A Moment of Clarity

Of course, I am victim to the same disease that all humans are - we feel everyone thinks like us.

Case in point: I am hopelessly riveted to election news and polls. A student came in today, one for whom I had helped request an absentee ballot. He said he had not received it (!), but would just drive home to vote. He then asked me about the state of the race (is it still a toss-up?), and so I confirmed it was close, that most tracking polls show a small Bush lead, and that I predicted a 5-point win by the good guy.

Then he asked why I thought that. As I went into a monologue about the effectiveness of the Republican Get Out The Vote (GOTV) efforts versus the GOTV efforts by the DemocRAT 527s, I noticed that his eyes glazed over. I then realized that 1) He didn't know the state of the race, 2) he doesn't know what a GOTV campaign is, and 3) he had never heard of MoveOn.org, ACT, or even knew what a 527 was. Keep in mind that this is one of our smartest and most mature students.

Most people are not as tuned in to the race as us political junkies. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I suppose I am better off for knowing it.