Racial pretensions

Now more than 36 hours into boycotting TV news, I can always check the pulse of the Obamasphere--these days an extension of the mainstream press--to discern what the air waves have blasted as the latest propaganda spiel. So I'm enjoying music in lieu of hype blaring in the background from tee-vee punditheads. Who needs 'em? I don't.

With that said, onward to race-race-race, a recurring campaign media trope.

Riverdaughter posted terrific commentary this morning on an "annoying theme from yesterday’s sweetie attack... that Kentuckians pretty much admitted that they were racists in exit polls." Garychapelhill followed up with an argument that I also support:

By repeatedly crying wolf on the race issue, Obama lessens the impact of the charge of racism when it really occurs. Despite what the pundits and the Obama campaign say, this exit poll data is of no use when trying to determine the racial attitude of voters. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look at some numbers.

Gary then examined exit polls from Wisconsin, Georgia, Connecticut, and Florida to demonstrate that building an argument about racism (and sexism) in the primaries--and specifically Hillary's "racist" voters based on exit polls--is not only stupid, but dishonest and destructive in trivializing the real-world problems of post-civil rights era racial injustices.

For further edification, see also Richard Thompson Ford, professor at Stanford and author of the book, The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse.

I left a comment at Riverdaughter's post about the alleged racism of the Kentucky primary, which I'll re-post here with additional remarks, revisions, and panels from the KY exit polls via CNN.

Looking at the exit polls, the Blog Boyz and the media have ignored the nuances. I suspect their motive is to undermine Hillary's huge win in KY in protecting The Precious (h/t Anglachel) and his march to the nomination. Pffft. Pffft. Shield your eyes from the electoral map and how it favors Hillary in the general election. Ignore the argument that Obama isn't as strong in defeating McCain. Instead, they jam the public discourse with race scandal-mongering as a diversion from the issue of Obama's electability.

First, eyeball the vote by race of the exit polls.


African-American voters broke large for Obama, a greater percent than whites who voted for Hillary. But who would be silly enough to criticize AAs for voting for Obama? It's a historical opportunity, a no-brainer.

Next, the specious argument du jour about bluegrass state racism via this exit poll question.

Of the 18% of whites who said race of the candidate was important, 9% of them voted for Obama, 2% voted uncommitted. So that whittles down the argument that one in five bluegrass voters are "white racists." A portion of those 18% whites--9%--voted for Obama because his race was important to them. What's that tell you? Are the alleged racists confused? More sexist than racist? Seriously, wonder about how the question was phrased and whether people say the darnest, dumbest things to end a research survey as quickly as possible.

Additionally, 2% of the 9% of AAs--or 22%--said that the race of the candidate was important.

Of Black Democrats (9%), 91% of them voted for Obama.

Also notice the breakout of party affiliation. Looking at the vote by party and race, the exit poll lumped All Republicans together (6%) and All Other Party (1%) without identifying their race. I suspect these cohorts are white but we don't know because the exit polls didn't provide the data.

What the exit polls didn't analyze is how many of the white group (18%) who said race of the candidate was important came from All Republicans and/or All Other Party. There are no party affiliations attributed to these white voters. None.

Only 7% said that race of the candidate was most important while 14% said that race was one of several factors contributing to their voting decision. What's the race of the 7% and 14% of these respondents? We don't know.


Of the latter 14% group, which said race was one of several factors, 19% of them voted for Obama and 2% for Uncommitted.

Based on this data, to claim that Kentuckians are racists is simplistic and erroneous. I don't fault the overwhelming majority of AAs who voted for Obama. Do the Blog Boyz? Or the media? Hell, no. They're busy shrieking their heads off about Hillary's racist voters.

Is there racism in KY? Probably, just as there is racism and sexism in America. But how deep the racism is--who, what, and where--these exits polls don't probe.

However, it's malignant absurdity to use exit polls to declare "that Kentuckians pretty much admitted that they were racists." What we're seeing mostly, IMO, is racial identity with a candidate. You can see that vividly in how Black Democrats voted--91% for Obama.

Assuming that whites who voted for Clinton aren't voting for Obama because he's African-American dismisses and discounts what Hillary offers to Americans as POTUS.

Violet at The Reclusive Leftist wrote on March 10 about...

...support for Obama from the African-American community, a phenomenon with which I’m deeply sympathetic. Just as millions of women (of all races) see their gender reflected in Hillary, millions of African-Americans (of both sexes) see their race reflected in Obama. You can call it identity politics, but what I call it is the chance to finally feel represented after 200 years in a so-called representative democracy. I begrudge no one that yearning.

Neither do I.

I support Hillary first and foremost because of her policies, her knowledge, her experience, her can-do attitude, and her tenacity. OMG, we need a fighter in the WH when our nation faces crises on so many fronts: the economy, energy, foreign affairs, and national security with two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I also identify with Hillary as a woman, trusting her to represent the interests of half of America better than a man with a sexist attitude who refers to us as sweeties.

So sweetie darthlings, take your racial pretensions about Hillary voters elsewhere. My teevee news programming is dark and Beethoven is playing. Da-da-da-duh.

Hillary's huge win in Kentucky

The news orgs have already called the Kentucky primary for Hillary Clinton. I heard Wolf Blitzer of CNN predict the margin may be as large as 30 points.

With 51% of the precincts reporting, Hillary is ahead 22 points:


I'll update as the numbers roll in.

UPDATE 8:11 PM: Clinton is now up 32 points with 60% of precincts reporting:


Hillary is about to give her victory speech in Louisville, KY. Woo hoo! The crowd chants, "Hillary! Hillary!"

Here's a rough transcript:

"If we only had a president ready, willing, and able to lead..." [Yes we will! chants]...

She said she didn't stay in the race to "prove her toughness" but because of a "determination"... "by never giving up and never giving in... I'm going on now to campaign in Montana, South Dakota, and Puerto Rico and keep standing up for the voters of Florida and Michigan.... they deserve to have their votes counted... and that's why I'm going to keep making that case for the nominee whoever she may be... [Crowd roars.]

"Kentucky has a knack for picking presidents... two terms to a president named Clinton... and it's often been said as Kentucky goes, so goes the nation... who's ready to lead our party at the top of the ticket... who is ready to defeat Sen. McCain in the swing states... who is ready on day one? ...Me.

"I'm thinking of all the women... to break the hardest glass ceiling in the land...

"We will unite our country... and thank you.. and God bless America!"

A CNN commenter remarked about a KY sign: "Kentucky says hold your horses."

8:41 PM: With 88% of the precincts reporting, Hillary thumps Obama in KY by 35 points.


8:58 PM: Hillary mentioned that Kentucky has "a knack for picking presidents." In general elections, the bluegrass state is 10 for 10:


Below are the lackluster KY primary numbers for John McCain:


A panel from the CNN exit poll in KY:

How to read exit polls

9:46 PM: Data from KY exit polls indicate that Obama doesn't appeal to Hillary voters.

Two-thirds of Clinton's supporters there said they would vote Republican or not vote at all rather than for Obama, according to the polls.

Forty-one percent of Clinton supporters said they'd cast their vote for John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, and 23 percent said they would not vote at all.

Just 33 percent said they would back Obama in the general election, according to the polls.

Those numbers are even worse for Obama than in West Virginia one week ago, where 36 percent of Clinton voters said they would back him in the fall.

10:32 PM: With 100% of KY's precincts reporting:


Now the map. Of the two counties that Obama won in KY, he got 51% to Clinton's 46% in Fayette, and 53% to Hillary's 44% in Jefferson.

Consolation prize: at least he won two counties compared to a big fat goose egg in West Virginia last Tuesday.



SOURCES: Screen grabs of KY primary numbers and map from CNN.

Kentucky hearts Hillary

Photo by Barbara Kinney

Hillary remains poised to win the Kentucky primary tomorrow. During a campaign stop in Loretta, KY, Amanda Keith, wearing a T-shirt that proclaimed, "Step aside gentlemen, it's time for a woman to take over," explained why she supports Hillary:

"She's the one that can get us out of this mess," Keith said ahead of Clinton's campaign stop at Maker's Mark distillery that drew hundreds of supporters.

Keith, who had to drop out of college because it became too expensive, said Clinton's plan to help people pay for higher education won her support. "I've got tuition bills I can't pay, and I don't know what I'm going to do about my kids," said Keith...

Keith's reasons were echoed by another Kentucky voter.

"She's showed she cares about this state," said Angela Markum, who drove an hour from Louisville to attend the event. "I don't see Obama here. I don't see him anywhere."

Real Clear Politics shows that Hillary could win KY by as much as 30 points.

Stumping in the bluegrass state, Hillary conveyed the ultimate argument:

"I am hoping that Kentucky will send a big message to the Democratic Party and to the country," Clinton said as the crowd cheered, "that we know what kind of president we need and we know who will defeat John McCain in the fall."

We need Hillary Clinton.

Obama promised a new kind of politics and he has orchestrated one of the most divisive campaigns I've had the misfortune to witness in my lifetime. He has lost key swing states and will lose Hillary voters, whom he bragged he could get to vote for him. But he has alienated too many for him to win the general election in November. As Anglachel so poignantly articulated, The Electoral Map Trumps the Party Math.

Hillary--not Obama--can defeat McCain.

Hillary--not Obama--can win the presidency.

Hillary--not Obama--performs better in the all-important Electoral College map.

Hillary has the experience America needs to lead us into more prosperous times, protect our national security, and improve foreign affairs.

Only one Democratic nominee can win in November.

Her name is Hillary Clinton.

Get your game face on for Hillary

Hillary is still in this race despite the 24/7 media spiel anointing Obama the winner and the chortling over the perceived fait accompli in the Obamasphere. So get your game face on and let's roll.

In cramming a lot into one post, I've abbreviated some of the cites so click the links to understand the whole picture.

Who has our worthless media establishment cut out of the political discourse?

Older voters. For Obama, it's teh suck:

The Clinton campaign consistently includes Hillary Clinton’s appeal to seniors when it discusses why she is the better choice to face off against John McCain – but the media seldom mentions older voters, choosing instead to concentrate on Clinton’s appeal to “white working class” voters to hype the race angle in the campaign.

The Obama campaign’s use of talking points involving “new voters” and a “new coalition” is sending a message to older voters – that “old” is worth a lot less to them than “new”, that young voters are more important than older voters, and that the “new coalition” means that the concerns of the “old coalition” members are no longer critical to the Party.

And all this is going on when the Republican Party will have a 71 year old as its nominee.

Paul Lukasiak provides in-depth analysis, numbers, charts, a whole megillah.

Who joined Republicans against progressive Democrats to undermine the middle class by voting for legislation with the Orwellian name, Class Action Fairness Act?

You know who:

In 2005, Barack Obama voted for CAFA, the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005. Who voted against it? Hillary Clinton, Dick Durbin, Ted Kennedy, Pat Leahy, Joe Biden, Barbara Boxer and other progressive Democrats. Even Harry Reid. Who voted with Obama? Republicans, from Trent Lott to Lindsay Graham to Jeff Sessions and Democrats Joe Lieberman and Diane Feinstein (big surprise.)

Jeralyn of TalkLeft discusses why it was a very bad bill and commenter andrys adds more flesh to some of *cough* Barry's benefactors:

Obama gives Hope to corporations - Truthdig, Apr 28, 2008

Barack Obama Inc.: The birth of a Washington machine - (Harpers, Oct 26, 2006 issue)

Obama Campaign press release - response to Harper's article - Oct. 23, 2006

A Bit More on Barack - Harper's added detail for Obama campaign - Oct. 26, 2006. This includes Obama's explanation that We can do better than burdening businesses with cases of class-action abuse.

All his talk about not knuckling under to special interests is talk. M'yeah. Smell the hypocrisy. Here's a whiff of Barry's stealthy lobbyist network from The Hill.

Polls from West Virginia and Kentucky indicate an upcoming Hillary landslide.

Do you wonder why the media have gone ga-ga for Obama as if he's got the nomination? C'mon. The media are corporate subsidiaries comprised of influence peddlers dedicated to the plutocracy. Via tngen at Corrente:

There’s a good reason for the recent Obamabot psyops, pundit declarations, general wailing and at times cajoling Clinton supporters have been subjected to since her recent Indiana victory was spun into a loss: Clinton still has a very good chance of securing the nomination.

What’s more, the next few days are absolutely critical for her and her supporters. The end is only here if we allow the latest round to depress morale and turnout for the upcoming WV and KY primaries.

Jay Cost at RCP lays out why Clinton’s down but not out. First some numbers and demographics:

Two things are holding me back: West Virginia and Kentucky.

—SNIP—

However, it is possible that she could counter Tuesday’s blowout with two big blowouts of her own in the next two weeks. This could undo most of the damage done by her big loss in North Carolina, and put her back on track....

...What happens to “It’s Over” if Clinton pulls a 40-point victory in West Virginia on Tuesday, then follows it up a week later with a 30-point victory in Kentucky? If these states turn out in the same margins that states since March 4th have averaged, that would imply a net of about 290,000 votes for Clinton. That puts her within striking distance of a reasonable popular vote victory. “Over” will be over as we turn our attention to Puerto Rico.

Lambert weighed in:

I keep thinking that, if they really had it in the bag, they wouldn’t be screaming so loud that they’ve got it in the bag — and then attributing Hillary’s persistence to, er, psychological factors (“You know how women are…”)... Eh? ...I mean, why doesn’t Obama just release the 50 SDs he’s got in the bag and have done with it?

NOTE And I love that “elite opinion” has congealed around Obama triumphalism. This is the Village [aka media pundit class]. They’re always wrong about everything.

To quote a Daily Howler bromide I'll repeat often in the next few days: "You really can’t run a middle-class democracy with a multimillionaire press corps." Big media is out of touch, disconnected in their ivory towers. They want to pitch information, not listen to info consumers. You think we have a free press in America with the public's best interest at heart? Don't make me open a can of bwahahahahaha.

What's happening to the Democratic Party? And are the Blog Boyz still members of the reality-based community?

Super-smart Anglachel analyzes the "mass psychosis that has overtaken half of [our] party" and the "dissolution of what should have been a solidly unified party." She delves into the break-up, the differences between Obama's and Hillary's approach, and a "revolution" of Barry's new "saints" demanding old sinners--Hillary supporters--to simply give up and bow to The One.

What I see rising from the other side is clearly of two kinds. Half of Obama's support is simply racial identity voting. The other half is from the faction of the party that is significantly insulated from the stark world of need and want. There is a love of the other-worldly where the beauty of the idea and the ideal matters more than the base. The political "base" is seen as base - low, uncouth, adulterated, impure, unworthy. They are not among the saved and the saints. I honestly cannot remember a previous time when so many people in the party were reviled for doing nothing except vote for a conventional candidate....

...Cultural liberals really do tend to think that people who fit the profile of Clinton voters don't have deeply held principles and are not capable of forming complex opinions of the world, little more than dupes of puppet masters like Karl Rove. They act from false consciousness, not from the rich inner life that the properly educated and worldly claim as their own. The dedication and commitment of Clinton voters is denied because those hicks can't really believe anything, and thus the saints need not take into consideration the desires of the fallen as real, let alone legitimate.

Are Clinton voters to STFU and sit down until our ballots are required at the sacrificial altar of The One? Ha! Think again. Anglachel cites Obama supporter Chris Bowers to prove her point. He wrote:

Cultural Shift: Out with Bubbas, up with Creatives: There should be a major cultural shift in the party, where the southern Dems and Liebercrat elite will be largely replaced by rising creative class types. Obama has all the markers of a creative class background, from his community organizing, to his Unitarianism, to being an academic, to living in Hyde Park to shopping at Whole Foods and drinking PBR. These will be the type of people running the Democratic Party now, and it will be a big cultural shift from the white working class focus of earlier decades. Given the demographics of the blogosphere, in all likelihood, this is a socioeconomic and cultural demographic into which you fit. Culturally, the Democratic Party will feel pretty normal to netroots types. It will consistently send out cultural signals designed to appeal primarily to the creative class instead of rich donors and the white working class.

The New Democratic coalition is kicking the working class (and whole lot of other folks who aren't Bubbas) to the curb.

Note the Bowers echo in the words of the DNC's Donna Brazile here and whoa! A hostile response from her here. (Thank you, Joseph!)

After reading Bowers's crazy talk, I wish someone would spike the Blog Boyz Kool-Aid with lithium. Maybe their manic phase would subside and snap the boyz back to reality. Grandiosity and hubris has run amok. McCain and the GOP will make lemonade out of a chunk of Hillary supporters pegged as lemons cast aside as old.

I'm fighting for Hillary because she's fighting for us all. Let's do it.