IT'S the season of superlatives as Americans go wild at the Super Bowl when the New York Giants clash with the New England Patriots in Arizona tomorrow.
Two days later, it will be Super Tuesday. Some even called it Super Duper-Tsunami Tuesday when presidential nominating contests take place in a record 22 states. Previous Super Tuesdays have not seen such a huge number of states holding their caucuses or primary elections simultaneously.
“It has never been this big. This one is seriously super,” said Prof Robert Shapiro of Columbia University.
These 22 states would be providing more than half of the delegates who would eventually pick the presidential nominee.
A Democratic contender requires 2,025 delegates to win the nomination; a Republican, 1,191.
Asked to describe the current battle for the Oval Office, Prof Shapiro replied: “I’ve not seen such an exciting election for decades.” There is no clear favourite, although Hillary Clinton and John McCain seem to be the leading choice of their respective parties, Democratic and Republican. John Edwards and Rudy Giuliani have dropped out of the race. Giuliani crashed out of Tuesday’s primary election in Florida, a state he had been pinning his hopes on. But even a day before that, according to The New York Times, American reporters travelling with him were already quietly writing his political obituary at the back of the plane while Giuliani’s team sat in the front. It is now Hillary versus Barack Obama for the party whose symbol is a donkey. For the Republicans, the battle is between McCain and Mitt Romney. “At this point, it is hard to say, although Hillary Clinton still appears to be the leading candidate for her party,” said Prof Shapiro, who specialises in American politics. Since 1989, Americans have had a Bush or a Clinton as their president. McCain, on the other hand, “may well be the strongest opponent against the Democrats,” Prof Shapiro said. RealClearPolitics.com, an independent website that collects polling data and news, found that Clinton and McCain are leading in California, New York and New Jersey. These three states are among those that will send the largest number of delegates to their respective party national conventions where the presidential nominee will be selected. “All signs point to a close race. There is a possibility that there will still be no clear winner (after Super Tuesday) for the Democrats,” Prof Shapiro said. Attention would then turn to the nominating contests in the remaining states, he said. Or worse, it would be a very messy affair during the Democratic National Convention in August when the uncommitted delegates would be wooed from all sides. Indeed, the Democratic race is stirring up much interest and debate among people. Obama has remarked that he “can’t tell whom I’m running against sometimes.” Well, that would be Billary (Bill and Hillary Clinton), in this age of TomKat and Brangelina. As the rivalry hots up, the US press has observed that Bill Clinton was getting more unhinged as he campaigned for his wife, sometimes saying all the wrong things. Desperate Husband, one columnist called him. Another report noted that “his face was turning red in public nearly every week”. Indeed, politics is very much about appearances. So, amid all the talk about the possibility of a first woman president, a New York Post article gushed that Obama appealed to women in more ways than one. “He is like a woman: slim, good looking, with long elegant fingers, appealingly dressed,” it said, adding that “he embodies many of the positive characteristics we tend to regard as feminine: sensitive and empathetic”. The New York Times Magazine, in its Jan 20 issue, carried a Q and A with Maya Soetoro-Ng, Obama’s younger half sister who works in Honolulu. Describing herself as Buddhist, she said she had a car sticker proclaiming “Women for Obama”. Most Americans will say that the presidential election should not be about race or gender but what a candidate has to offer to his or her country. Otherwise, as comedienne Whoopi Goldberg put it: “What am I supposed to do? I’m a woman, and I’m black.”
