History lessons in the making?

Quentin Fottrell has today focused on similar issues to those raised by Martina Devlin a few weeks ago - the fact that attacking Hilary Clinton’s “femaleness” (because ‘femininity’ wouldn’t work in this context) is fine, and in fact good sport, but that any mention of Barack Obama’s race is absolutely off limits:

We look at Obama, but are supposed to see JFK or Martin Luther King. We fear he may be assassinated like them, while Clinton undergoes a prolonged character assassination. She shows emotion, she’s a sobbin’ woman. She wears pantsuits, she’s asexual. She doesn’t, she’s showing her cleavage. She takes a potshot at Obama, she’s a desperate housewife on a losing streak. She rolls out Chelsea Clinton, she’s a madam.

Critics shout “iron my shirt” at her and it’s a joke. If they hollered racially charged comments at Obama, there would be passionate editorials condemning them.It seems strange to me that this point hasn’t been made more vocally and more often, but I suppose that’s the whole point.

Having studied a few hundred years of US elections, it also makes me wonder how this election, and these candidates, will be viewed in years to come. Will questions of race or sex be mentioned? And will one or both of those issues become more or less relevant, depending on the outcome of this election?

Cliché of the week: Only Time Will Tell