News Summary

Go white people! Yay black people!

You can do it Asians! Come on Hispanics!

Really, though, if you ask a NASCAR-lovin' highway construction worker about "Survivor" divvying up tribes by race, he'll tell you it doesn't matter.

And he knows — he's been there, won that.

"It doesn't matter if you're black, white, green or yellow. It's all about the people you can trust," explained Chris Daugherty, the South Vienna resident who won "Survivor: Vanuatu," and the $1 million that came with it, in 2004. "Twila could have been a green Martian and I would have taken her to the end with me.

"It didn't matter that she was white."

You've probably heard something by now about "Survivor: Cook Islands," which debuts at 8 p.m. today on CBS.

The 20 survivors indeed will be divided by race at first.

Frankly, the throwing down of ye olde race card — for better or for worse — in season No. 13 is a no-brainer, according to our local "Survivor" champ.

And, besides, for all the controversy, nobody ever said reality TV producers were responsible people in the first place.

Did they?

"Mark Burnett is a genius," Daugherty, 36, said. "He wants the ratings, but he's got competition. He decided to go with the race card.

"I don't think it's going to play a large role when they start playing the game. It played a large role leading up to the game."

Daugherty, who's back at work with the Ohio Department of Transportation after a 20-day suspension in June over an unapproved leave of absence for a "Survivor" promotional tour, predicts all this fuss will turn out to be for nothing.

"Once the game starts, doesn't matter, dude," he said. "As soon as they merge, race, color and religion don't matter."

The back-stabbing will be distributed equally.

Hopefully.

If not — why can't we all just get along?