The Selma Secret

The NYT also provided this handy little map to show just how close the churches were.










What VERY few of the news outlets bothered to mention is what lies between the two churches...the George Washington Carver housing projects. A symbol of just how far many black people HAVEN'T come since that march across the Pettus Bridge in 1965.

While Sen. Obama's oratory was more inspiring than Sen. Clinton's - she had one trick up her sleeve besides Big Willie. Hillary took at least a half hour out of all the marching and speechifying to hold a very it-takes-a-villagey meeting with some of the people who run the child care center at those projects. It was the kind of small, face-to-face meeting that could very well help her hold on to some of the votes apparently being siphoned by Obama.

Given Sen. BO's admirable history of working to empower people trapped in public housing - it was surprising that his team did not make sure he spent some quality (highly publicized) time in Carver Homes - and that they did not have him mention the plight of those people...and millions more like them... in at least one of his THREE speeches of the day.

Playing Nice in Selma...But Still Need Buffers

From the NYT
"The visit to Selma, a historically rich, economically struggling city, became a proxy battle for black support between Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama, whose candidacy represents a threat to Mrs. Clinton’s traditional base. That competitive dynamic intensified on Sunday with the debut of Mr. Clinton on the campaign trail, six weeks into his wife’s bid, and among a bloc of voters who are at once devoted to the former president and torn between his wife and Mr. Obama.It was the first side-by-side appearance of Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton in the 2008 presidential campaign, and the political theater of the two campaigns overlapped repeatedly, but with a polite tone that contrasted with their political skirmishing of recent weeks."

Pouring It On As Thick As Molases

Obama v. Clinton - The Sermon-Off

Hil's Hometown Paper Calls It: Barack Wins Selma Showdown

The New York Daily News says the junior senator from Illinois bested the junior senator from New York as both gave pulpit speeches on civil rights sacred ground.

Both campaigns spent a carefully choreographed Sunday in Selma, Alabama site of "Bloody Sunday" - the 1965 beatdown Black protesters got while demanded their right to vote.

From the Post:

"Hillary Clinton was very good, Barack Obama was a little better.

In the battle for Selma — and the black vote across the U.S. — yesterday's round went to the senator from Illinois.

Both were greeted enthusiastically at historic black churches, where they pumped up the congregations with fiery speeches. Both were cheered as they marched to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, walking in the steps of civil rights pioneers beaten bloody 42 years ago.

But on a day when two presidential heavyweight contenders came to town, it was Obama's intensely personal and provocative remarks at Brown Chapel AME Church - and the rock-star treatment he received along the route of the march - that gave him an edge."