Adlai Stevenson, Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, Al Gore, John Kerry. What do all these men have in common?

They all received my vote for president.

If you think this is narrow thinking, you are correct. However I remain stubborn enough to judge that, in virtually every instance, the candidates mentioned above would have made better presidents than those who defeated them. How’s that for political obstinacy?

The only one whom I have doubts about now is Stevenson. Marvelous political orator though he was, Adlai seems, in retrospect, too indecisive to have made an effective president.

These recollections come to mind as the Massachusetts presidential primary election approaches. I agree with former Iowa representative Jim Leach who calls the current national campaign “the most interesting election since 1960.”

What strikes me most about the current campaign for the presidential nomination is the identity of the three current frontrunners and their diversity.

Barack Obama is an African-American. Hillary Clinton is a woman. And John McCain is 71 years old. This trio represents a radical departure from our past.

Already, these facts about these three leaders in the race have become familiar. And, to a surprisingly large extent, the same realities have become acceptable to the American public.

Most voters appear ready to look beyond the stereotypes often attached to race, gender, and age.

Say what you will about the absurd length of this campaign and its other defects, but this trio represents something new and, until recently, quite unthinkable. The racial diversity of these frontrunners speaks well for us as Americans.

This roster of presidential candidates claims a place on my lengthening list of phenomena I never expected to see.

To have this presidential precedent unfold before my eyes, I had to live long. Had my life ended at age 75, I would never have witnessed this level of diversity.

Certain advocates of abstraction would have us ignore these distinguishing marks altogether. They want us to focus on issues exclusively and to forget the differences in personal identity among Obama, Clinton, and McCain.

But this approach strikes me as naïve. Most voters, whether we admit it or not, feel strongly influenced by the personal impressions we have of each candidate.

I agree with columnist David Brooks who writes (not without an excess of abstract words): “We voters ─ all of us ─ make emotional, intuitive decisions about who we prefer and then come up with post-hoc rationalizations to explain the choices that we already made beneath conscious awareness.”

If this view holds true, the fact that Obama is a black man, Clinton a woman, and McCain a relatively old man has an undeniable importance. I welcome these characteristics and think they add much to the drama of this electoral contest.

Our positive views of ethnic identity, gender, and age form part of the process of making up our minds about which candidate to choose. (Though some would judge it old-fashioned, in general elections I, however, still make my chief criterion what political party the candidate represents.)

Unfortunately, Clinton and Obama, or their surrogates, have sometimes sidetracked the issues in favor of petty disputes behind which race and gender lurked as divisive hidden topics. This diverging from real issues served voters badly.

Fortunately, they seem now to have returned to the main track.

McCain, for his part, appears to have escaped being targeted by age prejudice. Only pop star Chuck Norris, a Huckabee supporter, has blurted out the view that McCain is too old to become president. In a lighthearted response McCain countered at a news conference: “I’m going to send my 95-year-old mother to just go over and wash Chuck Norris’s mouth out with soap,”

In a society growing older, most voters perhaps recognize that age 71 is not what it used to be. Yes, a candidate’s health record remains a legitimate and important subject for examination. But that’s not the same as his age.

Despite what we have said here about the secondary importance of issues, they remain important for some voters. And, by the manner in which the candidates discuss them, they reveal their strengths and weaknesses as leaders.

The greatest need in the primary season is for candidates to focus on important issues that have been largely neglected.

For example, much talk has gone into health care but no candidate has provided adequate plans for long-term care. As anyone who has experienced the long-drawn-out decline of a family member or friend knows, current health care arrangements are terribly complicated and quite inadequate.

This issue affects not just those afflicted with illness in late life but those at every age who suffer unexpected illness. We continue to stand in desperate need of a national health system that responds to the needs of every citizen.

Why does not any candidate push for the kind of coverage that virtually all of them enjoy for themselves and their families?

Richard Griffin