When Barack Obama was losing the Hispanic vote to Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primaries, some people automatically assumed that racial discrimination had something to do with it. There was widespread speculation that Hispanics wouldn't vote for a black candidate.

In many cities where blacks and Latinos live side by side, there was plenty of evidence to the contrary. In local elections, Latinos had helped elect African-American politicians across the country. And in Latin America, some already had elected black presidents.

Yet just because many Latinos favored Clinton, some people tried to play the race card against the Hispanic community. It didn't work! It was a myth! On Election Day, President-elect Obama received 67 percent of the Hispanic vote and won four swing states thanks to the support of Latinos. According to the Pew Research Center, 95 percent of blacks and 43 percent of whites voted for Obama. Draw your own conclusions!

Are there Latino racists? Of course there are! Did some Latinos vote against Obama because he is black? Of course some did! But they are a miniscule minority, not worthy of the attention or importance they were given by the news media during the Democratic primaries.

Obviously, most Latinos realize that in terms of issues and interests, they have much more in common with the African-American community than they have differences. Blacks and Latinos are natural allies! If Obama is good for African-Americans, he also will be good for Latinos. Most Latinos and African-Americans probably think that way.

Does that mean there hasn't been friction between blacks and Latinos? Of course not! When they have helped elect black politicians in local elections, some Latinos have complained that only blacks gained political empowerment and civil service jobs. Meanwhile, some blacks have expressed fear that Latino political empowerment will be at the expense of African-Americans, as if blacks and Latinos still need to fight over the same civil service jobs.

Instead of arguing over crumbs, blacks and Latinos, united as a voting front, now have the power to demand their fair share of the American pie.

If Obama and the Democrats manage to keep this new national black and Latino alliance alive, the Republicans will remain a minority in Congress and nowhere near the White House for a long time.

But first Obama needs to do the right thing for the Latinos who elected him. Of course, many of the issues Latinos care about are the same issues that most Americans expect Obama to confront: the economy, our two wars, health care, education and so on. But the president-elect needs to pay attention to a few other issues that are crucial to Latinos.

He needs to appoint Latinos to key government positions, starting with his inner circle of advisers and his Cabinet but also including all levels of his administration. He needs to find a way to get comprehensive immigration reform through Congress, legislation that would include a legalization plan for at least 12 million illegal immigrants who are already here. Obama needs to rethink his position against the pending free trade agreement with Colombia, and he needs to stop suggesting that he wants to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement.

To maintain the support of Latinos, Obama needs to stand firm for freedom and democracy in Latin America. He needs to be wary of overtures from enemies who may pretend to be our friends now and who may expect us to overlook their civil and human rights violations.

Obama needs to convey to Cuba's Castro brothers that having the most liberal voting record in the Senate doesn't make him an ally of a Communist dictatorship. He needs to show the leftist, anti-American demagogues, such as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, that he is not their comrade.

If Obama devotes some time to issues that are important to Latinos, there is little that Republicans can do to regain the Hispanic support they squandered by introducing anti-immigrant measures during the past few years.

But if Republicans find a way to repent from their immigrant-bashing ways and Obama ignores the issues that are important in the barrios, the political pendulum will swing in the opposite direction, and Obama will lose his Latino support. It will have nothing to do with race, but some idiots will claim again that Hispanics won't vote for a black candidate.

To find out more about Miguel Perez and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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