How do you expect Obama supporters to respond to that? Why should he get all the criticism for interjecting race, when most of it is coming from the other side? If there were a bunch of gender related comments coming from Obama supporters, wouldn’t it be expected that there’d be some response to that from the Hillary camp? Yet Obama is supposed to ignore it or else he’ll be accused of being the race baiter himself. I’m not an Obama supporter but objectively I can see that’s patently ridiculous.

And no, I’m not saying that Hillary and/or her supporters are racist (I don’t think anyone thinks that.) The question is, are some of her supporters purposely bringing up racial biases in order to try to use Obama’s race against him (by planting seeds of doubt, that the electorate will accept him.) The idea is you don’t have to be a racist yourself to use race against your opponent- you only have to believe that there is a block of racist voters you can exploit, or even convince your party’s voters to believe that there are enough racist voters in the other party that would stop a black man from being electable.

But the honeymoon is ending, and he’s going to end up in the mud, including on ethnic issues, whether he wants to be or not. In Nevada, for example, both candidates have to appeal to the Hispanic vote to carry the state in the caucuses, which is why we see the fight between the (largely white) teacher’s union and the (largely Hispanic) culinary workers union. And in South Carolina Clinton’s dillema is how to go negative on Obama without completely alienating the black vote, especially the black women’s vote.

It’s gonna get uglier.

From FactCheck:

We turn first to the most recent of these Internet whispering campaigns: a widely forwarded e-mail that says Barack Obama’s church, the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, is anti-American, will only accept black parishioners and tilts toward Africa at the expense of the United States. The e-mail claims Obama is therefore "certainly a racist" and "desires to rule over America while his loyalty is totally vested in a Black Africa."

We’ve had scores of queries about the accuracy of this one. It’s bunk. For one thing, the church welcomes whites, according to a University of Chicago professor of divinity who says he has attended. And while its controversial pastor is a fiery advocate for blacks and liberal causes and a fierce critic of anti-black discrimination, we’ve seen no evidence that he preaches hatred of or discrimination against whites.

The finger print comment should have included a snark warning.

This incident reminds us in the US, what we already know, that you would have to be sub-mental to believe that change starts in Washington.  HRC arguing this point(and using LBJ?!?!) as the point of reference is not racist, but it is ignorant, sloppy oratory and offensive to some Americans.  You argument would be more compelling if it appeared the you understood the history surrounding the civil rights movement. You would also understand why so many found her comments offensive.

  When you open your mouth and say something that is patently absurd and offensive (to whomever and whether you meant it or not) then you shouldn’t look for your opponent to bail you out.  I would  let her wither on the vine – politics is a contact support.  I didn’t see anyone coming to Obama’s rescue after his foreign policy gaffe re: Chavez et. al.  Take your lumps, explain your position and move on – pointing fingers at your opponent and crying about how unfair it is makes you look childish.  Shocker of shockers, your opponent wont rescue you from an ill-advised comment???

O, and there’s nothing racist about that e-mail. It’s nasty perhaps, but not racist. Seemingly some Americans have a hard time understanding what racism actually is. And the part about race-baiting well, that’s exactly what Obama and his crew are doing, isn’t it?

Very sad.

If he’s such a ‘uniter’ he would use the opportunity to bring people together. Instead he purposefully – and his campaign – let it linger. And yes Lynx, some of those doing this stuff are close to Obama.

There’s no way to deny that he’s accepting it himself and that some close followers and feeding it.

I know you’re normally very strongly against this kind of tactic, don’t let that attitude change just because you tend to like Obama. Even when you like someone you can call him or her out on a tactic you don’t agree with.