Bumped Again

from my little BBC gig. I was about to talk about Barack Obama and if America is ready for a black President.

I think that a look at the two campaigns in 2006 most affected by race, the Ford-Corker Senate campaign in Tennessee, and the Webb-Allen Senate campaign in Virginia, are a key to this equation. Ford did respectably despite being black in Tennessee (although his campaign appeared to crater right at the time when the "Harold, call me" ad came out), and Allen lost despite being a racist in Virginia. The parts of the deep South where an African-American President wouldn't "play well" aren't exactly the swing states Obama would need to be victorious. If a Democrat wins in 2008, he/she will likely be the first President to win without gaining 5 seats or more in the South. I think Virginia, Missouri and Arkansas are in play no matter who the nominee is, as they are border states in the South. But it'd be very unlikely for a Democrat to win more than them (and putting Missouri in the South is charitable). I'm not sure Edwards would have a lock on North Carolina.

More than racial politics, I think Obama represents a change in generational politics, and that's what gives me some excitement about his candidacy. Young people favor him, and view him as a symbol of the future rather than the past. I've seen this up close when seeing him speak at USC a few months ago. He'd generate far more excitement than anybody else in the field among a group that's historically difficult to get to the polls. That, above any potential negative based on race, could tip the balance in his favor. I don't doubt that having Obama atop the ticket will cause ugliness, but the energy may offset that.

P.S. I find this article from Rupert Murdoch's British paper, that Obama has no good feeling among black activists, to be dubious. Here we have a few quotes taken out of context and a lot of sniping from a news reporter on another continent trying to gauge the sentiment of the black community. And it's a conservative paper doing a hit job on a leading Democratic candidate. Not buying it.