This is a follow up to a previous diary where I had started to look at the impact of race and gender on selected primaries after West Virginia. The premise is that one can take the data from exit polls and estimate the percentage of voters that used race and gender in their voting decisions. Most exit polls ask if race or gender was important in deciding who you voted for. By looking at how people who answered "yes" to these questions, one can determine their impact on the outcome.

More in the extended entry.

I am an intern for the Democratic Party in a swing state. Part of my duties today (besides making coffee of course!) was to answer incoming phone calls. Some people in this area decide to call the local Democratic Party to vent their anger and frustration regarding the primaries and their results. Many of them are angry Clinton supporters, though there are some Obama people who are very upset that she hasn't stepped out yet. I want to tell this community of a conversation that I had this morning with a Catholic woman who identified herself as a lifetime Democratic voter.

This caller is a Clinton supporter and she started the conversation by asking, "Why did our party make this mistake of nominating an inexperienced candidate with so much baggage from Chicago?" I of course provided the company line that the Democratic Party has not endorsed a candidate and that ultimately we are going to support whichever candidate is nominated.

She pressed further, "but even him?!" This is when I started to engage with her and try to push her towards the candidate that does appear to be our persumptive nominee. In regards to the lack of political experience, I told her that Barack Obama has been in elected office for more years before the presidency than George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and many former presidents, including Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Franklin Roosevelt, and Woodrow Wilson. What matters in this election is judgement, which can be achieved through the sheer number of years in government or the ability to appropriately see a problem and find its solution. In regards to Obama, we know that he wants to push for an end to the war in Iraq, economic reform, and greater health insurance benefits. For McCain, we know that he wants 100 years in Iraq, no substantial change to our nation's "markets," and reductions in a number of items that affect our nation's safety net. Who has the better judgement there to solve our problems?  

This began as a response in one of the diaries condemning Obama for Father Pfleger. As it got longer, I thought I would put it in a diary instead. As the title says, it is rambling and raw.

Let me start by saying what should be obvious, I condemn hate speech. I condemn prejudicial, racist, sexist, anti-Semitic (Jew and Arab) language.

It really concerns me how committed too many supporters in this campaign have been to the concept that their candidate has been mistreated based on their gender or race. Recently, I have noticed two main developments within the reasoning of many on this blog: 1) Hillary Clinton is losing mainly because she is being mistreated due to her gender, and that has been tacitly supported by the Obama campaign, and 2) Barack Obama has constantly pulled the race card in this campaign to better his position in the polls. To both of these assertions, all I can say is "WHAT THE HELL?"

In regards to the first assertion, I think that reasonable people must realize that there are bigger reasons for Clinton's current status as losing the nomination. First, instead of chalking this up to sexism, consider that the campaign was horribly mismanaged, especially in Iowa. There was financial mismanagement, message mismanagement, and strategic mismanagement from the earliest parts of the campaign.

After spending millions on upscale consultants, donuts, and unnecessary snow plows, Mark Penn told Hillary to run in a post-9/11 world that supposedly valued toughness and "experience" and to focus on these attributes.  This was a complete misreading of polling information, especially in terms of a Democratic nomination contest.  The overwhelming majority of Americans, especially Democrats, have seen what "toughness" and "experience" have brought us in Iraq.  They desperately are searching for real change.  It's hard to hit into that sentiment when your campaign wants to be a quasi-incumbent.

In debate after debate she invoked horrible memories of when women couldn't even vote. Talked about how old ladies who were born before women could vote wanted to live long enough to see a woman president.  So even if Obama did play the race card, how is that any different from Hillary playing the gender card.  Both blacks and women have a right to take pride in a historical election & view it in historical context.

Where the Clinton campaign crossed the line however was in feeding racist stereotypes about blacks dealing drugs and about hard working Americans being white Americans (and don't tell me she didn't mean it; she never means anything the way it sounds).  As for Bill's fairy tale comment, I agree that was over-hyped, & I couldn't care less if he compared Obama to Jackson.  But the other 2 comments crossed the line.

Update: I received an email from someone claiming to be Michael Wolff pointing out that I use 'Richard' several times in this essay. Ooops! He got me! Chalk it up to a bad pain day. Most of you know I'm usually vigilant when it comes to details like this - but sometimes, when the pain gets really bad, the back of my brain takes over. I was thinking about the TV pundit Richard Wolff (the Wolff I know best). It just came out - and for that I am sorry. If I'm eviscerating the man - I should at the very least get his name right! So thank you MICHAEL Wolff for the correction. That took courage.

A few weeks ago I read an article in Vanity Fair that really scorched my shorts.  I was so pissed off, I had to think about it a while - let it simmer, so to speak - see if the pot came to full boil.  Well it did.  I'd say I'm well and truly `boiled' now.  In fact - the more I think about it the `prime-ier' I get.  Why this particular diatribe?  Out of the encyclopedia of `I Hate Hillary's' littered like smashed walnuts on the side of the road - why did this pop my kettle?  The complete and utter denigration and dismissal of women in general.  Call it the final straw - the last nail in the coffin - one insult too far.  You see - Michael Wolff has declared us over 50 types unfuckable - and you know what that means: invisibility to the point of shunning (he even uses that word!).  Guess we can all go home now girls - at least those of us in what the opposite gender sees as peri-(pathetic) menopause.  We are now officially invisible - except for Hillary, of course.  She's still out there - plugging away - but it's only a matter of time.  She's fading - shrinking towards germ status (with any male handy the prescribed antibiotic).  The estimable and oh so quip worthy Mr. Wolff has pronounced her persona non grata, so - behold the unfuckable woman!

Let's look at some data as opposed to throwing numbers and accusations around. Exit polls ask if the gender and race of the candidate was important in who you voted for. We'll have to make a couple of assumptions.

1.    The responses are an accurate reflection of the person responding to the question.

2.    As in all polls, we'll have to assume the results reflect the voting population.

3.    And we'll also have to assume that voters using gender as a reason to vote for Clinton aren't sexist (since in this campaign its generally understood that if you aren't voting for Clinton specifically because she's a women that represents a sexist approach) and that voters using race as a reason to vote for Obama aren't racist (likewise, if you're not voting for Obama specifically because he's black that is construed as a racist approach).

More in the extended entry.

In tonight's your moment of Zen:

If sexism is in fact a major reason for Clinton losing, then wouldn't that mean that the most sexist states are the ones where she did badly -- progressive states like Oregon, Wisconsin, and Vermont -- while the least sexist states are ones where she did very well -- states like West Virginia and Kentucky?

But then why are Kentucky and West Virginia known for being conservative when it comes to social issues and Oregon, Wisconsin and Vermont are known for being far more liberal?