Southern Blacks Are Split on Clinton vs. Obama

In Atlanta, the race has also split longtime allies in the civil rights movement. The Rev. Joseph E. Lowery has supported Mr. Obama, for instance, while Representative John Lewis has defended Mrs. Clinton against accusations that she and her husband denigrated the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in an attack on Mr. Obama.

Another prominent Clinton supporter from the civil rights era, Andrew Young, also defended Mrs. Clinton. “Hillary Clinton, first of all, has Bill behind her,” Mr. Young said on a recent Webcast devoted to African-American issues. “And Bill is every bit as black as Barack.”

But a younger generation appears to be embracing Mr. Obama. Raphael G. Warnock, the 38-year-old senior pastor of Dr. King’s home church, Ebenezer Baptist here, gave Mr. Obama the honor of appearing there this coming Sunday, the day before the national King holiday.
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Roanoke has long been a stronghold of the Alabama Democratic Conference, which endorsed Mrs. Clinton in part because its members believed that a black man could not be elected. But statewide, the group’s support of Mrs. Clinton may be tested by the Obama campaign’s insurgency.

“This is going to be another one of these watershed events in the black community,” said Hank Sanders, a state senator and former president of the Alabama New South Coalition, a group that has endorsed Mr. Obama.

Gerald W. Johnson, the pollster for the Alabama Education Association, a powerful teachers’ union that has endorsed Mrs. Clinton, said Mr. Obama’s victory in Iowa had demolished Mrs. Clinton’s substantial lead among Democrats in the state. Mr. Johnson predicted that black voters would make up half of the Democratic primary voters, up from the usual 40 percent.

But Ms. Clark-Frieson said she feared that the Obama momentum might not reach Roanoke.

“A.D.C. is going to spend a lot of money,” she said, “and they’re going to put out a ballot, and voters are going to follow that ballot to the letter because they’ve been doing that for 30 years. Those that might would consider voting for Barack won’t commit publicly because they don’t want to be seen as going against the A.D.C.”

That hesitancy cuts both ways. In Atlanta, Mark Johnson, a 35-year-old seminary student, said he was the first to put a political sign up in his predominantly black neighborhood. It was a Clinton sign. “My son said, ‘Dad, what if they throw rocks at the window?’ ” Mr. Johnson said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/18/us/politics/18south.html?em&ex=1200805200&en=e349a8a3237d5b78&ei=5087%0A

Thats going to be a big problem for Obama by even mentioning Reagan's name.

The AA's might not view him licking up to Reagan like that particularly pleasing, after all they suffered a lot under Reagan.

also said Bill Clinton probably slept with more black women than Obama. Joke, joke, ha, ha. They should lock him in a closet for the duration.

His policies would probably help them more than the other two.

So I guess not.

It reminds me of the 80 race where Jerry Brown just got lost in the Kennedy-Carter contest...

What point are you trying to make?

That Obama supporters are violent? I don't get it.

That's the impression I have gotten around here as of late, if you're black and supporting Clinton, you may have a "slave mentality".

I have been indirectly accused of that by some, albeit very few, but it still hurts.

the core sell for both candidates is that special base, that pioneering symbolism. Both bases are split. Although the black base should come together more for Obama IF he gains the nomination he is now in a dilemma of being unable to reach out for it without accentuating divides. Hillary can reach out all she wants and is unlikely to do much better than she is now, with women of various ideologies on wings steadfast against her. So the advantage they give in the primary is disturbing. It offers bold newness as a separate path to face the headlong actual crises of the times. Yet it cannot really tap into the core bases of the voters all that dramatically. Then they catapult from there to another sidelong swipe at the public desire for change or restoration. Two near misses don't make a direct hit, yet they can pick up the nomination along the way toward a veering national campaign off to the side, in the clouds, supported by a woefully deprived public sentiment that is groping for a Democrat, but finding it slippery despite all the fine words.

The mix of doubt, confusion, antipathy in the rich dem constituency bases being offered a "first" is not how a campaign should be run this year. It is a failed distraction on top of avoidance calling for people to swarm to an image. Some of the oddities of 2004 were factional on issues and ideology, not gender and race. All the substance first candidates have fallen behind the grab bag non issue candidates largely because they are very good on top of other advantages, money and endorsements being awarded accordingly.
They promise the establishment above all else that nothing of real substance- or awareness- or judgment- will change very much at all. Nicer. Competent. Democratic. The hard stuff pushed off to the side the same way disturbing segments of what should be overwhelmingly enthused women and blacks are who actually have hard issues to address.

This leads me to a bigger issue and one which I should put in a more appropriate post. Are we thinking about where the voters REALLY are in America. By where I mean in their minds, hearts and desires for November. Are we going to spend more time evading, propping, defending and explaining our candidate? Not to say that they won't all come under attack, but in the fight to remain undefined and unifying(namely to get enough votes not all votes even in a great opportunity year) aren't the blemishes starting to show up as chinks in the armor and death of illusions? Of creating the very depression that the avoidance of "divisive" clear politics was meant to steer away from?

If we are going to have to work for a candidate who would be challenged on all things trivial wouldn't it ne better to have one who is challenging directly in turn for what Democrats all stand for? We WILL be divided, you can forget about the promise of a sustainable illusion. Better to be divided between those who stand up for the best and clearest ideals of the party in a progressive way and those attracted to the ravenous 15% hardcore GOP bootstompers. Better to be divided in way that admits reality and makes THAT the battleground and gives millions more real cause to join and participate other than as fan spectators who finally wish the whole thing was over and get very used to having their symbolic candidate in until they begin to tune out as they are never called upon again to be anything more than a TV audience that provides good poll numbers. I think several of the second tier candidates would have NEEDED the help of the people to get our country back. If the people moved to the center of the road when the semis are barreling down get the impression the top two simply need them to get the presidency and the murk gets more golden in tone and happy happy- we may well not even win or deserve to.

What happens if this is not just what the two top candidates MUST do to win the party nomination but their only path to November as well- more compromise and reaching out to fogbound centrists and independents with something that is less embrace than calculation- and doesn't really work all that well? Does hope share some the nasty distraction of fear? Will they be conjoined in an insane battle this fall with the GOP trying also to do both and Bush cronies appearing "new" and "strong"? Will the presence of two corporate appearing parties invite a THIRD "bi-partisan" corporate party into a shell game that the bewildered voter convinced at least that there is not so much choice or chance after all will pick- and behold Bush is under the chosen shell?

Why, in a year of revolt, revulsion and extreme national and global danger, choose the warned against safe path when someone just as capable and less in need of rationalization and gaffe defense could dare the right path? It seems we WILL take a chance on any of the three whose websites if not speeches suggest a strong Democratic progressive agenda, would it were more clear to our uncourageous spirit that one really is the best. Why are we joining the split crusades as if they were undivided and not any more help than hindrance to the real work of leadership that needs to be done- and not guessed at or compromised away before we even start competing with the vote riggers and mainstream propaganda?