Even in the deepest South, white conservatives will vote for black candidates who run against white politicians, on local and state levels, if they believe that the black candidate more closely reflects their personal values.

I didn’t think Clinton would reach into the bottom of Karl Rove’s bag of dirty tricks and use race as a wedge issue, but after the Jeremiah Wright debacle, conservative working-class whites are going to be skeptical of Obama’s bona fides as a patriotic citizen of the United States, much less his credibility as a moral leader.

I think he has the political skills to overcome these difficulties, but it will take more than his charm and dazzling oratorical performances to survive the onslaught of Republican swiftboating sure to follow when he wins the nomination.