City Newspaper Archives - 2/2008

POLITICS: After Super Tu

Published by Mary Anna Towler on Feb 05, 2008
And on we go.

Yesterday's election didn't give us a clear leader for the presidential nomination, either for the Democrats or for the Republicans. And that's a good thing. We still have a lot to learn, from all of the candidates.

And while it's rewarding to see the enthusiasm that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have generated among voters - and rewarding to see the Democrats' race come down to a choice between a white woman and an African-American man - there are troubling signs in the Super Tuesday results.

Those results underscore the divisions that continue to exist in this country. We're divided by ethnicity, by gender, by income, urban and rural. And some of our divisions are particularly troubling. Can Barack Obama win in a national campaign, or will our racial divide get in the way? And are we really not to read anything into Obama's inability to capture the Latino vote?

"Our time has come," Obama said as he stood in front of cheering supporters in Illinois. "We are and always will be the United States of America."

We can hope. We can hope.