SORRY, COLIN -- YOU DON'T GET TO FEEL GROUP SOLIDARITY

So Pat Buchanan, Rush Limbsugh, and George Will are all harrumphing that Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama because they're both black.

Um, weren't the women who voted for Hillary Clinton all supposed to flock to John McCain because Sarah Palin is a woman? Aren't hockey moms and outdoorsy people and small-town people and mothers of developmentally disabled children all supposed to vote for Palin and McCain because Palin is all four of those things? Aren't veterans supposed to vote for John McCain because of his military service? Why are all those forms of identity politics, some of which are working as expected, deemed perfectly acceptable, whereas any sense of racial identity on Powell's part -- which we can't determine wuith any precision -- is inappropriate? Was the bargain we felt we'd made with Colin Powell that he would not root for a black person, ever?