Obama says Iowa voters are beyond race
By MIKE GLOVER, Associated Press Writer
Fri Nov 9, 6:12 PM ET

Barack Obama says voters in Iowa, though relatively few are black like him, care little about that and much more about whether he'd be a president who would make their lives better.

"I am getting a fair hearing and I will get a fair hearing and I think we're going to win this place," Obama said Friday, campaigning for the Iowa caucuses that are now just eight weeks away.

"People are less concerned about race and much more concerned about, is this somebody who is going to be fighting for me," he said.

Obama is among the top tier of Democrats in polls in Iowa, along with Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Edwards, and electability in the 2008 election against the Republican nominee is a top issue among Democratic activists.

The Illinois senator says he's encountered concerns before about whether voters are ready to support a black candidate.

"I heard this when I was running for the U.S. Senate," said Obama. "Illinois is 12 percent African-American, it's not a majority African-American state or even a substantial plurality African-American state."

The latest Census estimates, for 2005, show Illinois at 15 percent African-American. Iowa registers a scant 2.3 percent.

Obama spoke during a taping of Iowa Public Television's "Iowa Press" program for airing later in the weekend. He said he answered doubts about the role race plays in politics when he won a tough Democratic primary for his Senate seat.

"People said there's no way that folks downstate are going to vote for you," said Obama. "Downstate Illinois is pretty similar to Iowa culturally and demographically. We ended up winning that primary by 20 points, we won the white vote, we won the rural vote, we won the farmer vote, there wasn't a vote we didn't win against strong candidates."

Talk about race "gives the voters too little credit, and we're confident that we're going to do well," said Obama. "If they feel that I can make their lives a little better, the last thing they are going to be thinking about is my race."

On the subject of electability, he also took a swipe at Clinton, whose high negative ratings concern many Democrats.

"Surveys show that I can appeal to the Republicans, independents in a way that none of the other nominees can," said Obama. "If you start off with half the country not wanting to vote for you, you don't have a lot of margin of error."