Obama Begins His Tango Of Races As The Candidates Turn Focus On Hispanic Population

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The media has portrayed a large portion of Obama's campaign as being focused on the black voters, with news reports showing lines of supporters willing to stand for hours just to cast their vote.

After a period of silence, renowned black leader, Jesse Jackson, made a public statement against Obama that could have a huge negative impact on the voting population of the black community.

In a recent article in the Herald Tribune that discusses the candidate's new focus on the Hispanic population, one could speculate as to why the turn?

According to the article, in July alone they have addressed the issues surrounding Hispanics, drawing reasonable conclusions that they are indeed vying for the Hispanic vote and the main issue isn't immigration, viewing the topic as "a trap". The main topics are things like health care, housing and education, the very issues that seem to draw emotional responses from many voters.

The democratic presidential hopeful has tunneled his efforts on California, New York and Illinois, three states where the Hispanic population is seen as exceedingly higher than the national average. He is also seen as a sure fire win in those states. Texas' Hispanic voters are getting McCain's side of things since the state is considered a win for him.

The state of Florida, one that is known for its past history with voting issues, is the state that is "up for grabs" when it comes to the Hispanic vote.

Obama's campaign has confirmed that they will be spending beaucoups of their dollars on this population with mainstream media ads and that they have an ace in the hole to pull out in the end, again substantiating the notion that the campaign has gone south.

"We're going to spend more money on Latino TV and radio than has ever been spent on a presidential campaign, and by a lot," Cuahtemoc Figueroa, the director of Obama's Latino vote effort, told members of La Raza on Sunday.
The campaign also views Obama's half sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, who taught school for several years in the Bronx, as something of a trump card to be deployed at events for Hispanic voters. "She speaks fluent Spanish, with a Dominican accent, and looks Latina," Figueroa said.

With three months from the final election, this focus on the Hispanic population and the main issues surrounding their culture in an effort to pick up more votes may be a normal strategy. However, in light of the recent tongue lashing by one of the main figure heads in the black community, it has a certain feel of desperation to it.

We will see come November.