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1. I too am worried that Obama might lose. The Clintons will stop at nothing and will cry and lie their way to the nomination, but no way she can win general election after slash-and-burn primary campaign.

   I just don’t understand why more Democrats don’t see that Hillary is such a bad candidate for so many reasons and that Obama really does represent a positive paradigm shift.

   Thank you for you dispassionate and informative article.

   — Dave Goldman · Jan 12, 09:41 PM · #

2. Thank you for this article. I am operating on Faith at this point. I can’t determine if it is the quick and every changing news cycle or a lack of understanding by the general public, but how can they not see what the Establishment is doing. I swear-I won’t vote if she is the nominee. My vote was bought and paid for by Sojourner, Mary McCloud-Bethune, Fannie Lou Hamer and Shirley Chisolm. I will not be the weak link; I will not betray the integrity of their sweat and tears. Since the suffragist movement, white women have used racist strategies to get what they want. I beg everyone to read Paula Giddings work When and Where I Enter.

   — RealB.G. · Jan 12, 10:16 PM · #

3. I believe you’re wrong. Perhaps you’re too young to remember the 1950’s. Dr. King and others weren’t campaigning to change the minds of the intelligentsia, who were already convinced, except for the small group around William Buckley and the National Review. They wanted the political leadership to act, to issue executive orders on discrimination in federally assisted housing, to remedy discrimination in polling, to safeguard civil rights. Ms Clinton makes the valid point that LBJ had both to lead in speech, but more importantly to arm twist and browbeat to get the legislation through Congress. MLK and SLCC, James Farmer and Core, NAACP, etc. raised the issue to the forefront, but LBJ got it done.

   — Bill Harshaw · Jan 12, 10:18 PM · #

4. Bill Harshaw –

   You’re interpretation requires that we ignore the larger context of Hillary’s comments – that she is clearly equating Obama to the black civil rights leader and herself to Lyndon Johnson. In fact, Obama is an elected public official who currently has as much chance of being president as she does. It is an unprincipled attack on the substantiveness of Obama’s candidacy, with the belittling of MLK merely an accepted side-effect of making her point.

   — Douglas Harrison · Jan 12, 10:34 PM · #

5. I agree with this assessment. And I don’t anybody needs to defend LBJ in response – obviously in order to get a law passed there has to be some cooperation from the government. It’s just that there would be no law if there were no civil rights movement. That Clinton pooh-poohed the role of that movement – and she did, she did cast it as LBJ trumping the movement -It Takes a President! – is jaw-dropping.

   But what is at least amusing, and at most where we might be delving into wee shades of racism – most likely unaware – is the fact that she cast herself as that president, and relegated Obama to the sermon-giver role, despite the fact that he is, you may have noticed, running for president. He can sign a law, too, you know! And Hillary had this whiff of: “you run along now with your picket signs and your chants, that’s your place, and this is mine, and mine is the important one, and don’t you forget it.” Statist, absolutely. But there is a whiff of racist as well, in her weird us-them divide, when she also puts Obama on the “movement” side, when he is a senator running for president.

   — Phoebe · Jan 12, 10:49 PM · #

6. Phoebe — You are right on target. It is subtle but that is exactly how Hilary comes across — and I felt this during the NH debate when she said that she thinks Obama is nice too — very condescending — with racial undertones — I think that is why he shot back ( and has been criticezed for ) with “you’re nice enough Hilary” He was insulted by her condensing remark to him.

   — Phyllis · Jan 12, 11:48 PM · #

7. I think the relevant thought experiment is a President who wanted to pass the civil rights act, but had to do so without the support created by King’s campaign. This obviously would have been politically impossible. This example shows that words do play an essential part, and one that Hillary plainly does not, or would not, understand.

   — Never certain · Jan 13, 12:01 AM · #

8. I think the comment was an ill-constructed attempt to make her “experience” case; she was trying to bolster her position against his appeal by claiming that only her experience could enable the kind of change that so inspires Obama supporters. I suppose that’s a bit “statist,” but either way I found it both atypically clumsy and hardly racist.

   In fact, I think both this comment and Bill’s “fairy tale” gem might actually help Hillary long term. Obama’s silence on the issue and willingness to let supporters inject the race card into his campaign are more troubling to me than either Clinton comment. While Hillary’s on her own, Obama should have already put this discussion to bed with a statement at least tacitly supporting Bill Clinton, and asking the country to move on.

   The Clintons are obviously proven friends to the African American community, yet the willingness of some Black leaders to disregard history and pounce on a fairly innocuous statement is revealing, and threatens to turn Obama’s campaign into a circus reminiscent of the O.J. trial. (I can already see Jesse Jackson getting his plane tickets to South Carolina and Nevada.) Even if Clinton was referring to Obama’s entire candidacy when he used the term “fairy tale,” so what? A bit mean for Bill, but not really unfair, considering his wife is running on a platform of experience and pragmatism. To further read racism into the comment only proves to me that almost anything desperately sought can be found. Hillary’s comment, too, while inelegant and possibly pointless, has been used out of context and twisted into an adjoining sideshow. In today’s New York Times, even columnist Bob Hebert joined the chorus with uncharacteristic recklessness, citing both Clinton quotes out of context (he spread more pixie dust by resuscitating the Hillary camp’s failed effort to make Obama’s past drug use an issue, falsely ascribing the term “drug peddler” to their characterization of Obama).

   If this campaign becomes reminiscent of Duke lacross and Don Imus, I think a backlash will find Obama. It is hard for me to imagine that his troupe wants this sort of campaign, but they aren’t doing much to stop it. Perhaps they don’t mind if voters are briefly distracted from his weaknesses – namely, a poor resume and a dearth of specifics. Either way, white voters with race fatigue may begin to see him less like MLK and more like Al Sharpton. Caught in the crossfire, Black voters may recall their fondness for Bill Clinton. Obama will be associated with the politics of race and racism, and the ensuing divisiveness could cancel-out Hillary’s, and undermine his otherwise sunny themes of hope and unity.

   — Joe H · Jan 13, 02:08 AM · #

9. HRC is not a racist, she is a politician in the fight of her life. Her campaign doesn’t respect Obama. In trying to make a point about Obama, she attacks his message because his message is what is so devastating to her reasons for running. It’s all she has. There is no reason for voters to nominate Clinton v. anyone else except yearning for the good ol’ days. But the good ol’ days are just that: gone. More importantly, there are critical reasons for Americans to vote the future. Obama lists them in his stump speaches: the War in Iraq, 9/11 terroist attacks, the attack on civil liberties, the trashing of the u.s. constitution, corruption and graft in Washington, and a political system that can’t or won’t solve big problems. Obama’s call for a new majority isn’t a Democratic Party majority, it is a call to citizens to be involved in their government again. Only a large majority can solve the proplems we have. When he talks about civility in our politics, it is a rejection of the Clintons, talk radio, left wing interest groups (yes, even the Rev. Al Sharpton’s identity politics – ever wonder why Sharpton is so pissed off?), Fox News, Swiftboating and Karl Rove’s slicing and dicing the electorate get a slim majority. He calls for action, and asks CITIZENS to demand changes. He wants the presidency, as his hero Abraham Lincoln did: he wants to save the Union. This is why I fully expect to vote for him and will put my faith in his ability to organize the electorate to a new majority.

   — Ellen Hamm · Jan 13, 02:30 AM · #

10. I have to agree with Joe that the statement seems to be a clumsily constructed argument for experience. I think Clinton is trying to make two points at once, and ends up confusing the two.

    A subtle, secondary part of her argument, one lost in the hubbub over the identity politics part, hinges on the fact that Kennedy was “hopeful” to pass the Civil Rights Act, but ultimately fell short. I’m too much of a history naif to take a firm stance on how much Johnson’s legislative experience helped push Kennedy’s bill through its blockage in committee. But I think at least part of her argument is of the “at best, Obama will be an inspirational but vacuous president, like Kennedy” type, which dovetails with her change in tack at the New Hampshire debates, when she first signaled her return to viability.

    My first problem with this: Kennedy could only do so much for his proposed legislation after being shot in the head. I think she is transparently skirting the issue that Kennedy can only be limited to an aspirational role because he was assassinated before he could do much about Howard Smith and the Rules Committee. I’m young and a lit student, so I don’t know the exact time-frame. Kennedy may have been too inexperienced to take advantage of an opportunity to change. But according to wiki, the bill went to committee the same month of his assassination, which seems like a small window to me.

    My second problem: this second, embedded point is immediately conflated with the primary argument. And her primary argument, in my opinion, is one of rank identity politics. Obama is not supposed to be MLK in her analogy. That would be a stupid comparison for her to make. I think anti-Hillary commentators (at least the ungenerous or mean-spirited ones) have strained to claim that she is, in fact, making that stupid analogy, but I have a bit more faith in her. So Obama isn’t MLK. But he isn’t Kennedy either, exactly. The analogy comes out so garbled that I’m not sure she knows where Obama fits. The result is an argument that relies mostly on cynicism: we’re all grown-ups here, we’ve hoped before, we’re too jaded to fall for that again.

    It’s depressing. She is looking to win, and so she is understandably unwilling to consider what in Obama is new, and what can change can be. She wields history as if it were never in doubt, and chides us for thinking things could have been otherwise. She is running against Obama-in-hindsight, which is made easier considering the disaster that has been Bush. But Obama is not Bush in the slightest. Everything about his organization, his experience in community organizing, and his pragmatic nature argues otherwise.

    Sorry for the length.

    — Ryan · Jan 13, 04:01 AM · #

11. It’s been documented that the CLinton apparatus despises Obama for trying to take what is “rightfully” theirs. They were literally breathing their last breath last weekend. They knew it and it showed by their words/actions. Those tears weren’t tears of passion or empathy(either for her cause or her political career). Those were tears of devastation. You notice, just after she says “I don’t want this nation to fall backwards” she goes right into campaign talk, saying “some are ready to lead, some are not”. How many of you recite talking points when you are overcome with sorrow?
    And the “guacamoli and chips” comment the other day as she sat in a Hispanic household on Nevada was even more callous than most anything said about Obama(except maybe Cuomo’s “shuck and jive” comment).
    ANyways, it saddens me that she may very well get the nomination due to sympathy and compassion. I’m a life-long democrat and here i am saying “how freaking typical of liberals”. If a tear is shed a cause will be manifested, apparently.
    Yes, the nation’s buried but still-breathing racism may show it’s face in an Obama presidential campaign, handing the presidency to a Republican, but i want to, A) take my chances, and B) see for myself how far we have come and how far we have to go as a nation in regards to racial perceptions and anxieties.

    — dave · Jan 13, 04:11 AM · #

12. Clinton is objectively right and Reihan objectively wrong.

    The launch of the Civil Rights campaign in 1956 with the Montgomery Bus Boycott had zilch effect in changing the law of the land which was Segregation. Truman could and did desegregate the Army by edict, and Ike send the National Guard to enforce the Little Rock students right to attend a white school, but those were changes on the margins.

    “Segregation now, segregation forever” was George Wallace’s cry, and it was tremendously popular. Much of the Southern Democratic Senators deserted LBJ and only someone like LBJ who was not perhaps eloquent but threatening could get the 1964 Civil Rights Act passed and change things not on the margins but at the heart.

    The Act made the enforcement of civil rights possible, particularly in the South and segregated cities in the North. It dismantled the legal infrastructure of Jim Crow.

    This is the folly of rich white elitists — that changing their minds is what is important. Generally that’s a mere triviality.

    As for Obama, his support comes from rich white people and college kids wanting “a cool black guy as their friend.” For Hillary’s lower-income supporters (she took NH’s under 50K income crowd) that’s all “nice to have.” Nothing essential.

    With a recession perhaps on the way, economic issues not “a cool black guy as your friend” are going to be critical. Obama is clearly the weakest Democratic Candidate because he plays to “nice to have” instead of “must have” economic issues. He’s also vulnerable on national security issues. Too weak and appeasing towards enemies, too harsh on allies.

    This has nothing to do with race one way or the other, though fallout if Obama loses to Hillary (likely) is a depressed to low Black turnout in the General Election. Thus the contradiction between Democrats upper-class “nice to have” status seeking (young people also have this need, they don’t have economic responsibilities) and the economic fears of middle-working class people. Perhaps it may tip the election to Republicans.

    Hillary is also correct in that vetting candidates is important. Obama has ties to various sleazy Chicago financiers and slum lords. A nutty Black Nationalist church and pastor. Anti-white statements in his autobiography. Hillary has her scandals but they are largely discounted and there is no uncertainty in what’s in her scandal closet. Obama by contrast is a huge risk (as is Huck for Republicans).

    — Jim Rockford · Jan 13, 05:32 AM · #

13. I think Senator Clinton’s comments have been taken completely out-of-context and Senator Obama is desperately trying to paint the Clintons as racists coming off his loss in New Hampshire.
    As the primary season moves forward, it is becoming more evident to the Democratic electorate that Barack Obama is an intelligent, eloquent man who has no plans to solve the serious problems that face our country. In contrast, Hillary Clinton has a solid, detailed program, 35 years of experience and will be ready to hit the ground running on day one. Senator Obama has a bright future in politics, but he is clearly not prepared to hold the highest office in this country. Vague rhetoric for “change” and false hope is not leadership.

    Hillary Clinton will bring about the change we need. Senator Obama should be ashamed for trying to smear the Clintons with charges of racism – the Clintons have fought for decades on behalf of all minorities and Hillary Clinton will continue to do so on inaguration day.

    Our country faces serious challenges, both domestically and abroad. Now is not the time to roll the dice with abstract idealism.

    — Dan · Jan 13, 11:53 AM · #

14. I’m always happy to be disagreeing with Jim Rockford — I feel it’s a good indication that I’m on the right track.

    — Reihan · Jan 13, 05:16 PM · #

15. I’ll start from early on in my evolution… I am a biracial man whose father is African-American and mother is Caucasian. My parents met in 1959 when my un-wed mother was in a nursing school where my father was employed as a nurses aide… my mother was engaged to a white man who was attending engineering school. My father had an African-American wife and (5) children at the time of his extra-marital relationship with my mother. At some early point of my mothers pregnancy with me she made the decision to marry her fiance, and to lie to everyone about who the father of her un-born child was… she achieved this by claiming that I had been afflicted with a skin-disease called “melanism”.

    My mother and step-father had four more children together in the space of nine years after I was born, and we grew up together in a middle-class household in white america where the subject of “race” was never discussed. My earliest recollections of having to be aware of race was when I was asked questions about the color of my skin by other classmates in first grade… “Why was my skin dark?”, “Was I adopted?” race was certainly a hot-button issue in 1965-66 when I began school , but any awareness that my mother and step-father had achieved from growing up in their white neighborhoods in the 40’s and 50’s was insufficient in preparing them for raising a biracial child… and to complicate things, they were both in complete denial of their complicity in my mis-education. When I came home from school after having been asked questions by fellow students from my all-white school district, my mother then explained “the skin-disease story” to me… “other kids with this disease usually have dark blotches all over their bodies, so you should feel fortunate”. When I would tell my mother about other boys and girls who would call me names or act aggressively for no apparent reason, I began to understand that I would get no further assistance from her to explain this rationale… my step-father was even more removed from the conversation and would only add, “You know what your mother said”. By the time that my step-father transferred jobs and our family of (7) had moved from the all-white Cleveland, Ohio suburb of Stow to the all-white school district of Portville in Western up-state N.Y. it was the spring of 1970 and I was in fourth grade, and already the veteran of many racial incidents and altercations between myself, classmates, and even some adults. My four younger siblings had also been told the same story, and had to explain the same things to their friends when asked why they had a brother who was black… “Hey, did your mother fool around a little bit??” I remember how much that hurt me when I heard it, and I’m sure that they felt just as badly when they did… nonetheless, this was a “subject” that we never discussed as a family, not once, at least in my presence. I was taught through my observations of my mother and step-father to keep quiet about things that I wasn’t sure about, and I was also taught to ignore the obvious. As I matured into my teen-aged years and began to experience societies issues and insecurities in coming to terms with this countries racial in-equalities during the 70’s, I felt an increasing need to rationalize and then codify the information that my mother had given me, regardless of what I was beginning to realize inside… I felt an increasing discomfort, yet there was no one in my life to offer any prospective… I had learned that black people were a part of society that we didn’t talk about. ( There was a black family in my small town, and they were poor and lived in a run-down house near the river…I never had any opportunity or reason to associate with them) I was a “B” student and also began taking an interest in sports where I was above average. Meeting other schools and student athletes were opportunities to then be exposed to populations that had not been inured by my story yet…I was just another black kid to them. Communicating my experiences to my mother and step-father was difficult because they had no experience with racial prejudice, therefore when I had problems with other children it would be looked at as an issue that “I” had in getting along with others(as well as intra-family sibling issues). Because “race” was being ruled-out entirely, by my mothers denial of my father, she could not logically use that rationale to explain any conflicts that I would have. My step-fathers complicity in this was to blindly support my mothers viewpoint. The “white” viewpoint has always been that blacks(black society) were pretty well cared for, and what contact they did have would be polite and careful… What, with the Voting Rights and Civil Rights Acts being passed, the playing field had been leveled.(re: my mother and step-father’s generation) The feelings and comfort of my mother were apparently what was important, and her inculcation had to have been partly comprised of the idea that white society acted as the gate-keepers and care-takers of an infantilized black population. questions: How has black society formed its identity? What role models have been used, and how does white society react to positive black role models today? (Are they held to a more critical prism??) Is there enough information readily available for black people to easily form a positive racial identity? Is it important that black society is able to connect accurately the dots of its social evolution in America? and is it also important that white society can connect those same dots?? What is White Privilege? What is White awareness? What is Whiteness? What about Affirmative Action? Is Race just a social construct? How do we improve our society in America? Is there any other way(besides the attrition of the old guard) to achieve this?? Dave Myers www.discussrace.com

    — Dave Myers · Jan 13, 06:58 PM · #

16. Good point as far as it goes. Everyone here seems to forget that Eisenhower was desirous of passing civil rights legislation but was thwarted by the brick wall of Southern Democrats, principally Lyndon Baines Johnson.

    Something had to change his mind. Wonder what it was?

    — Charlie · Jan 14, 02:18 PM · #

17. Obama and Al Sharpton together will help remove the race issue that pains America so much.

    Here is a nice picture of Obama embracing the Rev. Al.
    http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/2008/01/the_uniters.html

    There is no doubt that with the Rev. Al’s backing Obama and America will reach new heights of justice and inclusion.

    — M. Simon · Jan 14, 02:26 PM · #

18. Just read this

    — Joe · Jan 14, 08:04 PM · #

19. NEWS FLASH ! (SPREAD THE WORD)
    Hillary Was AGAINST the Civil Rights Act of 1964
    While a Republican and “Goldwater Girl”

    A March 12, 2007 article written by acclaimed Washington columnist Robert Novak sheds a very revealing light on the true sentiment of Hillary Clinton during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement.

    In an attempt to attract black support Hillary Clinton regularly shares her ‘civil rights experience’ during every speech given to black audiences. Novak writes of one such speech at Selma’s First Baptist Church on the 42nd anniversary of the “bloody Sunday” freedom march there, where Sen. Clinton declared: “As a young woman, I had the great privilege of hearing Dr. King speak in Chicago. The year was 1963.

    The fact is, in 1963, not only was Hillary Clinton a republican, but she was also a staunch supporter of republican Senator Barry Goldwater, well known as a segregationist and one of the most vocal senators adamently against the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which is why he lost in his presidential bid to Lyndon B. Johnson. Novak writes “…how then could she be a ‘Goldwater Girl’ in the next year’s presidential election?” He continues, “…she described herself in her memoirs as ‘an active Young Republican’ and ‘a Goldwater girl, right down to my cowgirl outfit.’

    Novak adds, “As a politically attuned honor student, she must have known that Goldwater was one of only six Republican senators who joined Southern Democratic segregationists opposing the histo ric voting rights act of 1964 inspired by King. Hillary headed the Young Republicans at Wellesley College. The incompatibility of those two positions of 40 years ago was noted to me (Novak) by Democratic old-timers who were shocked by Sen. Clinton’s temerity in pursuing her presidential candidacy.”

    To Read Novak’s original article simply Google ‘ Hillary, King, Goldwater ‘. His article is everywhere. Then SHARE THE TRUTH. We’ve had a liar in office long enough. NO MORE !!!!!

    — Greg Jones · Jan 15, 10:42 PM · #

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