Viva Las Vegas: the MSNBC debate
Posted: Tuesday, January 15, 2008 9:29 AM by Mark Murray
The Las Vegas Review-Journal tees up tonight’s debate. ”If Nevada's last Democratic presidential debate was a Vegas boxing match, tonight's is an Old West duel. Three candidates remain in serious contention. Two have each won a state. Their goal: Shoot to kill.” More: It is the first Democratic debate since the New Hampshire primary one week ago was won by Sen. Hillary Clinton, creating a tie between her and the Iowa winner, Sen. Barack Obama. Former Sen. John Edwards remains in contention… But in a surprise development, Rep. Dennis Kucinich was on his way to winning a legal challenge to NBC's decision to exclude him from the debate, making it possible a field of four will appear. The far-left pacifist isn't seen as having a chance at the nomination.”
The Las Vegas Sun: With just five days remaining before the presidential caucus, the leading Democratic candidates declared an uneasy truce Monday, at least on the issue of race, following the sharp exchanges of recent days. Some supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton had made clumsy statements that appeared to play to stereotypes of black men in recent days and weeks, while supporters of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama had begun to accuse the Clinton campaign of stoking racial bitterness. For a party steeped in a history of the civil rights movement, the tension was a surprising development.”
"Campaigning in Nevada, Obama called a news conference to praise Clinton, saying he wanted to put an end to the sudden 'unfortunate' tone in the Democratic contest. 'I think that Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton have historically and consistently been on the right side of civil rights issues. I think that they care about the African-American community,' Obama said. 'I just want to make sure that this doesn't end up personal,' he said. 'We've got too much at stake at this time in our history to be engaging in this kind of silliness.'"
Late yesterday evening, Clinton issued a ceasefire statement of sorts as well. "Clinton quickly said she had meant no slight, and on Monday she issued a statement proposing a truce. At about the same time, though, a prominent supporter of hers, Representative Charles B. Rangel, Democrat of New York, said in an interview that Mr. Obama was ‘absolutely stupid’ for calling Mrs. Clinton’s original remark ill-advised.
“‘How race got into this thing is because Obama said “race,”’ Mr. Rangel said on the NY1 cable channel. ‘I would challenge anybody to belittle the contribution that Dr. King has made to the world, to our country, to civil rights, and the Voting Rights Act. But for him to suggest that Dr. King could have signed that act is absolutely stupid.”
At the end of a long day dominated by questions of race, Obama was faced with a question about race, NBC’s Mark Hudspeth reports. "Let's get down to brass tacks here," said Christy Tews, during the question and answer portion of a town hall meeting in front of an overflow crowd of 2,400 at the Carson City Community Center. "We have never elected a black man to President."
"Yes, that's a good point. I've noticed that," Obama joked as high school gymnasium erupted with laughter. Rather than address the issue on most reporter's minds yesterday, Obama used the question as an opportunity to segue into standard material, citing his Illinois Senate race and some polls as evidence that he can attract more support from independents and Republicans than his opponents. "You know, people will take you for who you are", Obama said. "And I really trust in the American people, but I recognize the presidency is different. And I recognize that people will attack you, and send you, they're already doing it, they sent out emails accusing me of being this or being that, and so being the President, running for President is not playing bean bag, this is tough business."
Also yesterday, Obama granted interviews with correspondents from the three major broadcast networks. An Obama aide said it was during those interviews that Obama became uncomfortable with the direction the story appeared to be headed and decided to hold his first formal press conference since before the Iowa caucuses. "Are you concerned it could split the party?" NBC's Lee Cowan asked Obama during the interview.
"Well I think that if you have candidates who try to exploit it, I think it could," Obama said. "That's not something I've done and I'm assuming that's not what Sen. Clinton intends to do either."
So who has the harder glass ceiling to shatter -- Obama or Clinton? The New York Times’ Herbert believes it may be Clinton. "If there was ever a story that deserved more coverage by the news media, it’s the dark persistence of misogyny in America. Sexism in its myriad destructive forms permeates nearly every aspect of American life. For many men, it’s the true national pastime, much bigger than baseball or football." More: "It just so happens that the Democratic presidential candidates are campaigning this week in the misogyny capital of America: Nevada. It’s a perfect place to bring up the way women are viewed and treated in this society, but don’t hold your breath. Presidential wannabes are hardly in the habit of insulting the locals." (We've had a number of women anecdotally tell us its easier for the media to be sexist than racist.)
The New York Times’ David Brooks looks at this race vs. gender issue inside the Dem primary and writes, "The problem is that both the feminist movement Clinton rides and the civil rights rhetoric Obama uses were constructed at a time when the enemy was the reactionary white male establishment. Today, they are not facing the white male establishment. They are facing each other."
Nobody's certain who got the best of this race spat between Clinton and Obama. The quiet CW among some seems to assume that any discussion of race hurts Obama. But the Washington Post reports, "Clinton advisers said that they were trying to simply undercut Obama on his merits. They added that it is far from certain that racially controversial attacks would work against Obama; if anything, they said, they feared the episode could backfire against them."
More: "Both campaigns agreed they were entering uncharted territory at the presidential campaign level. Carville, a longtime Democratic operative who grew up in the racially charged politics of Louisiana, described the debate as wholly unfamiliar. Other Clinton allies have conveyed similar distress that two champions of civil rights have, in essence, been swept up in allegations of racial insensitivity. ‘I'm shaken by the whole thing,’ Carville said.”
