Let us sharply contrast this on Obama and the Latino vote from Debra Dickerson, writing on Mother Jones Magazine’s MoJo blog,
Obama is running 3 to 1 behind Clinton among Latinos (25 percent of the electorate) in vote-rich California, for instance, with Super Tuesday looming. Similar realities confront him across America. If Obama wants to be the nominee—and survive his first term as Prez—he’ll have to close that gap without alienating blacks, a tightrope I would happily ask my worst enemy to walk. What’s the brother to do?
with this from the excitable and excited Mary Mitchell in Sun-Times,
[T]he upset [on Super Tuesday] was that Obama lost 2-1 among Latinos on the West Coast. Because California has a large Mexican-American population, as does Illinois, you would have expected Obama, a phenomenal field organizer, to have done a lot better than that.
That brings me to a sensitive topic: What role, if any, did racism play in the outcome of the Latino vote?
It brings her to that sensitive topic, but how many others? How many blacks, how many non-blacks?
For one thing, it’s old news. She dates the tension to a 2003 survey, but it’s been an issue in Chicago for decades. I recall the late Msgr. Jack Egan asking plaintively at an auditorium panel discussion (from the audience), how to address the black-Hispanic divide maybe 20 years ago. He felt it was being overlooked.
Mitchell duly notes that in 1983, Latinos came out for Harold Washington in the general election, having largely sat on their hands in the primary.
“They rejected the bigotry,” [Congr. Luis] Gutierrez [an Obama supporter] said. “Those leaders who inspire hope allow us to overcome our innate bigotry and prejudices.”
Obama’s quest for the White House continues to force all of us to think more deeply about our views on race
concludes Mitchell, who makes it a quasi-moral issue. That’s the problem here. Dickerson, who is also black, stands astride no pulpit. Mitchell can’t resist doing so. In some circles that’s called nagging.
Blithe Spirit 