It's been a while since I was invited onto the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy Monthly Conference Call.

My apostasies over Iraq and climate change have been, well, if not forgiven, then papered over. And because we all realise the Israelis are in a tougher fight now than they've been in for 50 years, it's time to pull together.

But this call was less about the hurricane-plagued present and more about the sun, cigars and mojitos of the future.

"We got plans like you wouldn't believe, " said Sammy, my old Chicago Republican pal in his thick southside accent. "Cuba's gonna make Vegas look like a soft-core lapdancing joint.

Cuba's gonna be the real brothel.

"I been hearing from the old riverboat gang." Sammy used to work for the Gaming Commission of Illinois, where casinos are allowed as long as they're not actually on land. "They're excited."

"Aren't we getting ahead of ourselves, chaps?" asked my Tory friend who, regular readers may recall, rang me earlier this year to ream me out about my going soft on Iraq. "I mean, Raul is still, at least theoretically, in charge.

We aren't even sure if Fidel is dead yet."

"You're joking, right?"

Sammy cut across.

"He's fooled us before, " finished the Tory.

"Boys, we have just got to make sure this comes off, " said a new voice, this one a Washington K-Street lobbyist with a Texas accent, who conveniently represents the tobacco and oil industries. "My clients are ready. We've got plans for test wells off Cuba's west coast. And y'all don't need to be told that cee-gars are the last refuge of civilised tobacco cultivation. We can't afford to let that paratroop muppet set up his stall."

One of the ironies of history is that Cuba was traditionally seen as the biggest security threat to the US in the western hemisphere, exporting revolution around the Caribbean basin, Central America and even Africa.

But now the revolucion in Cuba may wind up being propped up, for a while anyway, by the man who would claim to be its heir, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.

A proxy war between Washington and Venezuela over the future of Cuba once Castro is confirmed dead is not out of the question, but I've decided to stay quiet on this call. I'll be damned if I'm going to be stuck sitting next to Francis Fukuyama at the Christmas party.

"We all know that boy Chavez is about as safe as the third guy on one of the Veep's [Dick Cheney's] quail hunts, " said Sammy. "We're not worried.

"Besides, " he continued.

"We think we have a solution that everybody's gonna love.

It's, erm, an Irish solution to a Cuban problem."

"Come again?" I ask, in spite of myself.

"That's right, Irish. Look at how Bord Failte ran things over all those years. Selling Ireland as the place of green fields with a red-haired cailin riverdancing at every crossroads?

"Now look at Cuba.

Europeans crawling over each other to get there despite our best efforts. See it before it's ruined. So why mess with a good thing.

Buena Vista Social Club . . .

hello? We're gonna make the island one big theme park for Lefties. Socialist nostalgia.

Authentic friendly peasants who'll send their kids to Harvard and one day build Havana's IFSC. But in the meantime we're gonna keep the place as authentic as possible.

"Disney's going to spruce some of it up, obviously. And the hospitals in Miami will snap up any of the decent doctors."

"But where are we gonna put the casinos?" I spluttered. I had a horrible feeling I already knew the answer. "Check your email, " said Sammy.

There in front of me on the screen was a file opening up with a little animation.

Fountains, girls wearing fruit with more panache than Glenda Gilson.

"Gentlemen, " said Sammy grandly. "I present the cornerstone of the players' paradise that will be Cuba Nuevo. I give youf the MGM Grand Guantanamo."