In a Barbara Streisand e-mail interview by Politico‘s Jeff Ressner, the aging actress-singer is asked if race will continue to be a factor in the presidential election. Streisand, who took three full weeks to respond to Ressner’s questions (one week to read them, one week to formulate rough-draft responses, one week to polish and finalize), says she “want[s] to believe that our country can see beyond race as a factor in voting for a Presidential candidate.
“But on some level,” she adds, “it would be naive to think that race will not be a factor. I do believe, however, that there is much less racism, sexism and homophobia among the younger generation and that we have come a very long way.”
Thank fortune, that observation seems to be true. I wonder, however, if the impact of non-racist under-25 voters may be counter-balanced by the under-25 donkey element in rural America (the intellectual kin of those two American Teen guys who don’t want to know from politics) who don’t plan to vote at all. If Obama loses, it’ll be time to once again paddle the backsides of the under-25s. I was hoping I’d never have to use the term “Generation of Shame” ever again. GenY had better watch its ass.