America Is Not Ready for a Black President?

In my ideal world (well first of all race would not play a factor in an election), it would be interesting to see the true/real statistical break down as to whether or not someone voted one way are the other based solely on race, but we'll never really know.

I think what Obama will do (and I think this is a positive step if it doesn't end with this election), is bring in voters who may not normally vote. This is something we should be able to more accurately track statistically.

 

First of all they weren't elected by the public.

2nd Obama also gets lots of support but yet and still many dont support him due to race. Which could be said if Condi or Colin were nominated.

Until Condi and Coli are people may want to stop using them to justify the Republican's willingness to accept Afro Americans into high offices. Its still not the Presidential Office

 

My whole reason for argument is that race plays a vital part in this election. On both sides black and white.

I agree that some blacks vote for Obama b/c he black, but I also believe the same of white voters.

I further believe due to the numbers of more registered white voters. That Voting for or against Obama due to race plays against him more the for him.

Its unfortunate that its currently exposing the Dems, but I do believe that the same would be true amongst Republican voters if they had the same opportunity for a black Republican nominee.

 

They're a lot of people(on both sides) who feel if he doesn't win, it's because of racist voters. They're also a fair amount who feel that if he's elected, he'll be "removed" from office asap.

IMO him being black is just a double-edged sword. There will be just as many people voting for him just because he's black as there is vice versa.

He'll already be in a bad position to clean up the garbage Bush has left behind. The first mistake he makes and every media, TV and radio station will be all up in his ass.

 

This article at Slate is from a while back but addressed some of these numbers...

http://slate.com/id/2198397/

If Obama Loses Racism is the only reason McCain might beat him.
By Jacob Weisberg, Posted Saturday, Aug. 23, 2008, at 12:02 AM ET

Barack Obama
What with the Bush legacy of reckless war and economic mismanagement, 2008 is a year that favors the generic Democratic candidate over the generic Republican one. Yet Barack Obama, with every natural and structural advantage in the presidential race, is running only neck-and-neck against John McCain, a sub-par Republican nominee with a list of liabilities longer than a Joe Biden monologue. Obama has built a crack political operation, raised record sums, and inspired millions with his eloquence and vision. McCain has struggled with a fractious campaign team, lacks clarity and discipline, and remains a stranger to charisma. Yet at the moment, the two of them appear to be tied. What gives?

If it makes you feel better, you can rationalize Obama's missing 10-point lead on the basis of Clintonite sulkiness, his slowness in responding to attacks, or the concern that Obama may be too handsome, brilliant, and cool to be elected. But let's be honest: If you break the numbers down, the reason Obama isn't ahead right now is that he trails badly among one group, older white voters. He does so for a simple reason: the color of his skin.

Much evidence points to racial prejudice as a factor that could be large enough to cost Obama the election. That warning is written all over last month's CBS/New York Times poll, which is worth examining in detail if you want a quick grasp of white America's curious sense of racial grievance. In the poll, 26 percent of whites say they have been victims of discrimination. Twenty-seven percent say too much has been made of the problems facing black people. Twenty-four percent say the country isn't ready to elect a black president. Five percent of white voters acknowledge that they, personally, would not vote for a black candidate.

Five percent surely understates the reality. In the Pennsylvania primary, one in six white voters told exit pollsters race was a factor in his or her decision. Seventy-five percent of those people voted for Clinton. You can do the math: 12 percent of the Pennsylvania primary electorate acknowledged that it didn't vote for Barack Obama in part because he is African-American. And that's what Democrats in a Northeastern(ish) state admit openly. The responses in Ohio and even New Jersey were dispiritingly similar.

Such prejudice usually comes coded in distortions about Obama and his background. To the willfully ignorant, he is a secret Muslim married to a black-power radical. Or—thank you, Geraldine Ferraro—he only got where he is because of the special treatment accorded those lucky enough to be born with African blood. Some Jews assume Obama is insufficiently supportive of Israel in the way they assume other black politicians to be. To some white voters (14 percent in the CBS/New York Times poll), Obama is someone who, as president, would favor blacks over whites. Or he is an "elitist" who cannot understand ordinary (read: white) people because he isn't one of them. Or he is charged with playing the race card, or of accusing his opponents of racism, when he has strenuously avoided doing anything of the sort. We're just not comfortable with, you know, a Hawaiian.

Then there's the overt stuff. In May, Pat Buchanan, who writes books about the European-Americans losing control of their country, ranted on MSNBC in defense of white West Virginians voting on the basis of racial solidarity. The No. 1 best-seller in America, Obama Nation by Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D., leeringly notes that Obama's white mother always preferred that her "mate" be "a man of color." John McCain has yet to get around to denouncing this vile book.

Many have discoursed on what an Obama victory could mean for America. We would finally be able to see our legacy of slavery, segregation, and racism in the rearview mirror. Our kids would grow up thinking of prejudice as a nonfactor in their lives. The rest of the world would embrace a less fearful and more open post-post-9/11 America. But does it not follow that an Obama defeat would signify the opposite? If Obama loses, our children will grow up thinking of equal opportunity as a myth. His defeat would say that when handed a perfect opportunity to put the worst part of our history behind us, we chose not to. In this event, the world's judgment will be severe and inescapable: The United States had its day but, in the end, couldn't put its own self-interest ahead of its crazy irrationality over race.

Choosing John McCain, in particular, would herald the construction of a bridge to the 20th century—and not necessarily the last part of it, either. McCain represents a Cold War style of nationalism that doesn't get the shift from geopolitics to geoeconomics, the centrality of soft power in a multipolar world, or the transformative nature of digital technology. This is a matter of attitude as much as age. A lot of 71-year-olds are still learning and evolving. But in 2008, being flummoxed by that newfangled doodad, the personal computer, seems like a deal-breaker. At this hinge moment in human history, McCain's approach to our gravest problems is hawkish denial. I like and respect the man, but the maverick has become an ostrich: He wants to deal with the global energy crisis by drilling and our debt crisis by cutting taxes, and he responds to security challenges from Georgia to Iran with Bush-like belligerence and pique.

You may or may not agree with Obama's policy prescriptions, but they are, by and large, serious attempts to deal with the biggest issues we face: a failing health care system, oil dependency, income stagnation, and climate change. To the rest of the world, a rejection of the promise he represents wouldn't just be an odd choice by the United States. It would be taken for what it would be: sign and symptom of a nation's historical decline.

 

Racism is the only reason Obama will lose. That's right....WILL.

 

Awfully naive.


Again... I don't vote because of "color of skin" but rather the "content of his character."

There are basic platform issues that deem it that I simply cannot vote for the Democratic party. I have realized since well before I was of age to vote, and every time there is a hint of a concession on those issues, the door slams shut and it's made clear that the party of Kennedy is not heading back there anytime soon... to pre-1972 to be exact... not even in principle, or in a compromising way.

The only party to compromise, or even consider any degree of comprimise on the major issues I've had, has been the GOP.

We all know the Democrats sided away form racism in the '60's out of convenience, and out of a need to get votes.

Many people know better than to not review the history of the Dixiecratic evolution... and not all of them jumped to the GOP as the claim is made. Many just learned to keep quiet about it.

Biden himself has made multiple racially charged gaffes about Obama and Indian nationals in recent times.

Racism is not a one party issue, nor is it a major enough factor IMO to make some blanket claim of it being the main reason for a loss in the election, should Obama lose.

It's the platform. It's the stance on issues that matter more to me than others. It's the "content of his character" that turns me to another choice.

If your candidate's character stands up for the issues that you most line up with and believe in, if these issues out weigh other issues facing our nation, by all means vote for them.

I'll not blindly call you racist for not voting for someone not of your skin color.

That's stupidity... because there is no way it can be simple naivety in this age.

Furthermore, you disrespect Obama if you don't think he has already overcome racism to be the Dem Nominee for POTUS, and cannot beat it again.

The argument sincerely fails to hold water in 2008.

So Clinton is white... or not?

 

Interesting comments from Dick Armey. I completely agree with him. I would agree with Clarence Page's 6% theory, but since Obama has an advantage with the electoral college, I think the polling margin for him to win the election is ~3-4%. So much for those who said here earlier that nobody was considering race or that "race doesn't matter" in this election. It is a significant obstacle for Obama.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-oped0924pagesep24,0,3492041.column

Obama hurdle called 'Bubba'

Clarence Page

September 24, 2008


What's Barack Obama's biggest remaining obstacle on his road to the White House? A nationally prominent Republican sums it up in a word: "Bubba."

"The Bubba vote is there, and it's very real, and it is everywhere," former House Majority Leader Dick Armey recently said. "There's an awful lot of people in America, bless their heart, who simply are not emotionally prepared to vote for a black man."

Sad, but true. I hate to nickname the problem "Bubba." I used to have a beloved Alabama uncle named Bubba. I loved Unc'a Bubba. He taught me how to milk a cow when I was 7 years old.

Bubba began as country slang for "brother." I don't know how it became a label for working-class white folks, but I'm sure my late Unc'a Bubba would want Dick Armey and the rest of y'all to know that there are a lot of black Bubbas too.

Anyway, as Armey implies, Obama fared worse in the primaries with white working-class males and their wives than with other identifiable groups of voters. That has also been typical of his party. Democratic presidential candidates have lost the white male vote in every presidential election since 1964, when President Lyndon B. Johnson, himself a quintessential Bubba in his younger days, beat Sen. Barry Goldwater.

Bill Clinton, another notable bearer of Bubba credentials, came closest in 1992. He was aided by third-party candidate Ross Perot's challenge to President George H. W. Bush who, despite his Texas tenure, remains a bit Bubba-challenged.

Yet, even Bubba knows something about political correctness these days, so he won't always tell the truth to pollsters. As a result, you will not always hear Bubba speak as candidly as Armey did to editorial writers and reporters at USA Today and Gannett News Service. Armey chairs the conservative think tank Freedom Works.

As Armey said, race-based voting is "deplorable, but it is real." That's why Obama has more reason than McCain to feel nervous about close polls.

In fact, if Obama fails to show at least a 6-point advantage in the polls by Election Day, I expect John McCain to be our next president.

Where do I get that number? I'm no math whiz, but I don't have to be one to notice that during the primaries Obama did best in caucus states, where the voting is conducted in public. Where votes were cast in the privacy of voting booths, Obama tended to do worse than the polls predicted. When Obama showed a lead that fell within the margin of error in the polls, it tended to mean a victory for his principal opponent, Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Now new evidence has emerged to back my 6-point theory. A new and unusually comprehensive AP-Yahoo poll that takes a look at racial attitudes offers this unsettling news: "Statistical models derived from the poll suggest that Obama's support would be as much as 6 percentage points higher if there were no white racial prejudice."

Of course, that's a rather grand statement, considering how difficult it is to identify racial prejudice, let alone measure it. White people don't have to be racist to vote against Obama, any more than black people have to be racist to vote for him. There are plenty of other reasons to vote for or against him.

For example, how do you separate race from apprehensions that he's "maybe a little too sophisticated?" Or the relentless e-mails carrying false rumors that the Christian Obama is really a Muslim—as if that would be a terrible thing?

Besides, Bubba might well be among the most inclined to see the 90-plus percent black turnout for Obama as justification to vote along racial lines too. As the black comedian D.L. Hughley observed, fighting racism is like weight loss: "The last few pounds are the hardest to get rid of."

Yet, one of today's quintessential Bubbas offers encouraging advice for Obama. Former President Bill Clinton, appearing on "The View," gave three good reasons why he thinks Obama will win: (1) "Two-thirds of Americans are having trouble paying their bills;" (2) America is "growing more diverse," pulling the electorate toward Democrats; and (3) voter registration is "up for Democrats and flat for Republicans in the 20 most important states."

Indeed, the fundamentals for a Democratic sweep are strong, partly because the fundamentals of the economy are so weak. That's a big reason why John McCain's convention bump has faded and Obama has been running even or slightly ahead.

But, if Obama is going to win, history shows "slightly" isn't going to be good enough.

Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune's editorial board. E-mail: cptime@aol.com

 

Don't distress them with facts like . .
80+ percent of Blacks have voted democratic in like the last 5 elections
and strangely enough . . IT WAS FOR WHITE DUDEs. . . .
wwwhhheeewww . .. look out there now. . . . think Kerry was 'black enough'?

SO
If Republicans are voting against him BECAUSE HE A DEMOCRAT
I will assume 80% of black folx are voting for him . . BE CAUSE HE NOT A REPUBLICAN . . .or. . .HE IS A DEMOCRAT!

but such logic is lost on those willfully blinded by his. . er. . . 'URBANNESS'

Rocket River

 

EXCELLENT POST

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