Obama wins Mississippi
Barack Obama has taken the Mississippi primary with 59% of the vote against Hillary's 39% which, according to the Slate calculator, would give him 19 delegates and Hillary 14, notching up another 5 delegate advantage to Obama.
Taken together with Obama's recent victory in Wyoming, both these victories for Obama wipe out any delegate gain made by Hillary in Ohio and Texas and further emphasise the hideous mountain she faces when trying to address what her supporters have taken to calling "the maths problem".
However, the contest has been overshadowed by comments from Clinton supporter Geraldine Ferraro who stated, "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. If he was a woman (of any colour) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept".
Ferraro went further stating, "Anytime anybody does anything that in any way pulls this campaign down and says lets face reality and the problems we are facing in this world, you're accused of being a racist, so you have to shut up... Racism works in two different directions. I really think they are attacking me because I am white."
This is, as Obama has stated, "Patently absurd". The complaints that I have witnessed against the Clinton campaign have been because Clinton has portrayed Obama as being less fit for the role of Commander in Chief than the Republican candidate. I thought that it was disgraceful for a fellow Democrat to portray their rival in this way. However, at no point have I ever believed that Clinton was doing this because of Obama's colour, so I am genuinely puzzled that Ferraro would make the claim that anyone is crying racism. Bill Clinton has been referred to as "America's first black President", so the notion that his wife's campaign is racist is, to me, simply absurd on it's face.
Clinton decided to throw the kitchen sink at Obama and the ferociousness and negativity of her campaign brought inevitable criticism. However, Hillary is a seasoned pro with very broad shoulders. She is also a strategist. She knew the criticism that going negative would bring but she calculated that the positives of doing so outweighed the negatives. That was a price she was willing to pay and Texas and Ohio were said - by her camp- to have been helped by her negative campaigning.
So it's really a bit rich for Ferraro to now act as if Clinton's camp are somehow being subjected to unfair cries of racism when no such charge has ever been made against the Clinton camp.
She made one fair point:
Ferraro had also argued that the campaign had shown sexism to be more pernicious than racism. "It's OK to be sexist in some people's minds. It's not OK to be racist."I have noticed a certain sexism in the way people portray Hillary and, if that were Ferraro's point, she would have better served it by leaving the subject of race out of the equation. As it is, she has played the ridiculous notion of the poor white person being discriminated against on the grounds of her colour. It is simply not a credible position.
But, once again, race has become an issue in this campaign, and it has done so just before Hillary faces yet another do-or-die contest, this time in Pennsylvania. In the clip below Pat Buchanan is asked whether or not this benefits the Hillary campaign ahead of this crucial contest and he replies in the affirmative.
Obama is playing down the win:
Although Obama played down the significance of winning Mississippi, he said the victory would take him closer to racking up the figure of 2,025 delegates needed to secure the Democratic nomination. "It's just another win in our column," he told CNN. "What we have tried to do is steadily make sure that in each state we are making the case for change in our country and obviously in the state of Mississippi people responded."This contest is getting uglier by the fucking day and I for one can't wait for it to be over now.
Nearly 20% of whites said race was important to their votes and nearly all voted for Clinton, according to the exit polls. Among African-Americans, about 40% gave race as a factor in their votes.
Those demographics weighed on Clinton's calculations when she moved on to campaign in Pennsylvania early in the day. "Some people have said, 'Well Mississippi is very much a state that will most likely be in favour of Senator Obama'. I said 'Well, that's fine'," she said in Hattiesburg, Misssissippi, before flying north.
It was bad enough when the gloves came off and we were forced to watch a Democrat attack her rival as being less fit for the top job than the Republican candidate; but, when people start citing racism as the reason why many of us find such attacks unacceptable, then it really is time to reach for the sick bag.
Hillary should have stepped down after Texas and Ohio because she didn't win by a large enough margin to seriously threaten Obama's lead in the delegate count. In every calculation one can make, even allowing Hillary a ten percent lead in every primary and caucus between now and Denver, there is no way Hillary can close that gap.
Which, as we watch the Democrats attack each other over charges of racism, makes me wonder what the fuck is being gained by any of this?
It's simply horrid. And it should stop. And the only way it will ever stop is when Hillary accepts what is now a mathematical reality. She can't win. She certainly can't win by a delegate count. And a victory of any other kind will simply tear the Democrats apart.
So what the Hell is she doing?
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