Caught Between a Rock & Roll City and Hard Place

As we head into tonight's showdown in the great city of Cleveland (my home town), I came across an interesting article in Sunday's Cleveland Plain Dealer, "Candidates Divide Black Community".

The article raises two familiar concerns in the voting process: 1) The pressure on someone to vote for their own race or gender; and 2) The pressure on the super delegates to either stick with his/her candidate or conform to what the voters want.

In this particular case, it is Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones, a Clinton supporter, that is feeling enormous pressure from the African-American community to support Barack Obama's candidacy. Many of her friends and political allies are Obama supporters and are also urging her to change her position.

Many women and African-Americans I have talked to in Ohio almost feel an obligation to make history for their own respective gender or race. Sometimes that alone can sway someone's support. We saw a lot of that, particularly regarding the vote of African American woman, during the South Carolina primary; but you can imagine the added pressure on an African-American woman who is also both a representative and super delegate.

As far as Rep. Tubbs Jones' role as a super delegate, if she changes her vote she will be going back on her decision and her word. She would be seen by the city as the Carlos Boozer of super delegates. At the same time, if her district (OH-11) ends up supporting Obama, she will be seen as going against the people she represents.

While this controversy will remain on the shores of Lake Erie tonight - and perhaps for several more months - Cleveland voters will face much more pressing questions, like how do you make globalization work in a dying industrial-based economy, how do you solve the mortgage crisis, how do you make health care and college education more affordable, and should the Browns start Derek Anderson or Brady Quinn?

We can only hope that the candidates running for President can offer solutions to these many questions and make the birthplace of rock and roll, one of the hardest hit economic communities in the country, rock again.