22% Does Not a Mandate Make
For anyone who still believes that "moral values" were the leading issue in the election last week, consider that the "moral values" voters were only 1/5 of those polled. (It's not like this number is a mystery; it's just that everyone who quotes it—and all the major news organizations have—does so as if one fifth is a WHOPPING number. It's not.)
Frank Rich has an illuminating op-ed piece in the New York Times today on this very subject: On 'Moral Values,' It's Blue in a Landslide. It's probably safe to read "blue" as a double entendre in this context, occasionally meaning Democratic (as in "blue states"), and occasionally meaning lewd or prurient (as in "the rather blue programming on Fox"). Give it a read.
Posted by Lori in politics at 12:23 PM on November 11, 2004