The United States Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is losing ground in the polls as what's now being dubbed 'The Lipstick Affair' continues to cost him the support of women voters who chose Hillary Clinton in the primaries.

According to recent polls, Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin is wooing those voters to John McCain's side. The Republicans are hurling accusations of sexism at Barack Obama to undermine him further. The latest is that he compared Sarah Palin to a pig.

A week ago Sarah Palin spoke about herself in her address to the Republican Convention:

"Do you know the difference between a hockey mom and a pitbull? Lipstick..."

In a web spot by the McCain campaign, Barack Obama has been depicted as a sexist pig. So, what's the purported link between the pitbull and the pig?

How it began
The controversy began on Tuesday after Mr Obama said his rival, John McCain, was advocating change while pursuing the politics of the current Bush administration. Speaking during a rally in Virginia, Mr Obama said of his rival's promise of change:
"That's not change. That's just calling the same thing different. But you know, you can put lipstick on a pig, it's still a pig".

Basically, Mr Obama was visualising how he sees McCain-Palin policies in lipstick-colourful language. In fact, Senator McCain had used the same analogy to criticise a health care plan presented by former Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton last year. But the damage was done! The mob heard "lipstick".

Obama responds
The audiences had heard the same word a week earlier. So, the McCain campaign put lipstick on Mr Obama's statement and concluded that he had compared Sarah Palin to a pig. By taking the word "pitbull" and replacing it with "pig", the joke seems to have completely backfired. The media had a field day, the Republicans lapped it up. Senator McCain's campaigners called the comments "offensive and disgraceful" and demanded an apology. Women were called on to punish this bastion of male chauvinism. The Democratic presidential candidate responded on Wednesday:

"I assume you all have heard this watching the news. I'm talking about John McCain's economic policies, I say ‘this is more of the same, you can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig.' And suddenly they say ‘Oh, you must be talking about the governor of Alaska'. See, it would be funny. It would be funny except of course the news media all decided that would be the lead story yesterday."

Democrats smeared
Opinion polls reveal that Mr Obama is having problems winning over the hearts and minds and votes of white women. The McCain campaign is making an active and audacious bid to attract the Hillary Clinton vote from Barack Obama over to their side. During Wednesday's rally in Virginia, one angry female Hillary supporter said:

"My party stood silently by as the mainstream eviscerated senator Clinton with sexist comments. And yesterday, I understand senator Obama personally said ‘You can put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig.'"

The crowd booed.

A certain number of voters have disqualified Barack Obama as the man who called Sarah Palin a pig. And, in these final crucial days of the presidential campaign, many more voters have heard little talk of the economy, education, health care or Iraq - the colourful cosmetic is now being smudged all over the political agenda, smearing the Democrats in the process.

* RNW translation (jn)