Audio: Eddie Glaude Jr. and Black Callers Discuss the Tavis Smiley Debate

I had been looking for some coverage of the Tavis Smiley debate that focused solely on the reactions of ordinary black voters, not white media pundits telling us what black people were thinking. I found one!

Eddie Glaude Jr., an associate professor at Princeton, and several African American callers discussed the debate on the Brian Lehrer show.

Listen here. (50:00)

• Notice how the Washington Post commentator makes a clear sell for Hillary having mastered the debate even though many of the African American callers and other commentators were impressed by Kucinich, Edwards, Obama, Dodd, etc.

• Note that I still don’t believe the Tavis Smiley focus group and Eddie Glaude’s summary of it in this audio clip. Listening to these African American callers make me even more doubtful   Luntz’s focus group captured black audiences’ inductive reactions accurately.
• Note that many African Americans in this audio segment and that I’ve seen around on other blogs have not been so impressed by Clinton’s ‘hit line’ at the debate. Yes, they clapped and believed she was speaking the truth. However, it didn’t move them politically. Michel Martin hints that some black voters may have found it to be manipulative.  Why oh why oh why is the media pushing this then?
• They need to throw out the internet poll to which they keep referring.  They talk about Obama’s support going down in the internet poll. However, Obama maintained more support than Clinton in the internet poll. Obama had a post-poll of about forty something percent while Clinton had like twelve percent support. That completely conflicts with their main thesis that Hillary won the debate.
• The Washington Post commentator actually admonishes the caller not to waste their vote on Kucinich! Oh my gosh. He says the media aren’t to blame for Kucinich not doing well. However, if you listen to these callers and Tavis’s focus group, Kucinich DID do well!  I’m surprised to see a journalist who is supposed to give unbiased coverage actually saying that a particular candidate is a wasted vote.  If he’s going to be covering the election, he needs to lay all his biases out in the open.