Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama will court and woo Latino voters in his presidential bid. But to succeed he must overcome the latent and sometimes open tensions and hostilities between blacks and Latinos.

Author and political analyst Earl Ofari Hutchinson contends that winning the Latino vote will be a daunting challenge for Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama.

Barack Obama will have to overcome the latent and sometimes open tensions and hostilities between Blacks and Latinos. Obama will make a big push in key primary states where Latino voters make up a swelling percent of the voting population to woo and court them for their votes. He needs those Latino votes to win.

In his new book, The Latino Challenge to Black America: Towards a Conversation Between African-Americans and Hispanics, Hutchinson. The past few years have seen an escalation in Black and Latino conflicts and even deadly clashes on the streets, in the prisons, and the schools between the two groups. This has created, says Hutchinson, bitter feeling among many Latinos toward Blacks. Polls and surveys show that many Latinos view Blacks with fear and hostility.

The task for Obama is to figure out a way, contends Hutchinson, to ease those tensions and the fears if he is to have any chance of winning a significant number of Latino votes. Hutchinson details in his book, The Latino Challenge to Black America how some African-American politicians have been able to successfully break down the barriers between Blacks and Latinos and win a large percentage of the Latino vote. Obama, observes, Hutchinson, will have to work doubly hard to sell himself as the change agent for Latinos too. Hutchinson in his book The Latino Challenge to Black America lays out a political blueprint for how Black politicians can succeed in tearing down the wall of hostility between Blacks and Latinos. That includes Obama as well.

The Latino Challenge to Black America: Towards a Conversation Between African-Americans and Hispanics was featured in the Washington Post's Book World, Sunday, January 13, 2008.

*Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His new book is The Latino Challenge to Black America: Towards a Conversation Between African-Americans and Hispanics (Middle Passage Press, 2007).

More information on Earl Ofari Hutchinson and the Hutchinson Report can be found at: http://middlepassagepress.com

Earl Ofari Hutchinson can be Contacted by  E-mail at: hutchinsonreport(at)aol.com