She's 49 years old. She was a little girl when John Kennedy was shot, and I don't think I've ever actually asked her how much she remembers about it.

She's a middle-aged white woman. "They" tell me she's not supposed to be supporting Obama at all.

This diary was inspired by vadasz's Wright & Katrina & AIDS, Oh My!: Confirmation Bias in the 2008 Campaign, which all of you should go read. :)

It deals with the issue of "confirmation bias." To quote vadasz, "basically Confirmation Bias is the idea that the human mind often looks for patterns in the world that confirm already-held beliefs." The cartoon I've seen about math and sexism is a good example--anyone have a link? The guy sees another guy making a math mistake and says "Wow, you suck at math." He sees a woman making the same mistake and says "Wow, girls suck at math."

My personal experience with racism is a lot like this. I am white, and in many ways, yes, "typical." I grew up in a blue-collar, mainly white town in the Rust Belt. And whenever I think about race, I'm always reminded of one particular story.

Follow me behind the cut...

I used to know a guy named Osama.

I've lost touch with him in the last few years. I used to go to his coffee shop all the time, back when I worked a few doors down from it. These days I don't work in that neighborhood and don't have as much money for those infamous Barack-supporter lattes. (Or in my case, white chocolate mochas.) So I haven't been there in a while.

But he's been on my mind a lot lately, in light of some of the mud that's been slung at Barack Obama by the wingnuts in recent days.