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Raising Race

Purpose Statement

In this essay, I trace the validity and effects of the “experience” argument used by Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign in order to reveal its racial undertones. I am not suggesting that Mrs. Clinton is a racist or even that, given the choice, would rather run on “experience” than a populist message of change. My purpose is descriptive. I only attempt to show the effects of her “experience” argument. I leave it to classmates and colleagues to judge whether the effects of her argument are purposeful or simply an unwanted byproduct of a campaign Mrs. Clinton wishes she wasn’t running.

-- By AdamCarlis - 09 Feb 2008

Introduction

Hillary Clinton targets potential voters by highlighting her experience. Unlike her equally ubiquitous “change” slogan, “Working for Change; Working for You”, Hillary’s “experience” argument fails the sniff test. When Mrs. Clinton says “experience,” she is actually speaking in code; making an argument that preys upon the electorate’s hidden racial prejudices.

Hillary's Experience

As many writers have shown, Hillary’s experience buckles under scrutiny. Her “35 years of change” include fifteen working as a corporate attorney, defending companies like WalMart and Tyson’s Chicken. Moral judgments aside, no reasonable person would classify her legal career as change-oriented executive experience.

Her public service career is equally suspect. Twenty years as first lady have given her insight into the daily life of an executive. However, claiming such experience makes her a skilled executive is tantamount to claiming that a sports reporter improves his swing after covering the Red Sox or a historian studying the Kennedy White House would be skilled at negotiating an end to a nuclear missile crisis. Observing and doing are two very different things and, during her years as first lady, Hillary did not do much. In fact, her most important attempt at acting like an executive failed, resulting in our current health care crisis.

After leaving her husband’s shadow, Hillary’s time in the Senate has been similarly unremarkable. She has no major legislative accomplishments to speak of and her vote on the key issue of the past 8 years, authorizing the use of force against Iraq, has proven unpopular. Absent leadership on any major bill, it is hard to see how Hillary’s time in the Senate has prepared her for the presidency since being present cannot count as experience. This indicates that, when Hillary speaks of “experience,” she is not inviting an analysis of her record. Instead, she is directing us to the prejudices that buttress her “experience” argument.

The Age Issue

Mrs. Clinton is nearly 20 years older than Mr. Obama. The generation gap between the two candidates is mirrored by their supporters. By asserting her “experience,” she is saying to voters over 55 that she is one of them and Mr. Obama is a precocious child not quite ready for a seat at the adults table.

This is a dangerous tactic; one that backfired when used against John F. Kennedy Jr. and Bill Clinton (who, like Obama, was 47 during his first presidential campaign). Given the Democratic Party’s pride in JFK and Mr. Clinton, let alone Mrs. Clinton’s reliance on her husband’s success, it would be both foolish and disingenuous to raise the age issue directly. Doing so in a coded fashion; however, offers all the benefits without any of the risk: she can highlight Mr. Obama’s youth without forcing comparisons to two of history’s most popular democrats.

The Race Issue

If the age argument couldn’t defeat the great Democrats of the past, why use it now? The difference is Mr. Obama’s race. Historically, white supremacy has used “son” and “boy” to emasculate and infantilize black men in an attempt to neutralize their growing power. While Mrs. Clinton can’t directly campaign by positioning Mr. Obama as a child (Mr. Clinton has referred to him as “kid”), she can conjure up that image in the minds of those who hear her “experience” argument. It is a subliminal cue to voters and one most of us don’t recognize until it invades our subconscious.

This is only one of Mrs. Clinton’s many injections of race into the campaign. As Hillary’s chief strategist spoke about Obama’s past drug use, other surrogates referred to him as “the black candidate” in what looked like a coordinated effort to caricature Mr. Obama as the stereotypical urban, black, drug abuser. After a victory in South Carolina, Mr. Clinton publicly compared Obama’s campaign to that of Jesse Jackson, an analogy that misses on every issue except race. And, during the recent debate, Hillary – after announcing that immigrants were taking jobs from American workers – confirmed her pollster’s false claim that Latino voters have “not shown a lot of willingness . . . to support black candidates.” These subtle hints are coming together to form the background music of the Clinton campaign, facilitating voters’ subconscious leap from “experience” to “white.”

Conclusion

Despite losing almost every demographic in the recent Virginia primary, Mrs. Clinton carried 96% of voters claiming that candidate experience was the key factor in their decision. Given that Virginia has an open primary and John McCain (who was in a POW camp while Mrs. Clinton was still in school and has three times her congressional experience) was also running, those voters must mean something besides “experience” when they say “experience.” Gone are the days when segregationist Democrats loudly declare their racist ambitions from the steps of the statehouse. Yet today the same irrational fear is being stirred up, albeit in a more secretive and perhaps more palatable way.

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