This weekend, the Washington Post and the NY Times both carried stories about Senators Clinton and Obama actively courting African-American women in South Carolina by campaigning in beauty shops and barbershops.

From the Washington Post article, "In South Carolina, Beauty Salons are also political soapboxes,"

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When South Carolina Democrats vote in their presidential primary in January, African American women will make up 29 percent of voters. One place Clinton and her main opponent, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, think they can reach them is at the hairdresser's.

"Girl, that's where we like to spend our time. If I could, I'd be in a beauty salon now," Clinton's state director, Kelly Adams, said with a laugh. "Seriously, we have to go where the voters are."

Both Adams and Obama's South Carolina campaign director, Stacey Brayboy, are black women who understand that beauty salons allow for intimate exchanges. They are escapes from a woman's hectic life -- places where the pulls of work, husbands and kids take a back seat to a new hairstyle and a good talk.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con tent/article/2007/10/13/AR2007101301301. html

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