Letter From America
Race catches up with Barack Obama
THE average of all the polls predicted that Hillary Clinton would win the Pennsylvania primary on April 22 by 5%. She won by 10%. Polls had also shown Obama winning the New Hampshire primary in January by 13%; but it was Hillary Clinton who won by 3%! Pollsters are aware of one dirty little secret of polling Americans: many whites are reluctant to say that they will not vote for a black candidate.
There are plenty of historical precedents. Democrat Tom Bradley, the African-American mayor of Los Angeles for twenty years (1973-93), was projected to win the California gubernatorial election in 1982. Surprisingly, he lost by less than 1%, giving rise to the term the "Bradley Effect," refering to the tendency of white voters to tell pollsters that they would vote for a black candidate, but then actually vote for his white opponent.
African-American Doug Wilder, who ran for the governor of Virginia as a Democrat in 1989 also suffered the "Bradley Effect" when he led his white opponent by 10% in the polls on the eve of the election, but ended up winning by less than 1%.
Through their persistent negative attacks and subtle race-baiting, Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton and the Republicans have managed to reduce Barack Obama to just another black candidate.
In the Pennsylvania primary, 66% of the white women voted for Hillary; only 34% voted for Obama. 56% of the white males voted for Hillary, 44% for Obama. White women constituted the largest segment of the population. It was because 90% of the blacks (only 10% of Pennsylvania's population) and a majority of younger voters picked Obama that the margin was not larger. 16% of Pennsylvanians said race was important in their decision; of those 75% voted for Hillary. So 12% of Hillary's 54.7% vote came from the race-conscious voters.
Of course that should not be news to Barack Obama. He knew that a certain percentage of white Americans would not vote for him under any circumstances. His challege was to pick up those votes from other segment of population thorugh his message.
Obama must have known also that other candidates were not going to get out of his way; they were going to block it. Running for the US presidency is a once in a lifetime opportunity for the likes of Hillary (60) and McCain (71). They were not going to play dead just so this 46-year old African-American phenom could win the presidency.
With Hillary's Pennsylvania victory, the wind is behind her sails. She raised 10 million dollars within 24 hours of her Pennsylvania victory. She is shoring up her defence credentials by speaking in front of military personnel in North Carolina where she trails Obama. Her surrogates are everywhere remininding Indiana voters of Hillary's "game-changing victory" in Pennsylvania, as polls show Hillary taking the lead in that state.
And where is Obama? In Chicago for yet another strategy session. At this late stage it is not a good sign to be reviewing strategy. Hillary has outwitted Obama in Pennsylvania. She was the much better candidate and talked about issues people care abouteconomy, healthcare, and jobs. At the last minute she wrapped herself in the Star of David, threatened Iran and thus energised the Jewsish voters, led by Governor Ed Rendell who placed the party machinery at Hillary's disposal. At the same time, Hillary kept Obama on the defensive by making his answer questions about Rev. Wright and "bitter-gate."
Obama is faltering because, like Hillary four months ago, he is acting like the inevitable nominee. He is attempting to run out the clock on Hillary. He refuses to face the reality that Hillary is not going to go away. Even Hillary's victory speech in Philadelphia was more inspiring than Obama's rehashed "heard it all before" presentation.
To get his campaign on track, Obama must come down from his high horse and address issues that dog him. Once and for all he must denounce and dissociate himself completely from Rev. Wright and leave his church. He must explain what Michelle Obama meant by saying "for once in my adult life, I felt proud to be an American." If loyalty to his wacky pastor and his errant wife is more important to Obama than winning the presidency, then Barack Obama will not win the US presidency. He must somehow mitigate the snub to those who "cling to guns and religion," even though they may not vote for him. And Obama must get back to making inspiring speeches.
And he must fight Hillary back. Hillary hit Obama mercilessly, thursting the knife into him and twisting it, in the Philadelphia debate on April 16. Even in the face of incessant Hillary attacks, Obama passed up an opportunity to attack Hillary back for her Bosnia sniper-fire lying. Americans like a fighter, which Hillary has defined herself as. They do not like a wuss or a sissy.
If Barack Obama believes that with his seemingly unsurmountable pledged delegates tally he is the certain nominee, he should think again. Hillary's campaign now has the look of a freight train, with the undecided superdelegates on board, which might wreck the insurgent Obama's campaign and hand the nomination to the original inevitable nominee.
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