Besides the "as far as I know" qualifier, she personally has kept her hands clean.
I'm just waiting for her campaign to complain about the plot of 10,000 BC being an Obama campaign ad...

Kevin, you are acting like an enormous concern troll on this.

It is inconceivable that Ferraro is acting solo. Clinton's fake apology "I'm sorry if anyone was offended" does nothing to suggest otherwise, yet you pretend this has nothing to do with Clinton's campaign strategy!

The "as far as I know" "qualifier" is another out of context quote. She actually denied that Obama was a Muslim eight times in a row, starting with "Of course not" the first time she was asked and then repeating "no" multiple times.

I think the whole racism thing -- particularly since it is funneled through Drudge -- smacks of Republican rat-fucking.

I think that Obama has a better chance of winning the general and possibly longer coattails, which is why I voted for him. However, I am quite certain that the minute Hillary is out of the picture "Clinton Rules" in the media are going to turn into "Obama Rules". If the Republicans retake the Senate or the House during his term, I absolutely guarantee that there will be investigations a-plenty into his "corruption" and they'll be trying to through his "sleazy" wife into jail.

Mirror: I don't think you fully understand the meaning of the word "inconceivable."

Actually, it's just the opposite: it's almost inconceivable that Hillary had anything to do with either Ferraro's initial statement or with her subsequent television meltdown. That simply makes no sense at all on any level.

Her insistence to change the rules in Florida and Michigan after she "won" them seems to represent her whole style of campaigning. Why not change the rules if things aren't going your way. Would this be how she would govern? It's how George W Bush has been doing it for 8 years. So I guess I have little problem thinking the the worst of her campaign.

Thank you, Kevin. The tendency for a lot of my fellow Obama supporters to demonize Hillary Clinton is something that frankly makes me a little nauseous. Can't I support Obama for his coat-tails and great ground game without buying into the "Hillary is a monster" package deal?

Still ... I don't think Team Hillary's hands are as clean as you give them credit for. In fact, I think it's possible that they know quite well that the Obama campaign has a tendency to over-react to these things, and is stringing them along ever so slightly.

OTOH, it's clear that Hillary not only "regretted" Ferraro's comments, but "rejected" them at least twice that I heard of -- and in the same sentence. For some reason, the "rejection" doesn't make the headline...

Not that I'm excusing Ferraro. I think she was taken out of context the first time round for what were remarkably clumsy statements. But then she insisted on ratcheting up the intensity and even took it further. So, she had a choice and chose the Mexican stand-off.

Well said. I think it's important to remember that in a couple months, an awful lot of the people who are working at the Clinton campaign will be working on the Obama campaign. (Or vice versa, although I doubt it.) The Clinton campaign is not the enemy, and the same goes for the Obama campaign.

And frankly, the idea that Democratic operatives and media consultants and Clinton supporters and surrogates are so willing to risk and ruin their careers to bolster some sort of crazy, Machiavellian race-baiting strategy during the Democratic primary is pretty bizarre. Especially the assertion that they'd do this right before the South Carolina primary. Especially that they'd continue to do this when it obviously hadn't been working. It just doesn't make sense.

I appreciate the recent push back you've been giving to these stupid election year memes, Kevin.

Trying to step back and look at how this came to a head. First you have Clinton's strong showing in OH, with some exit polling showing that she got 75% of "race matters" vote. Obama folks were pretty crushed and looking to blame something other than their candidate and latched onto the meme that dittoheads had put Hillary over the top in TX. With the primary in PA, a state that has significantly more "race matters" voters than OH, team Obama was bound to be pretty nervous, especially when you consider that the Clinton campaign intended to make a big win there her final and most compelling argument that she should be the nominee.

Around the same time, Kos and Kompany stoked that stupid fake controversy about how the Clinton camp had darkened Obama to make him look more sinister. Fuck me that was lame. The Clinton campaign showed class in not making a bigg fuss about it.

Then you have the hugely polarized electorate of MS, with blacks voting 9-to-1 for Obama, and whites voting in similar numbers for Hillary. Ferraro's comment was like a match set to kindling at that point, with Clinton's reject sans denounce raising more than a few eyebrows. As Ferraro kept digging, so did the commenters here and at other blogs like MYDD. The Obamans raised the anti by bringing up anything that could possibly be considered racist and laying at the feel of Hillary Clinton herself.

Finally, everyone was treated to a taste of what racism really looks like by Mr. Wright. This, thankfully, was enough to make all but the most intransigent Clinton and Obama supporters perfectly willing to change the subject.

Did I miss anything?

Kevin,

Why is there race issues in the campaign? Because that's what Obama is running on, and outside of the Ivy league graduate circles of the blogsphere there are serious unaddressed racial issues i this country, and it's the height of hubris to pretend they don't exist, and then have your online surrogates scream at the top of their lungs about the victim card.

Ferraro comment not racist. Bill Clinton's comment about SC registered black democrats voting black, also not racist. Especially now that we have seen every state from MS-SC vote 80% to 90% for Obama with black voters, registered and independent. If you know city level politicians in major metropolitan areas, this is how the game is played, you use every advantage you can and team Obama has most certainly via proxies on the web screaming about race at the same time the are embracing and laundering all kinds of anti-Hillary nonsense largely 90's round two.

Let me clue you in. Team Hillary does not have a web operation. They are almost completely inoperative when it comes to reaching the online base. Team Obama on the other hand has a very active and savy online campaign. Given this reality, which is the side that's been playing games? The only one that's on the field.

And how do we know that you guys in the blogsphere are eating the Obama victimhood shit up? Because we see it over and over again. We see Josh Marshal's boy over at ABC, we see Steve Benen also from the Marshal shop breathlessly reporting every incident, and David Kurtz from Marshal's shop pushing and pushing, we saw Kos dredging stuff from obscure papers, and we see Matt Yglesias never shutting up about any minor web video or positive spin. And you'll notice these people are all not working class America. They aren't slogging away in the actual conditions that everyone works under, so they aren't concerned that Obama doesn't get down and dirty and do the real work that it takes to achieve racial harmony in this country. It's enough that he looks good and shows up to the right functions and is personable and his speech writers give him the right gravitas.

It doesn't matter to you guys because you don't have friends who are affected by the lack of follow through from policies that are all talk. We're looking at the worst economic situation in the history of our country, and the people who have caused it are pushing it further in the wrong direction. Is Obama going to break his nails fighting them, when many of those guys are his backers?

Case in point.

The Obama Bubble: Why Wall Street Needs a Presidential Brand

http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=548&Itemid=1

You can't run on a post racial climate that doesn't exist. You can't be the black candidate and have proxies fight your war for you. MLK didn't run from racial problems. He addressed them in person. And he didn't play victim.

Her insistence to change the rules in Florida and Michigan after she "won" them seems to represent her whole style of campaigning. Why not change the rules if things aren't going your way.

Obama and Clinton both gamed the system, and both continue to game the system. They both sold out FL and MI voters for votes in IA and NH. Obama removed himself from the ballot in MI because he didn't want to give Hillary a symbolic win. Both are reacting to the prospect of revotes in exactly the manner you would expect.

They're both politicians looking out for themselves. SHOCKING.

Of course Hillary hasn't condoned any of the racist bile that her supporters have injected in the campaign. How could she know Bill would go around comparing Obama to Jesse Jackson? It's not like she and Bill talk regularly or anything.

And look how quickly she denounced and rejected Ferraro when she went off about how "lucky" Obama is to be a Black man*. Within hours, Ferraro was forced to resign her connection to the campaign.

OH WAIT... that's how OBAMA handled Samantha Power's relatively benign, off the record, comment about Hillary that got leaked. Hillary let Ferraro continue to spew her hateful stuff on nationally syndicated shows until she made sure every Archie Bunker in Pennsylvania had gotten the message before saying "I am sorry if anyone was offended."

Congratulations on your "even handedness" Kevin. There should be a job waiting for you in the MSM.

*an African-American blogger wrote a post today about how lucky he is: for example, he never loses his drivers license because he has to produce it so often....

there's nothing in Hillary's past to make you think she'd do this, because she has never been so desperate to win and so fatally behind until Obama won 11 in a row.

When her political survival is at stake - you'll see hillary pull every knife she can get her hands on in order to win.

Which campaign is injecting racial politics into the Democratic primary?

This is where people go off the rails. Race and gender would be factors regardless of being injected by either campaign. The majority of these incidents are probably not orchestrated by either side. Perhaps the question should be how well the campaigns and the candidates deal with them when they happen.

Sean Wilentz persisting in pushing back with his insane charge makes me think that this is part of a Clinton campaign strategy. Are we to believe that Wilentz isn't a strategic ally, just some dotty professor who happens to post incendiary bullshit in TNR ? Wilentz is a very smart guy. Smart guys only make incredibly disingenuous arguments if they have good reason.

Smart guys only make incredibly disingenuous arguments if they have good reason.

Or if they have an angle. Wilentz is a longtime friend of Bill Clinton's. It doesn't have to be this insidious conspiracy! That is what Kevin is saying.

An imaginary conversation between Steve Kroft and Senator Obama:

Kroft: You don't believe that the Clinton campaign is behind racist comments against you, Senator Obama?
Obama: Of course not. I mean, that, you know, there is no basis for that. I take her on the basis of what she says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that.
Kroft : You said you'd take Senator Clinton at her word that she's not behind racist comments against you. You don't believe that she is?
Obama: No. No, there is nothing to base that on. As far as I know.

Now, don't you go taking anything out of context. Because, ya'll know, "context" always makes things mean whatever you want them to mean, whereas just pointing out what someone actually said is meaningless without "context." This is especially true with qualifiers. They are always "unfortunate" or "inadvertent," never meaningful -- especially out of "context."

____________________________________________

"Wilentz is a longtime friend of Bill Clinton's."

I know that - which was the basis of my point.

No it doesn't have to be an insidious conspiracy - just a concerted effort by folks with common goals. I called it strategy, not "insidious conspiracy." And I think it's naive to assume it's pure coincidence and essentially a series of innocent missteps on the part of the Clinton campaign. And no, I don't think they do it because they're racists. They do it because they want to win at any cost.

I really wish I could still believe that the Clintons are given a bad rep by the media. I really wish I could still believe all that stuff. But aside from the race issue--which it can't be denied that they've been playing fast and loose--I've seen my worst fears confirmed time and again by the Clintons many times during the election cycle.

David Shuster. Samantha Power. People who committed some indefensible but quite minor offenses that happened to coincide with times when Hillary's campaign was in the gutter. And then the Clintons went on to try to ruin their lives--they tried to get Shuster fired and succeeded at getting Power fired. That's what I've taken away from this primary campaign--the Clintons will try to destroy you if it happens to be in their interest. Who cares about the real people out there getting screwed to garner Hillary some sympathy points with middle-aged women? That's politics, as Bill might say.

I'm actually inclined to agree with Kevin to some degree on the race stuff, however--the "face darkening" and 3 a.m. charges are pretty far-fetched. But a lot of the rest of it isn't, and there is a pattern to be found here. Clinton wants to win, and she seems to think she can smooth everything over after she's won.

Congratulations on your "even handedness" Kevin.

Kevin's being earnest. He doesn't recognize Ferraro's racism any more than she does. Just like Jeremiah Wright doesn't recognize his own sexism.

But has she been race baiting? I know we all "know" she has been, but the evidence is spectacularly thin — and, frankly, there's nothing in Hillary's past to make me think she'd do this.

Isn’t there a fine line between something we would call “race baiting� and what is known as a Sister Souljah moment. (wikipedia link)

They've both done their best to hand the victory to McCain.

President McCain - get used to hearing it. They're too busy trying to bury each other to recognize who their real adversary is and McCain is getting a free ride and big wet kiss from the press.

"...there's nothing in Hillary's past to make me think she'd do this

Really, Kevin? That's either an extremely naive view or a stupendous misreading of political history.

The entire Clinton campaign m.o. history has been one where you burn bridges today, with the afterthought that you will reconstruct them tomorrow, after "Mission Accomplished".

It was the great political ethicist Bill who famously said "you gotta do what you gotta do".

As Obama rightly observed in one of his first victory speeches, he was being opposed by an old school status quo that believes in "the idea that it's acceptable to say anything and do anything to win an election".

If they are so pathetically desperate to win that they'll advance "the kind of partisanship where you're not even allowed to say that a Republican had an idea, even if it's one you never agreed with", do you really think Hillary is oblivious to those in her campaign playing the role of Dick Cheney on any given day?

By Any Means Necessary. It's funny how quaint the expression sounds coming from the lips of Malcolm X, now that the Clintonistas have adopted it as their raison d'être.

Everyone from Rolling Stone to George Will have rightly seen Hillary as the new Nixon.
As Will observed a short time back, the Clinton campaign makes the Nixon administration look like debutantes when it comes to oblique nastiness.

"Nixon specialized in mock-solemn tropes such as "It would be wrong to say" this or that, thereby getting this or that into the political conversation."

After Clintonista Shaheen attempted to turn Obama into The Pusher Man, Mark Penn kept the story bubbling by talking about how uninterested the Clinton campaign is in talking about it: "The issue related to cocaine use is not something that the campaign was in any way raising."

Over and over and over again. Sure, Hillary is not using race in this campaign, as far as I know.

So your theory is that Geraldine Ferraro was a loose cannon greatly detrimental to Hillary Clinton's campaign? And yet the Clinton organization was helpless to stop her from making 6 or 7 different TV appearances on ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX (including O'Reilly and John Gibson!) doing exactly what she said in her letter she didn't want to do - damaging the Clinton campaign?

Of course Ferraro would have stopped if Hillary had personally asked her to!

MY theory is that the Clinton campaign either engineered or, more likely, seized the opportunity to "go there" - hoping that Obama's supporters would go ballistic (as they have) with racism accusations so as many Pennsylvania voters as possible would perceive the race through a black vs. white frame. You call that "stupid," but I don't think it's stupid at all. That kind of framing would be very helpful to Clinton in Pennsylvania, and probably Florida and Michigan as well, not just in delegates but in the popular vote. And she's likely counting on Obama bringing back the African-American and squeamish liberal votes for the general when he joins her on the ticket as VP.

When pondering which campaign is most likely to be responsible for a seemingly risky and desperate tactic, my money's on THE ONE THAT'S BEHIND.

Yes, why, why, WHY would the obama camp push a Clinton's are racist angle? Seiously, WHY? It's preposterous. It's ridiculous. It's insane to even imagine that they would have any desire to move black voters away from Hillary Clinton. So what if when they started this angle Hillary had 55% of the black vote, and now has 10% why would he say this.

Besides, it's not like the media will believe every charge against the Clintons. It's not like pundits feel free to say that Bill and Hillary Clinton will say anything to get elected. It's not like everyone says that every single word, gesture, or breath is part of some Machiavellian attempt to steal an election ... oh, wait.

All BS aside, it's very amazing that every time there is a primary in a predominately African-American state someone associated with the Clinton campaign says something that can be pushed as incredibly racist.

The truth is that the Clinton's may have been the most popular white politicians in the black community alive today. Barack wouldn't even be in the race if he hadn't gotten the African-American vote.

Hillary is running a campaign aimed at winning the General Election. Barack is running a campaign to win the noimination. That's why she pitched a heal the party campaign with a unity ticket theme. That's why changed his view on illegal immigrant driver's licenses. (Note to Obama campaign: Illegal Immigrants can't vote, I don't care what Bob Dornan says)

She seems to have forgotten that you have to win the nomination before the GE.

Orlando Patterson is an Obama supporter, and claimed, ludicrously, that Hillary's "3 am" ad was racist; some bloggers, who also support Obama, decided Hillary doctored an ad to make Obama look darker, and the consensus seems to be that the whole thing was pure, unadulterated bunk.

But, you know, being paranoid doesn't mean they are not really out to get you: The fact that some Obama supporters have embarrassed themselves with unfounded accusations of racism, doesn't mean that the Hillary campaign can be absolved of wanting to inject race into the primary. Maybe the Ferraro debacle was not a Hillary campaign plant -- it could have simply been a Clinton supporter embarrassing herself this time, and I confidently predict that before this is over, supporters of both Obama and Hillary will embarrass themselves several times. However, framing the discussion this way misses the point, which is that Obama is a black dude running for President, which is unprecedented, because there's, you know, racism all over. That's why I don't understand why Kevin seems to be waffling over whether Obama's blackness is an advantage or a disadvantage. He did it before, in a previous post on Ferraro's comments, OBAMA'S LUCK, when he decided that "...on balance it's pretty unlikely that Obama's color is a plus on his electoral ledger." "Pretty unlikely"? Really? Since when isn't being black in this country, by any criterion, a pretty big freakin' disadvantage?

Perhaps in certain rarefied California suburbs, racism is no longer an issue and it may even be really cool to be black. But the electorate is still about 3/4 white, and there are many people -- including, sadly, many Democrats -- who will not vote for a black guy. The idea that Obama needs to remind black voters and young white liberals that he's black by bringing up race is incredibly inane: Blacks and young, educated liberals are already for Obama and they've noticed he's black and they either don't care or approve of it! What Obama needs is more white folks voting for him, folks like Hillary's less educated, rural and older supporters (wink, wink, Archie Bunker, nudge, nudge).

Is it really not clear that any mention of race, especially as a complaint against whitey, will work against Obama's candidacy by alienating many whites? Both during the primaries, and especially during the general election? Do we need to waffle on this with a pretence of evenhandedness?

I don't know if Clinton is race-baiting. But it's clear that for her it works -- hell, Ferraro even managed to make everybody forget that Obama won two primaries last week. On the other hand, what advantage would Obama have by having Orlando Patterson remind everybody of scary black men lurking in bushes?

____________________________________________

Obama will lose if he's thought of as the black guy. Maybe not the Democratic nomination, but surely the general. The Republicans are certainly behind some of this.

"Where is the race-baiting coming from?" Answer: to a great extent, from neither campaign. It's coming from the press. The press has a tremendous interest in turning this campaign into a sexism and racism story. It's easy, it's headliney, it sells newspapers. The press is taking every tiny instance of a poorly worded comment or an uncensored thought and blowing it up into major campaign news. I'm not sure there's anything that can be done about this. It does, unarguably, sell newspapers.

Well I plan on voting for the Democratic candidate no matter who it is. My vote was going for Edwards until he pulled out, leaving me with either a good foreign policy (Obama) or a good domestic policy (Clinton).

Most of the hubbub has left me cold, just like Kevin. Just two things really grated on me - the South Carolina Jesse Jackson comment and the recent Charlie Rose interview with Hillary, where she "takes him at his word that he's not Muslim".

Lev- Wilentz is not a long time friend of the Clintons. He covered them as a journalist. He has stated that he has met with BC for about two hours in total. If you can prove otherwise, please do so.

enozinho at 2:30 AM says:

"Obama folks were pretty crushed and looking to blame something other than their candidate and latched onto the meme that dittoheads had put Hillary over the top in TX."

Actually, they latched onto the exit polls that said just that. I wasn't aware that quoting statistics could in any way be considered a meme. That is an interesting ... well, meme.

Wake up and smell the coffee! There was a period of time, not so long ago, when the country was often compared to an abused spouse, and the Bush administration to the abuser. Many people did not want to believe they really INTENDED for their nominees, policies, etc. to BE that bad. It just always turned out that way. Finally all but the 30% dead-enders concluded either that you couldn't be that consistently awful unless you were doing it on purpose, or that it didn't matter whether it was on purpose or not. America wanted OUT of this rotten relationship.

Fact is, whether you blame them, the VRWC, their "surrogates" or whomever, the Clintons are consistently surrounded by chaos and backbiting, along with drama and ruthlessness worthy of a Univision soap opera. We had it for 8 years. As soon as there was any danger of Hillary losing the nomination, it all started again. Blame in on a rip in the fabric of space/time if you must, but when something is stinking up the joint, it is often more productive to go to the swirling center of the stink and remove it. As politicians, the Clintons are great soap opera stars.

Wait - so Samantha Power is now Hillary's fault too?

Honestly, it's as if half the people posting here have never seen a presidential campaign for either the general election of a party nomination, or even an Senatorial campaign before. If you think that Hillary Clinton is engaging in a Rovian campaign, then you must not have been paying attention four years ago, because the current Democratic campaign can't hold a candle to the Bush-Kerry campaign (nor to the Bush-Gore campaign, for that matter). If you think this campaign has been unusually tainted by racism, you must not have noticed what happened to Harold Ford, Jr. when he ran for senate in Tennessee two years ago. (see Republican National Committee and "Harold, call me.")

Honestly, the naivete and the eagerness to find overwhelming "issues" where they hardly exist is like a junior high school lunch room, except that instead of listening to the gossip from the Heathers who eat at that table in the corner, you're listening to inane speculation and substanceless tripe from news sources (and "news" sources).

Look, I suspect that Wilentz (who is not a close personal friend of the Clintons) is wrong about the Obama camp injecting race into this campaign, but I also think that race has been a lot less present than it might have been. If you think otherwise, just wait until the general election!

It is perfectly obvious that the Obama camp is doing the race-baiting. The same shit came up after NH, Super Tuesday, and after Ohio. It's actually pretty amazing how timely these accusations almost always are.

The entire premise of Jason Z is flawed: Race baiting = swift-boating the Clinton(s) and its working. It's the only reason he's ahead. At least JZ got the part right about '72, because that's where were headed.

First of all, it was shown pretty conclusively on a post at DU that kos linked to that Obama's image was darkened. I'm sure it was done because black is beautiful and Hillary was just being generous to her good friend and amicable opponent Barack HUSSAIN Obama. Ridiculous charge or not, it happened to be true.

After the ferraro remarks, the clinton team downplayed them, defended them, blamed the victim, than issued a non-apology apology. Classy as always. And for their good behavior, they were rewarded about a five point bump in the penn polls. No exploiting race for political gain there.

Over the past few months clinton surrogates (and her/Bill) have repeated a variant of every negative trope about blacks: the black as an empty suit (only a speech in 2002), the black as a jive talker (nothing but words, Fairy Tale, Media/voters have been fooled), the black as a drug user and a drug dealer, the black as the Other (in both race and religion; black votes don't count; he won't protect your white babies at 3 am), and demeaning black sexuality.

Aside from the "hey all the darkies voted for Jesse Jackson too, what'd you expect to happen?" and the Ferraro remarks none of the rhetoric was rascist on its own--and even then the remarks just crossed the line. So most of the stuff is simply banal outrageous lies expressed in the usual Clintonian fashion. But note the resonance between the supposed gaffs and the Hillary attacks; they are the same logical points, only not latent enough. And they only happened when hillary was in trouble; they were absent when she was 20 points ahead, lied in abeyance when they backfired, only to reappear when everything was lost--unless Obama somehow became unelectable. Quite the fortuitous coincidence of perfectly timed gaffs.

While none of the individual data points are indicative of an overall strategy of race baiting, let alone dispositive, note the pattern: a surrogate goes as far as he/she can without being unambiguously racist and hillary goes as far as she can while maintaing plausible deniability. So my question for Kevin, all of the Clinton cultists, and the concern trolls is: in any of these flair ups, can you point to a single instance where if Team Hillary had gone a little bit further it WOULDN'T have been clearly racist? It seems to me like when she is in trouble, her campaign has a clear pattern of going right up to the line and dancing all around it--they sometimes trip up and stumble over the line, but only just.

As for the charge that Barack has been exploiting reverse racism, you aren't that obtuse, Kevin. Barack's whole campaign has been about removing the slightest hint of being the black candidate. It's what his whole unity bullshit is about: I'm you're black friend, Barack, your white guilt is absolved--and no, no all those scary angry black men are all gone now, I'm demanding nothing but mutual respect and magical de-racialized ponies.

The ONLY thing that could prevent him from being the nominee is being the black candidate. The Obama camp didn't push a tenth as hard against Ferraro as the Clintons did against Powers. They don't want to be having this conversation, they just needed to set a line well short of where Hillary needs it to race bait her way to the win. There's a huge difference between that and reverse race baiting.

Hillay's team has shown much less scruple in attacking, has nothing to lose, and politically benefits from this issue being discussed. Why it is so hard to imagine there is a disparity in tactics between them and Team Obama?

Is Geraldine Ferraro a sexist?
If you really believe Geraldine Ferraro's remarks were racist, then you must agree her remarks were also sexist too, right? Either that or you, like most in this judgmental conflagration against her, just have never bothered to notice her complete statement: "I was talking about historic candidacies and what I started off by saying (was that) if you go back to 1984 and look at my historic candidacy, which I had just talked about all these things, in 1984 if my name was Gerard Ferraro instead of Geraldine Ferraro, I would have never been chosen as a vice presidential candidate," Ferraro said on ABC's "Good Morning America." "It had nothing to do with my qualification."

And she is correct. Had her name been Gerard she would never have been chosen by Mondale!! Hello? And there is some evidence to believe that if Barack Obama had been a white man who 3 years ago had been a state legislator, he would not have become the darling of us liberals! Is this really that hard? Or are too many of us too engaged in demonizing to look at the possibility that Ms. Ferraro may have just been a little too off the cuff in her comments, a little too glib, yet innocent really.

I don't understand why blog authors feel it's ok to come out for a particular candidate - if you want to be taken seriously as a 'news/opinions' source it's incumbent upon you to remain neutral. It's one thing for the Times editorial board to endorse Hillary but if a reporter doing a story on Hillary re lets say race baiting came out and said by the way I'm an Obama supporter one obviously would discount what is said. Likewise here: I'm probably going to vote McCain so I have no Obama/Clinton axe to grind but it has been obvious for quite some time Kevin that you're an Obama supporter - and that's the point - it's been OBVIOUS - and so how can an objective observer really take your opinion seriously? I'm mean this post is full of fake objectivity because you've larded it with little signs all pointing in one direction: Hillary is a conniving bitch. The distressing part is that the center-left blogoshpere is rampant with disingenuous posts like this and a disinterested reader should be concerned that blogs seem to want to have their newsy little cake and eat it too - ie the mandate 'serious' blogs want to claim for themselves seems increasingly to be as phony as a Fox.

filmex: "Really, Kevin? That's either an extremely naive view or a stupendous misreading of political history."

With that silly litany of shopworn talking points devoid of substance, followed by your citing of George Will to support your contention that Mrs. Clinton is "the New Nixon," it's quite obvious that the only way you'll ever truly learn about political history is when subsequent events serve to highlight your own current and willful ignorance of it.

Maybe Hillary's campaign really is behind all this stuff. Maybe they really are that stupid. ... But has she been race baiting? ... there's nothing in Hillary's past to make me think she'd do this.

—Kevin Drum

Yes. No. Yes. No.

Client #11: "Barack's whole campaign has been about removing the slightest hint of being the black candidate."

Thank you so much for clarifying that, because this sure had me fooled:

"Barack knows what it means living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people. Hillary would never know that. Hillary ain’t never been called a nigger. Hillary has never had a people defined as a non-person." -- Rev. Jeremiah Wright - Chicago, IL (December 2007)

Kevin,

No matter how much you want Obama to win, you can't change the facts.

Remember the Nevada debate in January. The one where Obama admitted his SC Press Secretary was passing out 4-pages race baiting allegations by Hillary?

So Obama race-baits in January, February, and March but somehow this is Hillary's doing?

Client #11: "First of all, it was shown pretty conclusively on a post at DU that kos linked to that Obama's image was darkened."

And then, the acid kicked in ...

and, frankly, there's nothing in Hillary's past to make me think she'd do this

You should talk to Kevin Drum, who, at Washington Monthly's site, recently wrote: "In January, a slew of Hillary surrogates injected race into the campaign, and even though Hillary herself wasn't responsible for any of it, it struck me that there was just too much of it for it to be a coincidence."

Jeebus. The extent to which people will bend over backwards to deny what seems as patently obvious as things are going to get in politics is extraordinary. Next you'll argue that Carville never commented that if you drag a dollar through a trailer park, you never know what trash you'll find. Because the Clintons have been strong supporters of women's rights (really!), that can't have happened, right? Fucking vast right wing conspiracy.

Maybe Hillary's campaign really is behind all this stuff. Maybe they really are that stupid. ... But has she been race baiting? ... there's nothing in Hillary's past to make me think she'd do this.

Is there anything in her past that would make you think she would send Bill to do a campaign interview on the Rush Limbaugh show?

Has she ever run against a black candidate before?

The Clinton's are opportunists. If she were running against an Hispanic candidate and didn't have the Latino vote she'd have completely different rhetoric on immigration using it to drive a wedge in the party.

The only thing you can look at in the Clinton's past to predict the future is their obsession with doing whatever it takes to win, even if it means destroying the Party to do it.

Donald,
To hold Obama responsible for the statements of persons, e.g. J. Wright, not part of his campaign crosses into the realm of irrational. One difference I see between Wright and Ferraro is that she was part of Clinton's campaign structure and she was actively out seeking media attention, giving interviews and speeches. After she was criticized she redoubled her efforts in the media. Wright, on the other hand, was delivering a sermon to his church in January and apparently not seeking a larger stage for his views. If he has been giving interviews in the national media about this, I haven't seen them.

Race Baiting.. what exactly is race baiting??
What you guys are calling race baiting the rest of us are saying THAT is race bating??
Ferraro a case in point.. Bill Clinton's comment comparing OB's win in SC to Jessie Jackson in SC!
What is race baiting about that??

Normal people who are not part of your elite group are saying WHAT IS RACE BAITING ABOUT THAT?? Well what is? Please explained. I have been involved with civil rights for a long time. To me your charges of race bating are ridiculous. That is why many of us are checking out on this campaign if OB wins the nomination.

You want to see what race baiting is.. Check out Rev Wright.. there are plenty of posts around.

It doesn't matter to you guys because you don't have friends who are affected by the lack of follow through from policies that are all talk.

Rank presumption and false.

As Will observed a short time back, the Clinton campaign makes the Nixon administration look like debutantes when it comes to oblique nastiness.

Now, there's an impartial observer without an ax to grind who's never been known to make statements from the perspective of a detached pundit while secretly working on behalf of a candidate.

Were you guys born yesterday?

I agree that Zengerle is being too simplistic. Racism turns people off in a Democratic primary; there's no way that people's thinking your opponent is racist helps you get your minimum threshold votes to win the nomination.

However, it's a little too late for this:

Which campaign is injecting racial politics into the Democratic primary? Sean Wilentz argues, contra conventional wisdom, that it's the Obama campaign: "tentatively since before the primaries began, and with a vengeance since Clinton's surprising win in New Hampshire."

So what? Hillary's campaign is really probably over now. It's clear that Obama is significantly more popular than her, and that has been sufficiently consistent for awhile. Also, of course, he is winning on the pledged delegates.

For the mainstream media and Kevin Drum or other bloggers to show now that they won't go bit-and-bridle riding along with the Obama campaign, and to show that they're willing to take a critical or realistic look at him doesn't give them a bit of credibility in my eye. The bias has crept in a long time ago, and they've got no one to blame for it except their own cowardice. For all I know an Obama presidency is going to be better for the nation than a Clinton presidency, but the bias was wrong and hope we have a superstar ready to run against the Republicans in 8 years.

there's no way that people's thinking your opponent is racist helps you get your minimum threshold votes to win the nomination.

I'm sorry, this should have read "there's no way that people's thinking your opponent is racist helps the opponent get his/her minimum threshold votes to win the nomination."

The excerpt from Zengerle read to me like he was saying, "Well, there is only a sliver among the Democratic primary voters who are offended by racism, so it wouldn't make sense that Obama was trying to make Hillary look racist." Puh-leeze!

Kevin - You're always decrying the rhetorical excesses of partisans on both sides. So why stoke the fires again with this somewhat empty post that depends on thee-layers of mind-reading to be correct?

As a wise man once said:

Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.

Kevin still hasn't figured out that Ferraro FIRST made these remarks on right-wing radio (John Gibson), and continued making them on right-wing TV, where she is an analyst.

If she were going to blow a dog whistle, why not on the network(s) that dogs listen to? And isn't it conceivable that TERMINALLY STUPID Mark Penn figured us cats wouldn't be over there listening? And how convenient - right before the blue-collar PA primary.

With all that in mind, what are the odds against this thing being totally freelance? Astronomical, IMO.

The benign neglect started in January. And frankly I think the reaction of "neutral" Clyburn was orchestrated with Axelrod.

Team Obama let the charges bounce around for a week or so and as they started to die down Clyburn stepped in with an announcement of his disappointment. Four or five days later an official memo was circulated from the Obama campaign summarizing the "pattern" of race baiting. Somewhere along the line Obama eventually put out an anemic "I don't think Hillary is racist" comment.

Once baseless charges are out there Hillary had absolutely no way to stop the discussion. The only way to kill it would have been for Obama to immediately come out and say they were ridiculous. He didn't.

I think this whole style of campaign is spectacularly divisive for the party. The damage is done and Hillary is the least of the victims. Although I'll gladly vote for Obama/Axelrod, I'll also freely call them assholes (or was it shitheads?).

How could she know Bill would go around comparing Obama to Jesse Jackson

For the love of God, what the fuck is wrong with Jesse Jackson? I've been out of the country several times over the last decade. Did he kill his ex-wife or something.

I was supporting Hillary up until the last couple of weeks. I am greatly disappointed in the recent behavior of her campaign. Thankfully the only real candidate for change has thrown his hat in the ring, Ralph Nader.

Of course he has no chance and likely Obama will be the next president. There will be some interesting and nasty debates ahead for him. I hope he picks a strong cabinet and I am sure he will be a great ambassador. I just hope he turns out to be as good a leader as he is an orator. I am sure that many of us can agree that Reagan was the former but not the later.

Now that the official tally of major media and campaign figures noting the importance of the African American vote to the Obama candidacy has gone from 7,835 at the time of the SC primary to a cumulative 2,453,658 following LA, MD, VA and MO, can we quit pretending Bill Clinton's perfectly rational observation was "revolting" "dog-whistle" race baiting? Please.

Doug r: read somerby – the “as far as I know� meme is a media-created shibboleth

Mirror: so the brilliant strategy was to drop the race card in a tiny daily in Torrance CA and rely on Obama fluffer Kos to pick it up…? You’re an idiot

Patience: you’re so right about Marshall, Kos and Yglesias – my respect for them has gone way away down

Dave in Portland: the 90’s called, and they want you back…

Mainn: what a brilliant observation – PLEASE start your own blog. Tool.

Filmex: thanks for taking time away from your ongoing investigation that PROVES (really – this time) that Hillary murdered Vince to drop your science on us in comments. We’re truly blessed

Brooksfoe: ahhhh…! Halfway down the comments thread we finally get both heat AND light. Let me see: democrats divided and sniping, democrats self-destructing, democrats playing (as usual) identity politics…. When oh when have we heard this before…? I REMEMEBR NOW…! Every 4 years.

Dirk: we’re all glad that you’re going to vote democratic, but if you don’t know to whom/where Hillary made her (taken out of context) ‘as far as I know comment’ then: pretty please with a cherry on top - STFU.

Bluewave apparently doesn’t know the difference between a chicken and an egg.

AF: don’t you know EVERYTHING is Hillary’s fault…?

Keith: you have the distinct honor of being the second poster in the entire thread to have anything intelligent to say. The award is in the mail.

Jb64: you’re SOOOOO right…! The Obama camp is clearly taking the tried & true route of injecting race into the campaign, which has been a sure-fire winner since we had our first black President elected in 1868. You should thank God for Velcro, because you’re clearly too stupid to tie your own shoes.

Client #11: quote: “none of the…data points are indicative of a strategy…� but I’ll become incensed about the ‘strategy’ anyway…! ROTFLMAO

Sammi: Shush, you silly….! You can’t be HONEST on these threads…!

Don Ho: what the (clearly overexcitable) Rev. Wright says is now, ipso facto, Obama campaign strategy….? I thought we had plumbed the depths of inanity with client 11, but only two posts later, you top him…! Bravo..!

Some call me Tim: some call you stupid as well

Da5id: Nice recitation of RNC talking pints – succint too. Now go back to LGF where you belong. Tool.

Sister Souljah: I guess it was hyperbole in some sort of other context, but she did suggest we have a national "kill white people" week. To quote Clyburn "all of us should be careful about what we say about [insert --killing members of other races-- here]".

And as long as we're saying what we think I really find a lot of Wright's preaching offensive. I'd be a bit more comfortable if Obama was a Muslim.

I was listening to the Clinton interview regarding Obama's 'Muslim' religion, and the reason the interviewer kept coming back to it was that she wouldn't give a foresquare answer. "As far as I know" was completely consistent with her dancing around the issue during the entire discussion. There is an alternative explanation, not pretty but not race-baiting. HRC herself, and the campaign, simply never gives quarter on anything. Never concede, never explain. In a situation where she could 'help' Obama, she simply won't do it.

Even when it would help her. Had HRC, instead of getting into the ridiculous 'denounce' vs. 'reject' thing turned the Farakhan question back on Russert (this is ridiculous, not what we should be debating about, etc), she would have been the clear winner, it would have been a repeating clip the next day, and everyone would have praised her on it. But it's just not in them; straightahead hardball is just what they do.

It's consistent with the fact that the HRC campaign is inflexible and being run like nothing has changed since 1992-1996. They have no flex in strategy at all. Obama / Axelrod are still running rings around them on fund - raising (small donors being for losers and all), on grassroots organizing (existing machines being the grownups way to go) and on image, even with the battering.

She doesn't have the spontaneous speaking and reactive skills that allowed Bill Clinton to thrive in that environment. Not even a little.

This pattern doesn't mark the Clinton campaign as race-baiting, but it does mark them as a few-note, inflexible, strategically limited campaign. Given HRC's cap (iow, the fact that 48% of the electorate is already out of reach), sadly her candidacy bodes ill for the general.

Actually I think it's very likely that Obama's campaign has been the primary driver behind this brouhaha -- and in a strange way that makes me feel better about him. I voted for Clinton in part because I have doubts about his ability to punch and counterpunch in what I have absolutely no doubt is going to be a very dirty general election campaign -- doubts if you will about his toughness, which I do think is an issue and not an unreasonable one.

However starting with the strange story about hyping the photo of him in traditional African garb, I began to think that if this was a conscious strategy on his campaign's part then it was a very clever one. It's a two-fer. He gets to accuse her of racism, a very potent charge at least among Democrats. But also he gets out a picture that was going to come out anyway in the general election, gets it out early, and shapes the story line about it, namely, you'd have to be a sick racist to even put this out there. The media have repeated that line. When the Republicans trot this stuff out in the general, should he be our nominee, all he has to do is remind everyone of how shameful we've all already decided this is.

Low, but very sharp. It isn't exactly the new politics, but like a number of other people have said, I'm not looking to politics for a transcendent experience. I'm looking for someone who will do what needs to be done to win and to move the country forward.

These are the Clintons. Bill "it depends on what the definition of 'is' is" Clinton. Masters of language parsing. The MLK comments? I can believe that was just a tone deaf mistake, but tone deaf nonetheless. The SC comments? A mistake? Bill "accidentally" slipped with a comment that marginalized his opponent? Right.

The problem with Hillary's comments on Barack being Muslim start way before "as far as I know." They start near the beginning with, "I take him on the basis of what he says." It's like saying, "the defendant says he's innocent, and I believe him." It's very nice to be supportive, but when you're willing to say something stronger than "because he says so" --- an in "there is nothing to base that on" --- why water it down with a reference to personal testimony? That's the "context" for her "as far as I know" addendum.

Ferarro is an idiot. Trying to defend her comments as "honest" is beyond lame. At best, the truth of her comments is unknowable. For her to proclaim the unknowable as fact... maybe that's why Fox likes her.

And when was the last time ANYONE thought of Ferraro? Maybe she was just trying to gin up a little more limelight for herself, but it speaks ill of a campaign to have so many out of control speakers on board--not to mention Mark Penn making himself the focus of the Clinton campaign. If this is how she's going to run the White House, it'll be Bush's third term.

And when was the last time ANYONE thought of Ferraro?

The last time I thought about her was when she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. I'm not too concerned with the current brouhaha (as I've stated before the primary election has been over for a long time) -- but I thought it was pretty bad taste for TPM to call a 77 year old female cancer survivor and a past democratic vice presidential nominee "the clown parade."

Once again the omnipotent Donald from lalalala I don't want to here anything bad about my candidate has spoken. Hushed silence should follow the Donalds every proclamation. Sorry D it's time to wake up and smell the Kona. Hilary is a hack.

I think this whole discussion proves what I said yesterday. Regardless of how much we pat ourselves on the back we're not mature enough to have a major political race featuring minority or woman candidates, and not have race or sex be an issue.

It's a shame. And read again what J. Bean says at the top of the thread, at 2:07 AM: Read it twice. I think the whole racism thing -- particularly since it is funneled through Drudge -- smacks of Republican rat-fucking. And here we are cheerfully putting our leg in the trap, again and again and again.

Is the Clinton campaign really stupid enough to piss off such a huge segment of the Democratic voting bloc, i.e. the African-American community?

Thank you, Kevin, for saying on a front page what I've been saying in comments wherever I see it. I voted for Clinton, but I'm perfectly content to see an Obama victory. I don't like either side demonizing the other candidate and the portrait I've been seeing of Hillary lately has been repulsively familiar, to say the least.

*

Drum: But has she [Clinton] been race baiting?

Yes.

Is Hillary a flat-out racist? No.

But her campaign's predilection - and she is responsible for what her representatives say to the press when they are speaking about the campaign - for pointing out, over and over again, that Obama is black is an incredibly cynical ploy intended to drive Obama's negatives down to Clinton's own level...with the added effect of damaging an Obama candidacy for the general election. The strategy is dirty, divisive and would make Lee Atwater proud. That's not a compliment.

I was really hoping that we could all rise above how we feel about race and gender and focus on what it takes to make America better for everyone, but to many of us are not good enough people to do just that, which is too bad. Believe it or not, there are bigger concerns than how much support a candidate is getting from a certain demographic. Case in point:

Mary on March 14, 2008 at 9:43 AM:

He would not have won so many caucuses without that solid bloc vote (or the youth and academic vote also swayed by it).

Really; that's like something you'd read on Powerline. Enough, already.

Wow, Kevin lets some racist ass shit stay on this board...

Long, random thoughts on this that I'm sure no one will read:

1) As an Obama supporter who is trying very much to maintain my respect for Clinton, when there have been allegations of race-baiting I have tried to look at the comments in questions as if they had been made by a Republican. If a Republican had made Bill Clinton's Jesse Jackson comment, the Bob Johnson/Bill Shaheen drug comments, or Ferraro's repeated comments, I would have been livid. The 3am ad, the LBJ/Martin Luther King comment - not so much.

2) On the other hand, as a white person, I try very hard not to tell black people what they are and are not allowed to think is offensive. I don't see anything racially charged about the 3am ad - if I were an older black man, might I view the ad differently? Sure. Might there be a dynamic with the LBJ/MLK thing than I'm just not getting? Sure.

3) I think there are two problems for Clinton with this whole issue. The first is that once people think there has been some amount of racially charged dog-whistling in a campaign, it's going to be all the more easy to believe it's happening again. This is why I think Bill Clinton's Jesse Jackson comment was really bad for her campaign. There was really no reason for him to, without prompting, throw out the comparison to Jesse Jackson specifically other than to at least seed the idea that Obama's win in SC was because he was black. People can make their own judgments about whether this was an ok thing to do or not but, once it happened, it gave people the idea that the Clintons were willing to "go there."

The second problem for Clinton is that, from the beginning, they (with ample help from the media) were really pushing the idea that they were a fantastic, disciplined, crafty, "willing to do what it takes to win" campaign. This was the story for about a year up until they lost Iowa. So, when these incidents happen, it's easy to see why many have a hard time believing that they were not accidents, that the campaign had nothing to do with them, etc.

I think the reality is somewhere in the middle. The Clinton campaign has at times, starting with the Jesse Jackson comment, for tactical reasons sought to diminish Obama's victories in some states as tied to his skin color. They, and this is obviously well-documented in other areas, have not been as nearly as disciplined a campaign as anticipated, and the drug comments and Ferraro's comments are examples of them not being able to control their surrogates.

I also think that the Clinton campaign has just generally been not as good at navigating the race issue as I think the Obama campaign has been at navigating the gender issue. The reality for both campaigns is that there are things you could do in a "normal" race between two white men that would be more problematic in this race. A great example is the whole photo-darkening incident. You can't look at that photo and say it has not been darkened. But it has also obviously wholly darkened - in other words, it wasn't just Obama that was darkened, it was the background, etc. Darkening a photo is standard political stuff; it makes the opponent and what you are attacking look more sinister, etc. I am sure they would have done the same thing if Obama were white, but he isn't. And it was really stupid for the Clinton campaign to not realize that, by darkening the photo, they were opening themselves up to people taking offense. Is it unfair that the campaigns have to be more careful about this stuff? Maybe, but it's reality.

If you use race to try and knock a black opponent out, you're a racist. IT doesn't matter if you think black people are inferior or not. If you are willing to play to such notions to gain power, that is the very heart of racism. Racism isn't just about hatred, it's about self-serving power-plays as well.

Hillary Clinton is a racist.

Dagome: Do you have any idea what you're talking about...? Here's the f*cking transcript:

KROFT: You don't believe that Senator Obama is a Muslim?
CLINTON: Of course not. I mean, that's -- you know, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that.
KROFT: And you said you'd take Senator Obama at his word that he's not a Muslim.
CLINTON: Right. Right.
KROFT: You don't believe that he's a Muslim --
CLINTON: No. No. Why would I? There's no --
KROFT: -- or implying, right?
CLINTON: No, there is nothing to base that on, as far as I know.
KROFT: It's just scurrilous --
CLINTON: Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors. I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time.

How is it HRC's fault that after being badgered and re-asked the question, she let's slip the "so far as I know..." phrase...?
How is it HRC's fault that Kroft didn't simply move on to the next question after she CATEGORICALLY ANSWERED: "of course not. I mean, that's -- you know, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that."
THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE END OF IT.
NEXT F*UCKING QUESTION.
But because an MSM ratf*cker asks over ond over again and she rephrases, it's all part of a nefarious planned plot on her part...?
Your stupidity is simply collossal.

But has she been race baiting? I know we all "know" she has been, but the evidence is spectacularly thin

Were you expecting she might approach a mic and utter, "That nigger ain't fit to operate no White House."

which, Mrs. Ferraro nearly did. And continued doing in front of several news broadcasts, while under the (unpaid) employ of the Clinton campaign. She could have been shut down in a second, and she wasn't. And I'd probably let the whole thing slide if I felt the Clinton crew was sincerely apologetic and committed to not saying anything race related about Obama.

In this post-B/sh world, we can't respond to offense with Chamberlainesque calls for moderation. If she fucked up, make her stop it -- and then let's get on with it.

To the larger point. I think it's a glass half empty / half full argument. If you think white democratic voters on average respond positively to racism you're biased one way. If you think white democratic voters respond negatively to insinuated racism you're biased the other.

In case you're wondering Axelrod honed his message in state wide races in liberal Massachusetts, New York, and Illinois (with Daly, Spitzer, Patrick, and Obama) and not in Louisiana with David Duke.

Another thiong. a lot of people are sick of the 'you can't prove 100% that I'm a racist' trick. We've seen people like the Clintons pull this shit and then say 'You can't prove it was racist!' as if that makes a difference.

At some point, things become self-evident. It's hard top prove, on paper, that Pat Buchanan is a racist. We could 'prove' to this standard that Trent Lott was being racist when he said what he said. We couldn't 'prove' that George Allen knew what Macaca meant. We had to use our own judgment.

What Kevin Drum seems to be saying here is that we're just not allowed to call Democrats racist, because that's something only Republicans are. I'm sorry, but charges of racism can't be political, and Democrats can be racist every bit as much as Republicans.

mhr on March 14, 2008 at 10:34 AM:

I don't who Obama can blame for [Jeremiah Wright].

Well, mhr, I think he blames Jeremiah Wright for Jeremiah Wright:

Obama's press spokesman Bill Burton said, "Sen. Obama has said repeatedly that personal attacks such as this have no place in this campaign or our politics, whether they're offered from a platform at a rally or the pulpit of a church. Sen. Obama does not think of the pastor of his church in political terms. Like a member of his family, there are things he says with which Sen. Obama deeply disagrees. But now that he is retired, that doesn't detract from Sen. Obama's affection for Rev. Wright or his appreciation for the good works he has done."

If Obama is a black nationalist...blah, blah, blah..

Man, you could have stopped after the first part I excerpted and actually appear rational, but noooo....

Kevin,
You don't need to convince us that you're an Obama supporter and that Hillary's run a terrible campaign. That's Kos's territory (and wow am I getting tired of it). I like you much more when you stay out of the "he said she said" crap and write on more interesting topics.

I think a much bigger problem in this primary is the "You can't prove you're NOT a racist!" charge, which is what Kevin seems to be saying.

Who started injecting race into the campaign?
Here's a data point: in June 2007 the Obama campaign send a press release to reporters (specifying that it was not to be attributed to the Obama campaign) that refers to Clinton as "D-Punjab."
See http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/politics/memo1.pdf

There aren't any angels in this.

Am I the only person in the United States of America who remembers this comment by Jesse Jackson, Jr., Obama's national campaign co-chair, in early January?

...there were tears [Clinton's] that melted the Granite State. And those are tears that Mrs. Clinton cried on that day, clearly moved voters. She somehow connected with those voters.
But those tears also have to be analyzed. They have to be looked at very, very carefully in light of Katrina, in light of other things that Mrs. Clinton did not cry for, particularly as we head to South Carolina where 45% of African-Americans who participate in the Democratic contest, and they see real hope in Barack Obama.

But the entire media, and a whole slew of gullible citizens, think CLINTON is the one who's injected race into this campaign?

I had been hoping that Obama would get the nomination (Edwards was my first choice), and I still prefer him to Hillary Clinton, but the grotesque unfairness of the coverage of HC and resultant public hostility towards her esp. from Obama supporters has just made me sick to my stomach.

I may just sit this fucking election out, I'm so damn sick of this.

Mary: Who benefits from this so-called race baiting? It is clearly Obama.

Anyone who can say something like this has never...

...been or known a woman in a majority male situation who has been accused of being "too aggressive" and, when she protests such double standards, is seen as then proving that she's an aggressive (insert female-specific insult here: harpy, shrew, harridan, ball-buster)...

...been or known a black person in a majority white country who is accused of not earning the status he has and, when he protests such double standards, is accused of "playing the race card."

It's been distressing to find that some white women can't connect the dots between their own experiences and Obama's. It reminds me of Tiger Woods defending Augusta for not admitting women. You'd think the idiot would have been able to draw the line between race and gender in that one--what does he think Augusta would have done with him a few short years before?--but no.

There is no way, no way at all, for Obama to win this conversation or this election if it becomes race-based. If he is depicted as the Black Candidate for Black People, he loses. It's that simple.

Don't you think he knows that? Don't you think the Clintons do, too