Is it about gender and race or isn't it?
Topics: Democracy
25 Jan 2008
From: Ervan Darnell
I find that when I'm a crowd of mixed political stripes, liberals will complain that gender and race are irrelevant characteristics in a candidate and Clinton and Obama shouldn't be losing votes because of that. But, when in a group of liberals I hear the sentiment "It's about time we had a woman president." (a friend recently said exactly at that at a dinner of 12). Well, which is it?
A poll out today from South Carolina [1] gives the answer:
white women prefer the white woman - Clinton 43% (with Edwards second)
white men prefer the white man - Edwards 47% (with Clinton second)
blacks prefer the blackest candidate running - Obama 59%
Race is apparently a much stronger alignment than gender (worth 19 points, 59 versus an average of 38 for Obama, but only 7 for gender, 43 for Clinton versus a white average of 36). That's expected, but interesting to confirm.
I don't have any problem saying race and gender matter, but not necessarily for prejudicial reasons. It should be no surprise that someone who shares your experiences is more likely to want to subsidize them and fails to sympathize with the other guy. But I do wish that liberals would stop pillorying everyone else for being racist when they vote their own interest, just like liberals do.
[1] http://www.mcclatchydc.com/static/pdf/poll/012408scdem.pdf (linked from Slate and I assume therefore legit)
====================================================
Ervan Darnell
ervan@kelvinist.com http://www.kelvinist.com
_______________________________________________
Ragnar mailing list
Ragnar@ragnar.kelvinist.com
http://ragnar.kelvinist.com/mailman/listinfo/ragnar
Home