Hillary and Barack

I am still torn between Hillary and Barack and I have only a handful of days before I must decide. I suspect that when I get to the poll, it will be a gut reaction which one I choose. I think Hillary has more experience, especially legislative experience, which is needed to get work done, but Barack represents something fresh and new, a new generation of politics, which appeals to me greatly.

I don't like the way that Hillary and Barack have gone for each others' jugular during their campaigns. I think the bile spewed between the two has diminished the process and reduces it to politics as usual rather than "something new," which we desperately need. I hope that, by the time the election comes, democrats are not too bitter about winning or losing so that they become disaffected and don't vote. I'm especially concerned that all the black voters who feel energized and enfrachised for the first time will get turned off of voting in the presidential election if Barack loses. I have a feeling that most of the middle-class white female Hillary backers understand the need for a regime change and would back Obama should he win. I'm not sure what the roots are of this belief other than intuition or perhaps some subtle form of racism that I haven't interrogated in myself yet.

I have tried to avoid the gender/race debates in assessing Clinton and Obama. Instead, I've tried to pay attention to their stands on the issues. Obviously, I think playing gender and race against each other is so dangerous. On the other hand, it's been unavoidable. It's the frame that so many people use. Even Salon frames the the race in these terms, primarily because the candidates themselves are "playing" their race and gender "cards" (a phrase I've always thought to be perverse). NOW's cries of "betrayal" by Sen. Kennedy's endorsement of Obama reeks of that frame. To cast endorsing Obama as a betrayal of women is typical of the racism of second wave feminism's identity politics. As are arguments about which trumps which, race or sex. And we all seem to be slipping into these arguments.

Feminist philospher Nancy Fraser has written a response to NOW, which was sent out on the SWIP list (and I think it was published in the NYT, but I'm not sure). It's a response that I find quite compelling:

Hillary or Barack?
Two Views of Feminism
by Nancy Fraser

I was distressed to read that the President of NY State N.O.W. excoriated Ted Kennedy for "betraying women" by endorsing Barack Obama instead of Hillary Clinton (NYT, 2/1/08). But I was not entirely surprised. That view reflects what has by now become the mainstream self-understanding of American feminism as a political interest group. To the extent that feminists understand themselves in this way, as defending women's policy interests within the existing framework of
politics-as-usual, they have found an excellent standard-bearer in Hillary Clinton. But that is not the only way to understand feminism. Not so long ago, many of us saw ourselves as participants in a transformative social movement, which aspired to remake the political landscape. Intent more on changing the rules of the game than on playing it as it lays, we mobilized energies from below to stretch the bounds of what was politically thinkable. Expanding public space and invigorating public debate, our movement projected, not a laundry list of demands, but the inspiriting vision of a non-hierarchical society that nurtured both human connections and individual freedom. Some feminists continue to cleave to that self-understanding. For us, Barack Obama represents a better vehicle for feminist aspirations than Hillary Clinton. The democratizing energies now converging on him promise to create the terrain on which our sort of feminism can once again flourish. Drawing its momentum from activist forces, and inspiring the latter in turn, the Obama compaign offers feminists, and other progressive forces, that rarest of political opportunities: the chance to help build and shape a major realignment of American politics. That is a prospect worthy of the best and the highest in American feminism.

Nancy Fraser
Henry A. and Louise Loeb Professor of Philosophy and Politics
New School for Social Research

And it is indeed how I feel about Obama (-feel- being the operative word here rather than think). But I can't help -thinking- that so much work needs to be done in Washington. That we need a seasoned political hand for the cleanup effort.

My last devilish thought for the day on this subject is this: How much of my reluctance to choose is a product of my white liberal guilt?

Something to reflect on.