Has Hillary at 49, Obama at 45. If you look at Gallup and the Rasmussen poll and the narrowing of the race in NC and it sure looks to me that Wright has been a disaster for Obama.
And it once again proves that I am an absolutely horrid judge of public opinion.
BFR
And yet, the ‘race’ is closer than before to being officially over. The Super Delegate updateds this week have been nothing but a stream of bad news for Clinton. I have no doubt that Clinton will stay in through the end of the primaries, but she’s just getting further and further out of contention every passing day.
Nim, ham hock of liberty
Even if the relentless slime pump was working – something I’m not yet convinced of – it’s still too little, too late. There won’t be a delegate coup large enough for Hillary to overcome the hole she’s in.
Paul
Well, Frak.
I suppose Sen Clinton’s strategy, in retrospect, is going to be a winning one. Keep on plugging away and hope for a caltrops or land mine in Sen. Obama’s path.
Reverend Jeremiah Wright has been that land mine.
I have a feeling that some people were looking for a tangible reason toto *not* support Sen. Obama, and the Reverend gives them cover to do so. Sen. Clinton drove up his negatives, rather than increasing her positives.
And I know its months away, but the words “President John McCain fills my mouth, and not with a pleasant taste.
Apsalar
We are a stupid stupid people, and if McCain is elected in Nov., I’m almost getting to the point where I’ll say that we deserve what we get. Casualties in Iraq for 100 more years, horrible economic problems at home, inflation, more people without health care, etc.
No, I don’t really believe that. But I’m starting to wonder how we’re supposed to really fix any of these problems when the American public is apparently overwhelmingly terrified of teh Angry Black Men.
DP
I agree that it is too little, too late.
I also would not panic yet, I suspect we are seeing the Obama’s nadir with respect to the wright affair. His repudiation and getting back on message should help him rebound (ohpleaseohpleaseohplease!).
Sasha
Bummer but unsurprising. I imagined that the recent Wright flare up would hurt Obama, possibly badly. But it’s far too early to claim it’s fatal.
If Hillary wins by significantly large margins in the next coupla primaries, it’ll be a potential death knell. But I don’t see that happening.
And now with Obama proving to be, yet again, the only candidate on the right side of an issue (the gas tax holiday), he can hopefully pivot his campaign back on track.
Rick Taylor
I was nearly certain Gore would win in 2000, and even more certain Kerry would win in 2004. I’ve been knocked down enough I at least know I’m a horrid judge by now; and I do worry about a McCain victory in 2008. It’s odd, seeing this change now. I wonder what did more damage; Wright, the gas tax, or just the accumulation of things like bitter-gate. I’d guess the gas tax; politicians pander with tax cuts for a reason, it’s effective.
I’m afraid this country deserves the leadership it gets.
cleek
next time a politician with big numbers but no real chance of winning bows out of a race before the last contest and says the decision is “for the good of the party”… i’m gonna believe him (or her).
Paul
@Apsalar: I get your nickname’s source, I think. From the Erikson novels, right? Great series (although the last volume was a little bit of a disappointment to me)
(Hey I have to find some silver lining and cheer in this thread, yes?)
TR
“President John McCain fills my mouth, and not with a pleasant taste.”
That’s the best unintentional humor from an unclosed quote I’ve ever seen. Sounds like it comes from his reluctant Republican fluffers.
nightjar
I don’t know why. It’s not like he’s getting piled on or anything. And then there’s this and this which reminds me of a kid in grade school always ratting to the teacher what the other students are up to. Then claiming she’s just telling the truth.
Wingnuts and Clintonuts, grab your pitchforks and lanterns.
Times a wastin’.
must be rabbit powered server. maybe their just hungry.
Pooh
Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.
We are a truly, truly, TRULY stupid people. And that’s before we even add in P.Luk and MyIQTroll
EdTheRed
It’s likely that Obama has run the numbers and realized that he’s going to win the nomination anyways, so that while getting into the gutter with Clinton at this point might help him in the short term, it would end up hurting him in the fall by undermining what up to this point has been the theme of his campaign (changing the tone of politics in order to address serious issues in serious ways).
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
Bingo. The Clinton campaign failed to think their cunning plan all the way through. Either McCain is weak and a dead chimpunk – or a scary black man – could beat him in the GE, or he’s a formidable opponent and both candidates with high unfavorables will struggle to beat him. In either case, weakening Obama doesn’t make Hillary look better.
And that’s not even counting out the possibility of Obama bouncing back yet again.
Dug Jay
Perhaps some of you should now ask yourselves how a party of supposed racial transcendence inevitably ended up with primaries predicated along hardening racial lines, and a unity pony, trans-racial candidate who for twenty years was intimate with a pastor and spiritual advisor who seems to have derided almost everyone and everything, from America, to Italians, to Jews and Israel, to whites and moderate blacks, with serial slurs worthy of a Don Imus or Michael Richards.
Punchy
This doesn’t help Obama, either. But it’s a fact of life in America. Hell, my old man says the same thing (once a Southerner, always….)
strawmanmunny
Can not people realize that just because a Pastor has some out of the mainstream ideas that doesn’t mean everyone in his congregation does? I mean, really, Catholics have had Priests that are pedophiles, does that make every Catholic that attended those churches pedophiles? Look at people that follow Falwell,Robertson,Hagee,etc…does that mean they think the same way on EVERY subject as those Preachers?
I mean, come on America, for a country that keeps saying it’s the best in the world, why does it act so stupid.
I didn’t think I could be more embarrassed by my country than when Bush was re-elected….I was wrong.
Chris Johnson
I don’t care. I’m going to vote for Obama even if I have to write him in, period.
I am DONE with the psychotic mess of this country’s politics and if this isn’t just Dieboldian made-up numbers it suggests that the country DOES deserve whatever it gets, and God willing some of us will live through it.
ResumeMan
Seriously people, calm down.
First, we all know that that Gallup poll has been super-volatile. And that the mid-week polls are typically worse for Obama. And note that the polling was right in the middle of the Wright fusillade. Don’t panic.
There have been rough spots before too. Maybe this is a winning formula for Hillary, maybe it isn’t. But things like the Andrew endorsement today and the steady growth in his super tally indicates that the Superdelegates haven’t given up.
Let’s just take a deep breath and let it unfold. Don’t hit the panic button or you’ll make everything worse.
As John says, he’s a lousy judge of public opinion. Why credit him with being right now???
crw
A big part of the problem, beyond Wright and the inevitable after effects of Obama’s Pennsylvania loss, is that Obama just looks exhausted and down beat, lately. He hasn’t been his usual inspirational, incredibly eloquent self, and I think it’s all too easy for people to forget why they liked him in the first place. I don’t know how he can do it, but he needs to find some way of getting back his joie de vivre so he can get back to projecting some of that optimism that propelled him to 11 straight victories in February.
Paul
D’oh!
I cop to hastily posting before I realized the double-entendre. ;)
Ninerdave
The Gallup horse race poll is meaningless. A nice discussion point, but meaningless. NC and IN are the only polls that really matter
Dennis - SGMM
We may be running out of oil and we may be running low on food but any country that can elect and then re-elect George W. Bush has an inexhaustible supply of stupid. Fusion hell, just harness stupid-power.
Z
Its not America that is the problem. It is a majority of Americans over the age of 45. Pray they eat more french fries.
Apsalar
@Paul: yep, that’s it. I take the strong kickass smart female characters in scifi/fantasy where I can get them.
4tehlulz
>>President John McCain fills my mouth, and not with a pleasant taste.
Calm the fuck down, people. The election’s six months away. McCain may learn to wash down there by then.
Ninerdave
Intentional or not, it’s quite apropos.
nightjar
I grew up in eastern Kentucky and left as soon as I could. Their decent people, if your like them.
There are few blacks brave enough to live there now, and when the Civil War was over what slaves were there, got the hell right out of dodge and didn’t come back.
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
The Ten State Strategy at work. But they can make it work this time! Really!
Dennis - SGMM
Thank you for not including all of us. I’m fifteen years past 45 and I wouldn’t vote for McCain or Clinton even if they promised me an 18.4 cent a gallon cut in the price of gasoline for three months.
andante
Here in this part of North Carolina we have a LOT of transplants from West Virginia & Kentucky – both states where many voters have said they wouldn’t vote for a black candidate.
So, unfortunately, I’m not surprised one bit the race is narrowing.
uh_clem
Wright may seem like an albatross around Obama’s neck at the moment, but his 15 minutes of fame are rapidly coming to an end. The only way he can attract more attention is by being even more incindiary , even more far-out, and that’ll be a stretch after this weeks performance. By November he’ll be about as relevant as Alan Keyes.
OTOH, McCain has an albatross around his neck named “George” who isn’t going to be forgotten so easily. Just keep saying “third Bush term”.
Once Hillary gives in and throws her support behind Obama, the specific-candidate numbers will re-align themselves closer to the generic Rep-Dem numbers – and those ain’t pretty for the GOP.
Fledermaus
About the only good thing from McCain is he WILL break the voulenteer military on the stones of Iraq. It’s sad but the GOP and their small dicked supporters seem hell bent on it. Maybe they’ll have to go fight their own fucking wars for a change.
Wilfred
The closer Obama gets to winning, the more threatened the right and its mouthpieces feel. Clinton is part of the right these days, as is the entire Washington babblecorps, who are going to find themselves out on their asses when Obama does get elected.
That’s right, and it’s the only thing that matters.
jake
PotD.
I don’t get it John. If MyIQPluckU came here screaming that these polls proved that BHO was TOAST!11 you’d tell them to [scram].
cbear
Yep.
As H.L. Mencken put it, ““No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”
Welcome to the ship of fools, John—it seems we may be in for another long, long voyage.
uh_clem
Seems to me that securing the nomination would do the trick nicely.
Dennis - SGMM
We likes us some double-entendre, also innuendo, snark, shadenfreude, character assassination, and references to obscure books and films.
Zifnab
Gore did win. There was just a great deal of political dirty tricks and a virtual void of political courage. So he was declared a loser.
Kerry fucked up, and proceeded to get fucked up for his trouble.
Both of them would have made perfectly good Presidents, but you can’t simply discount the wide-scale voter disenfranchisement and around-the-clock media smearing that ushered Bush into office for both terms.
When an entire political juggernaut has been erected to railroad the democratic process, you can’t just run off and blame hick Joe voter because he couldn’t tell who to vote for in the fog of shit.
Davis X. Machina
Wright was a very clever way of saying “Hey, Obama’s BLACK!”, without saying “Hey, Obama’s BLACK!”
Wright qua Wright didn’t change a single mind.
What Wright did was made it possible for people to say what they heretofore had been only thinking, or saying in very small circles.
Dennis - SGMM
He said, “The candidate is near.”
JoyceH
I think the Joe Andrew switch indicates that the tide is turning. Did you read what the man said? He switched to Obama, not in spite of Wright, but BECAUSE of the way he handled the Wright situation.
If Obama survives Wright (and I think he will), this will turn out to be, not his Sister Souljah moment, but his Jennifer Flowers moment. Remember that? The press conference and the incredible media firestorm that followed? By every rule of politics that was a campaign-killing event. Every pundit everywhere was telling us with complete certainty, “That’s it – Clinton is finished.” Every other Democratic candidate breathed a sigh of relief that Clinton was finally finished off and there was one less candidate to overcome.
But when it turned out that Clinton was NOT finished, that the campaign-killing event did NOT kill him, that totally changed the narrative. It positioned Clinton as indestructible – it that couldn’t kill him, the reasoning went, nothing could.
If Obama survives this – and he will if his supporters don’t panic and bolt – I think he’s a shoe-in in November.
empty
It feels strange defending Obama to the Obamabots here, but folks Wright is really not the scary hateful person he is being portrayed as. Go listen to his Bill Moyers interview and his Press Club speech. His personal mannerisms during the Q&A were irritating as hell but he is neither hateful nor nuts. What is needed now is a pushback from Obama supporters pointing this out. And also pointing out that Wright is not a part of Obama’s campaign. The church Wright ran has done an amazing amount of good. Pointing that out should rub off on Obama as a member of the Church. And pointing out the difference between campaign staff and Pastor should help distance Obama from some of Wright’s more radical statements.
Apsalar
I’m neither panicking nor bolting (although the gloating of the Hilbot crowd about how this proves Obama’s unelectability is annoying as hell), I’m simply setting myself up for less disappointment in the future, if things don’t go the way I want them to. I truly want to believe that this hasn’t changed any minds, and the Gallup polls in NC are just reflecting who wouldn’t be voting for him anyway, but I’m not sure that some Americans aren’t just stupid enough to be freaked out by Wright.
Also, @Zifnab, the systematic rigging of the democratic process by the Republican party wouldn’t be nearly so easy to accomplish if almost half the country didn’t vote for them in the first place.
ThymeZone
But, he’s not toast, any more that Clinton was toast when she lied about Tuzla, or ran out of money a couple months ago.
Any more than Bill Clinton was toast when he was caught with his fly open in the primary season of 1992.
Tsulagi
Yeah, but even if you wired all the Bush supporters together in some Matrix-like pod collector, you probably wouldn’t have enough juice to power a digital watch.
nightjar
Couldn’t help myself and surfed over to Taylor Marsh’s house of Clinton and culled this nugget.
Pretty much sums up the Clintonite mindset at this stage of the game.
strawmanmunny
I think there is some validation in the theory that Wright just gave people a reason to not vote for Obama that they were looking for. My brother has been giving me that theory for awhile. He’s voting for Obama but says, just wait, people will not vote for a african-american and they will use some BS reason saying he’s too “black” or something. Alas, that might be happening.
Again, why aren’t white preachers that say things I find just as, if not more, offensive than anything Wright said grilled on TV for a month? Hmmm?
It’s not that some whites dislike blacks, it’s the some whites dislike blacks with power.
Disclosure: I’m white.
Desmond
It’s still a loooong way away from the general, and Obama is certainly enduring another rough patch, but EVENTUALLY the Wright story will play itself out. The problem is that it’s just close enough to the May 6 primaries to fuck him up yet again, and to keep Hillary in the race. It’s like a goddamn nightmare.
Genine
No, you’re not, John. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to think people are smarter than what they are.
I still think they are smarter, or will get smarter soon. One can only wallow in shit for so long before it gets to them and they want to crawl out. We, as a nation, are at that point or will get to that point soon.
“Lowest common denominator” politics will have to end.
Sasha
Perhaps for the same reason that a supposed big-tent party that doesn’t have anything resembling a viable minority candidate inevitably nominates a candidate that aligns himself and caters to known bigots, religious and otherwise, who unrepentantly and with impunity, slurs the gamut of non-WASPs, while being serially wrong about basic foreign policy details and economics and pandering to the electorate while claiming the mantle of “straight shooter.”
I don’t believe the increasing “racification” of the primary was inevitable, but the wedge against Obama became one of the few tools the Clinton campaign had left.
cleek
Taylor Marsh is quite familiar with appalling logic.
Barbara
I could say something inflammatory, but it wouldn’t be useful. What is happening is that Obama is taking it from both sides while being very cautious about dishing it out. This kind of sustained attack must hurt, and it is not good, especially coming from Clinton. Ultimately, Wright is like Gennifer Flowers, a big distraction but probably not big enough. Yes, to what those above have said or implied about there being a double standard for blacks.
I am not a super del, but I wonder if Joe Andrews’ letter will be taken to heart by many. It was unmistakably pointing the finger at Clinton even as it endorsed her biggest supporter in IN, Bayh, for VP! I am going to use it as an excuse to write to my elected and non-elected super Dels again. If you do that too, it will, at the very least, make you feel like you are doing something. You can also phone bank if the spirit moves you.
Clinton cannot win the nomination without the supers, and she cannot win in November without the black vote, who will turn out in far fewer numbers if she wins the nomination through the supers. All those white voters she is cultivating through demonizing Obama via Wright are still much more likely to vote for McCain than Clinton in November. This is the endgame. I cannot begin to fathom the empty headed calculations that must be going on among her and her staffers.
PeterJ
So, where have they put up the goal post this time? It’s no longer the delegates since Obama will win them, nor is it the super delegates, since they defect to Obama not from him.
Is it still the popular vote minus caucus states plus Michigan and Florida
It’s moving too fast…
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
Its the endgame of the, perhaps flawed, primary system. She’s too popular to drop out, yet can’t stay in the race without further damaging the front runner.
Micheline
We saw how the Clintons wanted inject race before the South Carolina primary but were thwarted by Obama’s huge win and Ted Kennedy’s endorsement. What we are seeing right now is the Clinton plan in fruition.
The Grand Panjandrum
Jesus Hair on Fire Christ! John, John, John. You are citing a national poll when all but 7 states have voted? The sky is not falling and Clinton would have to win EVERY remaining primary by garnering MORE than 68% of the vote in each contest.
My prediction. Before the close of business Friday, May 23, 2008 a major move by SD’s will give Obama the nomination. Period. He will have the 2025 votes required to take the nomination. It won’t matter if she stays in after that, she will only make herself more of a pariah than she already is. She will get about as much coverage as Huckabee got. Almost none. The horse race will have moved on to Obama-McCain. That’s all the press cares about.
BFR
I was really a lot less confident in 2000 and 2004 than I am now. I look at this election as kinda like the culminating scene in the Simpsons episode where Homer wins the election to run the sanitation department. In the end, enough of the people will get fed up that they will insist on having something at least in the ballpark of competent leadership.
I really think 2008 is one of those times.
John Cole
This is not about the nomination. The nomination has been his for two months, as far as I was concerned. This is about the general.
Martin
Geez. What a bunch of little girls here…
Look at the polling trends. Each time Wright came out, Obama plunged in the polls, sometimes below Clinton, and when he responds he has worked his way back out to right where he was before. These are 3 day rolling averages, so you’re looking at Mon/Tue/Wed opinions. Wright damage maxed out on Mon AM and hit the news cycle that night. Obama did his thing Tues and hit the news cycle that night. Normally he’d be starting his way up now, so this is looking like a more serious hit. If we’re still like this come Monday, then the damage isn’t getting undone. Primaries are Tuesday, so other crap will get rolled into the polling after then.
But the supers don’t seem to give a shit about Wright and the manufactured media outrage. The whole point of campaigning is to overcome shit like this, so why assume that it’s intrinsic to the candidate? They know that Clinton has the same stuff. They know her negatives. All the meta shit comes out in the wash. On this day in 2004 the Swift Boat group hadn’t even formed.
They care if there is *actual* judgment issues in there that they see, and stuff your pastor says doesn’t count. Stupid-ass gas tax holidays do:
chopper
the hillbot in a nutshell.
BFR
Thanks to this site, I’ll never be able to hear the term ‘Big Tent’ and not think of Homer Simpson in a muumuu ever again.
jnfr
Not only did Gore have his rightful Presidency stolen, so did Kerry.
Well, the only chains that we can stand
Are the chains of hand in hand
Keep your eyes on the prize, hold on
chopper
i just love how the that hillbots make fun of the MUP for ‘transcending’ this and that believe that their own candidate transcends democracy itself.
wobbly
A disaster, indeed, but not an insurmountable one.
We’ll see.
This is why I like the old-fashioned long primary campaign, and conventions where the outcome is in doubt.
Gives the candidates lots of exposure, exposure they can’t control.
Makes the conventions interesting, raw theater, gets people involved.
And may I repeat, as a Hillary supporter, I appreciate the personal dimension of this for Barack Obama. It amazes me that some of his supporters worry that he looks “tired” or “down”. I saw a snippet on television of his wife, and she looked hurt.
This was a personal betrayal of them by Wright, and they have every right to look hurt and tired. No shame if they look that way, they are human beings, not the Holy Family.
My candidate was also betrayed up close and personal-remember? SHE HANDLED IT WELL,if not PERFECTLY, and has gained great respect for her loyalty and tenacity in the years since.
Joshua Norton
And yet the Corporate media is not in a multi-millionaire dollar bidding war for your services as a political pundit. You have their number one qualification for the job.
empty
Come on Barbara. Don’t make things up. While Clinton is definitely benefiting from the Wright controversy she can’t be blamed for it. Here is Somerby’s take.
The Grand Panjandrum
That was not clear in your post. Are you saying that the Wright situation might cost Obama the election? I see the real challenge for Obama right now is that he, and the Democrats, have not yet define McCain. This is generally the time in the election cycle where Presidential candidates are “defined” by their opponents. John Kerry got nailed with the flip-flopping and weak on defense bullshit in April 2004 when the RNC started running those infamous ads.
The real danger is not Wright. The real danger is that the RNC and McCain will “define” Obama before he has a chance to get in GE mode. I suspect that’s why you see Obama taking more shots at McCain these days.
But, and this is a very big but, John McCain is not a great campaigner and once the spotlight shines more harshly on him I suspect it will not be to his benefit.
mapaghimagsik
The Gallup poll has bounced around quite a bit. What hasn’t changed is the delegate math.
What will change are the goalposts — again.
Brachiator
There is an interesting column from the current New Yorker that supports what you suggest here, at least with respect to some older white voters (The Race in Eastern Kentucky):
The question is whether younger generations have purged this sentiment, which might be more of a factor than any specific concern over Obama’s connection to Jeremiah Wright.
ThymeZone
She can certainly be chided for not speaking out against it. It’s an example of the worst kind of politics, the kind that was quite instrumental in defeating John Kerry in 2004 for example. She is content to ride its coattails while it serves her purposes.
She is, as John as described her, a complete asshole, and deserves nothing but scorn and rebukes for this behavior.
Barbara
“Cultivating” doesn’t mean “blaming” her for planting the seed. She is cultivating it as a wedge issue by continuing to speak about it. She tried to do it very deliberately in the week that Penn was playing footsies with Colombian officials, by going around and saying that she would have left his church (which she has now reiterated for O’Reilly) but it didn’t work. Her staffers were enraged that Wright didn’t do Obama in the first time around, in February, and apparently, he becames their impromptu Plan B. To say that she is not “using” it in a wedge strategy is really kind of out to lunch.
Barbara
P.S. I’m sorry for the last sentence. I tried to keep it from going through. You’re not out to lunch. People have different views on this.
nightjar
Aside from the smarmy way she piles on by hiding behind “just answering the question” she didn’t cause it and I don’t blame her for that. I blame her and her supporters for teaming with Mccain and the wingnuts, in an effort create a phony environment of outrage hoping against hope to overturn the rules we have and subsequent will of dem primary voters.
And if that fails, affecting maximal damage to Obama in the general election. And since there is no way so can achieve the former, we are left with the latter as her ultimate goal.
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
And remember, these are the ‘swing voters’ certain Hillbots have been trumpeting.
D-Chance.
Ah, the calliopes are playing…
Martin
I agree with empty. Clinton isn’t farming for white voters. There’s a cycle that’s developed which is ugly, but i don’t think is intentionally ugly.
Clinton pisses off the black community by constantly trying to change the rules and marginalize their vote, they run from her to other candidates, the only other candidates are Gravel and Obama so they to go Obama, Obama lands a huge % of the black vote, Clinton supporters cry reverse racism because black voters don’t want to support someone who, 4 decades after civil rights, seeks to discount their vote. And we jump from a community being disappointed to being outraged which only feeds the cycle.
The other cycle is similar as we’ve seen when p.luc jumps in here and calls us all sexist because we don’t support Clinton. Similar. But what’s going on in the Clinton side isn’t racism or anything of the sort in a meaningful or intentional way – it’s just Mark Penn identity politics played out which the Clintons have always subscribed to. They court the gay vote or the black vote or the female vote or the soccer mom vote or the left handed vote and treat them as a ‘bloc’ that they have or don’t have. When they don’t have them, they dismiss their vote as unwanted and unnecessary in an effort to shore up Clinton’s relevance to what really matters. All these little boxes that people are put in become so easy to dismiss in some abstract way that they don’t realize that it’s offensive to those that have always hoped the Democratic party would become the party of equality – and not just when it’s politically expedient to do so. Yeah, I can’t fault them for doing that analysis, but they take it from a measurement of where they are to a stick that they wield to achieve the outcome. That’s why Mark Penn has no business in this party. None. He is antithetical to everything the party should be, yet he is embraced by the Clintons. It’s this shit that people don’t like Clinton over, not her gender. But the Clinton folk have put her in one of those little boxes too, and are accusing us of dismissing her box, even though we don’t even recognize their nutty little identity accounting system.
scrutinizer
Huh? From what I’ve seen around here so far, “out to lunch” is a love tap.
scrutinizer
Hey, Z. Blow me. That kind of shit isn’t cool when you’re trying to bring old farts on board, you know? Segregating people based on cross-tabs is a p.huk thing.
Martin
Correct. Which is why people like me are pissed. I steadfastly refuse to accept that the opinion of white voters should trump the opinion of all voters. And I’m incensed that someone like Clinton would suggest that very thing, however subtly.
John Cole
I am just so god damned depressed and emo right now. Fifth anniversary of mission accomplished, I am fully deprogrammed, and people are dissing one of the most decent people to enter the national political stage that I can remember because of his fucking minister.
He says crazy things, they say. Like walking on water and turning water into wine and virgin birth and weekly rituals where you pretend that bread and grape juice are the body and blood of a deity’s son. Whoops. That isn’t the crazy stupid shit they are pissed about.
I think i am going to start drinking heavily. Where is that hotty hippy chick Genine? I am going to be John +6 in no time.
kwAwk
You guys still don’t get it. You are still blaming Hillary Clinton and Pastor Wright for Obama’s shortcomings.
Everbody is to blame but Barrak Obama.
empty
TZ and Barbara: I went back and listened to her O’Reilly interview where O’Reilly is repeatedly pushing her to dump on Obama about Wright. She does repeat her – I would have left statement – and then makes it about Wright rather than Obama. When he keeps pushing her she says “What people are talking to me about is not that..” and when he asks her about what Obama should do she says “He spoke out forcefully…” I am in no way shape or form arguing that she is an angel. She is a politician. But on the matter of race I think she is getting a bum rap. Again, do go read Somerby.
Apsalar
Well, I don’t see how Obama could have avoided this one and gotten to where he is. As a community organizer in Chicago’s black neighborhoods, I think he had to attend a black church. He picked one that’s not particularly socially conservative, has a large membership, and is well-known in the area. Are there any mentions at all of Jeremiah Wright being an America-hating Angrier Than Acceptable Black Man before last month? Before last month, everybody knew Obama was a Muslim.
John Cole
I saw the O’Reilly interview, too, and I think Hillary did everything she could to not shit on Barack. Although my heated rhetoric has gotten the better of me a number of times, it is important to remember she is not the fucking problem here. She was on the right side of most issues while I was still fucking worshipping the codpiece.
John +2.
Martin
But that’s what swift-boating does in general. It doesn’t convince people to not vote for a candidate, it just provides them a justification that they can properly internalize for not voting for the candidate.
Voters didn’t like Kerry. Many of them couldn’t reject him solely on those grounds, though. They knew they shouldn’t reject a candidate for superficial reasons so they needed something to rationalize their decision: “But wait! Maybe he’s a cowardly traitor! Yeah, I can’t vote for a cowardly traitor!” That’s what swiftboating does, and that’s why it’s perfectly functional when it centers on an obvious lie. A lot of people can convince themselves that a lie is at least possibly true by not looking too hard at it.
Look at the number of people that won’t vote for Obama because they think he can’t win. They’re suggesting that they personally think he’s fine but they don’t want to be stuck on the losing team (as if that matters for anything at all) when really they *do* have a problem with him but are ashamed to face up to it.
jake
Uh. I guess it’s progress that he isn’t worried Hillary will put in too many women in positions over menfolk.
I guess he can always pull that out of his ass in November.
empty
John, you should drink more often :)
John S.
Sorry, but Bob has been swimming in the Clinton tank for quite a while, as evidenced by this remark:
Adopting the standard Clinton line of “we’re just going where the GOP was going to go anyway” is one thing. But while it is true that Clinton did not interject Wright into to the debate, to characterize her campaign as having ‘never said one word about it’ is just patently dishonest.
Billy K
Oh FFS, you emo-bama-bots… All this crap means is that the next pre-manufactured media narrative will be a resurgent, triumphant Obama an the final fall of Hillary. After NC every story will be about the MUP’s comeback and how can hillary stay in the race, blah blah blah.
Tune the fuckers out.
empty
Well put. Martin, you are on a roll today!
Martin
Amen.
John S.
Perhaps you would enlighten us as to how Obama is responsible for the actions of anyone other than himself?
I’ll wait while you pull your head out of your ass.
nightjar
Genine says’
And
I think both of you gots some wisdom in your tank!
ThymeZone
Excuse me while I dig out from under this pile of straw you threw on the thread.
I said nothing about race, I spoke about politics.
This is shitty politics, and she is playing it for all it’s worth without actually letting loose her famous cackle while doing it.
Cut the crap, please.
Yeah, even a two-bit spoof can spell that name right. Please. As for blame? Blame it on the Bossa Nova.
John S.
Hillary’s dance with Bill-O really didn’t produce much in the way of Clinton kicking Obama in the junk – much to the chagrin of papa bear, I’m sure. The one thing she said that really sticks in my craw is this:
That is what real elitism looks like.
Barbara
Empty, I think that Martin has it about right. I don’t think Clinton is affirmatively racist by any means, but she pace Penn (who is really her husband’s crutch) does what Martin says: categorizes voters by placing them in the narrowest box and then tries to appeal to them directly based on the littlest thing they think appeals to that narrow interst. In their book I was probably a soccer mom in years past who has morphed into a latte drinking liberal member of the creative class (oh how I wish the latter were true!). No one likes being classified this way, as a general proposition, and they especially don’t like it when their significance is being marginalized. But what really irks me is that it is voters like me who would or could be schlepping around GOTV in November, like I did four years ago. My mother, who is a Clinton supporter, will give neither time nor treasure to this effort, and without it, along with significant African American turnout, Clinton cannot win.
And whether it’s Clinton or the pundits, it angers me any time someone suggests that only white voters are real voters whereas women and blacks are “special interest” voters. Maybe she doesn’t do it intentionally, but she is capitalizing on it. She may not be throwing the sh*t but she’s stepping in it and tracking it all over the house.
empty
Patently dishonest? I have a lot of faith in Bob Somerby who seems to actually do some research before making pronouncements (though the whole “we” thing makes me wince).
Here is what he said:
Why is this patently dishonest?
Laura Roslin
A group run by Clinton supporters has plauged NC with deceptive robo calls targeted at African American Voters.
“Fallout from Facing South’s investigation of illegal and deceptive election activity”
Facing South’s investigation into illegal robo-calls in North Carolina and deceptive election tactics in 10 other states by Women’s Voices Women Vote has had quite an impact.
Here are some of the major developments since we put up our first post at 9:32 am Tuesday morning looking into the issue:
* Yesterday, N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper publicly denounced the group’s tactics, declaring their anonymous robo-calls to be illegal and ordering that they be stopped.
* Also yesterday, voting rights advocates Democracy North Carolina successfully persuaded Women’s Voices to delay until after the primaries a deceptive mailing to 276,000 North Carolina households that would have further confused voters.
* Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama addressed the illegal robo-calls in a press conference yesterday, calling them “extremely disturbing.”
* Women’s Voices Women Vote board member John Podesta, President Bill Clinton’s former chief of staff, has publicly stated that Women’s Voices “will conduct a full and prompt accounting of the circumstances of the voter registration program.”
* The investigation has been widely covered in the media and brought greater attention to deceptive election practices. So far, the controversy has been picked up by ABC News, CNN, The Economist, Harper’s, Talking Points Memo, Time, TPM Muckraker, The Week and Wired.
We hope that this investigation and others keep the issue of illegal and deceptive campaign practices in the spotlight.
Labels: democracy north carolina, north carolina, robo-calls, voting rights, women’s voices women vote
southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2008/05/fallout-from-facing-souths.asp
scrutinizer
True dat.
ThymeZone
According to her campaign, and I have no reason to doubt them at this point, what she said was:
” … rich people — God blessed us — we deserve all the opportunities …..”
It’s a subtle difference, but make of it what you will.
myiq2xu
Empty: Shhhh! Facts only upsets them.
I see my name has been used in vain a couple times already today.
Jeebus! Now I’m the boogeyman. Do y’all scare your kids with me? “Eat your vegetables or myiq2xu will get you!”
cleek
oh thank you! thank you! rich people, for continuing to ensure our country is blessed!
sure is.
empty
Amen!! As for the rest I don’t disagree with much of what Martin said – I think he put it rather well. I do disagree with the view that Clinton is running an especially dirty campaign. But that is my perception. Yours is clearly different.
Genine
I really can’t argue with that sentiment. I’ve seen it, first hand. There are some people that will do that- no doubt and sometimes, I worry about that.
But I don’t worry for long. I think this is a good thing, in a way. This election is brining up all sorts of things that have long been in the shadows. People could ignore their own racism and sexism because no reason came up for them to confront it. Now there is a reason and, hopefully, we can all move towards addressing the underlying reasons for these divides and bring in a new era.
But, if people allow their own racism or sexism to bring in a third Bush term and all that entails, I think we’ll see some changes quickly. If people do let this Wright thing become a reason not to vote for Obama in the GE then, as they say, “Democracy lets people get the government they deserve.”
It will all turn out for the good, ultimately, because I believe people can and will learn and grow.
scrutinizer
But TZ, when you discard the peccant part:
I still hear nothing but a noblesse oblige argument—which is, by definition, elitist. Parsing bless vs. blessed doesn’t change that.
Z
scrutinizer,
I get what you are saying, but I said ‘majority of’ not ‘all of’ for a reason. Not ALL Americans are playing this nasty game. Look at the numbers… for all the p.luks of the world dicing and slicing this into lots of separate interest groups, the numbers show that the biggest divide is between 45> and
myiq2xu
Tell the truth, not the spin:
scrutinizer
Oh, good. It’s back.
John Cole
I read Somerby every day. I am a heater, I react quickly and irrationally to things a lot, so I really go out of my way to read folks like Bob and Kevin Drum and Matt Yglesias. Otherwise I might descend back into the fucking kool-aid days again.
Not joining another cult, thank you. One was enough.
myiq2xu
Wrong. Noblesse oblige is an obligation, not a privilege. Elitism is the idea that elites should rule.
scrutinizer
Oh, mickey, tell the rest of the story:
myiq2xu
So do I. His focus is on critiquing the media. He calls bullshit on the misinformation being spread.
He doesn’t spend much time on other things. Part of his shtick is using the royal “we.”
myiq2xu
Oh, do tell, what evil and nefarious plot is WVWV involved in?
Registering women to vote?
Genine
lol You were already +2, have you added the other 4?
Genine
Thanks, Nightjar! Let me tell ya, it’s hard-won and still got a ways to go. :-) Let others wallow in crap if they choose. It does me no good.
Martin
The one instance where I think the Clinton campaign has played race is getting Wright into the media.
TX/OH (3/4) was Hillary firewall #1, but didn’t play out to the delegate win that she needed. Immediately after Ferraro slow-walked the “He wouldn’t be here if he was white” line. That started 3/7. By 3/11 she dropped the “I really think they’re attacking me because I’m white. How’s that?” bit while making the rounds of every news outlet. On 3/13, ABC ran the Wright video for the first time.
The Wright story was known for a full year before that, however. I’d seen some of the video in December, I think it was. Hannity was running it as well. But the large media outlets didn’t want to run a story like that out of fear that they’d be seen injecting race into the election. Instead, Ferraro tossed out the notion that she had been attacked over her race which was enough justification for the networks to explore the subject by putting Wright out there saying things that would be seen affirming Ferraro’s claims. I think it’s just a matter of ABC exploiting an opportunity, but ABC had that video for weeks and didn’t play it until Ferraro’s dust up. I have a hard time accepting the timing there and how slowly Clinton responded to it. Ferraro is smart enough to know what to do her without Clinton being involved, but Clinton certainly didn’t work too hard to stop it either. It took her 3 days to respond to Ferraros first statements.
But the Clinton campaign didn’t need do anything directly here – and they never do. They know how the media will go and they just need to provide the little nudge to get the ball rolling.
scrutinizer
Ah, myiqislowerthanasquids:
Merriam Webster:
The OED:
IOW, it’s just back to the old “With great privilege comes great responsibility” crap. The nobles taking care of the less fortunate peasants. You know, myiq, elitism.
scrutinizer
That’s it? That’s all you got?
Hey, how ’bout that Joe Andrew?! That can only be bad for Obama.
zoe from pittsburgh
Everyone needs to chill out– other polls have him ahead of her. CNN likes ot report the results of their own poll and their own latest poll has him still ahead. Frankly, at this point, the drop is too small and it’s too early to tell if this is a blip or a signal to start binge drinking.
Seriously, the corporate media went off the rails when it came to this story– you’d think that Wright was a missing white girl or something– so all things considered I think he’s holding up pretty well for a newcomer.
The real test is Indiana and NC. Going into those states with lower numbers will benefit him (not her) in the expectations game.
Let’s just hope that he has the worst behind him.
myiq2xu
I’ve never heard anyone define noblesse oblige as a bad thing.
“With great privilege comes great responsibility”
You call that crap. I call it giving back.
There is a difference between being an elite (due to wealth or political office) and thinking that your status entitles you to anything.
Josh E.
\
Yep. Somerby has become that which he despises.
Rick Taylor
On the bright side, at least Obama didn’t serve in Vietnam, so they won’t be able to smear him for faking any war wounds.
myiq2xu
Wow! Were you wearing your tin-hat when you came up with that?
Ferraro says something stupid at a meeting in Southern California. A few days later the Great Orange Cheeto picks up the story from a local rag and takes it national. Controversy ensues.
Then ABC breaks the story on Rev. Wright that was already being reported on FOX for months.
You think this was a diabolical plot by Hillary to inject race into the campaign.
If Hillary can order Ferraro to do something that manipulates kos into reacting to make ABC do something else, she fucking deserves to be President.
Martin
By telling voters information that won’t get them registered and which suggests that they *aren’t* registered? They were called on it in Wisconsin when they misled voters with their instructions on how to get registered with deadlines and such when in fact you could register when you voted. That’s a suppression tactic.
You know, GOTV outfits like WVWV are normally extremely competent. Yeah, there are GOTV shitholes out there, but WVWV wasn’t supposed to be one of them, and now they’re acting like one.
This stuff isn’t hard, especially there there is so much documentation going back months showing efforts to straighten them out. That Maggie Williams was on the leadership board prior to joining the Clinton campaign is, well, suspicious. It wouldn’t be except that we had previously accepted that WVWV was a responsible, competent outfit.
Either we have to conclude that these former Clinton staffers are stupid and incompetent and couldn’t figure things out even in the face of repeated efforts by state officials to get them to change, or they are willfully stupid and incompetent. I don’t think these are inherently stupid people.
myiq2xu
Oops! I meant “tin-foil hat”
ThymeZone
Oh yeah, nobody will ever assert that Hillary Clinton ever looked, sounded or acted like she thought she was entitled to anything in the last year.
{ rolls eyes }
myiq2xu
Whose votes are they seeking to suppress? Women’s?
There are Obama supporters on the leadership board too, and it would have taken a psychic to figure out that Obama was going to be her main competition by this point.
BTW – Maggie isn’t on the board anymore, so WTF?
myiq2xu
But what kind of countertops did they have?
ThymeZone
Okay, officially am myiqfucku thread now, that’s it, thanks everyone. Please turn the lights off on your way out.
zoe from pittsburgh
WVWV’s biggest problem is that they fundamentally don’t seem to have their shit together– they made those robocalls trying to get people to register when the registration deadline had already PASSED. Not to mention they broke some state laws when they didn’t identify who they were and used a made up man in the call– which makes no sense if you’re targeting women votesr.
zoe from pittsburgh
OT, but can anyone tell me why the hell Lou “I can only talk about immigration” Dobbs still has his own teevee show? Even Tucker Carlson is smarter and more interesting than Dobbs.
myiq2xu
Okay, TZ is parroting Karl Rove again.
Martin
No, I was expecting it, actually, when I saw Ferraro’s “They’re attacking me” comment. I was surprised that none of the big networks had been talking about Wright when it was all over the radio, so I asked someone I know in the industry and she said it was just too controversial for a major network to introduce but that might change if something put it in context. This was in Feb, I think.
When someone lays out the process ahead of time and then it plays out, it’s hard to reject it out of hand.
Rick Taylor
I think Myiq2xu is right this time. This really is tin foil hat territory.
Brachiator
But there is also this snippet from an AP story (Defection of longtime superdelegate jolts Clinton):
Amazing!
Martin
They were calling men equally as much as women. And GOTV efforts are primarily centered around young people, which have been voting more favorably for Obama.
Why were they calling after registration deadlines? Why suggest packets need to be completed by people already registered? Why give them wrong information? Why mask who the caller is and not tell the callers who is running the operation? How far off the mark do you need to be on a GOTV effort to be investigated as an identify theft scam. That was in February. 2 months later they’re still doing it.
In what way were they actually helping register voters with these efforts?
Sasha
Et voila!
I have to give him extra mad props for not just pegging both candidates at once, but for deftly wrapping around the Iraq/Dubya albatross around them at the same time.
Dave
Look at the numbers:
North Carolina is holding
pollster.com/08-NC-Dem-Pres-Primary.php
Indiana has been volatile anyway
pollster.com/08-IN-Dem-Pres-Primary.php
What you will about Wright’s latest outburst, he hasn’t said anything he didn’t say the first time around. There will be turbulence, but my money is still with Saint Barry, for the primaries at least.
My main worry is that if this is coming out now, what haven’t we seen yet? Or is it a case of trying to throw the knockout punch early in the bout?
ThymeZone
He has the third largest audience on CNN.
I say this quite aware of the fact that he is one of the world’s biggest assholes.
zoe from pittsburgh
As I read somewhere around, either here or at Carpetbagger, when it comes to baggage Obama has a carry-on and Hillary has a 10-piece matching set.
But we’ve heard ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about Hillary’s substantial baggage this campaign. She has not been “vetted” in any meaningful way. The Clintons have some VERY SERIOUS baggage, from whe WH days and in the past 8 years. But the GOP has been silent and sitting on their hands and Obama won’t bring any of it up.
I sincerely believe that if Hillary were to get the nom at this point SHE’D LOSE the GE.
zoe from pittsburgh
What Obama Wishes He Could Say
nightjar
The same could be said about MCcain and the HIll’s. The meme of she’s already been thoroughly vetted during the 90’s is BS. She’s got 7 years of Senate business to rummage thru. But she doesn’t really matter at this point.
Saint John has a pretty big closet full of half aired skeleton’s, not mention what we don’t know about. It will take a passel of progressive boots up the ass of the press to motivate them to do their job regarding MCcain. Of course, all Mccain has to do is to bait ’em with some BB ribs for a free pass.
Martin
Yeah, I don’t know how he got Kos in there or how Kos managed to get Ferraro interviewed on every morning news show by the 12th, all the while Ferraro was proclaiming that she didn’t want her statements to overshadow the campaign (so why go on every network?) But Ferraro was suggesting that Obama’s campaign – specifically Axelrod of calling her a racist, Bill a racist, and Rendell a racist. Nobody in the campaign did that. Other people did, but no the campaign. She was the one who inserted that into the dialogue – and quite strongly by her use of “attacking me because I’m white”. That’s not just an accusation that Obama’s campaign was calling her a racist but that Obama’s campaign IS racist.
That came out of nowhere, and just a day later you have a clip of Wright on ABC with the lead-in: “Sen. Barack Obama’s pastor says blacks should not sing “God Bless America” but “God damn America.”” Why introduce it right then when Fox had it for months?
Vishnu
“Clinton cannot win the nomination without the supers, and she cannot win in November without the black vote”
Why can’t she? Last census I remember indicated about 12% of the US population is categorized as black. Take a reasonable number as being eligible, then take about half that to be female, then take a small portion of that to actually want to vote for Clinton in the GE and it doesn’t sound all that bad.
Now, trying to win the GE without the white working class vote…. *that’s* entertainment!
Barbara
Vishnu, In the past several election cycles, Democrats have won no more than 38% of the white vote. So that 12%, in the abstract represents a rather crucial delta, no?
In any event, the real story is that 12% is not distributed evenly in every state, and we vote state by state. Now, the percentage of white voters voting D is higher in traditionally blue states (California, New York), and it’s a lot lower in the South. But in the midwestern and swing states it’s probably somewhat higher but not nearly enough to constitute a majority of the voters, depending on the state and depending on the candidate. With electoral math being what it is, here are the states that Hillary will have difficulty winning if African Americans don’t show up: Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. You cannot lose any two of these states and hope to get elected as a Democrat the way Clinton has been running. Perchance you cannot lose any one of these states, but you sure can’t lose two of them. Other states become much more difficult, including New Jersey and maybe even Illinois. Even Florida gets marginally harder, and any southern state is totally out of bounds. If Clinton could KEEP the white working class voters who prefer her to Obama in the primary, perhaps she could win, but the chances of that are not good.
Bob In Pacifica
Hey, everyone. Take a day off from politics.
Wright is already over.
If you want a poll that says Obama is losing, just go over to TalkLeft. There’s a new one every four hours there. Obama HAS WON. Game over.
Ted
I’m worried about that place. We really should confiscate their belts and shoe laces in advance. Maybe even switch them to paper bed sheets.
Bruce Moomaw
Well, if it’s any comfort, today’s polls by CNN and Pew both show Obama still edging Hillary by 1 or 2 points, and both of them still running ahead of McCain by comparable margins — in fact, CNN shows Obama with a 2-point BIGGER margin over McCain than Hillary has.
I’m damned if I know what’s going on right now. What I DO know is that we are going to be engulfed from now until Nivember witll a tidal wave of TV and newspaper ads drawing a connection between Obama and Wright — and that Obama will have no convincing way to answer them. If he’d said from the start that he thought Wright said some repulsive things in his sermons but that he stuck with him on balance because he also said some good things, he might have a case. But instead he spouted that cock-and-bull story that he’d “never heard Wright say anything like that before” during 20 years of sermons, thereby making himself out irreparably to be a flat liar — and a dumb one. See Rasmussen’s analysis today of what New Hampshirites now think of Obama, and of his new story. It’s not pretty:
“Fifty-three percent (53%) of New Hampshire voters have followed news stories about Obama’s former Pastor ‘Very Closely’. Another 32% have followed the story ‘Somewhat Closely’. Most (53%) say that Obama was not surprised by Wright’s views expressed to the media on Monday. Only 32% believe the Democratic frontrunner was surprised. A plurality of Democrats (47%) were willing to give Obama the benefit of the doubt on this point, but most unaffiliated voters and an overwhelming percentage of Republicans were not.
“Fifty-four percent (54%) of New Hampshire voters say it’s at least ‘Somewhat Likely’ that Obama shares some of Pastor Wright’s controversial views about the United States. That figure includes 73% of Republicans, 55% of unaffiliated voters, and 36% of Democrats.
“Most voters (56%) say Obama denounced Wright because it was politically convenient. Only 33% believe he was truly outraged.”
And away we go… Are the Democrats EVER going to get tired of shooting themselves in the foot?
Vishnu
Barbara –
Your suggestion about losing any two of those states may be true but I have to point out – 12% of the total population is counted as black, not 12% of the eligible voting population.
The 38% of the white vote – that’s total voting population, right? And as you say, we vote state by state. Do you mean to say that in any given state a D did not win more than 38% of the eligible white voting population?
I’m a little confused.
zoe from pittsburgh
Vishnu– stop saying that the black vote doesn’t count. Seriously. It’s really not a good progressive argument.
The bottom line about the whole Wright controversy is that the corporate media’s obsessive coverage might have unintentionally helped Obama– it is no longer a “gotcha” issue, it’s an issue that has now been beaten to death, only to be reanimated and beaten to death some more.
Also, later on, when the GOP tries to use the Scary Black Man it’s going to end up feeling pretty icky when they over do it– and they will because they won’t be able to help themselves.
zoe from pittsburgh
Vishnu– stop saying that the black vote doesn’t count. Seriously. It’s really not a good progressive argument.
The bottom line about the whole Wright controversy is that the corporate media’s obsessive coverage might have unintentionally helped Obama– it is no longer a “gotcha” issue, it’s an issue that has now been beaten to death, only to be reanimated and beaten to death some more.
Also, later on, when the GOP tries to use the Scary Black Man it’s going to end up feeling pretty icky when they overdo it– and they will because they won’t be able to help themselves.
ed
dear myiqistwo,
Perhaps you should spend some time writing on your own blog. Mighty slim pickings there.
Darkrose
TZ, for some reason, all I can see is that myiq2xu really likes pie a lot.
Seriously, the pie filter is probably responsible for dropping my blood pressure a couple of points.
Barbara
No, that’s nationwide, as I tried to say, though perhaps not clearly enough. Really simple hypothetical numbers might look like this (leaving out Hispanics):
Pennsylvania residents are 14% black and 86% white. If blacks and whites are registered and turn out equally, and you gain 90% of the 14%, you have 12.6% of the voting population. You now need 37.4+% of the total, or, around 43% of the white voters. If the turnout of black voters versus white voters is higher, you need fewer of the white voters. If it is lower you need more. There are many states where it’s difficult for Democrats to win solely based on their share of white votes. Being able to count on black votes is what makes the difference. In places like California and New York, Democrats pull in a majority of white votes and probably a super majority of black votes and hence win those states easily. In many southern states, even though blacks make up a larger share of the voting population than they do in swing states, they cannot offset the overwhelming advantage given to Rs by the white voting population.
That’s why they call PA, etc. swing states, because turnout and voter loyalty swing the state. WJClinton’s schtick was to increase his share of the white vote, but, crucially, without alienating black voters.
That’s why, when you do GOTV, you really want to turn out those voters that you can be virtually certain are going to vote for YOU and not the other party. I did Dem GOTV in Pennsylvania in 2004, and I canvassed neighborhoods that were mostly African American.
Barbara
And what Zoe said. In case it wasn’t clear. This is not something I feel detached about, but objectively, it also happens to be stupid and counterproductive to say or imply or think that Black voters don’t count.
ntr Fausto Carmona
Hey Vishnu, I’ve got your ‘white working class’ vote right here:
Have fun catering to them.
Martin
Well, the problem with all of this is that we assume, short of efforts by campaigns to divide up the electorate, that a black working class voter would vote significantly differently than a white working class voter, or latino, chinese, gay, or anything else.
Now, that’s not to deny that older and younger people vote along different lines, care about different policies, and all that, but really these are not substantially different – and the key to winning is NOT to deny one group in favor of another but to put forward a set of policies and positions that advances all interests.
The problem with the ‘white working class is key’ argument is that you can’t raise it without the suggestion that everyone not in the group is less valuable as a voter. If you look at the Obama campaign, I can’t recall a time when they’ve raised such an argument. They’ve been asked about certain types of voters and they admit that they’ve had trouble getting their message out to certain voters, but there’s never this argument that group ‘x’ is key.
I mean, if white working class voters are the alpha and omega of winning in November, why even let other people vote? That’s the message that Clinton and her supporters are sending to the black community right now. (Substitute other communities as appropriate.)
And the problem with these historical arguments, even coming from the Obama side, is that if we keep looking backward, the only thing we can see is that the voting block of power in this country elects the person who maintains that power. Looking backward at what % do this or that ignores the fact that when given a pair of white christian men who primarily focus on white christian voters with some side excursions here or there, voters reward us with… a white christian man. One step to breaking this cycle is to stop looking back at historical patterns that reinforce this pattern and arguing in favor of them – especially when you don’t have white christian men running!
I’ve argued a number of times that we shouldn’t be surprised to see new demographics come out for Obama. Someone posted yesterday an article about how old-school conservatives see something good in Obama. I’ve mentioned that the religious middle is probably Obama’s to lose here. If you open up the entire menu of voters and just treat them all as Americans, I think you end up with things that you cannot anticipate. 2004 was a fantastic exercise by Dems of winning 90% of the 55% of voters they expected they could win at the outset. 90% is pretty good if you ignore the fact that they simply discarded 45% of the electorate before they ever got started. It’s an easy habit Dems have gotten in and really need to get out of.
My fear with Clinton is she’ll start with the 2004 formula, tweak it up a bit for 2008 and shoot for 100% of 55% just like last time. And the GOP will fight for that wee little 10% there in the middle for all they’ve got because that’s all they need to win.
KRK
For a bit of perspective, here are some tidbits I got from NYT archives:
On June 19, 1992:
On August 25, 1992:
On August 31, 1992:
KRK
And finally, on October 25, 1992:
So, bottom line, May 1 is way too soon to be worrying about gallup polls and the general election.
zoe from pittsburgh
Very nicely put, KRK and Martin.
One of the positive outcomes of such a long primary is the 50-state strategy is being established and strengthened EVERYWHERE. Aren’t we all sick of elections coming down to voters in Florida and Ohio? What if a Dem ran a national campaign as though they *could* make serious inroads all over the place? The timing is right, the vast majority of the people are SICKENED of Bush and many GOPers seem to be defecting all over the place.
Let’s also stop trying to divide the electorate into neat little categories– how about thinking outside of the traditional boxes? I’m a liberal who thinks that the current state of identity politics often only serves to divide us. I think the only person that can transcend that is someone who personally is multicutural who can actually say “hey, none of this matters as much as people make it out to, especially when it comes to the government serving the basic needs of the people. We distract ourselves with our superficial differences at our own peril.”
I think Obama is geniunely interested in breaking the establishement political mold– in fact, his multiculturalism is actually a very small part of the change that he represents. I think he’d use the word revolution if it didn’t have such radical connotations.
Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m drinking the Magical Unity Pony kool-aid…but it tastes so damn good!
jones
I TOLD YOU SO motherfucker
Seanly
The only thing I could think of when watching Rev Wright purposefully torpedo Obama was the Simpsons episode where Homer is watching a comedy show & the black comedy on stage is doing one of those “white people are like this, black people are like that”. Homer laughs at the stupid jokes & shouts “It’s true. We’re so lame.”
I’d just love to hear Obama ask Wright WTF he’s doing. After seeing Wright’s truly bizarre declarations about right-brained Anglo marching bands vs left-brained African marching bands, I am convinced that he hates Obama.
Vishnu
I’m not making a racist, nor racial distinction but rather a mathematical one. Instead of calling it black voters we could call it demographic category A, or whatever name fit into your oversensitized delicate fainting flower selves.
In this case it was said a candidate could not win without a certain demographic. It was my contention that the numbers represented by that demographic did not forestall a victory. I don’t care what the underlying characteristics are. I used blacks and working class whites as easy short hand to represent mathematical blocks but I see that is too much for the fauxtrage practitioners here.
I’ve never said anyone should discount any voters vote, but was simply refuting an arguement I felt to be invalid. IMO, that’s part of what these intertubes are for.
Sorry I offended you and I’ll be happy to help move that fainting couch closer if you need it.
Barbara
For being so mathematically inclined you don’t seem to be all that attuned to electoral math. In any event, no one here is a shrinking violet, they’re just tired of the notion of appealing to voters as if each “box” of voters has interests that are inimical to the others — as if appealing to black working class voters will somehow hurt white working class voters and vice versa. Whether intended or not, it operates almost as a ratification of the “Southern” strategy that depended, in fact, on convincing white voters that their interests were not aligned with blacks or the candidates they vote for.