Race and voting
A caller wanted to know why we didn't identify the race of the voters we quoted in our presidential primary stories.
Specifically, he wanted to know whether all of the people we quoted supporting Obama were African Americans. (I'm being kind: He said that he knew they were because they "sounded" like it.)
Racial profiling?
By including that piece of information, it would suggest that the individual's race is specifically relevant to how they voted. It may be. It may be because an African American wants a black man to win in the same way that a woman votes for Hillary because of her gender. It may also mean that the voter agrees with Obama's policies because they have seen the world through similar eyes.
I think the discussion overly simplifies a complex decision, and, in some case, tries to affirm our own beliefs about people. Many emotional, intellectual and political factors enter into picking a candidate.
Singling race out seems unfair, unless the voter specifically said he voted for Obama because of his race. An African American may vote for Obama because they support his policies. Put another way, imagine this sentence: "John Doe, who is white, said he voted for Obama because he agreed with him on the gas tax moratorium." What does race have to do with his vote? Nothing.
Granted, we want it both ways. We look at the demographics of voter registration and exit polling. Our first paragraph on the Obama victory story today certainly examined the results through a racial lens: Sen. Barack Obama's sweeping victory over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the North Carolina primary reaffirmed his strength among the affluent and African American voters and set up the final rounds in the bruising contest for the Democratic presidential nomination.
That tells me more about who voted for Obama and how he won, but not why.