It began in Iowa, where Barack Obama, the first African-American crossover candidate with broad appeal to all racial and ethnic groups, was on fire in a state that was overwhelmingly white.

Came then Billy Shaheen, the Clinton New Hampshire co-chair, to suggest that, were Barack to be nominated, Republicans would ask when he had stopped using drugs and whether he ever bought or sold drugs.  Mark Penn of the Clinton campaign denied on MSNBC's "Hardball" that his team was raising the "cocaine issue."

Stunned and stung, Barack's African-American backers then rushed into the baited trap.  One after another, they headed for the TV cameras to charge that the Clintons had fought dirty, forcing voters to focus on the race and gender of the candidates rather than on their records, ideas and issues.

But the damage has been done.  And reviewing the returns from Nevada and the polls in South Carolina, it may be irreversible. Barack is no longer a crossover candidate who transcends race.  The color-blind coalition he seemed to be assembling appears to be coming apart.

Indeed it does.  A Mason-Dixon poll of likely Democratic South Carolina voters released January 17 showed Obama winning 20% of the white vote in the Democratic primary, versus 39% for Clinton, and 28% for Edwards.  The Mason-Dixon poll released today showed that his white support had been cut in half, down now to 10%, with 36% for Clinton, and a 12-point leap for Edwards of 40%.  Obama's black support had raised three points in the same week, from 56 to 59%.  If he hasn't been completely pigeonholed as the "black candidate" in S.C., he is certainly heading that direction. 

If he was Jesse Jackson in 1988, this would be good news.  As the post-racial progressive leader Barack aims to be, this is the nightmare scenario.  According to Dick Morris, by losing South Carolina, the Clintons win:

If Hillary loses South Carolina and the defeat serves to demonstrate Obama's ability to attract a bloc vote among black Democrats, the message will go out loud and clear to white voters that this is a racial fight.  It's one thing for polls to show, as they now do, that Obama beats Hillary among African-Americans by better than 4-to-1 and Hillary carries whites by almost 2-to-1.  But most people don't read the fine print on the polls.  But if blacks deliver South Carolina to Obama, everybody will know that they are bloc-voting.  That will trigger a massive white backlash against Obama and will drive white voters to Hillary Clinton.

Slate's self-styled "neoliberal" Mickey Kaus (read "annoyingly contrary neoconservative) has some really stupid advice for how Barack can get out of the corner the Clintons have painted him in:

He could try to make Hillary the pet candidate of Latinos the way he's being cast as the pet candidate of blacks—but that would require a shift to the right on immigrant legalization that he doesn't seem willing to make.  (I hope I'm wrong about that.)

Right.  The candidate who bravely stood his ground supporting New York State driver's licenses for illegals, while NY's own senator famously caved, should now move to Hillary's right on immigration.  Cutting loose what little is left of his better-earned Hispanic support would do wonders for his candidacy, not to mention party unity.  Oh, wait, Mickey has more!

The more obvious move is to find a Sister Souljah—after Saturday—to stiff arm.  The most promising candidate is not a person, but an idea: race-based affirmative action.  Obama has already made noises about shifting to a class-based, race-blind system of preferences.  What if he made that explicit?  Wouldn't that shock hostile white voters into taking a second look at his candidacy?

Ok, let me see if I get this straight.  An African-American progressive candidate, whose strongest base in the polls right now is African-Americans, should now turn on them and piss all over affirmative action, in an attempt to win over the "hostile white voters" who are inherently afraid of the overt blackness of his candidacy?  If Mickey is really looking for a black candidate who buys into this platform, he should look no further than Obama's last political opponent.  His name is Alan Keyes.  And he's also running for president.

I am aware that the columnists I have quoted describing this Democratic dilemma all happen to be conservatives of one stripe or another.  That said, I would like to hear of any real solutions for Obama's dilemma that progressives have come up with, that I haven't come across.  I bet Today's Lies readers can do a hell of a lot better than this junk.

Or, if you don't think things are as dire as I do, or you don't think the Clintons are responsible for this mess, I'd love to hear those opinions too.  Bring 'em on!