THE PERMEABILITY OF RACIAL ATTITUDES IN THE AGE OF OBAMA.

During the historic 2008 election, media pundits from far and wide proclaimed that Barack Obama was coming to power in a new post-racial era. The most enduring divide in American politics had apparently become pass??, and the racial cleavages that have defined the social, economic, and political landscape since the country's founding somehow had become transformed. The actual election results did little to support this point of view, however. Approximately ninety-five percent of Black Americans supported Obama, as did approximately two-thirds of Latinos and Asian Americans. White Americans did not reject Obama out of hand, with forty-three percent supporting him, but race was not inconsequential to the vote (Pasek et al., 2009). Race clearly mattered in 2008, as it does now. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]