Now the spinning can be in earnest. What do you think? The NYT has it right now at 53.5% Clinton to 46.5% Obama. I suppose it will wind up somewhere near there. [UPDATE (by David): with 94% reporting, it’s now looking like a 55-45 win for Hillary, beating my predicted margin of 4-8 points.]
Personally, I want to thank everyone who wrote such excellent comments on my Meta of Pennsylvania piece. I have to say, many of the arguments of the Clinton supporters were compelling. If Senator Clinton wants to go all the way to Denver, that should be her call. I know that changing one’s position in any way is generally frowned upon in the blogosphere, and ask for your indulgence đŸ˜‰
UPDATE: Clinton gives what seemed to me a dull speech. Typical boring politics: thanks so much, we’ll keep fighting, I’m here for the little guy. Obama’s speech actually discussed a few issues and took the fight to the Republicans: health care, Iraq, and John McCain.
Meanwhile, the NYT, which endorsed her, called Clinton out on the petulant, spoiled baby style of campaigning she has adopted of late:
The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.
Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.
BOTTOM LINE: The walls just closed tighter on Senator Clinton. Her chances of winning a majority of elected delegates at Denver, mathematically speaking, are less today than they were before the vote.
Well guess we’re stuck with the witch till August. There goes the party and the election. But Ill do my part and go to Indiana and phone bank since Im still a sucker for my man Barack.
I think they are actually the same person — Barack and A-Rod — big gaudy stats, lots of homers and RBIs in the small games/states, but when it comes to winning the big ones, O-Rod will still K in the clutch. (Maybe HRC will have to win as the “wild card”, to continue the metaphor).
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p>Question is, what’s the political equivalent of a groin pull?
I’m amazed that you apparently don’t realize how horrendously sexist that comment is.
My comment replied to jconway.
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p>I’m sure you have your reasons. No explination needed. đŸ˜‰
It’s brutal challenging The Machine.
She won by being negative and fearmongering. Sad.
…to back that up? Care to demonstrate how Obama did not do everything you might feel compelled to accuse Clinton of doing?
She featured Osama Bin Laden in her ads! Her ads were 100% negative, that is a fact.
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p>There were areas of PA where Obama’s ads were 50% negative. And he did have a negative mailer and robocall.
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p>However, the Clinton campaign was very very negative.
her capitalizing on the wright controversy and bringing up Farrakhan when his name was completely irrelevant.
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p>You don’t hear obama blaming Hilary for belonging to the secret right wing prayer group circle with Santorum…
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p>http://www.suntimes.com/news/m…
…you do hear Obama and more importantly his surrogates accusing Clinton of any number of things.
to back that up? đŸ˜‰
…well if you say it’s a fact…
Actually, the Obama campaign has been negative throughout this election. Remember the health care flier that misrepresented Hillary Clinton’s health care plan? The Clinton ad you referred to in your post is not a negative ad. It does not even mention Barack Obama; it talks about Hillary Clinton’s leadership ability. Serving as the President of the United States is the toughest job in the world, so talking to the voters about who will be the best leader when a crisis occurs is important.
No doubt Barack has done some negative campaigning, but there has been no debate over who has done more. Hillary is widely regarded as the more negative campaigner.
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p>Don’t forget Hillary’s mailer misrepresenting Obama’s stance on choice. Much more false and damaging than insurance coverage in my opinion and a terrible thing to take advantage of for political gain.
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p>Oh, and there was the one about how Barack was going to raise taxes by a trillion? I’ve said before that tactics like that are usually reserved for the more “right-wingish”
I also note that you provide no links for your statements. The Obama campaign and his supporters have been attacking Hillary Clinton with vicious personal attacks, all the while claiming that she is the one who is doing the attacking. It is dishonest and outrageous and the voters are beginning to see it for what it is- garbage.
Hillary can do it!
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p>Hillary is the one!
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p>Yes, we can! Yes, she can!
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p>A Democrat in November. Let’s end the Bush run.
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p>
From exit polls in PA: “more than one in seven Obama supporters to say they would vote for Republican John McCain if Clinton were the nominee. Even more Clinton supporters, one in four, said they would defect.”
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p>This is important to note because BO said that he would easily get HCs votes but she wouldn’t be able to get his. It seems there are quite a few incorrect assumptions floating around the BO camp.
The relevant one is how many independents and Republicans would vote for Obama versus Clinton. If every Democrat who has voted in a primary votes for the nominee, and no more, we will lose. The nominee has to be able to attract support from independents and Republicans. Personally, I question Senator Clinton’s ability to do that.
…stop with the false limitations?
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p>How many presidential elections have less voters than the primary? None comes to mind.
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p>If you have a gut feeling that Obama will garner more independents or Republicans, so be it. But there is no chance in heck that only the primary voters are going to vote in the general.
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p>My gut feeling is that the general election will display just how empty Obama’s suit is, but I don’t need to pretend that reality will be altered inconceivably to say as such.
Total Democratic turnout so far is about 15 million. Bush won the 2004 election with about 61 million votes.
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p>My point was that enthusiasm for the candidate in Democrat-only primaries (like Pennsylvania, just saying) is not enough to win the general election.
An Obama / Clinton ticket? I’m starting to think that’s the only viable solution here. It will certainly help those voters who are concerned about Obama’s experience, and Hillary voters won’t jump ship and actually vote against her. This election is different from years past, more voters are leaning toward the Democratic party already. I think both Obama and Hillary will get votes from Independents and Republicans.
Hillary for president and Barack for vice president!
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p>Is a super ticket and will attract an energized electorate.
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p>
and this is coming from a person who voted for Hillary. What I do see here are two candidates that pretty much split the electorate. Neither have enough votes for the nomination, and both will not have enough before the convention. But at this point we’re going to need to give it to the person in the lead and that’s going to be Obama. IMO it would be completely idiotic to not run with the other person who has helped in getting voters enthusiastic again. Guess what? It’s not just Obama who has helped in getting more people registered to vote and having an active primary, no matter what the Obama nuts are shoveling.
this is not good. I wish Hillary and Obama would cut out the nastyness! Oye!
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p>And i dont think BO should waste his time criticizing the media anymore. I think he’s right by the way, the whole rev wright thing was dumb, but he still came off looking weak. Instead he should have more debates with Hillary. He can make his own news, and give us something else to talk about besides the same tired gossip.
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p>Lets look positive
voters getting tired of clinton’s tactics? yeah, the majority of penn voters were so tired of her, they gave her a sound victory, lol!
She was up 19 points a month ago. She really needed to win by a lot more. This just keeps the race going just as it was before with Obama very slowly winning the war of attrition.
And she still beat him by 10 percent in a state that the Democrats need to win in November. Ten percent is a huge margin of victory, particularly given all the money Obama spent. She got exactly the percentage she needed to get to prove that she is the candidate more likely to win in November.
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p>BTW, to be the Democratic nominee, a candidate needs to get 2025 delegate votes. Neither candidate has reached that number yet. Hillary Clinton still could.
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p>Hillary Clinton needs to stay in the race for the sake of all the millions of people who voted for her and all the millions more who want to vote for her in the coming weeks. And she needs to stay in the race for the sake of the party, because the Democratic party needs to make sure we nominate the candidate who will have the best chance of winning in November.
Where does this 10% number come from? Look at the actual results. Do the subtraction. HRC’s winning margin over BHO: 8.6%.
54.6 to 45.4.
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p>As we all learned in elementary school, 6 rounds up, and 4 rounds down. 55-45 = 10 point margin.
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p>Unless you really want to take every state’s result to decimal points.
54.6 – 45.4 = 9.2
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p>As you say, 2 rounds down, so Mrs Clinton’s margin of victory was 9%.
Obama supporters are getting a bit carried away with this percentage thing. She won by 10 points. She was outspent 3-1. Pennsylvania made their choice, deal with it and move on. I’m so tired of people bickering about minute details and missing the larger picture. Focus people, focus!
Everybody knew 6 weeks ago that PA was Clinton’s to win. It’s like Ohio, only with fewer blacks per capita. And yet, across most demographics, BHO did better in PA than Ohio.
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p>That Clinton was outspent is irrelevant — it represents that her ability to fund raise/budget is less strong than Obama. That she won by 9 points is relevant, but to who’s favor? She was up in the polls by twice that 6 weeks ago.
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p>So, just what is the larger picture?
But WHY was it Clinton’s to win?
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p>I heard six weeks of Obama supporters telling the world that he’s the nominee, the guy, the next President, and everyone else was just wasting their time and money.
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p>If that’s the case why did he lose the state? (and it wasn’t close)
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p>Why didn’t he win PA like McCain won Republican states that favored Huckabee (like Texas) once it became clear that he was going to be the nominee?
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p>It’s not making me feel confident in Obama’s ability to take states and demographics away from McCain if he can’t even win those demographics in a primary.
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p>Or are you going to argue that Obama will have more time and attention to lavish on a state than the 6 weeks and millions of dollars he blew on PA?
But WHY was it Clinton’s to win?
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p>I heard six weeks of Obama supporters telling the world that he’s the nominee, the guy, the next President, and everyone else was just wasting their time and money.
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p>If that’s the case why did he lose the state? (and it wasn’t close)
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p>Why didn’t he win PA like McCain won Republican states that favored Huckabee (like Texas) once it became clear that he was going to be the nominee?
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p>It’s not making me feel confident in Obama’s ability to take states and demographics away from McCain if he can’t even win those demographics in a primary.
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p>Or are you going to argue that Obama will have more time and attention to lavish on a state than the 6 weeks and millions of dollars he blew on PA?
But we were taught to round after adding/subtracting in order to avoid amplifying round-off error.
Going from a 20+% lead down to a less than 10% victory is hardly proof that she’s more likely to win in Nov.
In fact, I’d say it suggests the opposite.
All that $$ spent by the Obama campaign took 10-15% away from Hillary in a short ammount of time. Money well spent.
If several million of ads can whittle down a candidates lead that effectively and that quickly, I think that is what makes O'Neil and the rest of the swift-boat hit men drool over the prospect of running McCain against Clinton.
…and the Obama camp has been much kinder with it's advertising thus far than any right wing 527 would be.
6 weeks in a political time frame is a LIFETIME, not a short amount of time as suggested. If he couldn’t win with all that time and all the money he poured into PA, he is not going to win the general election.
Obama spent 6 weeks and millions of dollars, far outspending Hillary, and lost by 10 points.
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p>He won’t have 6 weeks in ANY state in the fall. If he can’t close the gap with a huge money advantage and the entire campaign’s focus on one state, what’s he going to do in the general election?
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p>Look, Obama supporters keep saying “he’s going to be the nominee, and he’s going to win”. If he’s the frontrunner, and he’s going to be the nominee, why didn’t he win yesterday???
It's not Obama that needs to “close”. He's closed already. He is ahead in the popular vote and with the pledged delegate vote with a large enough lead that it is pretty much impossible for Clinton to catch up.
Also, the “huge money advantage” might have something to do with the fact that he is flush with cash from a wide network of small donors while Clinton is 8 million or so in debt.
Now, before you insist again that having overwhelming support in every single state in the primary is a prerequisite to winning the general, consider John F Kerry, who dominated the '04 primaries relatively quickly and decisivly.
Now to turn the question back around:
If Clinton is a strong enough candidate to deserve the nomination, why can't she overtake her challenger?
…don’t lose states. They certainly don’t lose big states like Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania after there’s an apparent “consensus” that they are or are going to be the nominee.
Shoulda been a cakewalk,
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p>Not a resounding victory, and barely one when you look at the delegate count. Obama just EXPANDED his lead tonight.
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p>What concerned me more was the plethora of exit polling showing white blue collars “not ready” for a black candidate. It would be a sad reflection if that was true in 2008 and awful if thats why Clinton won.
as do the actual delegate count numbers.
Delegates
Source Clinton Obama BHO-HRC Yesterday Washington Post 1589 1714 +125 +139 NY Times 1511 1661 +150 +157 AP 1589 1714 +125 +139 CNN 1584 1714 +130 +146 ABC 1583 1716 +133 +145 CBS 1584 1710 +126 +139 MSNBC 1593 1726 +133 +140
These delegate counts are still singing that same old song that goes:
“Hillary has no chance to gain a majority vote in pledged delegates…”
that going forward Obama wins NC, SD MN and OR with 55%, and Clinton wins IN with 55%, and WV, KY, PR and Guam with 60%, then Obama needs just over 100 more superdelegates to reach the delegate threshold. With these same assumptions, Clinton would need about 215 additional superdelegates. There are about 305 superdelegates not yet commited, and about 15 still for Edwards.
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p>It will be interesting to follow the superdelegate moves over the next few weeks, if they continue.
All the talking heads created a high bar of double digits for Senator Clinton to continue to be viable. Guess what Bob, she did it. The voters of PA (you know the Dem only primary that is the base of the party) voted for Senator Clinton after she was outspent 2 to 1 (or is it 3 to 1).
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p>So another Clinton victory in a swing state will be spun as a loss on BMG:
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p>
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p>Senator Obama’s chances of winning a nominating vote of elected delegates is, mathematically speaking, less today than they were before the vote.
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p>So both candidates need superdelegates and both can make their cases for why they can beat McCain in November. And in my humble opinion, Senator Obama’s failure to win with a significant money advantage and a slight advantage in delegates raises serious questions about his ability to win in November.
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p> . .and please the “Hillary went negative” whine is getting old. Obama ran negative as well and will do so again in NC and IN.
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p>If Al Gore had half of Hillary’s guts, he would have stuck to the fight in FLA in 2000 and we’d have had a very different 8 years. Take it to Denver Senator Clinton and to the White House on November 4th!!!!
To have a shot at winning, which means going to Denver with a majority of delegates chosen by voters. She didn’t do that.
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p>She definitely did win by more than expected, and she definitely did win by enough to give her a justifiable claim to keep going (which, as everyone pointed out yesterday, she would have a right to do under any circumstances).
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p>So I agree with everyone that PA was a victory for Clinton. But it wasn’t enough of a victory to change the basic mathematics of the contest.
Obama’s lead in delegate count will probably be reduced by about 20 when PA is settled, so his lead will be about 120-125 going into NC and IN. Assuming he wins NC by 10% and a narrow loss in IN, he will expand that lead to about 125-130. The last 6 primaries will be split, although Clinton should be favored in the majority, so the final result will be a lead for Obama of about 120, unless there is more movement in the superdelegates.
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p>So what then? Maybe the Democratic Party will require a Solomon-type decision if they are to have a coherent approach to the general election. Of the “Dream Team” options, I feel it is very unlikely that an Obama/Clinton approach would work. So the option left may be the Clinton/Obama ticket, which would require Obama (and his many supporters) to fall on his sword for the good of the Party. He may just do that, if he could exact a promise that she would be but a one-term candidate. But given her proclivity for stretching the truth, he may need a firm “pre-nuptial” on any such agreement.
Mrs. Clinton did NOT break the media’s foolish double digit barrier.
but they’re distinctly not “reality based.”
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p>According both to CNN and to the NY Times, with 99% reporting:
Clinton: 1,259,842
Obama: 1,044,676
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p>That gives Clinton 54.7%, and Obama 45.3%. Difference = 9.4%. Not quite double digits, but not 8.6% either.
My source
It was a valid calculation at about 10 AM this morning. I should have stated that it was with only 99.x% of precincts reporting. I stand updated.
fuzzy math to me.
fuzzy math
that blacks vote for Obama 92/8? Are PA black voters racists?
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p>I can’t wait for the first political operative or gasbag pundit to accuse white voters of racism unless the support Obama. Or perhaps that card will first be player here, at BMG.
because I think your comment raises a point that I have not heard anyone discuss fully yet. (I do not agree with your last sentence, however.) There was talk after the NH primary of the Bradley effect, and I heard it mentioned again yesterday on NPR as being a possibility in Pennsylvania. I also have heard statements implying that working class whites would not vote for an African American because of racism. The question that I have not heard discussed is whether it is racism if your sole basis for voting for a candidate is the candidate’s race? In other words, is it the same as not voting for a candidate because of his or her race?
I believe a significant number of voters often choose a Candidate that has the same cultural background or base, looks like them, has the same geography and/or sounds like them and then, oh by the way, where is that candidate on issues.
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p>How many MA State Rep or Senate seats are determined by the largest city in the district block voting even when there are more voters in the rest of the District (Is the 9th CD really a “Boston seat”?).
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p>As a union member, on first look, I tend to favor candidates who are union members. It matters to me that we share a belief in an social and economic structure. It seems reasonable that Gay/Lesbian candidates get the attention of those communities upon initial announcement of campaigns.
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p>We are all aware of voters to vote Irish or Italian and of Districts that have ethnic bends in the candidates they elected.
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p>African American voters turning out in large numbers and vast percentage majorities for a candidiate that shares their experieces and, even god forbid, looks like them doesn’t stike me as racist. It says to me that a viable candidate from that population was long overdue and Obama has inspired real hope and a sense of finally having a voice they can claim in the political world.
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p>I am not naive enough to think that there isn’t a small percentage of African American voters voting Obama because they are racist and want to vote against a white candidate just as there are white voters who will never vote for a black candidate under any circumstances.
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p>I just don’t accept that voting for a candidate that looks like me equals a racist or ethnic statement for an entire voting population.
is that the blacks who vote for obama and the whites who vote for clinton are all voting positively for reasons of identity politics, not against anyone for reasons of racism?
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p>whatever the general reality of the situation, the press and people in general conversation do seem to delight in implying racism to what we’re here calling “white identity voters”, while completely withholding criticism on “black identity voters.” my general impression is that people are thinking “of course blacks would jump at the chance to at last get to vote for a great black candidates, and that’s ok and not racism giving the history of the country. and given the history of the country, of course many whites will never vote for a black man.” i think there is fair reasoning in such sentiments, but i also see potential racism in automatically only assuming the best of obama black voters, and automatically only assuming the worst of clinton white voters.
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p>something to keep in mind when thinking about this black/white dichotomy is that about half of black voters are also women, so they have a potential to identify strongly with both candidates. looking at exit polls, apparently black identity usually trumps gender identity in that cohort, and the extent it does is remarkable. just an observation.
Exit polls showed there were a large number of whites in PA who said they were “not ready” to vote for a black man. As a person who grew up in central PA I whitnessed a shitload of racism – sad reality and I think, oen result of the class system in America that keeps us all fighting for the same scraps.
First off Hilary could have ran an uplifting campaign that continued to get a sizeable # of black votes but she did not.
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p>Now your comment implies that it is possible for black americans to be racist – which it is not.
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p>Racism = power + predjudice
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p>White people have the institutional power in this country. “When a group of people has little or no power over you institutionally, they don’t get to define the terms of your existence, ” – The Reverse Racism Myth: http://www.raceandhistory.com/…
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p>
Nonsense.
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p>Every American who is eligible to vote has power to influence the election. Every American who can communicate has power to influence the election. Every American who can contribute money — even five dollars — has power to influence the election. Every American who can volunteer by making phone calls or poll watching or leafleting or driving people to the polls or helping people with absentee ballots has power to influence the election.
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p>Even black people.
what a patronizing attitude you have there. next you’ll be telling me that no gay men are sexist and indian casino operators never scam. it’s a nice world you live in, but it is imaginary. last i checked, we’re all human beings. this makes each and every one of us prone to the same suite of foibles, including racism, sexism, and any other ism you can think of. if you had said that black people don’t have the institutional power in this country to make others suffer an a large scale with the racism any of them may harbor, i would have agreed. but to state that any group of people is immune to racism is in itself racist.
OBAMA
–continues to lead in the race that counts (delegates), as well as by most of the convoluted metrics people bafflingly like to impose on this race (big state, electoral state, battleground state, swing vote, popular-vote-counting-(or-not)-Mi.- Fla.- and/or-caucuses-(or-not)–gahh!)
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p>–survived the predicted downfall following bittergate, wrightgate, and tempest-in-a-teapot-gate
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p>–has still got a bundle of dough to run on
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p>–has a strong campaign and is an attractive candidate!
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p>CLINTON
–racks up another big-margin victory against the front runner
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p>–leads by some of the the convoluted metrics people bafflingly like to impose on this race (see above, I’m not doing that again)
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p>–has astonishingly positioned herself as tough and experienced
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p>–has a strong campaign and is an attractive candidate!
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p>I learned all this by reading BMG.
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p>Pat yourselves on the backs everybody!