'Obama will lose six percentage points on Election Day for being a Black'

New York, Sep 23 : Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama will lose six percentage points on election day for being a Black.

That disturbing calculation was found in a groundbreaking new Associated Press-Yahoo News poll conducted with Stanford University, which probes the effect of the Democratic presidential candidate's race on his historic campaign for the White House.

"There's a penalty for prejudice, and it's not trivial," said Stanford University political scientist Paul Sniderman. In a close contest, racism "might be enough to tip the election," he added.

Still, the Illinois Senator seems to be making some headway even with White Americans who don't have much good to say about African-Americans, the Daily News reported.

Among the White Democrats who think Blacks are lazy, or violent, or boastful, two-thirds said they would vote for Obama over Sen. John McCain, a white Republican.

The poll of 2,227 adults was conducted from August 27-September 5, and was designed to probe people's racial attitudes and how those attitudes affect voting.

It shows that when it comes to race, there has been some progress in America: Most White people have positive things to say about Black people.

Still, pollsters found that a substantial portion of White Americans have very little contact with African-Americans and many still harbor negative feelings toward them.

Whites also have a rosier view of race relations than blacks.

Meanhile, nearly three-fourths of the Blacks polled said White people have too much influence in U.S. politics.

Also, the perception that voters in their 20s and 30s might go for Obama because they're less racially biased than their parents might be wrong.

ANI