The Real Race Card (Clinton/Obama/drug use)

[marmar]

from The American Prospect:



The Real Race Card

The Clinton campaign's discussion of Barack Obama's admitted drug use is having an effect all right. An effect on the black community's acceptance of Hillary Clinton.

Adele M. Stan | December 18, 2007 | web only



Rep. Helen Miller, an assistant majority leader in the Iowa House of Representatives, is simmering on low. On Saturday, I reached her on her cell phone in the lobby of the Clinton Library in Little Rock, Arkansas, where she was meeting several other women state legislators who were in town for the annual conference of the National Caucus of Black Legislators. According to Miller, one of only four African Americans in the Iowa House, a lot of the offline conversations she had during the three-day conference centered on the comments of two Clinton campaign advisers -- one of whom has since resigned -- about Barack Obama's admitted past drug use.

To many observers who are not African American, the comments by New Hampshire's Billy Shaheen -- then a national co-chair of the Clinton campaign -- about Barack Obama's admitted past drug use were simply hardball politics, playing on an opponent's perceived weakness. But to some African Americans, Shaheen's suggestion that if Obama won the nomination, Republicans would dwell on the question of whether Obama ever sold drugs -- well, that was something more than a spitball. (And white though I am, it certainly felt that way to me.)

"Some folks have actually been saying it was a subtle play of the race card," Miller said. "You know what? To me, it was. I'm sorry; I hate to have to say that." She went on to compare Shaheen's comments with the derailing of the Senate campaign of Harold Ford, an African American from Tennessee, by a scurrilous ad depicting a white party girl telling Ford to "call me." Miller even brought up the infamous Willie Horton ad, run by opponents of the 1988 Democratic presidential candidate Mike Dukakis. It preyed on racial fears by blaming the Democrat for a rape and battery committed by Horton, an African American and a convicted murderer, while on a weekend furlough from a state penitentiary. "There's a pattern here," Miller said.

...(snip)...

As Helen Miller puts it, "Now this is a part of Obama's arsenal in terms of why you should not vote for Hillary: because she's really not your friend." ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_real_race_card

[rinsd]

1. Gee I wonder why this was snipped out

"To be fair, Miller is a partisan here, having declared on Sept. 24 her intention to caucus for Obama"

:eyes:

[marmar]

2. It's the closing of the article....and I'm not an Obama supporter, so please don't go there....

:think:

[ellacott]

3. Good article, thank you

The legislator may be an Obama supporter but that doesn't make what she says is untrue.

[ellacott]

4. Sadly this will be dismissed also n/t

[jody]

5. For every black voter who rejects Hillary for perceived racism, are there not also non-black voters

who reject Obama because of his campaigns false accusation of Hillary as a racist?

[MadBadger]

6. Obama's called Hillary a racist?

[jody]

8. I did not say that. You should read more closely. n/t

[ellacott]

7. Funny

[killbotfactory]

9. Hillary isn't racist

It's her subordinates use of racist innuendo that people object to.

[jody]

10. Agree just as Obama's subordinates make veiled accusations against Hillary. n/t

[ellacott]

11. That's the point and that's what seems hard to understand

Bill of all people should understand how this would be perceived.

[marmar]

13. Exactly.....

.... and the best thing for Hillary to do is to put the kibosh on this right now....Or she'll get caught in a shitstorm she can't get out of. NO Democrat can win without a strong black vote.

[bunnies]

12. One question.

Were either Clinton or Gore accused of dealing drugs? hmmmm. I didnt think so. Point made.

edit: punctuation.