White rice is a starch, which is a complex carb, and does not have "a nutrition profile closely related to table sugar." Other than that, this is on-target. All of longest-lived populations eat primarily carb-based diets.
White rice is 90%+ very simple carbohydrates. It has a glycemic impact on your body extremely similar to straight sugar, from a gram to gram (of carbs) perspective. Now as the other poster mentioned there's the matter of fructose, though that is an area that has a little too much pseudo-science right now (it has become the new boogyman).