FALUDI

My contention is, yes, Krugman, any Democrat could win based on the economy, but, the culture wars are not over.  To put it bluntly, white people will not want to be called racist all the time and get beaten over the head by the Creative Class and African Americans.  

Clinton has proven beyond all doubt that she can deliver a part of th eelectorate that Obama cannot.  She's got the proof.

After seeing Jon Stewart come to the same conclusion last night (amid boos and hisses from his audience) after playing the quote from Hillary's radio interview, I've just had it. This is the non-stop tone of the primary season and has been since Jesse Jackson Jr. opened his mouth.

I can't tell you how many times over the years I watched southerners walk away from DKos because there was this underlying hatred of southerners (I should add that this wasn't anywhere near as prevelent as the current CDS). Even when they were eliminating conspiracy/false diaries, I couldn't get diaries I could show were false (even when Snopes showed it was urban legend) taken down.

Do whatever it takes to win.

Karl Rove is ecstatic and salivating. It's been a Repub goal to separate groups from the Democratic Party coalition.  They tried half-heartedly to break of black voters. Had much more success with more conservative whites.  The horrors of BushCo had driven the latter back to the Dem Party.  

Now, Obama's camp and his bloggy champions are working to drive them away.  

Old people? Women and especially older feminists? Stay on their terms -- not your interests. Hispanics, which are moving to the Dems, but are not cemented there by any means -- what is Donna Brazile thinking?

Thanks for being more polite about it BTD. My response made Cheney's comments to Leahy seem like pleasant advice.

But if the Clintons so much as mention race, they are race baiting racists of the worst kind and they are crucified.  It's the Dean scream all over again, with many people saying "what's the big deal with what he said or did?" and the media telling everyone they must "condemn! condemn!"  Today, the saintly Peggy Noonan came on MSNBC and  Mika read part of her column where she said Hillary was "vulgar".

Have you ever seen anything like this?

 
Party elders should be coming out on the balcony in full array, in full regalia, and telling the crowd, "Habemus nominatum": "We have a nominee." And the crowd below should be cheering, "Viva Obamus! Viva nominatum!"

...

To play the race card as Mrs. Clinton has, to highlight and encourage a sense that we are crudely divided as a nation, to make your argument a brute and cynical "the black guy can't win but the white girl can" is -- well, so vulgar, so cynical, so cold, that once again a Clinton is making us turn off the television in case the children walk by.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121027865275678423.html?mod=opinion_columns_featured_lsc

And she accompanies this opinion hit piece with a cartoon of Hillary tied to a railroad track with an oncoming train.

It's insanity.

The rules are different for the Clintons.  They always were and they always will be.  The rules are different for white people in general when they talk about race.  It's a minefield, and an unpredictable one at that.  New unPC words crop up every day.  I actually saw someone on a blog tell a poster to reconsider using the word "smug" because of the possible racial implications.

As I've said before:

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/05/09/999566.aspx

The title of the article: Did Clinton play the race card?

"Clinton played the race card yesterday as she dismissed Barack Obama as a candidate who will have a hard time winning support from `white Americans.' It was the most starkly racial comment Clinton has made in the campaign, and drew quick condemnation from some Democrats

Big Tent, didn't you say after Indiana/NC that Hillary must shift her campaign focus off Obama and onto McCain?

Clinton did not say this.  Clinton does not say this.  Again what good would it be for her to say people won't vote for Obama because they are racist?  It's insulting.  

1. if Obama cannot win white voters but Hillary can, the Super Delegates should take that into account.

2. People who complain that African Americans go for Obama in such high numbers should remember that Kerry got 88% in 2004.

3. I think Hillary and her campaign lost some of the African American vote, Obama won some of it.

4. The way our elections are talked about was a factor, but Hillary and Bill were clumsy in their analogies. LBJ was a Senator just as she and Obama. Hindsight is 20-20, but she could have said, "I know I do not have Dr. King's eloquence but I share his passion and I share LBJ's ability to get things done because I have been fighting these fights since 1992."

5. Peace out. Don't want to anger anyone here.

He took Edwards Populist campaign strategy (of course, his campaign strategist, David Axelrod, was Edwards' strategist back in 2004).  But I think this will still backfire among the BlueDog Dems because they won't believe Obama is "one of them", even if his white mother collected food stamps at one time (hell, even I have done that in the past, what's the big deal?)

Nobody argues that the road isn't harder for non-white male candidates.  It has been a challenge for Hillary Clinton and it remains so for Barack Obama.

But our party is the one that ought to be willing to fight harder to break glass ceilings like this.  When a candidate of color or a woman (or GLBT/Atheist/Jew/etc..) demonstrates the ability to build a large coalition and run an effective enough primary campaign to earn a nomination - haven't they've earned our willingness to roll up our sleeves and take them the rest of the way?

I don't see where it is constructive to speculate endlessly about Obama's "white problem" - just as I would not accept any handwringing involving the difficulties of electing a woman if Hillary Clinton were the presumptive nominee.

I would add this to the Chinese puzzle: the "elitism" might be related to race from Obama's perspective because somewhere in the back of this heart he might perceive some working-class whites as racist (his SF thumbnail description sounded like he was describing "rednecks" and was looking down upon them, a classic way to diminish them in importance, hence "elitist") and he might harbor resentment towards them which is sort of understandable from a certain perspective but I haven't heard this discussed. The problem is that working-class whites without college degrees do make up a large portion of the Democratic base and while I don't expect them to vote for McCain in any great numbers (they're not that stupid even if they don't have college degrees), they might not turn out to vote or won't talk up the Democratic nominee with friends and family with much enthusiasm. There are lots of ways of withholding energy from the Democratic nominee besides voting for the dark side.