OK, so we all know that one of the big stories on SuperMondoZOMG!Tuesday was not only that voter turnout was high nearly everywhere, but that Democrats were turning out a lot more than Republicans were—seen by many as a sign that Democratic voters are more energized and like their choices better.

How did The Oklahoman play that?

A total of 752,075 Oklahoma Republicans and Democrats voted in Tuesday’s election — smashing the previous record for an Oklahoma presidential primary by more than 118,000 votes.

“It is stunning,” said state Election Board Secretary Michael Clingman.

Clingman wasn’t particularly surprised that the record was broken. He predicted that might occur, since both parties had hotly contested races.

What was surprising was the amount by which the old record was broken — particularly because several candidates who were popular with Oklahomans dropped out before the election and “you had bad weather sweeping across the state all day long,” Clingman said.

“I think it just shows a lot of interest in this race. The same thing is being reported in other states as well — that they’re having record turnouts everywhere. The electorate certainly is engaged this time,” he said.

Interest was high among voters in both parties, with 42.6 percent of registered Republicans and 41.4 percent of registered Democrats casting ballots in the state.

Percentages were high

Overall, 41.9 percent of registered Democrats and Republicans voted.

The previous record for raw numbers of Oklahomans voting in a presidential primary was 633,850 set in 1992, state election board officials said.

The previous record for the highest percentage of registered voters casting ballots in an Oklahoma presidential primary was 34.6 percent, set in 1996, officials said.

General presidential elections often attract about twice as many voters as presidential primaries, Clingman said.

That's right—by never mentioning how many votes were cast in the Democratic primary, and how many were cast in the Republican primary.

Fortunately, the state election board has no such qualms. You can read the details for yourself, but here's the takeaway:

Democrats:   417,095 votes
Republicans: 334,890 votes
-----------------------


Total:       752,075 votes

The paper noted that a bigger percentage of registered Republicans voted to imply more Republican interest. But by the paper's figures, Oklahoma has about 809,000 registered Democrats, and about 786,000 registered Republicans. So, while Oklahoma has about 103% as many registered Democrats as registered Republicans, the primary vote included about 125% as many Democratic votes as Republican ones.

Gee, why would The Oklahoman have managed to omit those numbers…