Obama wins in SC, Bill Clinton plays the race card and Weekly Links #2

Obama received around twice the votes HRC did in the South Carolina primary on Saturday. This is great news and gives the Obama campaign a lot of momentum heading into the 22 primaries/caucuses that will be in play come Feb 5. A full rundown of the weekends events can be found here:

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8UECM4G0&show_article=1

As for the HRC campaign response? Bill Clinton immediately made the suggestion that Obama is "just like Jesse Jackson." Full text from ABCnews.com:

January 26, 2008 8:18 PM

Said Bill Clinton today in Columbia, SC: "Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in '84 and '88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here."

This was in response to a question from ABC News' David Wright about it taking "two Clintons to beat" Obama. Jackson had not been mentioned.

Link (with disgusting reader comments): http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/01/bubba-obama-is.html

Now, the Clinton campaign has been trying to paint Obama as "the black candidate" for about 3 weeks now. Josh Marshall at TPM has an analysis of Bill's involvement that you can read here:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/064811.php

Aside from the stain these episodes have left on HRC's campaign and how immoral I think the whole effort is, I'm left wondering if the strategy is working. For a former president, who was once glibly called the "first black president" to issue thinly racist comments you'd think is pretty risky. So far the comments have seeped slowly into the national press, and if pundits start spontaneously comparing Obama to Jackson, I think you could call the strategy a success. Obama will have to counterattack harshly, in my view, and publicize the concerted effort HRC is putting into exploiting stereotypes, without seeming like the stereotypical "angry black man" that Michael Savage et al refer to when speaking about Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Luckily this is uniting a lot of disparaging factions. Sean Hannity and his ilk absolutely detest HRC, and the more rational members of the media, such as Keith Olbermann and Bill Moyers, probably aren't reacting positively to the comments either. Maybe they'll all join forces on this issue, and HRC's strategy will backfire. Like the Zen Master said "we'll see". Either way, it shows what kind of people the Clintons are, and how we Americans cannot suffer an election that turns into a referendum on Bill's presidency. Get the Clintons out, get the dynasties out. This truly is, as Obama put it "the past against the future."

Some links this week:

HRC Campaign says they aren't trying to stir the pot:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/064877.php

Caroline Kennedy endorses Obama:
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Caroline_Kennedy_A_President_Like_My_0127.html

"Obama is a Muslim terrorist" smear campaign is hurting Obama:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0108/8109.html

The Obama Healthcare plan:
http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/