Who likes Bush?

The Washington Post has a rather condescending article, wherein the author searches for somewhere on the planet where people like President Bush. And if the very premise isn't biased enough, he chooses Randolph Utah as his target and proceeds to paint all Utahns as uneducated, out of touch, and hickish -- and by association, anyone who supports Bush.

The article begins with an anecdote of stopping at a Randolph cafe, and the cashier never having heard of Dijon mustard.

From there on:

In Randolph, though -- where Bush received 95.6 percent of the vote and support for him continues to be nearly unanimous -- the mind-set is even more specific to a place that seems less a part of the modern United States than insulated from it. It isn't just mustard, but everything.

There have been no funerals here from Bush's war on terrorism. There are no unemployment lines, no homeless people sleeping in doorways, no sick people being turned away from a hospital because of a lack of insurance, no crime to speak of, no security fence needed around the reservoir, no metal detectors at the schools.

Terrorist threats? That's anywhere but here. Iraq? That's somewhere over there. Hurricane Katrina? That was somewhere down there. Illegal immigrants? Not here, where everyone is fond of Ramon, who came long ago from Mexico and is married to the Catholic woman, who is the one non-Mormon everyone mentions when the conversation turns to religious diversity. As for racial diversity, everyone says there are three African Americans in the county, including the twins on the high school cheerleading squad, which also includes a Hispanic, according to the superintendent of schools, Dale Lamborn, which means "we've probably got the most diverse cheerleading squad in the state."

The message is obvious: they like Bush, and they're completly insulated from reality. Hence, people who like Bush simply don't have enough information. If they lived elsewhere, they'd certainly hate him as much as the rest of us enlightened intellectuals do.

The article ends as the Dijon-less diner is closing up:

In small-town quiet, she finishes her work. Somewhere out there are the sounds of chattering terrorists, and shivering homeless people, and helicopters ferrying soldiers, and a president rehearsing a vitally important speech. Here in 71.5 percent Utah, though, and 95.6 percent Randolph, and 100 percent Gator's, the only sound is of a believer explaining why, come Tuesday night, she doubts she will bother to listen.

"I don't think there's anything he could say that would make me dislike him," she says.

Read the whole thing. It's interesting and well-written, and condescendingly smug.

(Tip from The State of the Beehive