AP Headline Plays To Stereotype

It's possible that when you read this headline from the AP - "Second Female Senator Endorses Obama" - you had the same thought as I: "Wow! Hattie Wyatt Carraway has endorsed Obama from beyond the grave? If Obama is going to have the support of famous poltergeists, this changes everything! Also: it terrifies me!"

Naturally, that's not what the AP meant at all. By "second female Senator," they simply meant to commemorate the second instance of the crazy oddity of a female Senator coming out in favor of the male presidential candidate. Boy oh boy, is Amy Klobuchar going to be embarrassed when she learns that a woman was running for President this whole time!

Sarabeth at 1115.org elaborates:

According to AP, women are expected to automatically support Clinton? So that when a female senator supports Obama, her gender is the most important part of the story?

Or maybe AP simply thinks that we (the vast unwashed American public) expect that women should automatically support Clinton? So that their headline is simply pandering to our expectations?

But if they stopped pandering to our expectations...who knows? Maybe their brains would start working or something!