LORRIE MOORE: FEMINISM IS SO THIRTY YEARS AGO (AND BLACKS ARE SO ZEITGEISTY)

In the past few years, quite a bit of New York Times op-ed space has been given over to novelists and short-story writers -- some of them writers I enjoy and admire. I suppose it's a search for fresh perspectives; unfortunately, the results are often ill-informed and half-baked.

An example is "Last Year's Role Model" by Lorrie Moore, in today's Times. Moore seems to have become a one-issue voter, and her issue is this: Which Democratic candidate's election would do a better job of lowering the dropout rate? Either that or she's a white female who has contempt for white females -- or wants to proclaim that she has contempt for white females in order to score moral-superiority points. And the result of all this is an essay that insults Hillary Clinton (deliberately) and Barack Obama (inadvertently).

Confused? Well, here's an excerpt:

... In my opinion, it is a little late in the day to become sentimental about a woman running for president. The political moment for feminine role models, arguably, has passed us by. The children who are suffering in this country, who are having trouble in school, and for whom the murder and suicide rates and economic dropout rates are high, are boys -- especially boys of color, for whom the whole educational system, starting in kindergarten, often feels a form of exile, a system designed by and for white girls....

Boys are faring worse -- and the time for symbols and leaders they can connect with beneficially should be now and should be theirs.... inspiration is essential for living, and Mr. Obama holds the greater fascination for our children.

OK, here are some numbers. In 2004, among 16-to-24-year-olds, 11.6% of boys either weren't in high school or hadn't graduated -- but the percentage for girls was 9.0%.

So, yes, one out of every nine boys drops out, which is appalling in what's supposed to be the greatest country in the world -- but if "only" one out every eleven girls drops out, it's not as if we have that problem all sorted out, is it?

For the moment I'm ignoring the question of whether the sheer symbolism of electing an African-American or female president would have any effect on this problem. Do we have good reason to believe that it would?

And if you go back to those statistics, you see that, yes, the black dropout rate is noticeably higher than the white dropout rate, but the Hispanic dropout rate is twice as high as the black rate. Doesn't that mean we should have all abandoned our support of Clinton and Obama and rallied behind Bill Richardson?

More from Moore:

The time to capture the imagination of middle-class white girls, the group Hillary Clinton represents, was long ago. Such girls have now managed on their own (given that in this economy only the rich are doing well). They have their teachers and many other professionals to admire, as well as a fierce 67-year-old babe as speaker of the House, several governors and a Supreme Court justice. The landscape is not bare.

So that means there's no more sexism in America? Er, there's also one black Supreme Court justice, and one black governor. The last two secretaries of state have been black; two of the last three have been female. We can parse this all day, but as I read it, blacks have crumbs, women have a somewhat larger supply of crumbs, and white men still run most of everything. So why pit blacks and women against each other?

Moore's preference for Obama might be interesting if it didn't stink of condescension:

...Mr. Obama came of age as a black man in America. He does not need (as he has done) to invoke his grandfather's life in colonial Kenya to prove or authenticate his understanding of race. His sturdiness is equal to Mrs. Clinton's, his plans as precise and humane. But unlike her, he is original and of the moment....

Meanwhile, Mrs. Clinton's scripted air of expectation might make one welcome any zeitgeisty parvenu....

Maybe, as a white guy, I'm in no position to say this, but if I were Barack Obama and someone said my candidacy should be supported because I'm "original and of the moment" and a "zeitgeisty parvenu," I'd say, "Thanks, but no thanks. Keep your vote if that's what you think of me." Especially if she, as a white person, was giving me instructions on how I should and should not demonstrate my black authenticity.

I haven't yet mention the passing reference to Rudy Giuliani's "mayoral bunker ... beneath the World Trade Center" (it was actually on the 23rd floor of 7 World Trade Center -- doesn't anyone at the Times fact-check these novelists' op-eds?), or the bizarre rhetorical question "Why does it seem to be the Republicans who are more vocal about reforming our drug laws?" (Who? Ron Paul? William Weld?)

There may be fiction writers who can write intelligently about politics, but Moore isn't one of them. Maybe she shouldn't quit her day job -- and maybe the Times should stick with op-ed writers who know what they're talking about.

(Cross-posted at the Carpetbagger Report.)