Why Do Obama Voters Hate Democrats and America So Much?

The state party is criticized by some black voters who are incensed

that they won't be able to cast primary ballots for Obama.

By Scott Martelle, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

January 15, 2008

DETROIT -- The absence of Sen. Barack Obama's name from today's

Michigan Democratic primary ballot has angered a large swath of

African American voters here, exacerbating a racial political divide

and threatening party unity heading into the November general

election.

Many black voters are already unhappy about the state's new voter

identification law and a 2006 voter-approved referendum barring

affirmative action in public hiring.

Their frustrations have heightened by not being able to vote -- about

a week before the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday -- for the

first African American candidate in serious contention for a major

party presidential nomination.

At issue is a decision by Obama and former Sen. John Edwards of North

Carolina to withdraw their names from the Michigan ballot in October.

That came after the national Democratic Party imposed sanctions on the

state party for scheduling its primary ahead of the date the national

party had approved -- Feb. 5, or Super Tuesday.

At the time, the withdrawals were seen as a ploy to isolate Sen.

Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who had a large lead in national

polls, and to make it seem as though she were taking advantage of the

standoff.

But the perception among rank-and-file Democrats is that the state

party leadership lost a showdown with the Democratic National

Committee.

The national party stripped Michigan of its 156 convention delegates,

disenfranchising a large part of its political base in the process.

And it threatens to weaken the party in a key state for the general

election.

"Could I say it brings us closer together? I can't," said Rep. John

Conyers Jr., who has represented much of Detroit for more than 40

years.

The state party has urged supporters to vote anyway, casting ballots

for "uncommitted" if their candidates' names don't appear. The

uncommitted delegates would be allotted to candidates during meetings

March 29 in the state's 15 congressional districts, in hopes that the

delegates ultimately will be seated, said Mark Brewer, chairman of the

state Democratic Party.

But some African American leaders are also pushing an "uncommitted"

vote as a sign of protest.

"What started out as an effort to say we don't want to vote for

Hillary, we want to vote for somebody else, now has turned into a

protest that we don't get a chance to express who we want to vote

for," said Edna Bell, a former Wayne County commissioner and Obama

supporter, who is one of the leaders of the effort. "Those folks right

now are feeling disenfranchised."

The frustration runs deep and is a further indication of the chasm of

distrust between many black voters and the state party leadership.

"It smacks of pre-1963," said the Rev. Oscar King III, pastor of

Detroit's Northwest Unity Missionary Baptist Church. King said he and

others were suspicious of the party leadership.

"This is a system we look at with a jaundiced eye," King said. "Too

often they tell us what they want when they need us, and there's never

any quid pro quo. The constituency is relatively tired of being

ignored by one party and taken advantage of by another."

Brewer, the state chairman, said he expected Michigan's delegates

would ultimately find seats at the convention.

"That part of the penalty in the past, when it's been applied, has

always been lifted," Brewer said, adding that Michigan is crucial to

success in the general election.

"Michigan politically is so important to the candidate, he can't

become the Democratic president of this country without carrying

Michigan," Brewer said. "So a way will be found to seat us."

But Brewer acknowledged the state party had some bridges to rebuild.

"I just have to explain it to folks," Brewer said. Obama "took himself

off, but he's also now telling his supporters, 'Here, this is the way

that you can go vote for me' " by casting uncommitted ballots.

Deborah Thomas, a Wayne County Circuit Court judge, said much of the

dissension had grown from voters not understanding the process.

"It's not like a general election where you would expect every

declared candidate to be there," she said. "That kind of confuses

people, and they're blaming everybody."