Elizabeth Benjamin, Daily NewsCouncilman Simcha Felder, a Brooklyn Democrat and likely 2009 comptroller candidate, was asked last night by Orthodox Jewish radio personality Nachum Segal who he will be voting for on Feb. 5 and his answer raised the eyebrows of at least one listener/DP reader.
Felder said he's planning to vote for Barack Obama in "protest" to the racially-tinged tactics employed by Hillary Clinton's campaign in South Carolina.
Felder spokesman Eric Kuo confirmed that his boss will be voting for Obama, but stressed that he is neither campaigning for nor endorsing the Illinois senator.
"(Felder) was very uncomfortable with the way Obama was treated by Clinton's campaign in South Carolina," Kuo confirmed. "He was keeping abreast of the race, and was undecided. But South Carolina upset him, and this is essentially a protest."
Brooklyn is a hotbed of Obama support, with the bulk of the elected official detractors from the Clinton camp hailing from the borough.
The news about Felder dovetails neatly into Ben's post earlier today on how the Clinton campaign is scrambling to reach voters in Orthodox communities - particularly in Brooklyn - in an effort not to get, as he put it, "drowned in a demographic wave" in the city's predominantly African-American congressional districts on primary day.
The fear is that Orthodox Democrats, who often trend Republican in general elections (strong support there for Rudy Giuliani, for example), will simply stay home on Feb. 5, adding further weight to the black vote, which is already expected to be higher than usual, turnout-wise.
Of particular concern to the Clintons, according to one Jewish political source, are the CDs of Yvette Clarke (11th), Ed Towns (10th), and Greg Meeks (6th, in Queens). Rep. Charlie Rangel's district in Harlem, where Sen. Bill Perkins is leading the Obama charge, is also a worry, particularly since Bill Clinton's office is there.He brushed off concerns about a loss of black voters in the general election should Clinton win the nomination after an ugly primary -- a worry that many others in the party have alluded to.
"Black voters shouldn't blame Senator Clinton for running a vigorous campaign against me," he said. "That should be a source of pride. It means I might win this thing. When I was 20 points down, I was a 'person of good character' and my health-care plan was 'universal.' The fact that we've got this fierce contest indicates I'm doing well, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that."
More than once, Obama has played the adult in the Clinton sandbox. The lion tamer, the ringmaster. "Hillary, I look forward to taking advice from you..."Obama struck a similar tone when asked about Bill Clinton's role in the campaign. "Let me sort of dispose of the whole issue of President Clinton. I have said this repeatedly. He is entirely justified in wanting to promote his wife's candidacy," Obama said. "I have no problem with that whatsoever. He can be as vigorous an advocate on behalf of her as he would like. The only thing I'm concerned about is when he makes misstatements about my record. That's what I'm seeking to correct."
Of course we can't be sure that he'll win the nomination, although that seems likely right now, or that he'll be elected if he is the nominee -- though given the wounded candidates and intellectual collapse on the Republican side, that seems practically a lock. And as Bill Clinton has so helpfully pointed out, it's a roll of the dice what kind of president he would actually be. But to watch his statement live was to realize, even as it was happening, that you were seeing a moment of history people were likely to remember and discuss for a very long time.
Judge Him by His LawsConsider a bill into which Obama clearly put his heart and soul. The problem he wanted to address was that too many confessions, rather than being voluntary, were coerced -- by beating the daylights out of the accused.
Obama proposed requiring that interrogations and confessions be videotaped.
This seemed likely to stop the beatings, but the bill itself aroused immediate opposition. There were Republicans who were automatically tough on crime and Democrats who feared being thought soft on crime. There were death penalty abolitionists, some of whom worried that Obama's bill, by preventing the execution of innocents, would deprive them of their best argument. Vigorous opposition came from the police, too many of whom had become accustomed to using muscle to "solve" crimes. And the incoming governor, Rod Blagojevich, announced that he was against it.
Obama had his work cut out for him.
