Posted on 05/11/2008 10:23:07 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Hillary Clinton, down to her last straw, is making the case that she is the better candidate to run against the Republicans because, unlike Barack Obama, she can win white Democrats.
She is right. But because she is daring to touch the hot button of racial politics, she is being told to shut up or risk being charged with exploiting racial tensions for political advantage.
The facts are stubborn, however. Since his phenomenal win with 33% of the white vote in nearly all-white Iowa, Obama has been unable to get a firm grip on white Democrats. He has won a majority of these voters in only six states, the biggest of which is his home state of Illinois. Clinton has defeated Obama among white voters in key states such as California, Texas, Ohio, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Exit polls show Clinton winning an overwhelming average of 57% of white Democrats since the February Super Tuesday elections.
If you think none of this is a real issue for Democrats as they try to win the White House, then listen to Republican guru Karl Rove. Citing Obama's inability to get more than 30% of Catholics or working-class white voters in a big state such as Pennsylvania, Rove recently wrote: "Defections like this elect Republicans."
And now we are heading into a general election with an even larger group of white voters in play, key independents and suburbanites in "toss-up" districts that swing between Republicans and Democrats.
So it is critical for the Democrats to focus on what it means to nominate this particular black candidate. It is critical for them to honestly assess his strengths and weaknesses, even when those are uncomfortably intertwined with his race.
In particular, being silent on race is not going to erase Obama's ties to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and the preacher's fireballs of inflammatory rhetoric.
Nearly half of the voters in North Carolina and Indiana said Wright was an important issue for them. Then there is an April poll by The Associated Press that found "about 8% of whites would be uncomfortable voting for a black for President." According to a May Newsweek poll, 12% of voters said they thought most Americans would "have reservations about voting for a black candidate that they are not willing to express"; 41% said they thought some Americans would have such reservations.
To some, any reference to such numbers is desperate at best - and race-baiting at worst.
"I have much broader base to build a winning coalition on," Clinton told USA Today this week, making clear that she consistently does better among white, working-class voters. "There is a pattern emerging here."
That prompted The New York Times editorial page to write: "Yes, there is a pattern - a familiar and unpleasant one," making reference to charges that during the primary campaign the Clinton camp has used veiled racial attacks against Obama.
Howard Dean, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is living in similar denial. If the GOP brings up Wright during the fall campaign, Dean said recently, it will amount to "race-baiting...just like Willie Horton was race-baiting so many years ago."
Obama has run a brilliant campaign. He has won over many white voters by making them proud to vote for a supremely educated and capable man who, at his best, makes race a secondary concern. It is not inconsistent, unfair or unsavory to point out, at the same time, that Obama has been growing weaker over the months in his ability to win all but black voters. Nor am I necessarily suggesting that white voters are drifting from him because of his race - as opposed to judgments about the content of his character or candidacy.
This is about facing facts. And history will reflect poorly on Democrats if they believe it is virtuous to ignore race in the name of nominating the first black candidate for the White House - even if it means giving the Republicans a better chance to once again walk away with the big prize of the presidency.
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Williams, a political analyst with NPR and Fox, is author of "Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America - and What We Can Do About It."
She also brings high negatives.
I love how Brit looks at him sometimes. Priceless!
“obama’s got a growing problem with whites.”
yeah; it’s the problem with the growing perception that obama attracts bigots who hate whites.
The missing link is the number of Clinton votes who were/are actually true "Not-Obama" votes as opposed to pro-Hillary votes. I have been guessing at about 20%. They are the likely defectors to McCain if Obama is the 'rat nominee. That would be a couple million votes which otherwise would largly stay with the party. Big problem indeed.
It just occurred to me: Obama’s father was Muslim. We all know who ran the slave trade in Africa, as well as who did the actual slavecatching. Might be an interesting family tree to trace.
Interesting that few people realize that Obama is mostly white! He’s only 6.25% black, 50% European white and the rest African Arabic. Strange nobody is reporting this fact.
At the least, I'd say that a few years on Fox have made him more sensible. The same goes for Mara Liasson. Alone among NPR correspondents, these two understand how conservatives view the issues.
What? You mean that calling whites who won’t vote for Obama obvious racists ‘cause they won’t vote for the black guy isn’t a winning strategy? Guilt’s the way to go.
I’m not voting for anyone who calls me a European, a white, or a white European.
I have never heard this. I don't doubt it at all but do you have any thing more to support this claim.
If Obama is elected, will it become just as bad for blacks to be racists as it is for whites?
If so, it might be worth it.
Not.
Obama and his reverend opened this race talk. The Philadelphia speech will go down, if remembered, as divisive, the polar opposite of King’s dream speech.
Some whites are talking back. What HRC said this past week about her getting the white vote would have been met with the vapors in newsrooms only a few years ago.
From Dreams of My Father: ‘I ceased to advertise my mother's race at the age of 12 or 13, when I began to suspect that by doing so I was ingratiating myself to whites.’
From Dreams of My Father: ‘I found a solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity against my mother’s race.’
From Dreams of My Father: ‘There was something about him that made me wary, a little too sure of himself, maybe. And white.’
From Dreams of My Father: ; ‘It remained necessary to prove which side you were on, to show your loyalty to the black masses, to strike out and name names.’
From Dreams of My Father: ‘I never emulate white men and brown men whose fates didn't speak to my own. It was into my father's image, the black man, son of Africa, that I'd packed all the attributes I sought in myself, the attributes of Martin and Malcolm, Dubois and Mandela.’
From Audacity of Hope: ‘I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.’
... and he’s not “African-American” like a large part of his constituency ...
I don’t think Williams is getting more conservative. He realizes an Obama loss in the general election because of the Bradley effect would have repercussions for years for potential black candidates.
The Dems would be in clover if Obama had run a good race without coming close to unseating Hillary. If she went on to win with him as a V-Pres then he would have been a shoo-in for the Dem nomination in his turn—and the country would have been conditioned to ignore race as a factor.
What does it say about blacks that they vote 90% for the black candidate? At least 40% of White Democrats vote for a black man. For white democrats it’s not so much about race, for black democrats it apparently is.
Obama has a color problem. He’s a R-E-D.
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