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Race issue rears its ugly head in Democratic fight
Mon, Jan 14, 2008 The Straits Times
WASHINGTON - THE explosive issue of race spilled out last week in the increasingly close-quarters battle between Mrs Hillary Clinton and Mr Barack Obama to become the Democratic Party's presidential nominee. With Mr Obama hoping to be elected the first black US president, and a key primary contest looming on Jan 26 in the heavily black state of South Carolina, the issue has rattled both campaigns and put Mrs Clinton on the defensive. Black voters and politicians who strongly backed Mrs Clinton's husband Bill's 1993-2001 presidency have taken umbrage at perceived slights against Mr Obama and the US civil rights movement from both of the Clintons last week. The issue surfaced last Monday when Mrs Clinton, facing her second defeat in a row to Mr Obama in the New Hampshire primary, sought to emphasise her legislative experience against his popular 'change' sloganeering that frequently invoked revered civil rights icon Martin Luther King.

Mrs Clinton sensed quickly that she might be misread, and soon afterwards reiterated that Dr King was a great hero. But her remarks were nevertheless perceived by some US blacks as a slight against Dr King.

Mr James Clyburn, the highest-ranking African-American in Congress and a leading Democratic power broker in South Carolina, suggested on Friday that he might endorse Mr Obama in the wake of the remarks - a move that could help swing the state in Mr Obama's favour.

'We have to be very, very careful about how we speak about that era in American politics,' he said of the 1960s, when the battle for equal rights for blacks was at its peak.

On the same day, Mr Bill Clinton, seeking to discredit his wife's opponent, called Mr Obama's assertion that he always opposed the unpopular Iraq war a 'fairy tale'.

'There's no difference in your (Mr Obama's) voting record, and Hillary's,' said the former president. 'Give me a break. This whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen.'

That was taken by critics as a broader attack on Mr Obama's quest to become the country's first black leader.

Publicly, Mr Obama's campaign has, so far, only echoed the concerns expressed by others, without directly accusing the Clintons of trying to inject race into their primary showdown.

But other Democrats have spoken out.

'For him to go after Obama using 'fairy tale', calling him a 'kid', as he did last week, it's an insult. And I tell you, as an African-American, I find his words and his tone to be very depressing,' Ms Donna Brazile, a black Democratic strategist and long-time Clinton ally, said on CNN.

On Friday, Mr Clinton worked to smooth over the comments that have raised hackles in the African- American community.

He went on the radio show of national black leader Al Sharpton to insist that he was only referring to Mr Obama's record on Iraq, and not his White House aspirations. 'There is nothing 'fairy tale' about his campaign,' Mr Clinton said.

For months, African-American voters have struggled to pick sides between the wife of a beloved former president and the first black candidate with a realistic shot at winning the White House.

Now, as the South Carolina contest approaches, and other states with large black populations loom on Feb 5, when 22 states will vote, Mr Obama may be narrowing the advantage that Mrs Clinton once held among black voters.

A survey by the polling arm of the Alabama Education Association, the Capital Survey Research Centre, out on Saturday showed them locked in a statistical dead heat in Alabama, a Feb 5 state where blacks are expected to make up more than a third of Democratic primary voters.

It shows Mr Obama at 36 per cent and Mrs Clinton at 34 per cent. Last month, the same poll showed Mrs Clinton leading Mr Obama by 40 to 25 per cent.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, WASHINGTON POST, NEW YORK TIMES