Oprah Winfrey taps directly into the emotions, beliefs, buying habits and summer reading patterns of billions of women all over the world! Oprah Winfrey has the power to lay waste an entire industry with a mere utterance! She's a completely invincible, unstoppable force of nature...-- Gin Rummy, "The Boondocks, 'Let's Nab Oprah'"
Oprah Winfrey has joined the political fray. She has decided to throw her support behind Presidential candidate Barack Obama. The question is how much of an influence will Oprah's endorsement have over the Democratic nomination. When Oprah first made the announcement, Right Wing Minister of Propaganda Sean (Goebbels) Hannity was positively giddy about the news. His "Stop Hilary Express" was almost orgasmic at the thought of the Oprah Juggernaut squaring up against the mighty Clinton Machine.
But how effective will Oprah's endorsement be? Will her voice and influence translate into votes at the primaries? It's interesting because Oprah usually seems to target white women (for the most part) in her shows. The women that usually support Oprah usually vote Democratic, and it would stand to follow that those women would vote for someone who most resembles them, in the person of Hilary Rodham Clinton. But will the apparent Clinton supporters turn their support towards Obama, because Oprah says so? Sure, Oprah can make the beef industry blink in a staring contest, and she can propel a man with an active imagination to the top of the best-seller list with his "biography", but as I asked before, can this influence and power translate into action at the polls? Can the other Democratic nominees (after all, it's not over yet) find endorsement power of their own to counter Oprah? Bill Clinton (still a beloved figure in political circles [and I still wanna smack any idiot that claimed that he was the 'first Black President' because he played the sax and got laid with women other than his wife -- but I digress]) is going to have his work cut out for him in order to put his wife into the Big Chair.
What would REALLY make the race interesting is if Obama not only benefitted from Oprah's support, but if he also took kingmaker Karl Rove's advice. Not that I agree with anything Rove does, but his dark magic helped Curious George and the Administration That Couldn't get elected. Twice. And whether you like or loathe Rove, he does offer some good points on overcoming Clinton.
It's going to be an interesting primary season.
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