Politicking

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m getting a little fed up with the media coverage of the primary races.  Barack Obama is the black candidate.  Hillary Clinton is the female candidate.  Mitt Romney is the Mormon candidate.  Mike Huckabee is the Evangelical candidate.  Just for once, it would be refreshing to hear a newscaster refer to a candidate without focusing on their race, gender or religion.  If you want to know a candidate’s position on the issues, you can’t depend on the evening news.  Gotta go out and do your own research.  Exactly how shallow do they think American voters are?  After all, a political office is a job, and a campaign is basically one long job interview with the American people.  I find it insulting to our intelligence that the media assumes we’re going to base our votes on the very things we have forbidden be used as discriminating factors in the hiring process.  If you believe the evening news, race, gender and religious affiliation are the primary factors to determine who gets the most important job in the country (that, and who snubbed or pointed a finger at whom, like we’re all still in second grade). 

 

After a story about how African American women were supposedly torn between voting their race (Obama) or voting their gender (Clinton), one viewer retorted on ABC’s message board: “So if I’m a white male, does that mean I’m just as torn between voting according to my race (Clinton) or my gender (Obama)?  Have you considered the possibility that voters aren’t torn up about it AT ALL, because we vote on the ISSUES?  What an original thought!”   Another viewer fumed about being pigeonholed as a “religious” voter since 2 out of 5 Democrats consider themselves Evangelical Christians, and 2 out of 5 Republicans are Atheist or Agnostic.  Oddly enough, the “women’s vote”, “black vote”, and “Hispanic vote” aren’t as cut and dried as they like to think, either.  Darn those independent thinkers, voting outside their neatly categorized voting block!