Hillary Clinton easily breezed by Barack Obama in the Kentucky primary, bolstered again by working-class, less educated whites who made their decision to vote for her based on their unwillingness to vote for a black person. Another sad day in America.
Race played a decisive role in Hillary Rodham Clinton’s lopsided victory in Tuesday’s Democratic presidential primary in Kentucky, the latest contest to emphasize how fierce her rivalry against Barack Obama has become among the party’s voters.How much does prejudice factor into this? The Bluegrass State is living in another time, where Negroes knew their place — and one of those places was certainly not on a ballot running for president.…Seven in 10 whites overall backed Clinton in Kentucky, including about three quarters of those who have not completed college. That made Tuesday’s contest one of her stronger performances yet with those blue-collar white voters — little surprise considering Kentucky has one of the country’s highest proportions of people who are not college graduates.
* About one in five whites said race played a role in choosing a candidate;
* Nine in 10 of that group backed Clinton — the highest proportion yet among the 28 states where that question has been asked in exit polls;
* Only three in 10 whites who said race was a factor said they would vote for Obama should he oppose McCain in November;
* Nearly four in 10 said they would back McCain, while the rest said they wouldn’t vote.
These results in Kentucky (and West Virginia) neatly fit David Sirota’s theory of the Race Chasm. He originally pointed out the fascinating slice of statistics for In These Times. See the graph and a snippet below the fold.
Dave wrote this in March, so races after that aren’t included, but all of the subsequent primaries followed the same pattern:
When I read his piece earlier, I was taken aback at how obvious this all is, and how the results are so consistent. It says a lot about the racial dynamics and history in this country over time — the results of unresolved conflict, self-segregation/lack of interaction and racially motivated voting has presented us with a serious opportunity to discuss and slice and dice what we are seeing here.On the left of the graph, among the states with the smallest black population, Obama has destroyed Clinton. With the candidates differing little on issues, this trend is likely due, in part, to the fact that black-white racial politics are all but non-existent in nearly totally white states. Thus, Clinton has fewer built-in advantages. Though some of these states like Idaho or Wyoming have reputations for intolerance thanks to the occasional militia headlines, black-white interaction in these places is not a part of people’s daily lives, nor their political decisions. Put another way, the dialect of racism—the hints of the Ferraro comment and codes of Bill Clinton’s Jesse Jackson reference, for instance—is not politically effective because such language has not historically been a significant part of the local political discussion. That’s especially true in the liberal-skewed Democratic primary.
On the right of the graph among the states with the largest black populations, Obama has also crushed Clinton. Unlike the super-white states, these states—many in the Deep South—have a long and sordid history of day-to-day, black-white racial politics, with Richard Nixon famously pioneering Republican’s “southern strategy” to maximize the racist segregationist vote in general elections. “But in the Democratic primary the black vote is so huge [in these states], it can overwhelm the white vote,” says Thomas Schaller, a political science professor at the University of Maryland—Baltimore. That black vote has gone primarily to Obama, helping him win these states by big margins.
It is in the chasm where Clinton has consistently defeated Obama. These are geographically diverse states from Ohio to Oklahoma to Massachusetts where racial politics is very much a part of the political culture, but where the black vote is too small to offset a white vote racially motivated by the Clinton campaign’s coded messages and tactics. The chasm exists in the cluster of states whose population is above 6 percent and below 17 percent black, and Clinton has won most of them by beating Obama handily among white working-class voters.
In sum, Obama has only been able to eke out victories in three states with Race Chasm demographics, where African-American populations make up more than 6 percent but less than 17 percent of the total population.
I wonder if an intelligent discussion can now be had about the reality of prejudice versus affinity voting. When the MSM continually frames this chasm as a problem for Obama — it is a problem for all of us as a society. To have a whole demo of voters so poisoned by their own racism to vote for someone white simply to avoid casting a ballot for a person of color is sad. To then be willing to stay home in November or worse, vote for John McCain, who clearly doesn’t represent working class interests, is tragic.
Needless to say that’s the polar opposite of what I’ve called affinity voting — blacks voting for Obama in large numbers. Many are voting for him because he represents ideals and policies they agree with; that he’s the first credible, positive black candidate for president is a huge historical bonus. Those who say this is some sort of race bloc voting are not seeing this clearly — as I’ve mentioned before, if race alone was the deciding factor, we would have seen Alan Keyes or Cynthia McKinney racking up some serious vote totals. Black voters have been the most reliable voter base for the Democratic party regardless of the race of the candidate. That the party has spent so much time chasing this close-minded voting block of working class whites, even touting them, is kind of sad (or enraging, depending on your POV).
95 Responses to “Clinton wins Kentucky, race chasm proven again”
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You mean ““A pillaging band of vikings wins Kentucky, race chasm proven again.:
I’m starting to wonder if part of the reason we’ve seen it exaggerated in the last couple of weeks has to do with Obama’s strategy in the endgame. His goal now is to ignore Clinton, focus on McCain, act like the presumptive nominee, and rack up delegates so that by the time this gets to the convention, he can seat FL and MI as-is and it won’t matter. He spent almost no time in WV and KY, which is part of the reason he didn’t close the gap–not that a 20 point loss would have been that much better than what he got. He knew he’d win in Oregon, and he apparently pulled another 10 of Edwards delegates today, pulling him even farther ahead. S why waste time and resources in a primary state that you’re not going to win anyway?
The gap could have been a lot closer, if he’d come to the state a few times and gave some speeches. Funny thing, voters tend to vote for the one who shows up, talks about their issues with them and asks them politely for their votes, rather than the one who ignores them and then calls them racists for voting for the one who did show up.
So, let’s see, the GE campaign has written off WV and KY for being racist, so we obviously can’t put them in the Dem column for November. Then there’s all those deep red state caucauses that Obama did win, like TX, KS, and WY, but they’re not going to be in the Dem column either. So…how exactly are we supposed to get to 270 EC?
If I was a betting man, I would say Gore endorses Obama tomorrow. But I’m not a bettor, or a man, so I can’t.
Not to mention the high probability of being taken out by an opportunity deprived white person dead set against being “ruled over” by a n-person!
Makes you wonder what some of these people have done to people of color in their lifetimes that has them all worried about being punished under a “mulatto” regime???
Oh, I also think it has to do with the economic straits in those states where “not being black” is a way to stay employed.
States with higher percentages of black voters also have a higher percentage of whites who encounter blacks in daily life and don’t fear the unknown. States with fewer blacks don’t fear because there is no rational threat if they have to compete on even ground, and no fear of retaliation for oppression.
Okay, so the white (Democratic) people in Kentucky got a chance to stamp their little feet and let everybody know they are XXX. (certainly not racists - they’re good white people who just happen to not like Black people). Just like the West Virginians did.
The real question is:
In the general election, will their racism overcome their need for a change in American leadership? Or, now that they’ve made some “point” by voting for Clinton’s failing candidacy (what that point would be is beyond me), will they pull the lever for Obama in November?
Or will it matter?…
You could argue that since Bill Clinton won both WV and KY twice, they were just reverting to their old habits.
But I guess that’s just whistling past the graveyard.
Here’s the problem with that theory, Blue Jean. Clinton pretty much camped out in KY for the last week, and yet her numbers didn’t move, not appreciably. In fact, KY’s numbers haven’t moved much since March. So why should Obama have spent any time there, when it seemed pretty clear that no matter what he did, KY wasn’t going to listen?
I also think it has to do with the economic straits in those states where “not being black” is a way to stay employed.
Seconded, emphatically.
As a native of both Appalachia and the Buckeye State, and a white person who has been studying racial thinking for some years, I agree that David’s graph makes something I’ve struggled to explain as simple as…an x-y grid. (It’s not represented, or representable, as a pie.)
The hard thing about the graph is right there in the guts of the Race Chasm. This is not about making a point, this is about being willing to cut your own throat economically to make sure no black man is President.
Working-class, uneducated white KY and WV voters are more connected than they appear to the barely-middle-class, scraping-by BS-in-Business demographic in Ohio and Florida. Connected as in related.
As in, KY and WV are typical of Appalachia in being migrated from by most who have the education to have choices. OH and FL are migrated-to states, in different ways from one another, but both receive a lot of white people.
Example: My sister has been working in our ancestral homeland, down south of Prestonburg, for three years. My niece start kindergarten in the fall, and she’ll be up North where schools have books and desks. Our extended family is helping them move, because no one with options wants our kids educated ‘down home’.
Where do WV and KY migrants head to? Well, the post-war internal migration that moved a large portion of US blacks to the urban North also moved a large percentage of Appalachia to Ohio, and substantial numbers to Florida too. (Joke: What’s the capital of West Virginia? Punchline: Akron.)
I’m not at all surprised that a Harvard-educated black lawyer wasn’t able to win in KY and WV, but I’m also not surprised that you can take the redneck out of the sticks, but it’s a lot harder to take the sticks out of the redneck.
Unfortunately, proximity among different-raced workers on the line at Ford did not lead to fondness or post-racial thinking.
What the answers are, I don’t know, but I’m delighted to see someone asking such good questions.
Where I think David is way off, as in, Nice graph but do you KNOW any racially aroused white people?, is:
“…states from Ohio to Oklahoma to Massachusetts where racial politics is very much a part of the political culture, but where the black vote is too small to offset a white vote racially motivated by the Clinton campaign’s coded messages and tactics.”
This implies that there was some campaign that Clinton could have run, or indeed any white person could have run, to suppress the Race Chasm Effect. I’d love to live in a country in which a scrupulous effort to repudiate the votes of racist whites could affect the political participation of racist whites. I think if it were as simple as saying, “If you’re voting for me because my opponent is…(Blazing Saddles link here), then I don’t want your vote”, we wouldn’t have a serious political problem on our hands or indeed anything to talk about.
The data analysis and picture are really instructive, but that implied conclusion is neither proved nor, I think, provable. And that’s the point, really: We have a problem in this country because the people who are thinking, voting and buying their homes based on racial stereotyping don’t think they’re the problem. They’re looking for the crowd with torches and white hoods, not a mirror.
Its worth noting that (until Kentucky anyway) Obama actually had a slim lead among white males in total primary/caucus votes since Iowa, and will again after Oregon.
Count white people under 65, its a considerable lead.
I seem to have missed your blog post entitled “Obama wins N. Carolina, race chasm proven again”. You beelined to the data that would support your own predetermined outcome and ignored the reams of data that show a different picture of what’s going on with these ‘hicks’.
That sword cuts both ways, Ms. Marcotte. Not very smart politics on your part. You should ask McCain for a check since your blog postings will make excellent fodder to support the ‘latte liberal elitist’ meme to the fullest and help him win state after state handily.
Nice going
BTW, I am in no way suggesting that white males are any less prone to racist voting than white females. I’m just saying, the white vote Clinton gets may be inflated by women voting for her so they can see the first female President.
This implies that there was some campaign that Clinton could have run, or indeed any white person could have run, to suppress the Race Chasm Effect.
Well, there’s one campaign that, as of at least the last couple or three weeks, Clinton could have run to suppress this.
It’s called CONCEDING AND DROPPING THE FRICK OUT.
We have known since approximately the PA primary that Clinton has a vanishingly slim chance of becoming the nominee. But she stays in, and the primaries groan on, and best of all, she continues to use dogwhistles to enflame the racial sensitivities of working class whites in these states. Dogwhistles that will stick in minds long after the pointless primaries are over.
Of course, you could also say that these people probably would have voted for McCain in the end anyway. But if Clinton wanted to absolve herself of responsibility, yes, in fact she has had a very easy way out for several weeks now.
Obama made race a factor when he started calling the Clintons racist in the week leading up to the South Carolina primary.
This was tactically smart, because it increased his share of the black vote from about 65% to about 90%, which matters a LOT in SC.
But it was strategically stupid, possibly fatal. He polarized the DEM electorate along racial lines.
What you are seeing now in WV and KY is at least partly blowback. I know several people (including myself) who think that his false accusations of racism are simply unforgivable.
It’s that false accusation, and the deliberate fracturing of the DEMs that leads me to support Clinton over Obama. Not the color of his skin, but the content of his character.
Jack
Did you check the dates on the graph?
By your logic, she would have had to drop out before she ran.
You think that the racial sensitivities of whites in Appalachia (I’m including Indiana and PA to be broad and accurate) are being influenced by anything the Clinton campaign does?
Really?
That males no sense three ways.
One, it’s anachronistic.
Two, if naming this phenomena created it or exacerbated it, Obama wouldn’t be winning, because the chattering classes have talked of little else.
Most importantly, though, the reason ‘dog-whistles’ work is that dogs can hear them.
I don’t know whether a primary in which a black man were the only credible candidate for his party could shift the frame of racial thinking among whites in what we can refer to as ’swing states’, to save blamestorming hours next fall.
But that election hasn’t happened. In this election, I’m going to state unequivocally that the racially aroused vote against Obama is being triggered by the fact that he’s black.
This implies that there was some campaign that Clinton could have run, or indeed any white person could have run, to suppress the Race Chasm Effect.
Well, there were the racist dog whistles that came out of her camp–”shuck and jive,” Sheehan’s drug dealer comment, Bill’s attempt to marginalize his wins by comparing him to Jesse jackson, and then the killer post WV, where Senator Clinton pulled out the “white hard working” bit. Maybe if that hadn’t been a part of her campaign, then at least this wouldn’t come back on her the way it is.
So let me get this straight -
Nobody in Kentucky voted for Clinton because they honestly thought she was the better candidate? They’re all just huge racist fucks? Good to know. So when I voted for Clinton in the Indiana primary it was obviously only because I couldn’t stand the thought of voting for a black man.
Seriously, I used to love this place, but when did it turn into a full-scale Clinton bashing playground? I like Obama quite a bit, and I’ll no doubt vote for him in the general election if he gets the nomination, which looks pretty likely. I also have no doubt that there are far too many people whose internalized racism is influencing their voting - just as there are too many people whose sexism is causing them not to vote for Clinton. I think your analysis really falls down when you accuse basically all of the voters of a state of refusing to vote for a black man because they’re racist, which is essentially what you’re doing here.
That sword cuts both ways, Ms. Marcotte. Not very smart politics on your part. You should ask McCain for a check since your blog postings will make excellent fodder to support the ‘latte liberal elitist’ meme to the fullest and help him win state after state handily.
Amanda did not write this post. Pam Spaulding did. Her name is right at the top where it says, “Posted by.”
Nobody in Kentucky voted for Clinton because they honestly thought she was the better candidate? They’re all just huge racist fucks? Good to know. So when I voted for Clinton in the Indiana primary it was obviously only because I couldn’t stand the thought of voting for a black man.
Nobody said that. Nobody even implied it. You might try working on your reading comprehension and dialing back the anger a bit. There is a fucking universe of difference between saying that some people voted for Clinton because they’re racist fucks and saying that all of them did so. And their votes don’t necessarily tarnish her either.
Let’s see. It’s not as if anyone could possibly prefer the more experienced, more qualified candidate over a lightweight with a superthin resume who hasn’t even finished his first term in the Senate.
Nah — must be them evil RACISTS!
In fact, you can pinpoint exactly what percentage Pam is accusing of voting for Clinton because they’re racist fucks by reading the statistics she provides, in which the voters do everything but call themselves racist fucks outright!
Hint: 90% of 20%.
Or, if we’re feeling EXTREMELY generous, 70% of 20%, which is such a small number it just makes everything goddamned okay.
Nothing better than a gloating fool.
“Basically” and “essentially” don’t mean what you think they do.
—
The part that scares me? Only a third of Clinton voters say they’d vote for Obama in the general. That makes no sense on any pragmatic or policy level. I thought that sort of thing was confined to the dullest people on the internet. Wishful thinking on my part I suppose.
As Auguste said, let’s take a look at the NUMBERS that Pam quoted:
1 out of every 5 whites said that race was a factor in choosing their candidate
Of those 1 of 5, 9 out of 10 of them voted for Clinton
Of those 9 out of 10, 3 out of 10 said they would vote for McCain if Clinton were not the nominee
So what do you think the motive of people who said both that race was a factor in their vote and that they would vote for McCain over Obama in the general election really is if it’s not racism? Are they just really, really, really strong Clinton supporters who just happen to think that her race is the most important reason to vote for her?
Oh, no, wait, that would make them, y’know, racists. So there must be some other, completely innocuous explanation why voters who say that race is their #1 factor would vote for McCain over Obama in the general election. What is that explanation?
Not race chasm, Appalachia problem. Somebody already showed a map of Hillary’s winning county, and She wins heavily in appalachia.
So this is socioeconomic rather than race.
(too lazy to find the link, but google Obama appalachia problem)
1 in 5 is 20%
9/10 of that is 18%
3/10 of that is between 5% and 6%
so on the basis of 6% of the vote being clearly racist, Pam feels free to imply that the whole state is racist.
I don’t suppose it occurs to her that when she scorns the majority based on the scorn-worthy minority in their midst, she earns their ill will in return
Not very good at reading, are you?
And…Bradley effect, anyone?
By the way, folks….compare the segment Pam is talking about to the margin of victory Clinton had. That’s more relevant.
or to look at it another way. 1 in 5 said race as a factor, of those 9/10 went for Clinton (18%), 1/10 went for Obama (2%). So Clintons’ race related margin of victory was 18% - 2%.
16%
Since her actual margin was 35%. Race was clearly NOT “decisive”. In fact more people favored Clinton for NON-racial reasons than for racial ones.
So now 16% of voters are inconsequential? Someone alert every election strategist, ever!
Please, for the love of all that is blasphemous, show us where the reverse of this was claimed!
(Although…if you believe that every voter for whom race was a factor, admitted to it in an exit poll, I have a bridge to sell you.)
ok. Here is Hillary’s county map. (She is the appalachian candidate)
www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/20/162117/922/561/519120
okay. I think this one has the best looking chart visualizing the Hillary’s Appalachian vote.
http://theelectoralmap.com/2008/05/16/obama-could-galvanize-huge-turnout-in-the-south/
From the chart, one can also see, that Obama has the biggest appeal in red state outside traditional blue state/party machine.
The Clinton campaign is already well aware of that, or have you missed the constant talk that black votes count less?
Clinton benefits from racism: news flash. How is that even surprising? Do people really believe the tripe that we live in a post-racial society where nobody sees skin color?
20% of whites said race played a role. (Which means the real number is higher) Combine that with the fact that many of those people would vote McCain over Obama (or stay home) and “anything but the black guy” seems to be not uncommon.
Which again is hardly shocking.
No, the entire state isn’t racist, and not all Clinton supporters are racist. But some are. And I’d point out that the number of Obama supporters who would support McCain over Clinton is much lower, meaning “anyone but the woman” doesn’t appear to be as strong a motivator.
Impressive!
So now 16% of voters are inconsequential?
Dont be dense. 16% is less than half of 35%.
Even assuming all 16% are racist (which is not a justifiable assumption), if all of the supposed “racists” had stayed home Clinton would still have won by 19%.
Thats MORE than Obamas’ margin of victory in OR
Did you check the dates on the graph?
I’m not talking about the graph, which was made in March, I’m talking about the most recent primaries over the last few weeks, post-PA, wherein, if you do the math, Hillary actually can’t win.
Why go to states not exactly known for their open-minded views and run a racism-tinged campaign full of dogwhistles about the more “electable” candidate (which candidate has already pretty much lost the primaries), when everyone knows you cannot win?
It’s not like the rules state that we have to hold primaries in all 50 states before a candidate can be chosen. It’s not like Clinton doesn’t have any agency here about what kind of campaign to run and when it’s time to get our of the race. She chooses to run a racially problematic campaign in states she doesn’t actually need to be campaigning in at all. If she was super concerned about how not to contribute to the racial divisiveness in states like West Virginia and Kentucky, she could easily just drop out of the race at this point, because it’s been quite handily shown that she can’t win.
Even assuming all 16% are racist (which is not a justifiable assumption)
Man, I envy you. You must live in one of the more idyllic parts of America where racists don’t exist, like the Pacific Northwest. Or Canada.
Of course Geraldine Ferraro couldn’t have been saying the truth, could she? Naw, if you don.t vote for the black candidate, your racist but if 91% vote same-skin color, that’s okay - just ethnic pride
Exit polls:
Some folks’ll never eat a skunk: Obama 59%, Clinton 41%
But then again, some folks’ll: Clinton 98.3%, Obama 1.7%
“they’re good white people who just happen to not like Black people”
Or, they could be good people of any race who just happen to dislike Obama’s stance on the issues. And some of them–gasp–might be of color.
Don’t be a fucking regionalist. There are enlightened people in the South, and every time you act like there aren’t, those people get fairly crotchety.
Clinton and Obama are virtually identical on the issues. The only platform plank I can come up with where their stances differ wildly is Iran (and, more generally, the question of whether it’s better to use diplomacy or just whip Americans into a xenophobic frenzy and bomb any country we don’t like).
And while, sure, stupid hick rednecks have a right to want to bomb Iran into the ground for no rational reason, that doesn’t make them look particularly intelligent or anti-racist.
Squashed: Here is an article on the same issue of Obama’s Appalachian problem.
Some strategy obviously start to work.
KY county win map. Obama start to be able to win in population center in appalachian area. (too late for primary, but would be useful for GE.)
http://theelectoralmap.com/2008/05/21/obama-wins-oregon-clinton-takes-kentucky/
I think my main problem with Hillary, she is a lousy strategist. She plays the game like it’s 1992. When the opponent doesn’t play like before, her crew is panic mode.
It takes them 4-6 weeks to react and learn, which shows the quality of their team. Obama on the other hand learn and adapt within days.
Amazingly enough, when you call people “bitter,” or “racist” for voting for their preferred candidate, you do not engender their affection.
Obama is not entitled to anyone’s vote. He has to earn it - and he won’t win the general without winning over a chunk of Hilary’s base. He can’t do that by saying the only reason they didn’t vote for him was because they were ignorant, unreasonable racists. (Or “stupid hick rednecks”)
For the record? Hillary voter, Appalachian, Master’s-degreed, 26, and a feminist. This is a feminist blog, right?
Vir Modestus May 21, 2008 at 8:52 am
Squashed: Here is an article on the same issue of Obama’s Appalachian problem.
that is the worst kiss ass article for Hillary ever. (eg. hillary wins rural appalachia, she is electable)
yeah, but Obama wins the rest of rural counties in south and midwest… DUH?
can we NOT quote salon.com please? that outfit is The CNN of the internet.
Squashed, it is a socioeconomic problem insofar as the exit polling seems to say “we may be poor, but we ain’t black”, to paraphrase a line from Deer Hunting with Jesus.
Catnik May 21, 2008 at 9:21 am
Obama is not entitled to anyone’s vote. He has to earn it - and he won’t win the general without winning over a chunk of Hilary’s base
appalachian red neck is wingnut central. It’s McCain territory.
Obama only needs to get poor white woman over 40. Other than that, the rest will vote for democrat primary winner (provided there is no deep rift)
Hillary base is known quantity, and her techniques to get those vote is very crude. (Why do you think she is $30m in debt?)
It’s a question of Television ad.
McCain does not have the money to compete. Obama can outspend him 5-10 times in few spots.
But Obama can’t do that against Hillary, because she can concentrate as much spot ad and will cause voter rift. 3:5 money ratio. It’ll be Pyrrhic victory. (as you notice, Hillary is bleeding to death financially. She has no money to build GOTV and voter registration organization….. HOW, tell me, she is going to win general election?
at current financial state, she is about to mismanage the general election, JUST like she fucks up the primary.)
What’s she gonna do? call out her army of second rate bloggers? yeah, shrill fest is cheap. (they can’t even raise money for Hillz.)
The question for me is whether the “race chasm” data mean anything for the general election. Democratic presidential primary voters are not nearly representative of all general-election voters. The very fact that Obama and Clinton are so close on many of the issues (with the glaring exception of Iraq, but even there it’s not clear their policies will be significantly different) means that voters have been going on image and charisma and their beliefs about the people each candidate would hire into the executive branch. And yeah, race and gender.
But who has any idea of what that will mean against whatisname?
Ms Kate May 21, 2008 at 9:33 am
Squashed, it is a socioeconomic problem insofar as the exit polling seems to say “we may be poor, but we ain’t black”, to paraphrase a line from Deer Hunting with Jesus.
maybe it’s pure racism. There are campaign tricks to handle it for general election. My point: certain tricks cannot be employed against another democrat without destroying the party core idea.
I for one don’t see why winning West Virginia or KY is all that important in general election. McCain can have it. Hillary is not going to win WV or KY is that’s what she is trying to say.
I for one want VA, OH and IA instead.
(btw, the national electoral prediction map start to show up in various blogs. Hillz has no argument.)
ARRghhhhhhhh…….. THERE IS NO RACE CHASM (in national level) It’s regional, particularly appalachian.
Here are the strickly “race” by state analysis. OBAMA WINS the WHITEST states…
Can we use “good data” instead of ass hat hand waving number? (Clinton campaign hackeries make people stupid, by feeding made up lies.)
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/20/115022/033/755/518926
In fact, let’s look at the whitest states in the nation according to recent Census estimates:
1. Maine (Obama)
2. Vermont (Obama)
3. West Virginia (Clinton)
4. New Hampshire (Clinton)
5. Iowa (Obama)
6. North Dakota (Obama)
7. Montana
8. Kentucky (Clinton)
9. Wyoming (Obama)
10. Idaho (Obama)
The list above excludes HIspanics, which are considered racially white, but ethnically different.
Let’s look at the rankings of states including Hispanic whites. Remember, Obama is supposed to have just as much a problem with Hispanics as he is with non-Hispanic whites:
1. Vermont (Obama)
2. Maine (Obama)
3. New Hampshire (Clinton)
4. Idaho (Obama)
5. West Virginia (Clinton)
6. Iowa (Obama)
7. Wyoming (Obama)
8. Utah (Obama)
9. North Dakota (Obama)
10. Nebraska (Obama)
As a white, male native of rural Southeastern North Carolina who grew up in a trailer, lived six years in North Carolina’s Appalachia and has family in West Virginia, I feel perfectly comfortable asserting that the mountain folks are some of the most racist, ignorant human beings you will find on the planet. It may not be “politic” to say this, but fuck it, it’s true.
As a general note on being politic, the reason I keep coming back to this place is that there’s a feeling that the posters do a good job balancing “truth to power” with servicing the political machine. We should embrace it, as being anti-bullshit has a strong future in our Google-enhanced, economically fucked future.
As a Kentuckian who voted for Obama, I have to say that yes race is certainly playing a part, but it is not the sum total of the KY vote for Hillary.
Lexington and Louisville went for Obama and the rural voters went for Hillary; Lexington/Louisville both fit within that 6%-17% demographic of Black population, yet they still went for Obama.
Hillary campaigned like hell–and she did it all over the state in small towns and communities I’ve never visited during my 14 years of residence in the State. Bill was here, Chelsy was here, Hillary was here–they worked like mad and they worked in the rural areas of the state; Lexington and Louisville, as two progressive bubbles, went for Obama and they didn’t campaign in the major cities like they did out and about in the country. There is a lot of love for the Clinton family and particularly when it comes to economic policies, KY did a hell of a lot better 92-2000 than since Bush.
Though I voted for Obama, I will say that I felt ignored by his campaign–they didn’t even invest in yard signs for all those who asked (and visited and called his campaign head-quarters on numerous occasions). He has not been specific in terms of out issues, particularly Mountain Top Removal, which Clinton directly addressed. That issue might seem small to those unfamiliar with the area, but it is devastating and causing environmental wastelands for thousands of very poor people who still rely on their own gardens and hunting for survival.
So, yes, to some race was their issue and they might vote against Obama in November, but that’s not why the majority of Clinton voters went with her! Kentuckians are loyal people and many I’ve met have expressed a sense of loyalty and obligation to the Clintons that influences their own sense of personal integrity and honor.
So, yes, racism, but also the PRESUMPTION OF RACISM that caused Obama to ignore even those parts of the state that actually VOTED FOR HIM lost him Kentucky.
Another thing, about those “redneck hicks” - they tend to vote for people that want their vote. The Republicans are savvy enough to actually try to get them, even though it really seems to be an act of cynical pandering on their part. If the choice is between pandering and being totally blown off… well, is it any surprise?
The rural vote, the blue collar vote, the church-going vote - these aren’t guaranteed to the Republicans. However, if the Democrats choose to gleefully dismiss them in favor of “more intelligent” and “more sophisticated” voters, who can fault marginalized voters for going to where they at least get an illusion of respect?
Catnik May 21, 2008 at 9:58 am
The Republicans are savvy enough to actually try to get them, even though it really seems to be an act of cynical pandering on their part.
this is primary, not general election (it is about party faithful instead of general population of a state)
Hillary will NOT win WV or KY, not in a million years with her campaigning techniques. (mass media, direct visit) She will lost against McCain, because the republican has very entrenched media (FoxNews/AM radio)
She will be financially wasted.
Here is Obama major tricks, in case you haven’t cought up: internet, youth vote, academic. The farther a group of voter from that, the least effective Obama campaigns are. (again, we are talking about primary, not general election. those are different set of campaigning mode)
Things you have to ask about Hillary: she is in DEBT! She has no meaningful ground organization for GOTV and voter registration. She is still flailing around trying to win primary. How is she going to win General election?
By spinning on WV and KY primary numbers? Good luck with that. Both states are VERY red, she has no ground office, no campaign structure that can execute, no media money to win both states.
Obama is not entitled to anyone’s vote. He has to earn it - and he won’t win the general without winning over a chunk of Hilary’s base.
So Hillary’s base is going to vote for McCain, that exemplar of women’s rights, over Obama in the general?
He can’t do that by saying the only reason they didn’t vote for him was because they were ignorant, unreasonable racists. (Or “stupid hick rednecks”)
I don’t think Obama or anyone affiliated with his campaign has called anybody either explicitly racist or used the phrase ’stupid hick rednecks’. The latter was me, and I used it because, sorry, but anyone who thinks it’s OK to not only continue Bush’s ‘War on Terror’ but to expand it to yet another country that has nothing to do with anything aside from being Teh Moozlum Evul is a stupid hick redneck.
And I say that as a native born southerner.
Obama taps the silicon valley crews, that’s how he can eviscerate Clinton money machine. (republican money machine is cheeseball comparatively.)
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200806/obama-finance
The story of Obama’s success is very much a story about money. It provided his initial credibility. It paid for his impressive campaign operation. It allowed him first to compete with, and then to overwhelm, the most powerful Democratic family in a generation—one that understood the power of money in politics and commanded a network of wealthy donors that has financed the Democratic Party for years.
What’s intriguing to Democrats and worrisome to Republicans is how someone lacking these deep connections to traditional sources of wealth could raise so much money so quickly. How did he do it? The answer is that he built a fund-raising machine quite unlike anything seen before in national politics. Obama’s machine attracts large and small donors alike, those who want to give money and those who want to raise it, veteran activists and first-time contributors, and—especially—anyone who is wired to anything: computer, cell phone, PDA.
Here’s another thing: he is doing it almost effortlessly. That is to say, in an era when the imperative for campaign dollars demands more and more of a politician’s time and lurks behind so many recent scandals (including the auctioning-off of the Lincoln Bedroom), Obama has raised more money than anybody else without plumbing ethical gray areas or even spending much of his own time soliciting donations. During the month of February, for example, his campaign raised a record-setting $55 million—$45 million of it over the Internet—without the candidate himself hosting a single fund-raiser. The money just came rolling in.
Obama’s campaign is admired by insiders of both parties for its functional beauty—not just admired but gawked at, like some futuristic concept car leaking rocket vapor at an auto show. Obama’s campaign has made a similar leap in how it has applied technology to the practices of raising money and organizing, and it is already the clear model for everyone else.
Obama’s campaign is admired by insiders of both parties for its functional beauty—not just admired but gawked at, like some futuristic concept car leaking rocket vapor at an auto show. Obama’s campaign has made a similar leap in how it has applied technology to the practices of raising money and organizing, and it is already the clear model for everyone else.
Obama is to Speed Racer as Howard Dean is to Spritle?
I think there are some “modifications” lurking under the hood, too, for those who think dirty tricks are the way to go.
Howard Dean for Veep?
Compare that to this, the supposedly Miss Electability.
She is $30m in debt!
Tell me she is not going to screwed up big time in GE if she gets the nomination by twisting arms. Who is going to pay for her operation? Mark Penn? Her blogger crew?
http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/05/22_million_hillary_raised_in_a.php
$22 Million Hillary Raised In April Does Not Include Loans
A number of you have written in to ask whether the $22 million raised by Hillary in April includes the $6.4 million she lent herself in recent weeks. She lent her campaign $5 million on April 1; the rest came in May.
Hillary spokesperson Howard Wolfson confirms that the $22 million does not include the loans.
The rural vote, the blue collar vote, the church-going vote - these aren’t guaranteed to the Republicans. However, if the Democrats choose to gleefully dismiss them in favor of “more intelligent” and “more sophisticated” voters, who can fault marginalized voters for going to where they at least get an illusion of respect?
Catnik, unless you intend to spend some time in the rural parts of Western Oregon, and any given part of Eastern Oregon save maybe Bend …
SHUT. THE. FUCK. UP! (or I might send my intelligent, sophisticated cousin Tanya after ya …) You cannot “generalize” your experience of Clinton’s pandering or Republican pandering across the entire country, no matter how hard you may try.
Wait - so saying that it is unfair to dismiss rural and blue-collar voters out-of-hand as lost causes is generalizing?
West Virginia is not a solid-red state (it went blue every time a Democrat took POTUS). The Midwest does not “belong” to the republicans. When the Obama camp goes on about how they don’t “need” huge slices of the demographic, they are, in fact, alienating voters. They might just stay home, they might vote for McCain, they might hold their noses and vote for Obama - but there is no guarantee of any option.
If you go out of your way to dismiss a voter, call them bitter, call them stupid, or call them a racist - don’t be surprised that they don’t vote for you.
(Also, hurling invectives usually isn’t very persuasive, either.)
A campaign has limited time and resource. It has to pick the battle or else it will exhausted and bleed to death.
Catnik May 21, 2008 at 11:21 am
West Virginia is not a solid-red state
show number and voting trend. Either you know something that others don’t or you making it up.
see number here.
www.fivethirtyeight.com/
Shorter this thread:
Commenter X: How dare you call all Clinton supporters racist!
Commenter Y: No one’s calling all Clinton supporters racist. Just the ones who say they’re racist, plus there’s strong evidence about the ones who claim to care about womens’s rights but would vote for McCain. But here’s the statistics, just to show you what we’re saying.
Commenter Z: How dare you call all Clinton supporters racist!
Which side is supposed to be the “bots” again?
When the Obama camp goes on about how they don’t “need” huge slices of the demographic, they are, in fact, alienating voters.
And when the Clinton camp goes on about how they don’t “need” black voters, they are also alienating voters. Splitting the country into white voters vs black voters is not particularly productive, and I hope we can all knock it off once the nominee is chosen.
Where’s California on that graph? I voted in February.
forget race, man…
Crude oil just hit $134/barrel. That means $5-6/gallon gas is within sight. (Or that tax holiday Hillary promises? it vanished.)
at current rate, 6 months from now unemployment will double.
When you talk about working-class, less educated whites who made their decision to vote for [Hillary] based on their unwillingness to vote for a black person, you are not talking about me or anybody in my family. However, this is only because I don’t believe that those members of my family who don’t have a college education voted for Hillary last night. I have some idea how my mom’s two brothers would vote, but I have really no certainty about how any of them voted last night.
What concerns me is the statement that working-class, less-educated whites are unwilling to vote for a black person. This description fits, to my knowledge, my 91-year old grandmother, three of her children and their spouses, and half of my generation of cousins. I don’t know how willing they would be to vote for a black person, but that does not substantiate the prejudice and the broad-brush smear perpetuated here. If you were to conclude that a given black person were a criminal because you believe black people are criminals, would your prejudice in that matter be justified if it turned out the black person in question actually was a criminal?
As far as the argument that you’re not calling all Kentucky racist, just parts of it, the headline of this entry is not calculated for nuance: Clinton wins Kentucky, race chasm proven again suggests that Clinton won Kentucky because of racists. Nope, I guess that of course you’re not talking to me, you don’t mean me, I’m a decent person. It’s these other Kentuckians who voted for Hillary you’re calling racists.
Why is no one asking Clinton’s campaign why they can’t get educated voters to vote for them?
MKK
Falconer, you may want to read the exit poll that Pam linked to before you get all indignant on behalf of the people you know:
In other words, if you asked working-class white Democratic primary voters if they would vote for Obama in the general election, 4 of them said yes, 4 of them said they’d vote for McCain, and 2 of them said they wouldn’t vote at all. That means you have 6 people either voting McCain or staying home vs. 4 people voting for Obama.
The question I have that no one has answered is: what is the motive of the working-class white people voting in the Democratic primary who say they will vote for McCain over Obama in the general election if it’s not racism? I’m genuinely curious to hear the explanation.
what is the motive of the working-class white people voting in the Democratic primary who say they will vote for McCain over Obama in the general election if it’s not racism? I’m genuinely curious to hear the explanation.
The answer is so simple that I’m surprised you have to ask. They are Democrats, but not all that partisan. (The majority of Americans aren’t all that partisan).
They believe Hillary and McCain have the experience to lead the country. and Obama does not.
He is, after all, only a 1 term Senator, and he stopped actually DOING that job about a month after he got it (so that he could spend his time running for president.)
Also, a LOT of people believe in the media lies about McCain that paint him as a ‘liberal’ Republican and a ’straight shooter’.
When did race come to exclusively mean “white” or “black,” and more specifically, white American and African-American? When did working-class come to mean “white” only? What happened to Latinos, Asians, other immigrants of color, a more nuanced understanding of geographic diversity that extends beyond the black-white “color line”? What happened to discussions of ethnicity? This election has made discussions of race and ethnicity extremely black and white - pun intended.
Also, for the record, I’m so tired of the suggestion that Bill Clinton was the only campaign surrogate speaking in racist terms pre-South Carolina. On 1/9/08, 2 weeks before Clinton’s “Jesse Jackson” remarks, Jesse Jackson, JR. - Obama’s campaign co-chair - accused Sen. Clinton of faking her tears in NH, suggesting that they needed to be investigated given she’d never cried over “Katrina.”
How is that not a dog whistle?
(An additional irony being that Sen. Obama made a conscious point after Katrina to say that the government’s response to the disaster was “colorblind.” Sigh.)
oops…there shouldn’t be “other” before immigrants…
Dave wrote this in March, so races after that aren’t included, but all of the subsequent primaries followed the same pattern
West Virginia is over 95% white, and it went strongly for Clinton; black population is around 3.3%.
Also, why doesn’t the graph contain NY, IL, IA, or NH? afaict, the only reason to not include these is that they don’t fit the pattern…
ie yes, there is a pattern, if you leave out the data points that don’t support the pattern.
Really, there are several things going on: Obama does well in the Mountain West and Plains. Clinton does well in the urban northeast and Appilachia. etc.
It’s meant that for about 300 years. It’s only recently that other races have been mentioned at all, except maybe Native Americans. So the fact that we revert back to those terms isn’t all that surprising.
Huh? I have no idea how you decided it’s even a dog whistle. It’s now racist to imply that someone is racist?
“Katrina” isn’t a dog whistle because everyone knows exactly what “Katrina” refers to. A dog whistle is a coded message that seems innocuous to outsiders but sends a clear signal to a specific group. What secret message do you think is being passed by referencing Katrina in this case? It seems like a pretty straightforward accusation of racism to me, not a dog whistle.
Why is no one asking Clinton’s campaign why they can’t get educated voters to vote for them?
I voted for her, and I’ve got a B.A.
But getting an education isn’t a guarantee that you won’t turn out to be an asshole. I knew plenty of people in college who were assholes right up through graduation.
I think the difference is, educated assholes know how to disguise their assholery more effectively, while people who don’t gots no book-larnin’ and are assholes are pretty blunt about it.
Educated people are easier to con.
Cite
Just now Rachel Maddow explained her theory that the Dem’s have 10 days to save this election. Unless Obama get’s the Supers to come on board NOW to get the 2026 necessary today, the Rules committee will meet on May 31. If that meeting happens, then the 2026 is no longer the number. The rules committee will meet and decide how to seat the FL/MI delegates, but that decision will be appealed by Clinton to the Creditials committee. They will meet in DENVER, at the convention!!! Clinton’s people know the rules and will succeed in dragging this to the convention
dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/21/195950/380/661/520045
www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/21/clinton-says-shes-willing_n_102934.html
I am sorry, but it appears Hillary wins. Either she or McCain will get the nomination.
Implication:
1. Iraq war will continues. Plus Iran (neocon/DC war machine continues)
2. Money politics as usual. (thus all bad economic policy, pro wall st. will continue. Including banking and mortgage crisis.)
3. by that extension, energy price will continue to go up.
I am now putting Hillary wins at 40% up from 5%. Pass May31st RBC meeting her chance will go up at 60%
*Chuckle*… the RBC people are all Clinton people.
yep. she wins. sorry folks. it’s over. The status quo win.
All hail DC establishment!
the Rules committee members.
Here they are:
Co-Chairs - no endorsement
Alexis Herman (co-chair, Washington , D.C. )
James Roosevelt, Jr. (co-chair, Massachusetts )
Members - Clinton supporters (13)
Hartina Flournay (DC)
Donald Fowler (SC)
Harold Ickes, Jr. (DC)
Alice Huffman (CA)
Ben Johnson (DC)
Elaine Kamarck (MA)
Eric Kleinfeld (DC)
Mona Pasquil (CA)
Mame Reiley (VA)
Garry Shay (CA)
Elizabeth Smith (DC)
Michael Steed (MD)
Jaime Gonzalez, Jr. (TX)
Members - Obama supporters (8)
Martha Fuller Clark (NH)
Carol Khare Fowler (SC)
Janice Griffin (MD)
Thomas Hynes (IL)
Allan Katz (FL)
Sharon Stroschein (SD)
Sarah Swisher (IA)
Everett Ward (NC)
Members - no known endorsement (7)
Donna Brazille (DC)
Mark Brewer (MI)
Ralph Dawson (NY)
Yvonne Gates ( NV)
Alice Germond (DC) - DNC Secretary
David McDonald (WA)
Jerome Wiley Segovia (VA)
Falconer, I was raised in finer trailer parks throughout Oregon. Most of my family mailed in their ballots marked “Obama”.
This is why I am totally offended by the notion that Obama “neglected” working class voters … it goes hand in hand with the stupid East Coast Media-driven idiocy that Oregon is “latte liberal”. (spits chewing tobacco spit). Obama simply didn’t waste his time in areas where there was zero chance of changing people’s minds for the reasons tallied up in the exit polls.
Sure, the educated pulled hard for Obama in Oregon, but he hardly neglected the working class regions in Oregon, and polled well on the west side (yes … there are PLENTY of working class people west of the Cascades). If you know the place, you would understand this.
Watch Clinton smoothly lies. This is after she signs a pledge not to participate in FL and MI, and agreed on FL/MI will be ignored on rule.
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/05/shameless-1.html#m
Now, I’ve heard some say that counting Florida and Michigan would be changing the rules.
I say that not counting Florida and Michigan is changing a central governing rule of this country - that whenever we can understand the clear intent of the voters, their votes should be counted. I remember very well back in 2000, there were those who argued that people’s votes should be discounted over technicalities. For the people of Florida who voted in this primary, the notion of discounting their votes sounds way too much of the same.
—–
her pledge not to participate:
www.hillaryclinton.com/news/release/view/?id=5492
www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/21/14414/2815/313/519384
Hillary saying 2025 (MI and FL not being counted)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OsYnegoV28
LIARS win. Never play by the rules if you are status quo. woo hooo…. Who says lying and cheating don’t pay?
Squashed, I’d have no issue with counting FL and MI … but ONLY IF they are reballoted under the standard rules for the state … you cannot deny that the situation changed the entire dynamic and people would have voted differently if it “counted” in the first place.
They already rejected reballoting. Both MI and FL houses rejected them.
So this is now coming down to how the delegates will be seated. RBC will decides.
My sense: Hillary wants free for all, she thinks she can persuade the delegates to go to her sides. (either that or she wants as is. without Obama getting any.)
Obama wants 50-50 since there is no way to control how those delegates will vote. ..or whatever system he knows he can play and has a chance winning.
Mnemosyne,
I disagree with you on the meaning of “race,” but I see your point. I think it’s weak given the election since that leaves out a significant population of voters, and given the political efforts by both parties to attract the growing Latino vote in this country. Given we all haven’t been alive for 300 years, I think its arguable that many of us have a different, broader understanding of the word “race” and our use reflects that.
As for Katrina, I’d argue it’s a dog whistle because blacks and whites differ dramatically on whether or not they believe race played a role in the government’s response to Katrina (see Pew polls and the opinion research of political scientist/Prof. Michael Dawson, in Chicago) - the majority of African-Americans think it was a racist response and the majority of whites do not think so. So maybe whites didn’t even notice what he was saying, other than the accusation that her ties were contrived, which is offensive in itself. Adding, “especially in light of Katrina” or similar phrasing could be a dog whistle.
But our race problem in the US traces back specifically to slavery and the fact that waves of immigrant groups have leapfrogged over African-Americans to become white while the problems of African-Americans remain. In another 30 years, being of Mexican or Guatemalan descent will be pretty much like being of Italian or Irish descent, but African-Americans will still be black, and still be in the exact same social position.
Yes, we have other major racial problems in the US, but they’re not nearly as deeply-seated as the problems between whites and blacks.
I’d be very curious to see that research if you have a link to it, because all of us white West Coast liberal elites are pretty sure that the Katrina response had a hell of a lot to do with racism. We may not think that it was a planned-out conspiracy, but when you have black people herded into a football stadium and kept prisoner there for a week with very little food or water, even the most dull-witted white person is going to start to think that maybe, possibly, there might be a wee racism problem involved.
the poll start to consolidate and move away from Hillary.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/22/12239/7807/243/520455
This is a harbinger of what will happen across the nation soon after Clinton throws in the towel.
A new poll released today in California finds political momentum shifting dramatically toward Barack Obama—and away from both Hillary Clinton and John McCain—in the nation’s most populous state. According to a survey conducted over the past 10 days by the Public Policy Institute of California, 59 percent of likely voters here now have a “favorable” impression of Democrat Obama, while a majority view both of the other candidates unfavorably. In a state whose Democratic primary Clinton won in February, 51 percent of voters now say they have an unfavorable opinion of her; 53 percent of voters feel the same way about Republican McCain.
Obama, meanwhile, seems to be making strides across nearly every constituency. If the general election were held today, 54 percent of Californians say they would vote for him, compared with 37 percent for McCain. That gap has widened by 8 points since March. Obama enjoys the support of more than 80 percent of Democrats here, along with over half (55 percent) of independents. He leads McCain among men and women and is viewed favorably by nearly 70 percent of Latinos—a powerful political group, experts note, not just in California but in several other western states, including Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada.
Mnemoyne, here’s the Pew data:
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=255
“In addition, blacks and whites draw very different lessons from the tragedy. Seven-in-ten blacks (71%) say the disaster shows that racial inequality remains a major problem in the country; a majority of whites (56%) say this was not a particularly important lesson of the disaster. More striking, there is widespread agreement among blacks that the government’s response to the crisis would have been faster if most of the storm’s victims had been white; fully two-thirds of African Americans express that view. Whites, by an even wider margin (77%-17%), feel this would not have made a difference in the government’s response. ”
Here’s Sen. Obama’s response to Katrina:
http://obama.senate.gov/statement/050906-statement_of_senator_barack_obama_on_hurricane_katrina_relief_efforts/
Mnemoyne, here’s the Pew data:
“In addition, blacks and whites draw very different lessons from the tragedy. Seven-in-ten blacks (71%) say the disaster shows that racial inequality remains a major problem in the country; a majority of whites (56%) say this was not a particularly important lesson of the disaster. More striking, there is widespread agreement among blacks that the government’s response to the crisis would have been faster if most of the storm’s victims had been white; fully two-thirds of African Americans express that view. Whites, by an even wider margin (77%-17%), feel this would not have made a difference in the government’s response. ”
Here’s Sen. Obama’s response to Katrina.
Damn, trying the Obama link again.
Ah well, it’s his official statement as Senator. I quote:
“Which brings me to my final point. There’s been much attention in the press about the fact that those who were left behind in New Orleans were disproportionately poor and African American. I’ve said publicly that I do not subscribe to the notion that the painfully slow response of FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security was racially-based. The ineptitude was colorblind.”
Race and Obama in West Virginia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8J9laUNgL4
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/22/142132/498/133/520573
Mnemosyne, here’s the Pew data:
Do you have anything more current than 1 week after the hurricane? The Oct. 19, 2005, poll was done about a month after the one you reference, and it was trending upward with people realizing that economic inequality was one of the problems with the response, with 48 percent of respondents saying that America is divided into haves and have-nots:
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=260
A LOT of people are still pissed about Katrina, and not all of them are black, believe it or not. Not all of them are even Democrats — it sent at least a couple of lifelong Republicans I know personally off into rants about how horrible Bush is.
I am still pissed about Katrina. Bill Clinton was spinning for Bush, blaming the gov.
wtf?
And Hillary didn’t say jack about it, until waaaaaaay into campaign season when she has to suck up. (Of course it didn’t work.)
I wrote a long post about both HRC’s and Obama’s responses to Katrina, both of which were forceful and active. It’s titled “Pandering” and it’s over at nycweboy.typepad.com.
As for the Pew data, Prof. Michael Dawson’s research is more longitudinal, but I don’t have a link to it, as I’ve only seen draft copies of his work. Dawson is a Prof. of Political Sci at U Chicago and considered an expert on race and politics.
Of course it was an issue of economic inequality as well. If you’re familiar with the situation in NOLA, which I am through my work, there’s bias against displaced low-income African-Americans by upper-middle-class African-Americans/Creoles too. It’s not possible to separate race from class. But I stand by the research I’ve seen and my direct experience with working with recovery activists in NOLA and the Gulf Coast that the government’s response was racist (and elitist).