By William E Gibson/Sun Sentinel/TNS

US presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton has called for an end to the US embargo of Cuba, setting up a clear contrast with her Republican rivals on an issue that divides Florida.
“The Cuba embargo needs to go, once and for all,” Clinton said in a speech at Florida International University on Friday.
“Engagement is not a gift to the Castros,” Clinton said, referring to Fidel and Raul Castro, the former and current leaders of Cuba. “It is a threat to the Castros.”
“Lifting the embargo doesn’t set back the advance of freedom, it advances freedom where it is most desperately needed,” she said.
The Democratic front-runner is taking a political risk, gambling that most voters in Florida and elsewhere have lost patience with an embargo that has not transformed the Cuban government or led to reforms after more than 50 years.
The speech reflected Clinton’s shifting views on Cuba since her 2008 campaign, in which she took more of a hard-line approach than Barack Obama, her Democratic rival at the time.
On Friday, she fully backed Obama’s policy of establishing closer ties to Cuba and using them to encourage political and economic reforms.
“I’ve been sceptical, too,” she said. “Anyone who thinks we can trust this (Castro) regime hasn’t learned the lessons of history.
“But as secretary of state, it became clear to me that our policy of isolating Cuba was strengthening the Castros’ grip on power rather than weakening it and harming our broader efforts to restore American leadership across the hemisphere.
“The Castros were able to blame all of the island’s woes on the US embargo, distracting from the regime’s failures and delaying their day of reckoning with the Cuban people.”
She argued that economic engagement would be a boon for the Cuban people and for Americans, especially Cuban-Americans.
Florida businesses, including major cruise lines, are eager to take advantage once Congress agrees to remove restrictions on trade and travel to Cuba.
“With the lifting of the embargo, were that to occur, it’s pretty apparent the cruise industry is looking to move quickly and would begin Cuban travel operations,” said Robert Kritzman, of Miami, former general counsel for Norwegian Cruise Line. “It would be something new and unique to passengers, especially those who already have seen spots in the Caribbean.”
Hundreds of thousands of Americans already are travelling to Cuba under Obama’s new rules, which allow Cuban-Americans unlimited visits to see relatives and others to take tours for educational, religious or cultural reasons.
The embargo still restricts pleasure trips and most forms of trade, and it can only be removed by act of Congress.
“We should help more Americans go to Cuba,” Clinton said on Friday. “If Congress won’t act to do this, I will use executive authority to make it easier for more Americans to visit the island to support private business and engage with the Cuban people.”
A nationwide poll by the Pew Research Centre in July found that 72% of respondents want to end the embargo.
Support for the embargo also has eroded in Florida, even among Cuban-Americans who in the past had overwhelmingly favoured economic sanctions as a way to squeeze the Castro regime.
An FIU poll last year of Cuban-Americans in Miami-Dade County found that 52% were ready to end the embargo.
But many voters, especially older Cuban exiles, want to keep it as long as Cuba is controlled by the Castro regime.
Clinton’s position puts her in conflict with them and with most Republican presidential candidates, especially US Senator Marco Rubio of Florida.
“Unilateral concessions to the Castros will only strengthen a brutal, anti-American regime 90 miles from our shore,” Rubio said before Clinton’s speech. “President Obama and Secretary Clinton must learn that appeasement only emboldens dictators and repressive governments, and weakens America’s global standing in the 21st century.”
Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, also a presidential candidate, wants to undo and reverse the Obama policy.
“I would argue that instead of lifting the embargo we should consider strengthening it again to put pressure on the Cuban regime,” Bush told the US Cuba Democracy PAC, a pro-embargo group, during a speech in December in Coral Gables.
Clinton did not mention the Cuban Adjustment Act, a law that allows Cubans to remain in the US once they set foot in the country.