Eugene Robinson: Desperate Clinton is Danger to the Party

[babylonsister]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/05/desperate_clinton_is_danger_to.html

Desperate Clinton is Danger to the Party
By Eugene Robinson


WASHINGTON -- From the beginning, Hillary Clinton has campaigned as if the Democratic nomination were hers by divine right. That's why she is falling short -- and that's why she should be persuaded to quit now, rather than later, before her majestic sense of entitlement splits the party along racial lines.

If that sounds harsh, look at the argument she made Wednesday, in an interview with USA Today, as to why she should be the nominee instead of Barack Obama. She cited an Associated Press article "that found how Senator Obama's support ... among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again. I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on."

As a statement of fact, that's debatable at best. As a rationale for why Democratic Party superdelegates should pick her over Obama, it's a slap in the face to the party's most loyal constituency -- African-Americans -- and a repudiation of principles the party claims to stand for. Here's what she's really saying to party leaders: There's no way that white people are going to vote for the black guy. Come November, you'll be sorry.

How silly of me. I thought the Democratic Party believed in a colorblind America.

snip//

The other notion -- that Clinton could position herself as some kind of Great White Hope and still expect African-American voters to give her their enthusiastic support in the fall -- is just nuts. Obama has already won more Democratic primary contests; within a couple of weeks, he almost certainly will have won more pledged convention delegates and more of the popular vote as well. Only in Camp Clinton does anyone believe that his supporters will be happy if party leaders tell him, in effect, "Nice job, kid, but we can't give you the nomination because, well, you're black. White people might not like that."

Clinton's sin isn't racism, it's arrogance. From the beginning, the Clinton campaign has refused to consider the possibility that Obama's success was more than a fad. This was supposed to be Clinton's year, and if Obama was winning primaries, there had to be some reason that had nothing to do with merit. It was because he was black, or because he had better slogans, or because he was a better public speaker, or because he was the media's darling. This new business about white voters is just the latest story the Clinton campaign is telling itself about the usurper named Obama.

"It's still early," Clinton said Wednesday, vowing to fight on. At some level, she seems to believe the nomination is hers. Somebody had better tell her the truth before she burns the house down.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

1. self delete.

[TwilightGardener]

3. GENE ROBINSON???!!??!!

[babylonsister]

4. You OBVIOUSLY don't know what you're talking about...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Robinson_(journalist)

Eugene Robinson (born 1955) is a newspaper columnist and assistant managing editor for The Washington Post. His columns are syndicated by The Washington Post Writers Group. In his columns he generally takes liberal positions and often criticizes President George W. Bush for his perceived domestic and foreign-policy failures, especially the Iraq War.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

7. I was wrong. I was under the mistaken impression that he was conservative columnist who, until

quite recently, wrote columns supporting the Bush adminstration.

I will edit out my incorrect post.

[babylonsister]

8. OK. This is the guy who's often on m$nbc, a talking head who

I really like because he's critical of * and liberal.

[Doctor_J]

10. You're thinking of "Uncle" Thomas Sowell

who thinks slavery was fine. robinson is a liberal dem.

[TwilightGardener]

2. How does she have a "broader coalition"? Is she winning more states and delegates

than Obama? Since she's losing, there's a problem with her "coalition"--end of story. Good stuff--I love Gene Robinson!

[madokie]

5. She'll burn the house down no doubt

cut her nose off to spite her face. When I first came to DU I thought I was a solid Hillary supporter but as I read and listened I realized how wrong I was. Its all about hil and bil and the hell with us is her biggest problem. I love Eugene Robinson an see him as a shining light on KO's countdown.

[BayouBengal07]

6. Great article

" Let's examine those premises. These are white Democrats we're talking about, voters who generally share the party's philosophy. So why would these Democrats refuse to vote for a nominee running on Democratic principles against a self-described conservative Republican? The answer, which Clinton implies but doesn't quite come out and say, is that Obama is black -- and that white people who are not wealthy are irredeemably racist."

I never thought of that angle before...isn't that kind of condescending on the part of the Clinton campaign?

[Peace Patriot]

9. When Bush Sr. pulled his "Willie Horton" stunt, I realized, back then, that the one

UNFORGIVABLE sin, in a U.S. politician, is stirring up racial hatred--in our highly diverse, multi-cultural country whose very existence depends upon--and is built upon--racial and cultural peace and cooperation. There is nothing worse. Add to this the particular history of slavery, segregation and bigotry, that blacks have suffered in this land, and it verges upon treason.

Discussing white vs. black voting stats is okay. That is not racist. But this thing that emerged from Hillary Clinton's lips--"white voters, hard-working white voters"--which she may not have intended as racist, nevertheless betrays an intention of her campaign to pander to racial stereotypes, and that is the unforgivable part.

It also reveals a lack of control of her own mouth, that she could utter such an insensitive remark--and one with such extremely inaccurate implications--that whites are more hard-working than blacks! Jeez, are there any people in this country who have to work harder for every scrap of food on the table, for every rent or mortgage payment, for every item of clothing on their children's backs, and who are more disadvantaged in every way imaginable, from poor schools to our racist 'justice' system, as to getting ahead? Illegal immigrants? Native Americans? What group works harder, with more disadvantages, merely to live? It's not that white workers don't work hard. ALL workers work hard in this country. The U.S. has the most productive workforce on earth. And what thanks do we get? The outsourcing of our jobs! Raiding of our pension funds and Social Security! Theft of all our hard-earned tax dollars--for war and for other ill purposes, for making the rich richer! How dare she play to this fascist, racist, "divide and conquer" stereotype that "whites" are "hard-working" and blacks are...what? Lazy SLAVES?

No, I don't think she meant it that way. But, yes, it DOES betray something about her and her campaign. A wrongful, out of focus purpose, based on a wrongful, out of focus view of what our country is all about, in its finest manifestations. We are not focus groups. We are not demographics. We are not wedges on a pie chart. We are not slaves. We are not cannon fodder. We are not percentages. And we are not stupid. "Hard-working white voters" is a STUPID remark, and more than likely the result of many stupid discussions led by Mark Penn, the master of stupid political campaigns--in South America and here.

This remark angers me, like nothing else has, since the Bushite suppression of black votes and purges of black voters in Ohio and Florida. Because it is so profoundly immoral, or should I say amoral? The Bushites are vicious. This is casual--Clinton's unthinking, automatic use of stereotypes to manipulate racial/cultural groups. And it is perhaps all the more revealing because it was unintended. What it reveals is callousness and cynicism.

[Doctor_J]

11. Yes, but I never thought that the Clintons would use it.

:shrug:

[Peterquagmire]

12. Eugene Robinson. Who is more biased than him?

Karl Rove, perhaps.

[babylonsister]

13. Ah, Peter, we hardly knew ya. nt