January 26, 2008
Obama Pulls Off Decisive S.C. Win, Plus One Heck Of A Speech
UPDATED.
When Barack Obama announced his candidacy for the White House in February last year, he knew he was a mere mortal going up against a dragon. Hillary Rodham Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, comprised the head of the Democratic Party establishment. The race for the nomination was Hillary's for the taking, the chattering classes believed, because the Clinton machine was simply too entrenched, too monied, too formidable.
Tonight, Barack Obama drove a dagger into the heart of that dragon.
In a rousing, to-the-rafters speech reminiscent of a religious revival, the one-term, 46-year-old senator from Illinois delivered a damning indictment of the very thesis of Clinton's candidacy.
"We're looking to fundamentally change the status quo in Washington. We are looking for more than a change in the party in the White House," Obama told a packed auditorium of supporters. "This is a status quo that extends beyond any particular party. We are not going to let them stand in our way any more."
The crowd of supporters reflected Obama's crossover support in the South Carolina Democratic primary. There appeared to be as many blacks as whites, women as men, with representative smatterings of other races. At various points throughout his victory speech, the crowd chanted "Yes we can!" "Race doesn't matter!' and "We want change!"
That second chorus reflects the unseemly role race has taken in Obama's and Clinton's rivalry. Obama may have gotten extra help in South Carolina from the perception the Clintons were seizing on Obama's race as part of an argument that he could not win a national election.
In his victory speech, Obama quickly dispensed with Clinton's main argument for her candidacy: experience.
"We're up against the conventional wisdom that says your ability to lead depends on longevity in Washington or proximity to the White House. But we know that real leadership is about candor and judgment, and the ability to rally Americans from all walks of life around a common purpose, a higher purpose," Obama said to what sounded like deafening, rock concert applause.
Obama's speech tonight was more barbed than the one he gave after his Iowa caucus win. The Clintons, Bill in particular, are known for their fierce partisan dogfighting. Obama tonight showed that not only does his candidacy transcend race and youth, it also transcends the Politics 101 rules of partisanship.
"We are up against the forces that are not the fault of any one campaign. It's the politics that uses religion as a wedge and patriotism as a bludgeon. A politics that tells us we have to think, act and even vote within the confines of the categories that supposedly define us," Obama said.
He went on to mention a Republican woman who used to work for one-time segregationist icon Strom Thurmond. She is now campaigning for Obama. "Don't tell me we can't change," he boomed, with Sunday-morning spitfire. (Watch the speech here.)
We could go on with the church analogies -- he dropped the word "believe" about a dozen times -- but that's because Obama showed tonight that he really can convert nonbelievers, and he intends to keep doing so ahead of Super Tuesday. It's no surprise Clinton opted not to deliver a big concession speech. She's moved on to Tennessee to solicit Feb. 5 votes there. At a town hall she quickly congratulated Obama and then immediately moved on to talking about Super Tuesday.
As recently as a couple of months ago, South Carolina's black voters seemed to doubt Obama's ability to win the presidency. Today, those voters propelled him into a solid victory over Clinton in this Democratic primary.
Obama's triumph in the first-in-the-South nomination vote was so clearly decisive that AP and the cable news networks were able to call the primary for him right after polls closed at 7 p.m., with fewer than 1 percent of precinct results in. Obama ended up taking 55 percent of the vote, while Clinton received a relatively paltry 27 percent and John Edwards, the only Southerner in this contest, received 18 percent. (See the county-by-county breakdown here.)
Exit polling shows that blacks, who make up about half this state's voters, overwhelmingly favored Obama. The Clintons campaigned heavily on the former president's long history of support among black voters. But Obama, who had much lower name recognition in South Carolina six months ago, established a savvy ground operation in the state, which included sending volunteers out to the barbershops and hair salons so central to Southern black social life.
As recently as December, the black vote was largely evenly split between Clinton and Obama. Obama enlisted the support of mega-celebrity Oprah Winfrey, who appeared with him at a rally in an 80,000-plus capacity football stadium. The event was heralded as a possible turning point for him in that state, as voters were treated to the sight of two tremendously successful Americans who happened to be black.
Obama hasn't made his race a central issue of his campaign, and while that seemed to initially irk black leaders like the Rev. Jesse Jackson, it has helped him win enthusiastic support among whites. South Carolina's results indicate that not taking up the race mantle hasn't hurt him among blacks, an initial concern among some supporters.
Bill Clinton stayed behind to address supporters in South Carolina. He also tried to change the topic to Super Tuesday and appeared to stump on behalf of his role in his wife's campaign.
"He won fair and square," the former president said after offering his own congrats to Obama. "Now we go to Feb. 5 when millions of Americans finally get into the act."
Perhaps out of worry, Clinton is appealing to the Democratic National Committee to seat Florida's and Michigan's delegates, who are being punished for those states' early-vote maneuvering. Her campaign believes she could win Florida, which would help her rack up more of the 1,678+/- delegates at stake.
After sounding off themes Camp Clinton believes will ultimately win her the nomination -- strength on the economy, health care, foreign relations -- the former president continued, "I am here because I think I know something about what it takes to put together a successful presidency, and because today, in my current capacity post-politics, I work with ordinary Americans and ordinary people around the world."
The flap over race has dominated this rivalry in recent weeks, forcing both camps to call a truce on a couple of occasions. The role Bill Clinton has played in his wife's presidential bid has come under some scrutiny lately, and her significant loss here may force Camp Clinton to recalibrate his presence on the trail.
Moreover, Obama's win tonight may be proof that Hillary Clinton's effort to co-opt his "change" message is a nonstarter. She will have to stick with her "experience" message and keep Democrats looking ahead to the general election. If John McCain emerges the winner in Florida in Tuesday's Republican primary, that would help seal his front-runner status. Democratic voters have a rather painful choice to make between Obama's banner of hope and moving forward and Clinton's reassurances that she is her party's best shot at retaking the White House after nearly eight unhappy years under President Bush.
"I am very hopeful that we can now get this whole issue of racial differences behind us and go forward talking about the divisions our candidates have, their competing visions for this great nation, and about our vision of the Democratic Party," James Clyburn, the third top-ranking Democrat in the House and eight-term representative from South Carolina, told CNN. He is not endorsing a candidate in his party's primary.
That Obama pulled South Carolina right out from under the Clintons' feet may convince Democrats fearful he can't win a general election to sign on. Exit polling shows that not only did Obama clean up the black vote, he had a strong showing among young voters and college-educated whites.
But none of the early voting states could be described as bellwethers. The jackpot states are more representative of the national electorate, and so national polling may be a better indication of how things will shake down on Feb. 5. Clinton still maintains a solid lead in national polls. With cash-on-hand already an issue for the campaigns, in this most expensive of elections, Obama has little time to take his stump message of change and optimism to all those states.
As for Edwards, he's still in the race. He insists that he will stay in the race until the Democratic National Convention, and for reasons many of us don't feel comfortable talking about, it makes sense to take him at his word.
Photo illustration by Reuben Dalke
Posted at 10:36 PM
Posted to:
Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Bush Administration, Campaigns, Democrats, Hillary Rodham Clinton, John Edwards, John McCain, President Bush, Republicans, WH 2008
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