US-Cuba is a curiosity, not a big story

"The reasons for this failure are not difficult to find. In recent years, editorial management has downgraded the seniority of the Cuba correspondent position and cut the Miami bureau - chief watching post for Cuba - from seven correspondents to one, apparently under the puzzling assumption that the island and its relationship with the United States were no longer a big story."

I don't think that's a puzzling assumption. The relationship isn't a big story. It's a curiosity which could have been covered just fine from DC and with some local features, like the NYT road trip.

Cuba has trading partners, is not a hermit kingdom and its status vis-a-vis the US is entirely due to provincial US legacy policies and a doddering anti-Castro establishment in Miami which also no longer matters.

This is a milestone story which crested when it happened. Criticize Reuters all you want for wrong-headed emphasis, but this is a poor example. ■