President Barack Obama is considering nominating Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue, as his next ambassador to either the U.K. or France as he looks to reward his biggest fundraisers with embassies never out of fashion, according to two people familiar with the matter.
Megan Salt, a spokeswoman for Vogue, said Ms. Wintour isn’t hoping for a diplomatic post. “She’s very happy with her current job,” Ms. Salt said.
But Ms. Wintour has repeatedly been rumored to be in the mix for an ambassador’s post — and interested.
If so, Ms. Wintour, 63, would have some competition for the London posting; Matthew Barzun, finance chairman of Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign, also is interested in the job, officially known as ambassador to the Court of St. James’s, said the people, who requested anonymity when discussing possible personnel moves.
The 1990s culture wars were fought over many social issues that many on the right thought were being redefined from their traditional normals by progressive activists and the liberal media for the next generation. Three of the key points of contention were abortion, gay rights, and recreational drug use. The results from last Tuesday’s election indicates that the right is losing the war on these three issues.
New voters
Conservatives were fearful that the minds of America’s youth (that is, those born in 1980 and after) would be infiltrated by secular, liberal ideology. At the fundamental level of political allegiance, they were right: the great majority of those born in 1980 or after are strongly Democratic-leaning.
The president’s anchor among age groups in both 2008 and 2012 was young voters. He won 66% of the votes of 18-24 and 25-29 year-olds in 2008. That percentage shrunk, as he lost support nationwide, to 60% among 25-29 year-olds in 2012 – though this was still more than among any other age group. Importantly, for the long-term Democratic coalition, there was no sign in the exit polls that the Democratic appeal for young voters was abating among those who turned 18 over the past four years: those 18-24 year-old were just as likely to support the president as the 25-29 year-olds.
And those who turned 30 over the past four years have maintained their Democratic allegiance from 2008. The conventional wisdom is that people become more conservative as they age. This isn’t borne out in the research, and 2012 is no exception. The only age group whose vote increased for Obama from 2008 to 2012 was 30-39 year-olds, as those who had formerly been 25-29 years old moved into 30-39 year-old age cohort.
Abortion rights
On the issue of abortion, there was no indication that voters had become more anti-legalization over the past eight years. In 2004 exit polls, only 55% of voters felt abortion should be always or mostly legal. This year, 59% held a pro-abortion rights points of view. The introduction of new voters into the electorate has not changed the pro-choice majority that has existed since at least 1975 in the US. Sixty-five percent of young voters in 2012 believed abortion should be legal all or most of the time, which is actually higher than the 58% of those over the age of 30. The exits also fit fairly well with the pre-election polls that have shown the always/mostly legal position on abortion holding steady over the past 20 years.
Gay marriage
This uptick in liberal positions is even clearer with regard to gay rights, perhaps the defining issue of the culture wars. It was less than 20 years ago when the policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in the military was thought of as a compromise. It was only four years ago when the voters of the progressive state of California amended their state constitution to ban same-sex marriage. Through last Monday, voters in no state had turned down the opportunity to ban same-sex marriage. (Note: Arizona voters did not pass a very restrictive ban in 2006; they did pass a less restrictive same-sex marriage ban in 2008.)
That all changed on election day 2012 when four states chose the more gay-friendly position on same-sex marriage ballot measures. Maine, Maryland, and Washington all approved measures allowing same-sex marriages in their state. Minnesota rejected an amendment aimed at banning same-sex marriage from the state’s constitution.
The only reason the pro-gay rights position won in three of the four states is because of voters aged 18-29 years old. That age group supported same-sex marriage in Maine with 68% of their votes, Maryland with 70%, and Washington with 65%. Sixty-seven percent of youth voters rejected the same-sex marriage ban in Minnesota. The anti-same-sex marriage side actually had more support with those 30-plus year-olds and older in Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington. As those born after 1980 become more plentiful in the electorate, we will likely see more victories for same-sex marriage forces.
Marijuana legalization
The issue of marijuana legalization is not quite as polarizing as same-sex marriage, but is still at the forefront for the culture war. Support for weed legalization comes from both liberals and libertarians like Ron Paul and Gary Johnson. Pro-marijuana defenders have made up a fairly steady proportion of the electorate the past few years, after a large uptick since 1990.
Colorado and Washington became the first two states to legalize recreational use of pot last Tuesday by 10 and 11 points respectively. The victory in Colorado was especially noteworthy as it was only six years ago that Coloradans turned down a similar effort by 18 points. Youth voters were for legalization in Colorado by more than 40 points and in Washington by 15 points.
Unlike same-sex marriage, marijuana approval was not as age-divisive and would have passed in both states even if all young voters had stayed home. While youth voters were more likely to be pro-weed in Colorado than any other age group, they were not any more likely to be so in Washington. A recreational pot amendment also failed in the fairly Democratic state of Oregon, though youth support was in the high 50s for it. All of this suggests that while pro-marijuana forces have gained strength, it’s not in as strong a position for future years as same-sex marriage now is.
Young and liberal
Overall, the 2012 election demonstrates that the young voters of America not only hold a pro-Democratic party outlook, but one that espouses liberal positions on the important social issues of the day as well.
Barack Obama can rise to the big rhetorical occasion. We all know that, so it was no surprise on Tuesday morning that he pulled out the stops for his acceptance speech in Chicago, re-elected for a second term despite the recession and his own underwhelming record in office, the backdrop to a bitterly partisan campaign against Mitt Romney. I found it more poignant than was probably intended.
In an age where the conversational style of television interviews is the dominant style of public discourse – the glib soundbite, the personal confession, the unconvincing attempts by extraordinary men (if only in the size of their egos) to persuade voters they are just like them – people often mistrust the big speech with its naked appeal to suspend disbelief.
Why? Because the 20th century was littered with such promises, most notoriously in the mid-century heyday of totalitarianism, though it is always worth recalling that Franco, Stalin and Mao were not public speakers in the Hitler or Mussolini mould. Churchill was an old-school rhetorician, but America’s FDR, hero of the fight against Depression and war, specialised in the radio “fireside chat”.
Both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, folksy exponents of Middle America’s virtues, could do both. Tony Blair was pretty good. Margaret Thatcher, like Charles de Gaulle and William Gladstone, addressed all audiences as if they were a public meeting (as Queen Victoria complained of Gladstone), exceptional public figures all of them. Most of the time we have to settle for greater mediocrity.
Was the animating spirit of this morning speech actually Jack Kennedy, whose inaugural State of the Union address in 1961 stirred many listening hearts? The cadences were there, but so were those of Martin Luther King: the preacher’s habit of repetition on a rising note which are so familiar to millions of Americans, black and white.
But Kennedy’s speech famously focused on the historic tussle with Soviet communism – then nearing its peak – the young, new president’s willingness to “pay any price”, his challenge to Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country”.
Stirring stuff but, in the America that Obama leads, international affairs take second place to healing domestic wounds and squaring up to the challenge – political, economic, cultural, educational – that comes from a resurgent Asia. Russia, hobbled as usual by a command economy incompetently run, was never the threat that China poses. But China has not been the dominant focus of this election.
Obama’s problem has always been that he can hit the high notes of the politician’s trade, but not the low ones, the ones that “squares or squashes” his opponents – the phrase is David Lloyd George’s, a British reformer who could do both – and persuades voters to follow down necessary roads they may not want to travel. He promises to try harder second time around. Good.
But that comes later. Tuesday was an occasion for the lofty phrase about the bright, if tarnished, promise of America’s future and for gestures of conciliation to a defeated opponent and his supporters.
Here’s an example of the healing Obama: “That’s why elections matter. It’s not small, it’s big. It’s important. Democracy in a nation of 300 million can be noisy and messy and complicated. We have our own opinions. Each of us has deeply held beliefs. And when we go through tough times, when we make big decisions as a country, it necessarily stirs passions, stirs up controversy. That won’t change after tonight. And it shouldn’t. These arguments we have are a mark of our liberty.”
Here he is being upbeat: “We want our kids to grow up in a country where they have access to the best schools and the best teachers, a country that lives up to its legacy as the global leader in technology and discovery and innovation with all of the good jobs and new businesses that follow. We want our children to live in an America that isn’t burdened by debt, that isn’t weakened up by inequality, that isn’t threatened by the destructive power of a warming planet.”
And here’s a gesture to that cherished belief in American uniqueness (the “last, best hope of mankind”, as once put by Abraham Lincoln, the republic’s most beloved president, and a crafty public speaker in the folksy and lofty departments): “We want to pass on a country that’s safe and respected and admired around the world, a nation that is defended by the strongest military on Earth and the best troops this – this world has ever known – but also a country that moves with confidence beyond this time of war to shape a peace that is built on the promise of freedom and dignity for every human being.”
But he was also more personal than Mr Cool usually feels able to be, a tribute to his magnificent campaigner of a wife, and an affectionate (“one dog’s enough”) gesture to his kids. Obama has been making similar remarks throughout the campaign, but they come better from a winner, exhausted, evidently grateful and relieved.
The president struck what Democratic voters – and many conservatives as well as liberals abroad – will find to be more persuasive notes than Governor Romney might have offered: inclusivity, education, the need to get the US federal budget back into better balance, to protect the weak and hold the ever-more powerful of corporate America to better account.
He mentioned military wives, and the need to ensure that their husbands get civilian jobs on leaving the services, and families struggling to pay the bills for sick children – one in Mentor, Ohio, no less, how suitable for a mentoring president – of the women and Hispanic voters, and the young, who helped to secure his second term.
But he doggedly stuck to the grooves of the American dream. “You can make it here in America if you’re willing to try,” he said towards the end. Well, yes, and his own improbable career as America’s first Pacific president as well as its first black one shows it can still be done.
But all the data about rising inequality and stalled middle-class incomes, which is a story at least a generation old now, reminds his listeners how hard the dream has become for millions, especially for the poorer whites who – unlike many of the women, blacks and Hispanics in Obama’s coalition – have seen their living standards and prospects decline.
With or without the rise of China, this would be a problem. It is the dysfunctional American political system which has gridlocked Washington, raising the prospect of the “fiscal cliff” disaster in a few weeks’ time if compromise is not reached. Obama’s victory does not guarantee success; far from it. That was the poignancy of this morning’s speech for me.
“I have never been more hopeful about America’s future,” the president said. Well, good luck. Here’s hoping he knows something the rest of us can’t quite see; even if it is only his own determination to learn from past mistakes and do better.
Michael Bloomberg has been avoiding offering support for Mitt Romney or President Barack Obama, but Hurricane Sandy changed that. Bloomberg has officially endorsed Obama, citing the President’s work to tackle climate change.
“Our climate is changing. And while the increase in extreme weather we have experienced in New York City and around the world may or may not be the result of it, the risk that it might be — given this week’s devastation — should compel all elected leaders to take immediate action,” wrote Bloomberg, in an op-ed for Bloomberg View.
“We need leadership from the White House — and over the past four years, President Barack Obama has taken major steps to reduce our carbon consumption, including setting higher fuel-efficiency standards for cars and trucks.”
Bloomberg even took some time to jab Romney, for that pesky habit of flip-flopping:
“I believe Mitt Romney is a good and decent man, and he would bring valuable business experience to the Oval Office. He understands that America was built on the promise of equal opportunity, not equal results. In the past he has also taken sensible positions on immigration, illegal guns, abortion rights and health care. But he has reversed course on all of them, and is even running against the health-care model he signed into law in Massachusetts.”
The video above, distributed on the Walmart Community YouTube channel, features the First Walmart Mom, Michelle Obama, who helped launch Walmart’s healthy food platform. She talks about how she and Barack started married life in debt from student loans, and points to BarackObama.com/plans and, of course, vote.barackobama.com. And in the interests of balance if not equal time, the Walmart channel also posted an appeal for the Romney campaign by Ann Romney, whose video clocks in at 5:25 vs 3:10 for Michelle:
Obama for America has released a video that humorously takes Mitt Romney to task for picking on Big Bird in last week’s presidential debate. And unlike a lot of political internet videos that make the rounds, this one is 30 seconds long and contains a disclaimer at the end, so it might actually end up on TV for the wider world to see.
UPDATE: In a statement, Sesame Workshop requested that the campaign take down the ad. “Sesame Workshop is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization and we do not endorse candidates or participate in political campaigns. We have approved no campaign ads, and as is our general practice, have requested that the ad be taken down.”
Runway to Win is a project that mixes fashion and politics, with top designers showing their support for Obama. Set up by Anna Wintour of Vogue, the fundraising initiative features a collection of clothing and accessories available to buy online, and the proceeds benefit the Obama Victory Fund.
The designers include Marc Jacobs, Tory Burch, Diane von Furstenberg, Vera Wang, Derek Lam, Joseph Altuzarra, and Rachel Roy. Recently, some celebrities also got on board to provide some new pieces for the collection. Beyoncé and her mom Tina designed a series of baby onesies, Sarah Jessica Parker designed a t-shirt that says ‘Viva Obama’, Ricky Martin designed a t-shirt that says ‘Unidos’, Kerry Washington designed a paisley print scarf, and model Chanel Iman designed a backpack.
Are radical feminist separatists infiltrating Saudi Arabia’s ruling elite? Have the women of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia undergone a wild revolution, read Love Your Enemy? and decided to eschew all male company to create their own political systems and free themselves from the patriarchy? I hope so, because otherwise it’s hard to imagine the convoluted logic behind a decision to build all-female cities to boost women’s employment.
The country already has separate schools, segregated universities (and the biggest all-female university in the world) not to mention offices, restaurants and even separate entrances for public buildings. Now industrial hubs are to be built so that women can be hidden away even further than their current dresscode of abaya, headscarf and niqab allows.
The country’s segregation is so extreme the plans bring to mind the US’s racial divide under the Jim Crow laws, ensuring “separate but equal” institutions for black and white people. And like the legalised discrimination in the US, “equal” in this context means no such thing. The female half of the adult population of Saudi Arabia is considered unfit to control their own lives. Women cannot decide whether to leave the house, whether or who to marry, whether to work or study, whether to travel, what to wear, or even whether to have major surgery – without the consent of a male guardian.
In a country of such startling misogyny, which treats women like children, it is hardly surprising there are few women in work and that it is becoming a crises the ruling elite is being forced to take notice of. Almost 60% of the country’s college graduates are women, but 78% of female university graduates are apparently unemployed – despite the fact more than 1,000 hold a doctorate degree. In total only 15% of Saudi Arabia’s workforce are women. And unlike in many recession-hit countries, there are more than enough jobs to go around – the economy apparently booming.
Yet with women refused driving licences for fear it will lead to social disintegration, education for girls failing to fit them for the workplace, and businesswomen still expected to have a male representative to deal with government agencies, not to mention the pressure to provide women with separate offices, employers naturally favour men. With sexism so central to the system, women are also largely restricted to traditionally female-oriented fields in the public sector and less than 1% of decision-making posts are held by Saudi women.
With so many barriers and a climate that seems hostile to women working – or being in the public eye at all – many female employers and employees will no doubt welcome the chance to find jobs and not have to cope with the difficulties of a mixed-sex environment. The industrial cities are said to be places that will improve women’s prospects and give them the chance for greater financial independence. The first is planned to open next year, and will apparently create 5,000 jobs in textiles, pharmaceuticals and food-processing industries, with four similar industrial cities being proposed in Riyadh.
But how can further segregation be expected to solve the problems caused by discrimination? It takes a peculiar leap of logic to think the answer is instead to build whole new cities where women who choose to have careers can be herded. Would this be seen as acceptable, even progressive, if the cities were there to house workplaces for people of one race rather than one gender? But where are the voices calling for an end to the country’s discriminatory practices? There has been none of the broad support that would have ensued had the segregation been along race lines. In South Africa such segregation was the basis for a worldwide boycott, yet Saudi Arabia is merely seen as an “exceptional” place with a different culture.
Clerics will say that Islam does not allow women and men to mix at work, while the rulers explain that segregation is part of Saudi culture. Yet Islamic feminists have pointed out time and time again, that the prophet Muhammad himself was married to a businesswoman – with no need to hide in an all-women city. A culture that does not just segregate women, but enshrines in law that they are second-class citizens is hardly one worth preserving.
If the cities fail, it will, no doubt, be seen as a sign women are not fit to run businesses. But if they turn out to be a success, more will be built, and women will be more segregated than ever – disappearing even further from the public sphere. So maybe the answer is for women to not just welcome the cities, but flock to them, close the doors, and refuse to leave until the kingdom’s rulers understand just what it is like to live without women.
Vogue editor Anna Wintour urges the president’s supporters to step up and take part in an online contest to win a pair of tickets to a June 14 fundraiser in New York City. Wintour is co-hosting New York Night with President Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, Sarah Jessica Parker at the actress’ Manhattan home.
Wintour has long been an enthusiastically active Obama backer and, along with her close friend Harvey Weinstein, one of the president’s leading New York fundraisers. Campaign officials hope the online contest to attend the June 14 dinner will build on the success of a similar online drawing for tickets to the recent Obama fundraiser at George Clooney’s house in Laurel Canyon.
The list of celebrity names at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner (hosted by Jimmy Kimmel) on Saturday night (April 28) read like an awards show afterparty, but the rapper who got a shout out during President Obama’s speech wasn’t even in attendance. During his humorous minutes on the mic, Obama made his taste for Young Jeezy’s music known by admitting he sings the Jeezy’s songs to his wife.
“In my first term I sang Al Green. In my second term, I’m going with Young Jeezy,” President Obama joked, addressing his wife Michelle Obama, when he added, “I sing that to her sometimes.” Jeezy was pleased to hear that President Obama was a fan, replying on Twitter. “Shout out to @BarackObama,” he wrote, “You know they love the snowman in the white house.”
This article titled “America’s roaring twentysomethings: how young voters won the culture wars” was written by Harry J Enten, for guardian.co.uk on Tuesday 13th November 2012 13.30 UTC
