The whole discussion of race during this primary season has been totally devoid of facts or meaningful analysis. The popular narrative in the media, the only ones who are benefiting from this, is that the Clintons and their surrogates brought race into the campaign first. Whether it is because no one has thought about it, no one remembers, or it is not interesting to discuss, the ones who put race into the primary were the Democratic party leaders who redesigned the primary season. The South Carolina primary is scheduled when it is because Democrats were concerned that Iowa and New Hampshire, two overwhelmingly white states, were given too much say over the nomination of the candidate of a party that is much more diverse. South Carolina was selected to reflect the feelings of black voters. That was not necessarily a bad idea. Frankly, the Iowa/New Hampshire influence is a bit absurd to me irrespective of race. In any event, the Democratic party made a calculated decision years ago to make race the rationale behind the South Carolina primary and now it is paying dividends.
The structure of the Democratic primary schedule is no longer helpful. It is obvious that the Democratic party did not anticipate the emergence of a viable black candidate. Since the party did not anticipate that candidate, the party never anticipated how all the candidates, including the candidates of color, would react. As nice as it is to talk about hope, change, and playing kissy face, campaigns are about winning, and there is no higher stakes race than the one for the White House. Everyone wants to believe there is a halo above the head of their candidate of choice, but that is not real. These are very powerful people who are in desperate positions in that they are in the job hunt of their lives. The Democratic party was too dumb to see the writing on the wall and left the South Carolina primary and all the racial implications the party attached to it right out there for the Democratic candidates to exploit, for the candidate surrogates to exploit, for the media to exploit, and for the Republicans and their groupies to exploit. From that, we have had a disastrous series of events.
Michelle Obama was the first major campaign surrogate to bring up race and how it should factor into voting. When Senator Obama was trailing Senator Clinton in Iowa and among black voters, Michelle Obama said in speeches and fund raising letters that Sen. Obama had to win in Iowa or it was over. Her point was that if Obama lost, it would appear that he could not win with white voters. At the time she was making this appeal, Senator Clinton was beating Obama badly among black voters. Michelle Obama said that black voters were not supporting him because they were afraid to support him because they did not think he could win and a loss in Iowa would cement that. Michelle Obama was not wrong to make that assertion. It was not an attack based on race, but she was implying that black voters should have an affinity for her husband and would naturally gravitate towards him once it became clear that he could win. She was not making a wild or crazy statement. But she did inject race into it.
If people are indeed playing the race card, the media are the dealers. It was particularly unfair to the voters of New Hampshire, Senator Obama, and Senator Clinton that the media were rushing to declare his loss in New Hampshire a result of the Bradley Effect. The fact of the matter was in the wake of Senator Clinton's misstep in the debate in Philadelphia, the media created a story about her political doom, the public got caught up in it, the media continued to push and expand that narrative, then Obama won Iowa, and then the media were making it up as they went along. The media allowed their hatred for the Clintons (which was lovingly cultivated by an overly secretive and hostile Clinton camp) and their love for making entertaining news instead of covering the news, to get in the way of covering the trends among voters. The media were salivating over the chance to pronounce Hillary Clinton dead, they pumped it up, they were rolling around in the polls like pigs in filth. When the voting returns came back and made all of them look like idiots, they ran to cover their asses. It wasn't that they were more interested in covering Clinton's campaign stop meltdown or publishing snappy tabloid covers like "You're So Yesterday," it was that white voters in New Hampshire are liars and racists who used deception to pull the wool over pollsters' eyes. I know that explanation sure made Chris "Tweety" Matthews feel better. Instead of having to admit he looked like an ass clown, he shifted the blame to white voters.
We moved to Nevada and no one covered what would have been the only legitimate racial story and that is the story of the Latino vote. Population shifts have made Latinos, not blacks, the largest minority population. No one covered where their votes went, where they thought their votes might go, what issues are important to them as a group if any exist. It should be noted that one group supported by Obama sent out robo calls and put up ads in Spanish saying that the Clinton campaign was trying to take away Latinos' rights to vote and that it was "unforgiveable." Clinton won that caucus. I think I heard one or two stories about her dominance among Hispanic voters.
As the race tightened, it became clear that both the Clinton and Obama camps were swinging for the fences. Bob Johnson, the man who gave me and my fellow black teenagers the vapidity that is known as BET, made a pointless reference to Obama's admitted drug use. Though I think it is a fair point, it was a dumb thing to say. The media, with help from the Obama camp, rushed to declare it to be the latest in a salvo of racial attacks from the Clintons. All of a sudden a factual statement, like it took President Johnson to codify the principles of the Civil Rights movement, all of a sudden, Hillary Clinton is saying Martin Luther King was irrelevant. Bill Clinton calls Obama's claim of being consistently and totally opposed to the Iraq war a "fairytale" and the Obama people and the media say that Bill Clinton is saying the candidacy of a black man as a "fairytale." Andrew Cuomo, a Clinton supporter, chimed in with his very helpful "shucking and jiving" remark. Everything became about race and racism.
People on both sides behaved badly and it lead to that nasty debate. That nasty debate has lead to nastier attack ads. Now Obama is hemorrhaging white voters as the media have cast him as the "black candidate fighting off racist attacks." His support from black voters is being viewed, in the words of the ever eloquent Tweety Matthews, as "blacks coming to the defense of a brother." Hillary Clinton is being called a fake feminist because she is using the Democratic Party's strongest counter argument to a Republican presidency: her husband, former president and international superstar, Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton, the chief surrogate of the Clinton campaign, has been having meltdowns but also being effective at knocking Obama off of his game, while angering other Democrats.
This is out of control. The Democratic party needs to stop the bleeding. After the last vote is counted in South Carolina, all Democrats need to stop playing into the hands of the media and the Republicans or else the nomination of our party will not be worth winning. Count the votes, learn this lesson, and move on. I am a voter who would never vote for Obama, but that is not because I like Clinton. But most voters are not like me, but many voters are becoming like me. Democratic voters are becoming angry with opposing campaigns and saying that they will not vote for the other candidate no matter what happens. Clinton voters rightly feel that their candidate is being falsely accused of racism. Obama voters feel that the Clintons are racists and what with the media coverage, I can see why. Edwards supporters, of whom I am one, are justifiably angry that their candidate is running a decent campaign (with the exception of that unseemly display at the debate before last) and has a genuine passion, but is not getting any coverage because of the Obama/Clinton freakshow.
Do we want a replay of the 1972 convention in Miami when there were fistfights on the floor of the convention hall over delegates? Do we want a replay of the 1968 campaign where we had a Democratic candidate undermined by racism? Do we want a President "Mittens" Romney who thinks the Iraq war was a good idea? Do we want the doddering old man McCain who thinks the war was such a fabulous idea that not only should we continue it forever but we should expand our military to do it? Do we want a President "Hick"abee serving deep fried squirrel at state dinners while positing about the WMD Easter Egg hunt? If not, then we need to keep it clean. The media and Republicans are getting nourished off of our bloodletting. If not, no matter who wins our nomination, it won't be a nomination worth having.
Off topic: My fellow Edwards supporters, let's keep a good thought and see if we can't steal second from Clinton.
Way off topic:
As a New Yorker who lived through Giuliani and his bullshit for 8 years only to have to watch him pimp out 9/11 for nearly 7 years (you can read my diary on my 9/11 experience to see just how personal it is for me), I am happy to announce that two NYPD groups endorsed McCain over him for the NY Primary. The real heroes of 9/11 were going to swiftboat his ass if he made it to the general. Well, now that his campaign is dead, in 5 years he can petition the Vatican to be beatified as St. Rudolph of 9/11.