Liz, what great photos. I loved Ann Richards. I remember writing to her and thanking her for her wit and spirit. She sent the nicest note back. I miss Ann Richards. Especially during this campaign season. By the way Liz, you must be a hoot yourself! Great ladies surround themselves with other great dames!

This campaign has been transformational for me. If anyone could have ever told me that I would not be supporting Senator Clinton, I would have never believed it. I loved the Clintons. I defended them, volunteered for their campaigns from the early days in 1991. Made phone calls. Canvassed. I was so thrilled when Hillary won her senate seat in 2000, and her overwhelming re-election. I never saw Obama as viable. I was so angry at congressional Democrats for their blatant weakness in the face of what I believed to be the worst administration and president in our lifetime that I just wanted Hillary, the first viable woman who could become president to go in and clean house. And then, I actually went to Senator Obama’s site. I started to watch him, and listen to him. Read his speeches, and work. In the beginning they said he wasn’t black enough. That was hysterically funny to me because my family heritage is not far off of that of Senator Obama’s family. I knew that regardless of how he related to his own ethnicity in his life, this country would only think of him as an African American or black man. Even though his mother was white. We are a superficial and strident society when it comes to labels. I fought hard not to believe that he would be viable. At first it was because I was afraid for him and his family. Later, even though I still feel some fear, it has become what most people of color know. It is the subtle and not so subtle forms of racism. We had just gone through all of the incidents of nooses hanging from trees and trucks and doorknobs at Columbia University. Then Iowa caucused. It blew me away. After New Hampshire, I thought it was a fluke, and became skeptical again. Then the ‘nastiness’ started. Not just with Bill Clinton’s remarks, but with white girlfriends who had always been so liberal and progressive. They were outraged when Harold Ford lost Tennessee after that racist ad campaign with the white woman calling Ford and seeming to be half naked. There were undertones of “Why did he half to run now. It’s our turn.” I even had a little confrontation with a friend who told me that I was voting for Obama because he was black. When I asked her how that explained all of the white candidates that I had voted for over the years, she changed the subject and started to riff on his middle name and how that would never fly. There was that moment on 60 Minutes where Senator Clinton left open the possibility that Senator Obama could be a Muslim. That was too cute by half. Finally, the nail, and glue that sealed the coffin was the Reverend Wright story. When that blew up, as a woman of color, I was offended, but I was particularly upset with my white Catholic friends and family members (yes, I am married to a white guy) when they couldn’t remember all of the trouble our own church had been in with the pedophile scandal. We all could have walked away from our church as well. The overwhelming majority of us did not. Will not. We also don’t know history. The reason why many people in the black community would believe some of the most controversial words are because certain aspects of history have been as embedded into the black mind as has many of the stories handed down through generations in many white families. We remember the Tuskegee syphilis horror. The real reason for the Ohio and Pennsylvania ‘blue collar-working class’ votes are all about race. Just as the terms “strict constructionist” and “far right” means non-whites need not apply, “blue collar” and “working class” have meaning. It deeply saddens me that Senator Clinton, her campaign and the former president have jumped in to this mud. They lived the “southern strategy.” Neither of them could have won any of their elections without the so called ‘black’ vote. And my white sisters discount the fact that women of color are women too! Who are they really talking about when they say the ‘female” vote? It’s almost as if we are a sub-category of a sub-category. I can’t believe that we fought for equality as women because we wanted an equal playing field for our daughters and young women to be able to thrive and achieve! Women of color were a part of that struggle as well. Now it seems as though we were just convenient allies. For these women to now turn around and say cheap and petty things in order to win this election like: “I am just going to have to vote for Senator McCain if Hillary isn’t the nominee,” speaks volumes. Just as Leslie couldn’t see the subtle racism at Denny’s, I don’t think most of Hillary’s older white female voters can see that. Why would you even say something like that? Does the Supreme Court mean nothing to you? Sorry to say this, but when white women express those feelings, it tells me that they either don’t understand that dynamic, or they realize all too well that they are on a higher rung of the food chain and while they might feel some of the blow-back from a McCain victory, women of color and poor people of color would suffer even more. Another 4-8 years of right wing policies might not kill the soccer moms, but it would be catastrophic for women of color! Finally…I know the Constitution has been treated like toilet tissue in the past 8 years, but the last time I checked, the criteria for becoming president is 35 years of age and being a natural born citizen of the United States. That’s it. It doesn’t mention caveats such as during war time and under foreign attack, you must elect people with military experience. Years in the senate or congress. If that were the case, most women would have a hard time becoming president. The president is the Commander and Chief of the military. Not of us. So the entire glorification of war credentials is amazing to me. For women to buy into that Mark Penn “ready on day one” narrative after all of the blood that has been shed is stunning. Hillary or Barack should be qualified because they have passed the constitutional test, and because they are both smart and accomplished in what they have done with their lives. Both of them. Is Obama perfect? Absolutely not. What he is to me is a chance for us to finally turn the page from all of the drama and bitterness that the Reagan, Bush and Clinton years have brought. I haven’t seen so much excitement from young people since…well, since the first Bill Clinton campaign. Even that campaign didn’t capture the imagination like Obama’s has. Obama’s campaign is the confluence of timing, technology and global awareness. To dismiss that because he is a bi-racial man is ridiculous. Yes, he is bi-racial. The media loves that African American label because the race story keeps the sub groups alive. I don’t want to shy away from the subject of race because it is long overdue. Our children have taken the ball and run with it. They couldn’t wait for us any longer because they have grown up in a global community. They file share music from artists of all genres. They hang out together. And those that don’t would, if they hadn’t been sequestered in polarizing communities that we forced them into either by white-flight or poverty. Surprisingly, Obama supporters would more readily vote for Hillary because we know how large the stakes are. We are tired of divisions. I am just so sorry, and frankly ashamed that my sisters in the struggle who support Hillary seemed to have hitched their deeply personal dreams of a first woman in the Whitehouse on Hillary. That’s all they see. It hurts to think that for all of the things people of color have contributed to this country, we are still only good for “Driving Miss Daisy” in the eyes of some. Working for, but not leading this nation. Even though we have historically been the most forgiving people in this nation in so many ways, and continue to be. That’s the gamble Hillary is willing to take on in a delegate fight. She and Bill know how forgiving black people have been. The Democrats have taken the black vote for granted, and they know it. I hope they aren’t betting it all on black this time, because if she gets the nomination, I fear that this time, that gamble won’t pay off. I had to wake up to why she is the wrong choice at this time; I hope that other Democrats will as well. Can Obama win? If we don’t ease the reigns of our own deep seeded fears, last chance dreams, and prejudice, No he can’t.