She kissed women

This is the obligatory political post and it may really annoy some people and I may even alienate some of the handful of readers, but anyway...

As I was driving home from work today and it is a short drive, I heard on NPR them talking about the campaign. They were talking about Hillary and how she has not given up on Nevada even though it appears that Obama should win this state. They noted that she went to Las Vegas today and went door-to-door, she even kissed women, etc. I really lost it after the whole kissed women thing. What the hell is that supposed to mean, she even kissed women? Is this supposed to show that she is more available? Is this supposed to show that she is "down with the Latino culture"? Is this supposed to appeal to the lesbian vote, what the hell does it matter if she kissed women, there was no mention of what she did with the men, did she kiss them as well? I am pretty sure that it would be just as appropriate to kiss a man on his cheek as a woman within Latino culture. So what the hell did that mean?

This led me to what has bugged me about this campaign, the whole idea of the women versus the black man and that is exactly how this campaign is being portrayed. I can deal with this from the MSM as I expect this from them, but it seems that the progressive, liberal blogosphere, the same one I am a part of, is falling into this same trap. I heard an interview with Elizabeth Edwards where she said something to the effect of, isn't that why we fought for civil rights and the rights of women, so that gender and ethnicity do not matter. Yes, it is in her and her husband's best interest for the race to be more about the issues. I am biased in this, but if the issues were raised I think that John Edwards may do better. I would support an Obama presidency, but he is inexperienced and another four years would be good for him, in my opinion, so that he could get more foreign policy experience. And I do believe that Clinton is too much of the same old DC politics and is too tied to big corporations, more so than the other two, but I would support her in a presidential run. The real issue for me is that we hear very little about what the candidates really think about the issues and too much about their gender or their ethnicity and the history of this election. If Edwards cannot win, and it is starting to look like he can't, I want to see an Obama/Clinton or vice versa (I don't care which) Democratic ticket, but in my opinion that wouldn't happen and that is the biggest shame of it all.

Oh by the way, I am also super annoyed because the NC primary is in May sometime, yes I will still vote, but really who will be left, the race will be almost if not totally decided by then. We need a national primary where all of the states have the same primary date or we need a regional primary system where over a set of five different dates, ten states each have their primaries. There is too much importance put on Iowa and New Hampshire and not enough on those states like NC who have really late primaries.