Americans are sharply divided by race heading into the first election in which an African-American will be a major-party presidential nominee, with blacks and whites holding vastly different views of Senator Barack Obama, the state of race relations and how black Americans are treated by society, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

Here are the results:

• More than 80 percent of black voters said they had a favorable opinion of Barack Obama; about 30 percent of white voters said they had a favorable opinion of him.
• Nearly 60 percent of black respondents said race relations were generally bad, compared with 34 percent of whites.
• Four in 10 blacks say that there has been no progress in recent years in eliminating racial discrimination; fewer than 2 in 10 whites say the same thing.
• Among black voters, who are overwhelmingly Democrats, Obama draws support from 89 percent, compared with 2 percent for John McCain. Among whites, Obama has 37 percent of the vote, compared with 46 percent for McCain.

For the complete article and poll results, click here.

Posted by: Mark Pasetsky

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