WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Barack Obama,
struggling to win over white Democratic voters, said in a Sunday
television interview that race would not be a factor in November's U.S.
presidential election."Is race still a factor in our society? Yes. I don't think anybody
would deny that," Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president,
said on "Fox News Sunday.""Is that going to be the determining factor in a general election?
No, because I'm absolutely confident that the American people -- what
they're looking for is somebody who can solve their problems," the
Illinois senator said in an interview taped on Saturday.Obama and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton,
a New York senator, were focusing on Indiana, which along with North
Carolina will be the next big tests on May 6 toward picking a
presidential nominee to face Republican John McCain in November.Obama is leading Clinton in the popular vote, states won and
committed delegates to the party's nominating convention in August, but
her recent victories in Pennsylvania and Ohio have raised questions
about his ability to win white voters. In Pennsylvania, Clinton won white union households and white
Catholics -- two key Democratic blocs -- by about 70 percent to Obama's
30 percent. About one in seven Pennsylvania voters said race was an
issue and that group voted overwhelmingly against Obama. Obama said he had won many of those same voters in other states and
after a Democratic nominee was decided, those voters would back the
party's candidate against McCain. "I am confident that when you come to a general election, and we are
having a debate about the future of this country -- how are we going to
lower gas prices, how are we going to deal with job losses, how are we
going to focus on energy independence -- that those are voters who I
will be able to appeal to," he said. Continued...