Thoughts on SC primary

The South Carolina primary has come and gone. And the results are in! Barack Obama won the state with more than twice as many votes as his nearest competitor, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Former Senator John Edwards placed third in what might reasonably have been his last best chance at making this historic primary election from a two horse race into a three horse race. But his third place finish effectively means that he has no shot at being the eventual Democratic nominee for this years Presidential election come November.

Why did Barack Obama win in South Carolina and by such a large margin? First, I think the color of his skin was an important factor. Obama won a supermajority of the black votes in South Carolina. According the the exit poll results in the NYTimes, Obama won 78% of the black vote. The black vote in South Carolina accounted for 55% of the total votes cast. Still, the solidarity of the black vote for Obama alone would not give Obama such a large margin of victory.

The second reason why Obama won with such a large margin is because of his message of hope, change and unity. Over the last decade and a half, politics seems to have gotten a lot more partisan. The two major political parties are fighting an ideological war and the ones who suffer are the American people. The people feel like children in a particularly nasty divorce where both sides demonize the other. It has gotten to the point where Democrats are labeled as soft on the war on terror because they are unwilling to abuse and torture prisoners. While Republicans are described as war mongers who believe the ends justify the means regardless of what civil rights are violated or who gets tortured for information. That is why the message of hope, change and unity resonates with people today. The voters of South Carolina are sending a message that they want a candidate who will unite America. A candidate who inspires us to be better than what we have become. A candidate who can bring about changes in the politics. No candidate, Democrats or Republicans, embodies those ideals more than Obama.

The third reason is that people in South Carolina think that Obama was unfairly attacked by Hillary Clinton and her surrogates, especially her husband, former President Bill Clinton. Whether or not the Clinton campaign unfairly attacked Obama is a matter of perception. Currently, the vast majority of people believe that yes, the Clinton campaign did attack Obama unfairly. People believe the Clintons introduced the race card into this campaign. That the Clintons have twisted the words of Obama to suggest that he supported Reagan's policies which devastated the poor and minority groups. Or that Obama thought the Republican party were the party of ideas in the last decade and a half. Whatever it was that the Clintons tried to do, the people of South Carolina thought it was an unfair attack against Obama and they made their feelings known in the voting booth.

Congratulations on a fine victory by Obama. The question is will his newly gained momentum carry on over the next 10 days into super Tuesday when over 20 states will have their primary elections? Or will Clinton stage another comeback like she did in New Hampshire. Either way, the primary season for the Democratic nominee has been the most intense one in recent memory. The question that needs to be answered is, who will win the Democratic nomination to be candidate for the Democratic party? Stay tuned because super Tuesday will be a wild one.

A final note about the primaries so far. I disagree with a lot of Obama supporters on whether or not the Clintons have been attacking his campaign unfairly. If anything, Obama and his supporters ought to be thankful they are facing the Clintons. He is being tested like never before and IF he can come out on top afterwards, it will only make him a stronger candidate. This is politics at the highest levels in the United States. Karl Rove, probably the most hated person by Democrats, has shown that winning is what matters regardless of what underhanded tactics are used. Because the winners decide policy and direction while the losers go back to the Senate like John Kerry. And if Obama can get derailed by members of his own party during the primary season, he can certainly be railroaded by the attack machine of the Republican party. Say what you will about Hillary Clinton, but she takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

To close out this entry, I want to use a memorable quote from a movie and hope that the eventual Democratic nominee does what is necessary to put a Democrat back in the White House. "He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He puts one of yours in the hospital, you put one of his in the morgue."