OCCOM BILL wrote:If Hillary loses South Carolina and the defeat serves to demonstrate Obama's ability to attract a bloc vote among black Democrats, the message will go out loud and clear to white voters that this is a racial fight. It's one thing for polls to show, as they now do, that Obama beats Hillary among African-Americans by better than 4-to-1 and Hillary carries whites by almost 2-to-1. But most people don't read the fine print on the polls. But if blacks deliver South Carolina to Obama, everybody will know that they are bloc-voting. That will trigger a massive white backlash against Obama and will drive white voters to Hillary Clinton.
First off, I cant believe we're going on Dick Morris now. Sullivan was one thing, but Morris - yuck.
But, OK, lemme push that out of the way. I gotta admit that, for just this one time, he seems to have a point.
There is, however, one potential snag that could get in the way of the Clintons' racial strategy. As of this moment, there's only a small chance of it happening - but it's a chance. And it would, if the media arent too much asleep at the wheel (a big if I admit), disrupt the narrative they're going for here. That's if Hillary doesnt just lose the black vote to Obama -- but loses the white vote to Edwards.
Throughout this month, Edwards has been polling 26-31% of the white vote in SC. Obama's been stuck at 17-22% since his post-Iowa bounce disappeared. But Hillary has been ahead since the same time - apparently the same white people who had gone to Obama after Iowa went (back?) to Hillary afterwards, cause she went up to 40+% and stayed there.
But there is one latest poll out, from Reuters/C-Span/Zogby, which dissents. It's the only poll that was at least partially done after the brawling debate, and not just does it shows Hillary's black support in SC down at an almost record-breaking low of 16%; it also suddenly shows her white support down to 33%. Which was just one point more than Edwards got.
So there is just this faint possibility that this is not just statistical noise, but that the brawl of the last week(s), culminating in the debate where Edwards seemed the wiser of the three battlers, has not just chased blacks towards Obama, but is starting to chase whites to Edwards too. Its hard to say, cause there's no previous Zogby poll to compare this one too, no remotely recent one anyhow. So who knows.
But if Hillary ends up losing SC not just because Obama got the black vote, but because Edwards trumped her among whites, surely that would change the narrative here?
Just idle speculation for now, of course... but it could be another way in which Edwards is actually helping Obama. Imagine how racialised a polarisation the race might yield if it was really just a pure one-to-one between Obama and Hillary, and he wasnt there to kind of muddy the waters (in a good way, I mean)?
Heh. I do hope that lady is indicative of her peers... but I wish she were 10 or 20 years older...
If Edwards is coming close to splitting the bigot vote, than I guess I may have to place a moratorium on calling him out for being... what you know I think he is... for a spell. As dangerous as the dynastic duo may be, bigotry's desire for a white male strikes me as worse. I reserve the right to change my mind...
