readiness to change in the hemisphere. What he says about Cuba will make headlines."
Hakim testified about Latin American policy Wednesday before the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Cuban students love American pop culture and are hopeful that Obama will better relations between Cuba and the U.S.:
