mr. herrero, if i could ask mr. herrero to weigh in on that. >> two largest protests we've seen in the last two years in cuba were actually protests by entrepreneurs who were protesting, that is the truth. largest. >> that is not true. come on. >> frank there was one with 500 people in the street. mostly on thes. i know you don't want to recognize entrepreneurs. if i may, it is my turn. amnesty called for lifting of embargo. so has human rights watch. our policy again goes back to whether we're trying to micromanage a transition from the united states. visit cuba talk to cuba hope by us demanding everything they will do everything we want or try to engage in constructive ways and empower civil society. now civil society is not just a handful of dissidents that agree with particular policy here. it is everybody that is opposed to government. the entire opposition movement. all dissidents. not only that, entrepreneurs academics, artists anybody who is seeking to increase autonomy from the state. they are the folks we s

mr. herrero? >> frank there's -- >> if i could just ask mr. herrero to weigh in on that. >> the two large protests that we've seen in the last two years in cuba were actually protests by entrepreneurs -- [laughter] who were protesting -- that's the truth. >> come on. >> there was one with 500 people in the street. i know you don't want to recognize entrepreneurs. >> look at amnesty international. >> if i may, it's my turn. amnesty, by the way has called for a lifting of the embargo. and so has human rights watch. our policy, again, it goes back to whether we're trying to micromanage, not visit cuba and just hope that by us demanding they'll do everything we want or try to engage in constructive ways and empower civil society. now, civil society is not just a handful of dissidents that agree with a particular policy here, it's everybody that is a opposed to the government, all dissidents, but not only that entrepreneurs, academics, artists, anybody who is seeking to increase their autonomy from the state. they're the folks that we should be help

mr. ricardo herrero executive director of cuba now which advocates engagement with cuba.he is an attorney and the son of hubinette cells. he was briefly the deputy executive director of a cuba study group in washington a former executive director of the miami-dade democratic party and served on the 2012 presidential campaign of venezuelan opposition leader henrique. his articles have appeared in the "huffington post," "usa today" and "the miami herald," among others, and disappeared quickly on tv, including cnn in asp and you'll. welcome, rick. [applause] >> i want to start with you and i sort of left off a few weeks ago during an on air congress who were having on wlrn that has to do with the central premise that president obama laid out for why he undertook this very dramatic very historic change in the u.s. policy towards cuba. and that premise was as he said in a state of union address as well if something isn't working after 50 years, you can't expect a different result to give to move on to a different approach. you pointed out, however, that that central premise yo