What The Exit Polls Really Tell Us

There has been a lot of talk about race in relation to the presidential campaigns lately. I'm not going to get into the comments made by Ferraro or Rev. Wright. What I want to talk about is the media's interpretation of the exit polls coming out of the Mississippi primary. Obama won 91% of the Black vote and Clinton won 70% of the White vote. The pundits believe that this is indicative of a trend. According to them it shows that while Obama is gaining more Black support he is losing support among White voters. As I sit in front of the TV watching the pundits talk about this conclusion which they all seem to have universally come to I find that their voices are drowned out by three little words that keep running over and over again in my head. Three, non-politically correct, culturally biased little words:

But...it's Mississippi!

Let's face it, in a world that is filled with change and unpredictability there are only a few things left that we can depend on and some of those things are unjust or even flat out wrong and yet their consistency breeds not only acceptance but, at times, a certain degree of comfort. For instance we know that no matter how many articles and studies come out about the dangers of junk food and the benefits of healthy eating, McDonalds will continue to market their highly processed, horrifically caloric Happy Meals to our children. We know that no matter how much America is able to improve her image in the world community over the years to come the French will never treat our tourists like anything but inferior, fashion-backward imbéciles. But all of that is okay because every once in a while we enjoy indulging our children's yearning for really awful food and if the French stopped looking down on us...well whose laugh would we imitate while pretending to be snooty?

I have always felt that Mississippi is kind of like that because...let me think of a diplomatic way of saying this...Mississippi will never be one of America's most socially progressive states. We all know that, we get it. The fact that Mississippi's state flag actually incorporates the design of the confederate flag is a bit of a tell. The good news is that when we look at the racism in our own backyard we comfort ourselves by saying, "Well, at least it's not Mississippi!"

To those of you who are from the the grand ol' Magnolia State I do apologize for any offense that I may have caused. If it makes you feel any better, I live in LA, a city that (according to my son) should have the motto: "Vanity is more important than sanity." What can I say, we all have our issues.

But given that, would any journalist with half a brain come out to Rodeo Drive and then go on to report that women across the country love putting dogs in two thousand dollar handbags? No. What applies to Rodeo absolutely does not apply to the towns that line Route 66. So why are we looking at these exit polls in Mississippi with the idea that they are in any way indicative of a nation wide trend? As far as I'm concerned all the exit polls tell us is that Black people and White people in Mississippi disagree about a lot of stuff. I know, it's a shocker.

I'm not saying that racism doesn't exist outside of Mississippi’s borders. I'm just saying that the state doesn't make a very good test case. Unless of course we allow the press to convince us that Mississippi is a trendsetter and we all hop on that bandwagon. I think even Mississippians would agree that's not a great idea. And yet there seems to be some supporters of both Clinton and Obama who have done exactly that. To them I say:

KNOCK IT OFF!

If you want to debase yourself go to France and order a well-done cheeseburger at a bistro but leave the rest of us out of it. After all, if we want to see racial division we know which Southwest flight to book.

Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
SEX, MURDER AND A DOUBLE LATTE,
PASSION, BETRAYAL AND KILLER HIGHLIGHTS,
OBSESSION, DECEIT AND REALLY DARK CHOCOLATE
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING