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ACCUSED: The Age’s blatant bid to blacken America’s deserved reputation for racial tolerance

American academic James Gimpel appears to have been partly verballed by The Age newspaper’s Ian Munro in an article about the US Presidential election that falsely portrayed the American electorate as racist.

RACE SMEAR

Munro lives in New York but seems to have little affection for his host country or perhaps just can’t bring himself to understand that a candidate on the left fringe of the Democratic party might always have had some challenges in getting elected. He writes:

STRUGGLING to explain Democratic candidate Barack Obama’s inability to dominate his Republican opponent John McCain in the polls, Americans have started to think about the unthinkable: the race factor.

After his comments appeared to say the white racists were the only reason why Senator Obama wasn’t doing as well as the media expected in the opinion polls, a member of the VEXNEWS Investigative Unit made contact with the academic and his explanation clearly indicates that he’s been quoted out of context. The academic responded to this letter:

Dear Mr Gimpel,

I refer to your quotes in today’s edition of The Age newspaper, a daily distributed in Melbourne, Australia.

While I appreciate your vastly greater level of experience and research in US politics, your primary focus on one particular issue to explain Obama’s failure to dominate this race (excusing the pun) is both a gross simplification and frankly, demeaning and offensive to the great many Americans who  will not vote for Obama and – by virtue of your analysis – now stand accused of being racist.

Could the statistical dead heat possibly be explained by McCain being viewed as a superior candidate with a far greater level of legislative and military experience? 

You note that Obama’s vote is particularly bad amongst older (50+) whites; could not that simply be that Obama’s ‘pitch’ of youthfulness in contrast to McCain’s age is of little concern to an older  demographic?

I had the opportunity of viewing the Saddleback Forum featuring both candidates two days ago.  By virtue of your definition is the US media and the thousands of blogs online reporting on the performance of both candidates racist too for judging McCain the better performer?

If, albeit still unlikely, McCain does win the election it would be sad indeed if members of the academia like yourself stoop to accounting to an Obama loss to a perceived undercurrent of racism throughout American voters.

ACADEMIC PUTS REMARKS IN CONTEXT PROVING THE AGE TO BE DEMONISING AMERICA

The response sets out the entirety of Mr Gimpel’s remarks which makes it clear that he – unlike it seems The Age’s Ian Munro – is capable of putting race into a broader context of American society.

Dear Bibi,

Well, I haven’t read how I was quoted, but in my remarks to the story’s author I insisted that there is certainly more than race going on in this /race/.

This is a basic summary of what I said to the reporter in our phone conversation.

First of all, there is plain-and-simple partisanship.    That is the foremost consideration and primary determinant of voting behavior.    It is a filter through which most campaign events and activity are judged.

Second, there is race.    People trust those who are like themselves. That isn’t necessarily racist in the conventional sense you mean below, it’s a matter of favoring what is familiar.     How many African Americans will be choosing Obama because he is black?   Probably a large share of them.     But no one is likely to write a story about that.

There is a noteworthy generational resistance to Obama among older white voters — Democrats and Republicans.   I don’t think they are virulently racist, but they aren’t particularly progressive in their diversity views either.    Several of my own family members fit into this category, by the way.

Finally, I remarked that many people were undecided, and that these early polls should be taken lightly.    Late deciders, often among the most poorly informed voters, commonly decide close elections in the U.S.

This is a bit of an irony, but it’s still true.

All best Jim G.

James G. Gimpel, Editor

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