By Robert Schlesinger
Here’s what’s at stake for Barack Obama this morning: The nomination, the White House and the viability of the Democratic Party.
As I argue over at Huffington Post, Obama is now faced with the task of using language stronger than Jeremiah Wright’s in order to calm a situation that is threatening to spiral out of control. Language, of course, has its limits, but Obama has been so dependent upon it to reach this point that it now threatens his candidacy.
I have been arguing for weeks that Obama all but had the Democratic nomination locked up. There was no argument, I asserted, that Hillary Clinton could make to the superdelegates that would prompt them to swing their support to her — causing black voters to abandon the Democratic party. No Democrat can win without strong black support. Period.
This could become the kind of situation that causes superdelegates to question Obama’s viability. But worse for Democrats, it could become a racially polarized issue: Even if Obama became politically inviable, superdelegates could still risk the party losing black voters who continue to support the Illinois senator.
Here, then, is the situation which the superdelegates would face: Stick with a crippled Obama, keeping a key element of the Democratic base happy but running the risk of allowing the party to be painted as beholden to its own narrow special interests (harking back to the party image of the 1970s and 1980s); or they could abandon the crippled candidate but lose black support with him for an untold number of election cycles — and wonder what went wrong while watching John McCain’s inaugural address.
And now you see what Ferraro was really doing with her seemingly stupid statements.
I wonder why if the situation were reversed Obama would have already lost the nomination…I lay alot of the blame on the press with their incessant comeback coverage for the Clintons…they are an ARkansas mafia..ruthless, crooked, liars, thieves….yet you people continually cover them…many people will not vote at all if Hillary is the nominee…I hope the press is happy and the dumbocratic party goes down big.
Senator Obama’s comments on race and the explanation of his pastor’s comments would be easier to believe if there weren’t persuasive evidence that the Obama campaign made a conscious decision to “racialize” the debate. I urge you to read the following analysis by Princeton historian Sean Wilentz in The New Republic – “Race Man: How Barack Obama played the race card and blamed Hillary Clinton.”
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=aa0cd21b-0ff2-4329-88a1-69c6c268b304
Obama is not the crippled candidate. I have read his Philadelphia speech.
It won’t be enough. The events leading up to Sen. Obama’s speech today are tantamount to the straw that broke the camel’s back. These events are all that were needed to allow hesitant delegates to back away from Sen. Obama and back Sen. Clinton. Sen. Obama’s presidential campaign has peaked, the shining beacon of his political capital has been tarnished and the long term out look for his future in politics has diminished.
Pioneer King,
Go read some American history, please. JFK won the Presidency on the weight of a speech no more powerful or compelling than Obama’s. Like it not a demagogue is a powerful force in politics. After all, rhetoric is the first step towards action.
Where we tonight shall camp?….The top blogs of the day. the newest report , see and reply me some comments. Thanks.