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I wanted more detailed information, so I gave Michael Fertik, the CEO of Reputation.com which lets people pay to opt out of being tracked, a day to search my online data too. He found out that I'm white (61% likely pro-Romney, according to Fertik's analysis of polls), male (57% Romney), in my 40s (52% Romney) and married (59% Romney) and that I earn more than $90,000 a year (54% Romney). Also, I am Jewish (70% Obama), live in L.A. (67% Obama), have a postgraduate degree (57% Obama), am a journalist (65% Obama), drive a small car (57% Obama) and don't believe in God (62% Obama). Because I watch The Daily Show, am a foodie, love David Letterman, shop at Target far more than Walmart and am a heavy social-media user, I'm likely to be pro-Obama. But because I occasionally eat at KFC and White Castle, I'm probably a Democrat who is unlikely to vote. Which makes sense, since after I eat at KFC or White Castle, the only thing I'm likely to do is sleep off my hangover.
Fertik said the reason the candidates didn't bother courting me was that my vote is immutable: I am absolutely going to vote for Obama. All that time I spent investigating the candidates' positions was wasted. I didn't make a choice; I am part of a psychographic whose members all think alike. "If you're on the correct side of the one-way mirror of the Internet, like I am, you get to see that. You're a foregone conclusion for about 90% of what you have to say," Fertik said. "That's only a bummer for you if you believe you have a huge amount of agency. It's not a bummer if you realize you have only a certain amount of time to decide everything." Which sounded smart until I realized that if I have enough time to hit White Castle at 2 a.m., I probably have enough time to consider who should be President.
That's when I surprised Fertik by telling him that I was deeply considering not voting for Obama. "No, you're not," he said. "You're going to vote, and you're going to vote for Obama." I thought about betting him $100 but then realized: he knows far more about me than I do.