The Dish

Obama is ahead with white voters. And black voters – by a massive margin. The Clintons have a big lead among Hispanics and Asians. Fascinating.

The Clinton spin on Obama’s big Georgia win:

Unlike the Obama campaign, the Clinton campaign never dedicated significant resources to Georgia. Sen. Obama spent over $500,000 dollars on ads on television and radio; we never went up on TV. The Obama campaign has 9 offices in Georgia. The Clinton campaign only has 2. Sen. Obama has had staff and significant campaign operation across the state for 8 months. Sen. Clinton only deployed staff to the state in the last couple of weeks. Polls have consistently showed Sen. Obama with wide lead over Sen Clinton. That lead has only widened over time.

This strikes me as the big news tonight. Mike Huckabee’s remarkable strength in the South is proof to me of the resilience of Christianist populism in the current GOP coalition. I can’t see how either Romney or Huckabee can ultimately topple McCain, but I can see that Huckabee is proving a serious contender for the veep slot. The big imponderable is obviously California. If Romney beats McCain there, he doesn’t seriously challenge him but he sure bloodies him – perhaps critically.

This has been only an average night for the Republican front-runner. At this point, one begins to wonder if the GOP isn’t in serious disarray for a while.

To my post. I’m glad to be better informed of his views. I’ll respond in due course but there’s a lot going on right now.

He got 44 percent of the Latino vote in Arizona, according to Ambers. I’m struck by how many red states he has won – more than Clinton so far. I’m still listening to one of the most leaden political speeches I’ve heard in a long time. Does Clinton think she’s won? And, of course, the gender card: she references her mother who was born "when women didn’t have the vote." And she even worked in "the best days are yet to come" schtick. Jeez. How fathomlessly lame is this candidate?

Back to DC to see Obama beating the Clintons in the delegate count. Better than I expected so far. California is now the biggest prize. I’m watching Clinton give a profoundly pedestrian – Penn-style – speech. Stay tuned.

A reader writes:

Since you’re turning this into a commentary about Clinton’s status as a feminist, why hold a woman to a different standard from men who have advanced in politics?  Why hold women to special scrutiny, particularly when women have historically been subject to social and cultural constraints regarding power that men have not?  (The same question would probably apply to minorities as well.)  The jury’s still out on whether it’s "feminist" to benefit from one’s family connections in politics — but I do know that those are precisely the rules men get to play by when given the opportunity.

On that score, I disagree that Thatcher’s "rich husband" was not a stepping stone to politics for her – of course it was, as his wealth enabled to her to not be chained to the home with the domestic chores that prevent less well-off women from pursuing public life.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean she was not exceptional, of course.  She was similar to other exceptional women of her generation, which would include Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and I am sure that Thatcher faced similar discrimination to theirs (and while conservative, Thatcher was a feminist in her own way).  Women of that generation indeed had to be exceptional to get ahead, even with the benefit of family connections or wealth, because legal and cultural barriers were extensive and entrenched and there was no movement in sight to change that. 

But your assumption that Hillary could have done it on her own — the suggestion that she faced no constraints to her ambitions — shows a genuine ignorance of the lives of American girls growing up in the 50s and 60s and coming of age personally and professionally in the 70s and 80s.  Hillary is indeed an exceptional woman of her generation – as you call her, "one of the leading lights in her generation."  But how does it follow that because she is not quite as exceptional as Thatcher (in your book) that she is not also a feminist?

Your comments reflect little appreciation for (or perhaps little understanding of) second-wave American feminism, of which Hillary is decidedly a product (O’Connor and Ginsburg were not of that generation, but Ginsburg nonetheless embraced second-wave feminism in her work). Second wave feminism was based largely on the awareness of common oppression (think consciousness-raising groups) and the efforts that those feminists made (and still make) were oriented towards making advances for women as a class – thus the energy spent on changing laws to redress egregious, class-based violations of women’s autonomy and dignity and on breaking down the barriers in education and the workplace that held them back.  (In contrast, third-wave feminism is conscious of discrimination women face but tends to take a more individualistic approach to problem-solving because many class-based barriers against women are no longer there and a lot of discrimination is more subtle and of the sort that isolates women in their own particular experience).  My point here is that because women embody different projections of feminism doesn’t mean that they aren’t both feminists.  Thatcher’s feminism was very much of her generation and culture, while Hillary’s is very much of hers, and feminism will look yet different when the twentysomething feminists of today reach their 50s and 60s.  But they are all feminists.

Hillary’s appealing to certain gender touchstones is hardly the mark of an "un-feminist" – it’s often quite the opposite for women who identify more with second-wave feminism than the third wave (even if they wouldn’t call it by those terms).  And let’s not pretend that men don’t play to gender touchstones in every election – why else all the football-throwing on the tarmac during campaign stops, the ridiculous hunting trips, the pictures of them playing football or basketball in college, the one-upping each other on who will put more people on death row or who will torture more people, but to prove who’s more manly?? (This is, by the way, very limiting to gay men, too.)

And by suggesting that we should vote against Hillary to "defend the cause of female equality" aren’t you advocating that women do precisely what you have criticized Hillary’s supporters for doing (without much evidence)?  That is, what’s the difference between voting for her because of her gender versus voting against her because of she’s supposedly not feminist enough?  You advocate that people vote for Obama because he’s the better candidate.  What are you so afraid of that you have to advocate that people – and let’s face it, you’re talking about women here – vote against Hillary *not* because of her positions or qualifications, but simply on her supposed status as an "anti-feminist" in your book?  So, the best disqualifier a conservative like you can come up with is that Hillary isn’t a feminist?  And that’s a problem???  Of course it isn’t a problem for you.  But your insistence that it be a problem for women is incredibly patronizing.

Responding to this post, a reader writes:

My wife & I commented similarly this past weekend on the absence of a gay candidate…then we got to thinking, with Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, can a gay person be Commander In Chief?  Are we, gay American-born citizens over age 35, the only American-born citizens who do not qualify to be president?

Another adds:

An atheist candidate seems equally unlikely (so does a Muslim one, for that matter). Every Democratic candidate has pandered openly to Christianity over the course of the campaign. As an atheist, I don’t get mad. I understand what they need to do to get elected. But it is still sad. The party seems to have responded to George Bush’s injection of religion into politics by embracing it. I see in this another example of supposedly liberal Democrats backing down from their convictions in the face of the Republican machine.

Or just acknowledging reality. Obama’s rise suggests to me the way to defeat various obstacles to minority candidates: get out there, don’t rely on your identity to get votes, make the arguments you believe in, and do what you can. Oh, and stop whining.

    

New data suggest a weaker connection than some have posited:

When it comes to certain physical characteristics, such as hair and eye color, the groups studied followed diverging evolutionary trajectories. But the the researchers found that genetic predispositions to disease actually converged over time. In some ways, our ancestors became less alike; in other ways, they became more similar.

So while the study didn’t measure genes associated with neurological development or cognitive powers, we should be careful about automatically assuming that different groups of people evolved different degrees of intelligence — a cautionary echoed by geneticists.

"There is not evidence at all of any population differences in genes associated with neurological development or cognitive performance," wrote study author Lluis Quintana-Murci in an email. "In addition, I even wonder if there are genes really associated with ‘cognitive performance.’"

Dobson’s jab at McCain:

"I’m deeply disappointed the Republican Party seems poised to select a nominee who did not support a Constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage, who voted for embryonic stem cell research to kill nascent human beings, who opposed tax cuts that ended the marriage penalty, and who has little regard for freedom of speech, who organized the Gang of 14 to preserve filibusters, and has a legendary temper and often uses foul and obscene language.

"I am convinced Sen. McCain is not a conservative, and in fact, has gone out of his way to stick his thumb in the eyes of those who are. He has at times sounded more like a member of the other party. McCain actually considered leaving the GOP in 2001, and approached John Kerry about being Kerry’s running mate in 2004. McCain also said publicly that Hillary Clinton would make a good president. Given these and many other concerns, a spoonful of sugar does not make the medicine go down. I cannot, and I will not vote for Sen. John McCain, as a matter of conscience.

Ross notices something strange:

Dobson conspicuously didn’t endorse Mitt Romney; indeed, the entire statement more or less assumes a McCain victory, and strikes a note of near-elegiac wistfulness rather than defiance.

David Kuo thinks Dobson is destroying his base:

By putting himself out there so forcefully, Dr. Dobson risks playing the role of Dr. Kevorkian in ushering in the end of the old-line religious right.