'Game Change.' (AP/J. Scott Applewhite)
Washington, D.C. - The revelation that Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) made outlandish racist remarks in reference to then Sen. Barack Obama couldn't come at a worse time for Democrats...or a better one for Republicans.
Reid, a key figure in pushing Obama's agenda through Congress, apologized to the president on Saturday over remarks published in a new book calling Obama a "light-skinned" black man "with no Negro dialect unless he wanted to have one."
Reid's comments, made in private conversations, were quoted in a newly published book about the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, "Game Change," by Time magazine reporter Mark Halperin and New York magazine writer John Heileman.
Even prior to disclosure of the remarks, Reid was facing disastrously low poll numbers heading into the 2010 election cycle. Reid currently as an unfavorable rating of over 50% according to a Mason-Dixon survey and would lose in a potential race between three potential GOP candidates including one virtually unknown former assemblywoman from Reno, according to voters.
Reid's troubles come on the heals of influencial Dem. Sen. Chris Dodd's announcement that he will not seek reelection as he was facing a very difficult battle in the fall. Democrats are facing potentially drastic losses in the 2010 congressional elections given public sentiment over healthcare and mounting spending and debt. While it appears all but certain that Democrats will lose their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, their losses in the House as well as the Senate could make for a nearly evenly split Congress in 2011.
_______________________________________________________
Follow Joshua on Twitter to stay up to date and subscribe at the top of the page for updates
Comments