Listening to Barack Obama’s wife Michelle, ‘out on the stump’ for her husband in New Hampshire, News Hour was intrigued to note the imperative for voting in her speech:
"Little more than a year from now my husband, a black man, could place his hand on the Bible and take the oath as 44th president of the United States. Just imagine what that will say to the world! We are asking you to help us change the world!"
Not domestic policy, not foreign policy, and not the economy? News Hour is all for using every trick in the book when it comes to elections – in fact we rather enjoy undignified mudslinging, to a point – but it’s interesting to note that Obama campaigns, at least at one remove, on the basis of his race, while Hillary Clinton makes little if any reference to her gender. She is simply ‘Hillary’, a full-throttle force of her own, more of a brand than a name. Go to her website, and the first thing that greets you is ‘Hillary for President’. Not ‘Senator Clinton’. NPR has an interesting if mildly overstated podcast which explores the semantics of this in more depth.
Is it not worrying that the Obama camp feels the necessity to deploy this kind of argument, that he should be voted for purely because of his race? Does it not speak to an absence at the heart of his campaign, perhaps underlining his inexperience? But then, anyone who wheels out race in an election risks stepping on a garden rake. When Hillary singled out Colin Powell for a prominent foreign policy in her future government (assuming she gets the nomination and assuming she wins), Powell was said to sound ‘distinctly unenthusiastic’ about the idea.
And perhaps it all has more to do with the fact that the Iowa caucus is on January 3 – throw everything you have, and see what sticks – but it’s interesting to speculate.
I don't mean to pick your excellently argued piece apart but does Hillary have a gender to which she might refer?
ReplyDeleteHave a place in my blogroll, by the way. So delighted to see that you've linked to me.
Thank you Richard, for your comment and your link. You are a gentleman and a scholar.
ReplyDeleteHillary may indeed be of no or perhaps 'other' gender, possibly explaining her reticence to campaign on the equality platform. Or is that simply a necessary male prejudice toward a woman in a position power? Who can say.