According to all reports, the logistics and mechanics of West Virginia's primary were quite successful. No major glitches anywhere statewide. That is real good news.
However, that is not the news that made the national broadcasts and headlines and certainly not what made the Internet pseudo-newscasts.
West Virginians expressing unmitigated racist sentiments is what made the nightly news and the major papers' headlines the next morning and video on Youtube.
In that sense, West Virginia's primary was not so successful - as a matter of fact, it was quite damaging.
As Secretary of State Betty Ireland said in an op-ed piece, ''My mantra for this election was for West Virginia's electoral system to stay out of the spotlight and let our election night results speak for themselves. In that, we succeeded ... .''
''What we could not do, of course,'' Ireland continues. ''was control the picture the late night talk shows and arrogant national 'news' commentators wanted to paint of West Virginia in the days after the vote. ... Shame on them for taking the cheap shot instead of the bigger and fairer view.''
In all fairness, if The Logan Banner had sent reporters out to do typical man-on-the-street interviews of voters that day and if only one person had said they would not, could not vote for Barack Obama because he is black, it would have been and should have been on the front page of The Logan Banner the next day.
However, we hope our coverage would have been more balanced. That is what was lacking or completely absent in the national news coverage of West Virginia's primary. Not everyone in West Virginia is a bigot or a racist Although that is not to say there are no bigots and racists in West Virginia. We have our fair share in every part of the state.
We would add that the residents of Appalachia are suspicious of strangers - yes, of people who do not look like them, sound like them, come from where they come from. It might not be so much that Obama is black that causes people of Appalachia to not vote for him rather than the fact that he is a big city liberal with deep roots in the liberal eastern establishment.
We would suggest that a moderate to conservative black man would do very well in West Virginia and the rest of Appalachia. He might not win the primary or carry the state in a general election, but who knows. No one thought John Kennedy could win the primary in West Virginia either because of his religion, but he did.
In addition, we would point out that West Virginia's Democrats did vote for a woman for president of the United States. So, it's not like were sexists, too.
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