It all depends how you look at it

JL tipped me off to a Time Magazine web page about Super Tuesday which inadvertently distills in a nutshell the difference between how Republicans and Democrats approach the election.  Here is how Time reports the Fox News National Exit Poll results:

GOP Results
Republicans: McCain 40, Romney 36, Huckabee 18
Evangelicals: Huckabee 33, McCain 31, Romney 30
Conservatives: Romney 42, McCain 31, Huckabee 20

Those most concerned about:

Immigration: Romney 48, McCain 25, Huckabee 15
Economy: McCain 40, Romney 32, Huck 18
Iraq:
McCain 51, Romney 20, Huckabee 15

Democrats

Blacks: Obama 81, Clinton 17
Whites: Clinton 50, Obama 44
Hispanics: Clinton 62, Obama 36
White women: Clinton 57, Obama 45
Young whites: Obama 64, Clinton 35

Since I’m a bit slower thinking than JL is, it took me a second to figure out what’s bizarre about that information.  The way Time reports it, the breakdown between the votes on Republican candidates revolved around profound issues affecting American today:  National Security (which is coyly stated merely as “Iraq”), Immigration and the Economy.  Apparently all the Democrats care about, however, is sex and race.

I’m willing to bet that the pollsters didn’t even bother to ask the Democratic voters about substantive issues because the pollsters understand that such voters truly don’t care about those things.  Their Bush Derangement Syndrome, after eating away at them for the last 8 years, will instantly be relieved by Bush’s inevitable and automatic departure from the White House (and inevitably that we can trace back to George Washington, when such concepts were not at all inevitable).  And as to anything else, it seems apparent that, in choosing their candidate, the voters have figured out that the Democratic candidates have indistinguishable political positions, and they’re only fighting about which Democrat will enter the history books as a “first” — that is “the first woman President” or “the first black President.”  I don’t know about you, but I continue to find it terrifying that, in a time of substantial upheaval, both in terms of American security and the American economy, about half the voters couldn’t care less.