Robert Novak discusses the implications for Senator Clinton’s strategy of the fact that, in California, for example, her “12-point overall lead derives from a 59 percent to 19 percent Clinton edge among Latinos.”

Clinton’s 39 percent against Obama’s 27 percent in California’s Field Poll released last week provides much less certainty than a 12-percentage margin normally would. With Clinton falling and Obama rising, it compares with her 40-point lead six months ago.

The demographics are most important. Clinton has dramatically lost support among blacks, trailing Obama 58 percent to 24 percent. It is a virtual dead heat among white non-Hispanics, 32 percent to 30 percent. Therefore, the 12-point overall lead derives from a 59 percent to 19 percent Clinton edge among Latinos. In California, the Latino vote is notoriously undependable in actually voting, especially when compared with African-Americans. How the Clinton campaign deals with Hispanic voters is a sensitive matter, but sensitivity never has been a hallmark of the Clinton style.

Insensitivity was reflected in a recent issue of the New Yorker, when Clinton’s veteran Latino political operative Sergio Bendixen was quoted as saying, “The Hispanic voter — and I want to say this very carefully — has not shown a lot of willingness to support black candidates.” [an assertion that has often been provably false -- ed.]

That brief quote from an obscure politician has generated shock and awe in Democratic circles. It comes close to validating the concern that the Clinton campaign is not only relying on a brown firewall built on an anti-black base, but is reinforcing it. A prominent Democrat who has not picked a candidate this year told me, “In any campaign I have been involved in, Bendixen would have been gone.”

But not in Hillary Clinton’s. During the Jan. 15 debate prior to the Nevada caucuses, where the Latino vote was important, NBC’s Tim Russert read the Bendixen quote and asked Clinton, “Does that represent the view of your campaign?” Her response was chilling: “No, he was making a historical statement.”…The Clintons are making a risky gamble that black voters will not be offended by Hillary Clinton attacking Obama for legally representing a Chicago slumlord or for clearly identifying him as the black candidate for president. They are betting that African-Americans will forget the slurs of January and loyally troop to polls in November.

Amazingly enough, we sort of predicted this in September 2006 — any group that votes 90% as a bloc is potentially vulnerable to some strategy for splintering that vote. But who could have foreseen that it might play out in the bizarre way that it has, with the Clintons themselves possibly becoming that wedge.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 28th, 2008 at 10:52 am and is filed under Democrats, General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.