How the Clintons lost the black vote

Before this presidential election is over, Barack Obama will be waterboarded as Black, Muslim and Terrorist -- the three things on which America has declared war.
 
Much of this negativity has been hurled by his nemesis Billary, the two-headed, anti-hope machine that finds it's political fate in jeopardy.  But as much as Billary thinks it can read the hearts and minds of black people, it doesn't realize just how much black people will rally around one of its own when attacked, especially the likes of Barack Obama, the embodiment of those kitschy buzz words hope and change, this generation has never seen.
 
From Billary, there's always been this idea that Obama, a former community organizer, state legislator and junior senator, wasn't experienced enough, that it wasn't his time.  For many black people, this slight was symbolic of the black continually being passed over for jobs and promotions, being told you're not qualified enough, you don't have enough degrees, you don't have enough experience, only to watch a white person of equal or lesser qualification take the same position.
 
"The Clinton camp seems shocked that Obama is so successful," says Bernard Greene, a 31-year-old married father and IT Manager. "Everyone's cool when you are in your place, but when you start threatening to be more successful than the people who think they brought you in, things start to get nasty."
 
For Hillary's experience, she was the first lady.  Although the two Democratic candidates agree on broad issues like troop withdrawal and universal healthcare, they do differ on the details.  But as much as Clinton touts her experience, Obama is right to point out -- using the vote to go to war in Iraq, which Clinton supported and he didn't as an example -- we don't need a president who will be ready on Day 1. We need a president who will be right on Day 1.
 
Policy aside, Billary continues to throw race-fueled hand grenades in its thirst for power no matter how it splinters the Democratic Party.
 
First there was Bill, who after Obama handily won the South Carolina primary, basically said so what. Jesse Jackson also won South Carolina when he ran for president in 1984 and 1988. The implication was that Obama had the benefit of some political affirmative action. He didn't win because he's the better candidate. He won because he was black.
 
Then Hillary, despite the fact that she feels Obama is all words and no substance, recently said that she'd offered him a job as vice president, her presidential sidekick, dismissing the fact that he is the frontrunner, which some critics have called a get-to-the-back-of-the bus mentality.
 
The truth is Hillary is not in a tight race with Obama.  Even if she managed to scorch the entire earth and win every primary, she'd still lose the delegate count.  Her only shot at the White House is to get the superdelegates to go against the will of the people and destroy the Democratic Party.
 
The latest assault came from Geraldine Ferraro, 1984 Democratic presidential nominee and Hillary campaign finance chair, who said Obama has only gotten this far in the race because he's black.
 
That a black man named Barack Hussein Obama running for president has an advantage is a low blow, intended to scare, anger and rally Hillary's base, which has dissipated to working class white men.
 
Hillary demanded that Obama renounce Louis Farrakhan for his support, yet she remained silent on Ferraro.
 
"Hillary is really showing her true colors," says Greg Goodwin, a graphic designer, who's switched his support from Hillary to Obama. "First she has the nerve to offer Obama a job, then one of her elite supporters boldly attributes Obama's success to his race, as if the race for the presidency is some kind of equal opportunity employment revolution. It's a very bold and condescending move on her part."
 
No Democrat has won the White House since 1948 without carrying Pennsylvania, the birthplace of liberty. The state has been described as Philadelphia on the east, Pittsburgh on the west, and Alabama in the middle.

The latest poll shows Hillary with a double-digit lead, and both the governor and the mayor of Philadelphia have decided to back her and the party machine.  But it may be of little consequence.  Even in southeastern Pennsylvania, some believe he'll do better than expected by appealing to the college-educated and the middle-class.

And one third of the state's Democrats live in Philadelphia, which is 43 percent black, and the Clinton campaign's race-based sniping is turning off some Hillary supporters.

"The more I learn about the Clintons and their doings, the less I like them," says Jeffrey Pender, 43, a cigar shop owner.  "I'm going with Obama."
 
Although Clinton has apologized for her husband's degrading remarks, the question is whether black Democrats in Philadelphia and beyond will see her act of contrition as just words.