By Jennifer 8. Lee, The New York Times

For all the rhetoric of national unity and bipartisanship, presidential political strategy is still centered around coalitions of various constituencies: labor, religious groups, youth, retirees, African Americans, Latinos — and women. Women, African Americans and Hispanics are among the most strategically important and closely scrutinized demographic groups in a campaign where two historic first candidates are going head to head, especially in a city where blacks comprise one quarter of the population and women make up 60 percent of registered Democrats. And that is presumably why Barack Obama’s supporters organized two afternoon events in what is ostensibly the Hillary Heartland: a Women for Obama rally that drew 500 people to Columbus Circle and a smaller march later in the day through Spanish Harlem… One of the younger speakers was 20-year-old Sara Haile-Marian, an Ethiopian-born New York University student who said she had been largely apathetic about politics until a year ago but hopes that 10 years from now children will “aspire to be politicians not celebrities.”
While much attention has been paid to Mr. Obama’s appeal to political newcomers like Ms. Haile-Marian, there were a number of people in the crowd who said they could remember the days of Franklin Delano Roosevelt… Read More >>