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How to approach the +50yo female Clinton Supporters Count Too voters

May 21st, 2008
By JILL MILLER ZIMON

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Earlier today, someone asked me “How is someone supposed to convince [Hillary Clinton] voters to side with him [Obama] when they vote for his opponent knowing she will not win and claim they will not support him once he wins the nomination as they are predicting?”

Here’s my response:

You can’t convince the Clinton Supporters Count Too kind of voter to “side with” Obama. That’s not going to happen.

So what can you do?

1. You let them vent.
2. You try to discern the common issues important to them and to you (or the other opponent).
3. You offer as much as you can to help them see how the opponent is not only not an opponent, but in fact is an ally.
4. How do you do that? With facts.

This is all about building trust. People who already feel screwed, legitimately or not, don’t want to feel like they’re setting themselves up just to be screwed again. You read this kind of fear over and over in the rants from the Clinton Supporters Count Too people.

If not having this group “side” with the opponent is in fact such a huge problem, then the person finding it to be a huge problem has just as much of an obligation to solve it. It is pure and utter nonsense in terms of negotiating and mediating and getting this particular crowd of voters to see the choice you want them to make as something they can do if the side that sees them as a problem is completely unwilling to step forward.

Should it be that way? Who knows. But it’s not about the way it should be or has always been. It’s about the way you want it to be and what you have to do to get there.

5. So you build the trust, but in this case, it has to be organic. That means, these voters have to really feel it. If they don’t feel it, they won’t change their allegiance.

I agree with the legions of Obama-committed that Hillary Clinton has to send the signal that she is going to trust Barack Obama. But part of the deep-seated piece for this particular cohort of voters - primarily that 50 year old and older female demographic - is that they’ve lived their lives saying sisters are going to do it for themselves. So part of them is saying, what do we need men for? We’ll find our own way.

And so they really, honestly in their heart believe and are okay with letting men screw themselves.

Therefore, I say to those who see this attitude as a complete barrier to the success of the opponent (Obama), you don’t win them over by telling them that they need you and must come to you because that’s the way it’s always been. They will laugh in your face. They are the generation that’s lived to prove that they can do it on their own or will die trying.

Rather, you have to find what matters to them: their daughters and granddaughters, as well as their sons and grandsons.

This is why I am dedicated to efforts like the White House Project that helps me work on the challenge to be sure that there are more than enough women always ready and able to run and to win.

6. Then, you can’t break the trust. The issues that are in common and the methods for addressing them have to be followed through on, at all levels. From now through and after the general election.

It’s actually really very simple: strategists and advisors figure out how to target and microtarget all the time.

This situation should be viewed as exactly the same thing, but the tactics that will be used to address this group? Those may have to be as unprecedented as anything else we’ve seen in the last 17 months.



This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 21st, 2008 at 7:29 am and is filed under Democratic Party, Voting, Newsweek Blogitics, John McCain, Barack Obama, 2008 Elections, Democrats, Hillary Clinton, Politics. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Viewing 36 Comments

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    You are right about Clinton needing to send a signal. With the pro Hillary blogs spewing so much paranoid and nasty garbage that keeps her supporters stirred up they will not listen to anyone but, Hillary.
    Someone said many feel like a man stole it away from her.
    Now, I am a 50 yr old white woman who supports Obama. I do not understand the anger and this emotional need for a woman to be president to feel worthy or validated. I feel you should deal with doing that yourself. You cannot live through other people and Hillary as president is not going to change anything in their lives that any other democrat would.
    But, I understand they feel that somehow Hillary being president will make them feel legit or validated. So be it.
    And they feel Obama is the enemy for daring to challenge her. They resent him for winning.
    They do not accept that Hillary was responsible for blowing a sure thing by bad management and problems with her own campaign. And to suggest it they feel you are attacking them personally.
    I just ignore them and let them vent for now. Sometimes I shake my head in wonder at what they say and plot to do - like protest at an Obama event, ect., but, hoping they get it out of their system
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    I am with you 100%. I am almost 46, I feel very much like you do except that I've been very unenthusiastic about both candidates (I would have voted for Biden, Dodd or Richardson if they'd still been on the ballot in Ohio).

    I don't feel the way this group of voters feels, but, like you - I get what it is to them. I choose to work the "where's the opportunity" angle, even though I do have concerns about making sure that we don't drop the ball re: the media and sexism we've seen.
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    I am 65, white, masters degree, woman.

    I was impressed with Obama's speeches. Perhaps I might have been swayed if I hadn't read his books.

    There is something chilling about the line from "Dreams from my Father" that if things turned ugly he would stand with the muslims. Another line that really bothered me was that he gained comfort from holding grievance against his mothers race.

    He speaks in public of having transcended race and that we should do so. His campaign would have us trust him. There are too many contradictions evident from Obama's speeches and writings to evoke any sort of trust from me.
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    Jill,

    I'm a 41 year old African American man who is a supporter of Hillary Clinton who will not be voting for Obama. Unlike the "Holly In Cincinnati" crowd I'm not going to vote for the crazy man in the other party due to some neo-con, pro Israel fantasy, I'm just going to stay home along with my money and my mom (she happens to agree with me).

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    Why?

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    1) His inexperience (and not in the way you think); its really my inexperience with him, I don't know him, I've heard and read alot about him, but I just don't know him. As I've said before I know what I would have gotten from a President Hillary Clinton (both good and bad), but I'm not sure what I will get from a President Barack Obama, I think I know what I'll get, but I'm not sure.

    And after 8 years of George Bush's ineptitude and malfeasance I just want someone who while I might not agree with them 100% of the time and they may not be a "politics changer" they're at least competent and reasonably honest. This election is too important for it to be decided by thoughts like my wish is that the president will do..., my hope is that the president will do... and I think I know what the president will do about... it needs to be about thoughts like I know what the president will do. Remember, the last time we elected a President based upon wishes, hopes and I think I knows, we got George Bush, ask any non 28 percenter how well that turned out.

    2) Because of the intense misogyny and hatred shown by some of the Obama supporters (I'm a big believer in you scratch a misogynist and you'll find a racist and vise-a-versa).
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    Jill, a question for you, as a female Clinton supporter. I'm a female Obama supporter, of the younger generation, and it's my personal impression that Clinton's defeat is still a triumph for women, though not the 100% triumph a win might have been.

    Let me explain. Blacks vote almost unanimously for Obama. Though I'm happy for it, because he's my candidate, I'm sad that they still feel the need to be tribal, to vote as a bloc, to vote out of loyalty for their own race. It's a sign that we have not advanced to a color-blind society (not that I didn't know that), that race is still very much a factor.

    Now take Clinton. Though women, especially older women, trend more towards her, it's much more varied. Women do NOT vote with their ovaries, they vote with their ideas, mostly. To me this is a GOOD sign, a sign that our gender no longer defines us, a sign that the world we live in allows us to not be a tribe, to be blind to gender.

    I understand the passion of the older women, who have had to fight a long hard battle to come this far, and would like to see a great big symbolic barrier fall. I and all young women have a lot to thank this generation for, but I'm saddened to think that this very passion may prevent them from realizing that their battle has enabled a generation of women to grow up in a world much more gender-blind than it is race-blind.
    I'm not saying sexism is dead, it's not. I'm not even saying that sexism has been totally absent from the campaign (though I don't think that's what beat Clinton), but I think that some women may be overestimating the extent to which gender mattered and ignoring or not noticing how this campaign actually reflects the advances in gender equality, at least in the minds of young women.
    What do you think?
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    I am 55, black, with a masters degree, woman.

    I think the only thing you don't trust in him is his blackness. You would come up with any excuse as will most racially motivated whites to make yourself feel okay not to vote for a black man.

    You probably found fault with MLK and was angry when he was given a holiday.
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    I absolutely do not agree that the only thing I don't trust in him is his blackness. And I deeply resent your insinuation of racism.

    As for Obama, his consciousness in his book was all about his blackness - which probably stands to reason because of his searching for his identity and his desire to find and respect his father. His conclusions, however, that he would like to get rid of his whiteness and his white blood are something else.

    Lashing out at me or others who think like me is certainly not the path to unity. I am not racist. I would have voted for Colin Powell in a heartbeat because I think he is a truly great man. I also felt that way about MLK.

    I also am not looking for an excuse not to vote for Obama. I will probably vote for him if he wins the nomination - because I think that we must elect a democrat this year - the country must turn around from this destructive path that it is on.

    My post earlier addressed the issue of trust. I don't trust Obama - I have been uncomfortable with the people that he has surrounding him. His background and history in Chicago have caused me pause. Interestingly enough, though, I don't know that I fully trust any of the politicians that are running.

    I have at times admired McCain for his willingness to buck the establishment and to cross party lines. But in the final analysis, he is a Republican - and he will keep us going in the wrong direction like we have been for the past 8 years.

    I will vote for the Democratic candidate.
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    Jmacmanus: I think a lot people echo what you've said. When I think about the instances you cite and the instances that concern me (and again, I want to emphasize, Clinton and Obama were neck and neck for being the low candidate on my totem pole, starting in 1/07 when I first started writing about the campaign) relate to both the candidates, i get tripped up on political expediency. How do we ever really know their motivation?

    So maybe that makes me nothing more than a garden variety cynic. I think I probably am, to be honest! But I feel that way about pretty much all political candidates - because they are political candidates, not because of anything else, least of all immutable traits like race or gender.

    I don't think anyone should begrudge you your reservations, and that's what bothers me a lot about the rhetoric from so many factions, pro-Clinton and pro-Obama. It's like people forget that one of the few things that is really ours, is our vote.

    Which is why, when one camp is trying to figure out a way into the other camp's mindset, they need to tread carefully, thoroughly and respectfully. AND take no for an answer.

    I just hate the nastiness - that's what bothers me the most, I think.
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