By Ronald Baygents, KUNA
Washington : Although America has never elected a female or minority member President, political analysts agree the strong desire for change after eight years of Republican Party rule under President George W. Bush means Democratic leader Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama getting to the White House is a likely scenario for 2008.
“The Democrats and the nation are ready for this,” said Julian E. Zelizer, professor of history at Princeton University and editor of American Congress.
A “generational shift” has occurred in US politics that makes such a racial and gender breakthrough more likely, he told KUNA.
Clinton, the former first lady and US senator from New York, has avoided the gender issue and maintained her lead in the polls for many months, Zelizer noted.
While the fact that Clinton is a woman could be a “hidden issue” in the general election for US President next November, Zelizer said that given how divided the nation has been over the Bush administration, Clinton as the Democratic nominee is not likely to prompt Democrats to vote for the Republican or to not vote altogether, he said.
The gains for Clinton outweigh any possible losses, he said.
“Clinton will attract female voters who otherwise would not vote,” Zelizer predicted, “and this could turn the election against the Republicans.” Obama, the senator from Illinois who has been placing second in polls among Democrats on their presidential preference, is the son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya. He was born and spent much of his childhood in Hawaii, and lived in Indonesia between 6 and 10 years of age. His paternal grandfather was a Muslim.
While there might be some Democrats and other Americans who would not vote for Obama because of his ethnicity, Zelizer said Democrats will vote for the Democratic nominee in 2008 “because they hate Republicans and do not want Republicans in power.” Obama, 46, attracts young voters, Zelizer noted, adding, “The election is about bringing in new people as much as possible,” and Obama is generating excitement among young voters in America, while Clinton is doing the same among women.
“The novelty of both candidates and what they represent — the possibility of change — really excites young people,” he added.
Nathan Gonzales, political editor of the Rothenberg Political Report, said 2008 is a unique election year in US history.
“The Democratic nominee will have the initial advantage in the presidential race,” Gonzales said.
While US voters are not necessarily looking to elect a woman or an African-American, they do want change, he added.
“So the candidate who embraces that change message is most likely to be one of them (Clinton or Obama),” Gonzales said. “America appears ready to do it.” There may be some hidden gender or racial bias among US voters, since people do not want to admit to pollsters that they are prejudiced, he said.
But, there are now significant numbers of US senators and governors who are women, showing that American voters are willing to put more and more of them into public office, Gonzales noted.
On the other hand, the number of African-American office-holders is “dramatically lower,” he said.
However, Obama has been doing a good job of breaking the stereotypes about African Americans, unlike past black US presidential candidates such as Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, Gonzales said.
“He tries to transcend partisan politics in America,” Gonzales said of Obama. While Obama’s race could be a challenge for his candidacy, Gonzales said, “I do not think it is enough for him to lose the election” to a Republican, should Obama win the Democratic Party nomination next summer.
“The Republicans’ biggest hurdle is the public perception of the Bush presidency,” Gonzales said. “The public is so upset about the direction of the country.” The public approval rating of Bush has remained in the low 30s for more than a year now. If not for this fact, the gender and racial hurdles for Clinton and Obama would be higher, Gonzales said.
Dr. James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, told KUNA that he believes the gender and racial issues for Clinton and Obama are “transcendable.” “There is racism (in America),” he said. “It is pervasive. It is a defining issue in American life. It is not going away anytime soon. And similarly on the issue of gender, I think that it is real. It is something we are not going to see pass away anytime soon.” However, the question is whether Clinton has been able to project herself as strong enough to overcome the gender bias, and whether Obama has been able to project himself “as broad in vision enough and understanding enough of the lives of farmers in Iowa and rural folk in New Hampshire to be able to escape race bias,” Zogby said. “My sense in both cases is most probably yes.” Those Americans whose biases are still so deep that they will not be able to listen to Obama but just see black, and those who will not be able to listen to Clinton and just see woman, “are probably not going to vote for a Democrat ever anyway, no matter what,” Zogby said. “And so there is probably not a whole lot of loss there.” The bigger problem for Obama is convincing some African-Americans that he is “black enough, that his story is really their story,” Zogby said.
“My sense is that if he does win, even the first state (Iowa in early January), you are going to see a real shift among African-Americans who will say ‘he can win, he can overcome this issue’,” Zogby said.
Clinton has a somewhat similar problem because some of her most virulent opponents are women “who do not like the fact that she is, in fact, as tough and strong as she is,” he said. “That is an attitude that you will find among a lot of women.” Evidence of the fact that Clinton and Obama transcend some of the gender and racial bias “is the fact that they get a different kind of bias coming back at them,” Zogby said. “‘He is not black enough, or she is not enough of a woman.’ Just on that, I think that it is an issue