Ferraro quits after saying Obama's an affirmative action candidate

NY Times:

After a two-day firestorm, Geraldine Ferraro has quit Senator Hillary Clinton’s finance committee, saying that Senator Barack Obama’s campaign was twisting her words to make her appear racist and that this was hurting Mrs. Clinton.

“I am stepping down from your finance committee so I can speak for myself and you can continue to speak for yourself about what is at stake in this campaign,” Ms. Ferraro wrote in a letter to Mrs. Clinton. “The Obama campaign is attacking me to hurt you. I won’t let that happen.”

For the last two days, Ms. Ferraro has been sharply criticized for comments she made last week, but which surfaced only recently, that suggested Mr. Obama had succeeded as far as he had because he was black.

“If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position,” she told the Daily Breeze, a newspaper in Torrance, Calif.

...

What is interesting about her statement is that she has said the same thing about herself in discussing why Mondale selected her to run on his ticket in 1984. I don't think it was a racist statement. It was a statement of opinion that is at least arguably true. Obama would like to make the case that he appeals to a broad cross section of the voters. In some states he has, but in many states his support has been primarily from the black community and from white males. What Ferraro seems to be suggesting is that the latter group is made up of the white liberal guilt community. Could be, but Obama does not want anyone making that suggestion.

More problematic for Obama is the fact that he is still winning in states that he can't carry in November Mississippi being one of them.

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