NY Times: Landrieu Losing Because White Voters Don't Like Her, Not Enough Blacks Left

Riiiggghhhtttt!

The New York Times has decided that there is one simple reason why Mary Landrieu will likely not win reelection to the Senate: race.

The Times writes:

At risk is not only her Senate seat… but a family dynasty dating back to her father, Moon Landrieu, a former mayor of New Orleans. There is also a sense that the black-white coalition that moderate Democrats like Ms. Landrieu once forged to win statewide office here may be fading into history.

Of course, Barack Obama's presidency is a factor in Landrieu’s troubles: “The rise of the first black president helped accelerate the white migration to the Republicans, which was reflected in the Republican tide that swept away many surviving Democratic officeholders across the South in November.”

And, there’s always the fallback position of implicitly attacking George W. Bush: “And Louisiana lost a hefty chunk of its black population after Hurricane Katrina.”

Let’s visit with some of those racist white folks, shall we?

Before she headed to Hammond on Tuesday, Ms. Landrieu stopped in the working-class New Orleans suburb of Gretna. There, a group of white, retired gas company workers were sitting in a coffee shop on Huey P. Long Avenue, ignoring the rally that Ms. Landrieu’s team was preparing… Joe Ortolano, another one of the men in the coffee shop, said the Landrieu clan had created an environment where 'everything catered to the black.'

Landrieu has been tied to Obama, as she voted with him 97% of the time, but as Roy Fletcher, a political consultant, pointed out, if Landrieu put some daylight between herself and Obama, the blacks in her base would likely abandon her. Black voters, he asserted, “are so wedded to the Obama thing that they would not allow her to maneuver.”

The Times writes wistfully, “They will need to turn out in tremendous numbers if Ms. Landrieu is to have a chance. Since the general election, prominent African-Americans including Stevie Wonder and Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey have come to Louisiana to campaign for Ms. Landrieu, but some experts here say it’s hard to envision a black turnout so big that it could save her.”

There are other problems plaguing Landrieu, writes the Times, such as Landrieu’s vote being the one that cemented the success of ObamaCare and her consistent billing of taxpayers for political trips, which she attributed to “sloppy bookkeeping.”

But make no mistake: according to the Times, Landrieu’s troubles center on the lack of black voters and fed-up whites. The Times describes a rally for Landrieu’s opponent, Bill Cassidy, like this: “A mostly white crowd packed the pews, and there was little talk of oil and gas policy or hurricane protection. Instead, Rick Santorum, a former Republican senator from Pennsylvania, spoke of the 'lawlessness coming out of the White House.'”

NY Times: Landrieu Losing Because White Voters Don't Like Her, Not Enough Blacks Left
Sat, 06 Dec 2014 16:19:37 GMT