Or does Kevin think Tom Harkin and Dick Lugar want to lift the embargo simply on the principle?

Anyone who takes out an education loan that becomes a "crushing burden" is living well beyond their means.  This is a choice, whether out of ignorance or stupidity, that some feel entitled to make.  I feel entitled to point out that it's not a smart choice...not a good choice...and not the only choice.

Yes..."endless complaints" refers to general public complaints about 'the cost of college,' not only from those already in debt for their education.  Generally speaking, these complaints are grounded in ignorance and some wacky sense of entitlement by people who live in some other universe than the one I inhabit.

I generalize from the specific, having reviewed hundreds of local applications for scholarships over the past 30 years.  Let me give you a brief glimpse of what I see:

First, applicants with no job, no savings, very little or no prospective help from parents and evidently no clue, who want to attend a private college!  They often write that they 'need' a scholarship because they don't want to 'have to borrow' to continue their education...never imagining that a scholarship committee is unlikely to want to invest in anyone who won't invest in themselves.

Second, lifestyle expectations.  In the application process, students are asked to present a budget of expected costs of attending college.  The smallest items in their budgets are tuition, books, school fees when they are expecting to attend a public college or university.  The biggest items (both boys and girls) are often their auto payments and car insurance along with room/board and 'spending money.'  These are not actually 'the cost of college.'  These are the cost of living whether one is attending college or not.  Borrowing to live is what becomes a 'crushing burden' for most folks.  

Many seem incapable of cutting back on a lifestyle while attending school, of lowering expectations, of working while in school and every summer, of facing the difference between wants and needs.

Private colleges are seductive of course, baiting the hook with what looks like a large scholarship for maybe half their tuition, leaving the other half (still larger than a whole year's public school's tuition) to be paid somehow...by loans, no doubt.

Public college in my state (WA) is cheap (much cheaper than many other state's tuition for 4-year schools) and there is huge support for needy students.  Living is expensive.  Private schools are expensive.  

Knowing the difference and making choices one can afford gets my admiration and support.  Endless complaining about 'the cost of college' doesn't.

I imagine there are many influences but it seems to me that the longer expats are here, the less likely they are to want to return...even if, somehow, they identify more as Cuban than as American, which I suppose some do...particularly those old enough to remember a previous life in another country.

It offended me.

I do not know any white Russians so I can not speak for your friends, but no Cuban American I know of does not know what Batista was.