What seems to be missing in this post is the well known fact that the entire Democratic party has been exploiting the "black vote" for half a century. They seem to treat African American's as little more than prizes to be won, without truly presenting policies that will help them and the rest of America. Just as Ol' Bush tried to do with the Latino vote during the 2004 election, the Democrats are constantly doing with African Americans: pandering to their interests with mounds of hollow promises and lofty generalist goals with no true plan to accomplish any of them. The truly sad thing is that African American's continue to buy into it at a great disservice to themselves. The only thing that has changed with this election is that ethnic favoritism (a.k.a. racism) is ironically color blind, as black Americans are now seemingly just as prone to it as white Americans. They are not favoring Obama because he's presenting a different set of promises, or speaking more to their ideals; on the contrary, they are largely supporting him because he is of the same race. Just as racism likely lead to Obama's crushing defeat in West Virginia, so did it lead to his resounding victory in North Carolina.
What is most ironic about this is that the more that democrat voters continue to vote based on these narrow minded qualifications such as race or sex, the more likely they will be to have another old white man in the White House in January. The democratic base as a whole - white, black, red, green, etc. - need to take a page from the republican play book and realize that when you want to win, you line up behind your man (or woman) and push them to victory based on who has the best chance, regardless of anything else. This is how the Republicans have controlled the White House for 20 of the last 28 years, and why they will win yet again in November.