Joaquin Bustelo
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism/2008-March/025835.html
Í don't know if anyone here has followed the comments of the
Clintonites upon losing Governor Bill Richardson's endorsement. The official
reaction was ho hum, no big deal, there weren't any states left where
Richardson, who is of Mexican descent, could help Obama much (which is
probably true).
But having a former prominent cabinet member of the Bill Clinton
administration, who served as both energy secretary and UN Ambassador, the
only Latino governor in the country, who was himself a presidential
contender and is the most prominent Latino politician in the Democratic
Party, supporting Obama could not be dismissed so lightly.
Particularly galling to the Clinton camp must have been the warmth
of Richardson's endorsement, and how Richardson emphasized that Obama's life
experience meant that he understood the situation Latinos faced, that he was
a true friend that the community could rely on.
He said that one phrase in Spanish as he embraced the Illinois
Senator, undoubtedly knowing that this moment would be at the top of
Spanish-language TV newscasts -- which, of course, it was.
It's a subtle thing, but Obama has differentiated himself from
Clinton on the immigration issue, not so much on the details of the proposed
immigration reform each one favors, but by denouncing the scapegoating of
undocumented immigrants and saying he is in favor of giving them drivers
licenses. This last point would be moot under the kind of sweeping
legalization both candidates suggest they would support, but is one of great
symbolic importance to the community.
He painted a portrait of Obama as a "god guy", a decent human being
who, in one of the campaign debates, saved Richardson's but by whispering
"Katrina, Katrina," when the governor was caught by surprise by a question
when he wasn't paying attention.
Richardson also attacked the negativity of the Clinton campaign, a
reference to the increasing racist tinge it is acquiring around the edges.
It's no secret that it was Clinton campaign operatives who jumped on the
Wright smear in the media, and pushed it, giving it a credibility in the
mainstream press it would otherwise not have had. Thus Richardson's fulsome
praise for Obama's speech on race, and the timing of his endorsement to help
prevent the Wright controversy from monopolizing weekend campaign
ruminations by the punditocracy, was clearly aimed at undermining a Clinton
offensive against Obama that had been more effective than anything else the
Clintonites had tried.
And Richardson suggested that it was time for Hillary to quit by
saying, in essence, that he'd never say it was time for some candidate to
quit. But coming within hours of it becoming clear there would be no do-over
in Florida and Michigan, which means that it is impossible for Clinton to
overcome Obama's lead in popular votes or elected (pledged) delegates, the
message was that as one of the more prominent of the super-delegates, it was
time for the super-delegates to step in and put the Clinton campaign out of
its misery.
And there could not be a harsher verdict against Sen. Clinton than
that of a former Clinton Administration insider, rejecting ties that go back
more than a decade and a half to back the upstart from Illinois.
And so calls were steered to "Raging Cajun" James Carville, who
dutifully told the New York Times that Richardson was a traitor, in fact, a
Judas.
He said it on Friday, and on Monday evening he was interviewed by
CNN --twice!-- and went out of his way to repeat and reiterate the
characterization both times. He said people like Kennedy or Daschle having
endorsed Obama didn't bother him, that was fine, he was still friends with
them, but Richardson was a traitor. He didn't bother to go out of his way to
explain just WHY Richardson was a Judas, he only asserted and reaffirmed it.
The reaction in political circles has been instructive. Everyone
agrees it was mean spirited, even stupid, a gift from the Clintons to Obama.
But despite every opportunity to soften his remarks, Carville was, if
anything, more cutting on CNN Monday night than he'd been in his comments to
the New York Times on Friday.
Yet no one has said the obvious thing -- even though Carville
virtually invited this by referring to other Obama endorsees who he did not
castigate in the same way -- that here was the hitherto-dominant white
faction of the Democratic Party lashing out at a Latino who had dared
challenge it, having consciously and explicitly allied himself with what
might by called an emerging Black-identified wing of the party.
But what's going on is brass-knuckle politics. The Clinton machine
wants all the super-delegates still on the fence to know that if she wins
the nomination, they can expect to be stabbed in the back by their own
candidate in the general election if they backed Obama. They won't get
national funding from the DNC, joint campaign appearances, nor anything
else. And they had better believe it. Bill Clinton quite consciously
resurrected the 1994 "Republican Revolution" in Congress after they had done
themselves tremendous damage by forcing a shutdown of the federal
government. He gave them a viciously anti-Black "welfare reform" and an even
more viciously anti-immigrant "immigration reform" before the 1996 elections
to put some wind back in their sales and strengthen Clinton's hold over the
Democratic Party.
That's not the way people on this list are used to thinking about
bourgeois politics because, by and large, the infighting between bourgeois
politicians is really not our concern. However, now that the color line has
so prominently emerged as a dividing line within the world of bourgeois
national politics (its always been this prominent in many local races,
depending on the area) we need to relate to it and therefore to understand
it.
Joaquin
_______________________________________________
pen-l mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
