A former top-level Cuban official says conditions on the island are bad and
                                 getting worse.

                                 It seems we've been hearing this for the last 40 years, but Alcibiades
                                 Hidalgo speaks with some authority. Until he fell out of favor, Hidalgo had
                                 been Cuba's ambassador to the United Nations; chief of staff to Defense
                                 Minister Raul Castro, Fidel's younger brother and designated heir; and a
                                 member of the Communist Party's inner circle.

                                 In an interview with George Gedda of the Associated Press, Hidalgo said
                                 worsening conditions in Cuba — hunger and rising unemployment
                                 — could produce a popular uprising, "a social explosion'' against
                                 Castro's dictatorial rule.

                                 Again, this is something we seem to have been hearing for 40 years, but
                                 Hidalgo suggested a new twist — that it is problematic whether the
                                 military would intervene to quell a popular uprising. The military professes
                                 unswerving loyalty to Castro, but in fact no one knows.

                                 Castro has blamed the island's economic woes almost solely on the U.S.
                                 economic embargo. Hidalgo said that while the embargo aggravated
                                 conditions, the real culprit was Castro's socialist policies, a fact clear to
                                 any outsider. Hidalgo wouldn't agree, but removing Castro's last remaining
                                 excuse for his disastrous rule seems like a good reason for lifting the
                                 embargo.

                                 Although political support for easing the embargo is growing in the United
                                 States, it is not likely to be lifted soon. Congress may, however, lift a
                                 general ban on Americans traveling to Cuba. Hidalgo says lifting the ban,
                                 with the money it would bring to Cuba, would be "a gift for Fidel.''

                                 Hidalgo, 56, said he defected because of the rigid ideological conformity.
                                 "The first right is the right to independent thought,'' he said. Now that
                                 Hidalgo is thinking freely in a free country, we trust he'll bear with us while
                                 we make this next point:

                                 Lifting the travel ban is not about Fidel or his regime or exile politics but
                                 about Americans' fundamental right to travel where they please. If things
                                 are as bad as Hidalgo says, it would be salutary for Americans to see for
                                 themselves.