Ninety-Two Percent

So who is she? Does she dress up in white robes at night? Does she secretly attend white supremacist meetings? Does she make a practice of not hiring anyone of a different skin color? Did she grow up on the dusty fields of "Tobacco Road"? Were her parents, spouse, or child noted bigots?

What is it about Hillary Clinton that made ninety-two percent of the African-Americans who went to vote in North Carolina, come out against her and support her rival? In state after state with significant African-American populations (i.e. Georgia, South & North Carolina, DC, Maryland, Virginia, etc.) Hillary Clinton has garnered between 6% to about 15% of the black vote. With odds like that, there is no doubt about why so many southern states went in to the Obama column.

Yet where is the ranting, raving, and suspicious inquiries into this phenomenon? Hillary Clinton (and her husband Bill) have been great champions for African-Americans. Early on in the campaign many prominent Black Americans came to support Hillary. This impressive list included BET head Robert Johnson, actress Whoppi Goldberg, Congresspeople John Lewis and Sheila Jackson Lee, and Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter. But as the election has gone on, her vote totals have slipped below what even George W Bush was able to garner in his winning runs for the presidency.

If things were reversed, pundits would be all over this issue pointing out racism. Indeed, even with Clinton pulling some 60% plus of the white vote, analysts have murmured about a white racist trend. But is this fair? Obviously, Obama has won caucus states that are considered white (i.e. Utah, Maine, etc.) and has won such white primary states as Wisconsin and Washington. When a large majority of whites vote for Clinton in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and North Carolina, that still means a significant minority pulled the lever for Senator Obama.

So we come back to the original question. Why would so many African-Americans completely back the African-American candidate? One could understand if the competition was the person we asked about in the first paragraph. Obviously, Hillary Clinton does not fit any of those bigoted stereotypes and has given her life to spread compassion and equality for all Americans. If the election was progressing the way the whites have been voting, then it would be expected that Clinton should still be receiving somewhere between twenty to thirty percent of the black vote. In the southern states that she lost, this higher percentage would most definitely put her in the ball game and make these southern primaries a lot closer than they actually have been.

It is high time that we all have the boldness to tackle this question. It is high time that we all have the courage to even state this question. Is there a racist element at play in the African-American Democratic vote that is propelling Barack Obama to victory?