A lot has been made about how Obama can't win without white working class voters, women, and latinos. Many have argued that these groups just won't vote for him. I have pointed out without doing the serious number crunching before that this is just not true and that the key to a democratic victory is SOLID African-American support. I have now done the number crunching based on the 2000 and 2004 exit polls for key states such as Pennsylvania and Ohio with the help of others and without a doubt, no matter the maximum increase of voters in Hillary's "voting blocks, " she nor any Democrat can win the White House without SOLID African-American support.
Here's why:
We started out with CNN's exit polls for 2004 for Pennsylvania. Notice that Bush got 16% of the African American turnout compared to Kerry's 84%. It should also be noted that Bush increased his AA turnout numbers by 9% in 2004. Based on the 2004 exit polls, Kerry received approximately 680,000 votes from AA's. He won PA by about 150K votes. Now if we were to subtract all of the AA votes from both candidates and redistributed it to a 60-40 split,Kerry would gain about 400K or so votes and Bush would receive about 320K AA votes. In the end Bush would win. Keep in mind that AA turnout was 2% higher than in 2000. If Obama was the nominee it is most likely that AA turnout would probably be about 4% higher than 2004 and given that Obama is usually getting 90% of the AA vote, he would most likely build upon that lead. I seriously doubt that if Obama is the nominee that McCain would get 16% of the AA vote and would most likely get closer to 10%.
In PA, latinos made up 3% of the vote and they went 70-30 for Kerry. Yes, there is a good chance that their vote percentage would be a bit higher but given the population of PA, it wouldn't make that much of a difference. As for whites, they went for Bush in PA by almost 9%. If we were to give McCain white voters by 60-40, based on the numbers from 2004, and then included AA's which would most likely make up closer to 15% of the electorate and then gave Obama a 90-10 split, Obama would still win by perhaps a margin of 150K votes. Hillary would lose PA by about 150K votes if AA's didn't vote for her by at least a 70% margin.
We also examined Ohio as it is another battleground state which also has a higher AA population than latino population but also has a high white working class population. In 2004, AA's made up about 10% of the electorate, Bush won again about 16% of the AA vote and he again increased his AA vote from 2000. Kerry lost Ohio by about 150K votes, similar to how he won PA. Let's say that like the primaries in 2008, AA turnout is close to 15% in the general against McCain. In this case we would give Obama 90% of the black vote. Based on the 2004 numbers he would win Ohio. Latino's like in PA are less than 5% of the electorate so the Latino vote would be insignificant in Ohio as in PA. The white working class vote would be important in Ohio just like PA. Again, let's give Mccain a 60-40 split on the white vote in OH and take out all of the AA vote. McCain would win. However, when you add the AA vote and estimate a 15% turnout among AA's in Ohio and them going 90-10 for Obama, Mccain would lose OH by about 80K votes. Furthermore, although the Governor of Ohio was a Clinton supporter, I seriously doubt that he wouldn't be behind whomever was the democratic nominee which would also add to an Obama victory.
I would also like to point out something rather interesting in Ohio's democratic primary exit poll. When asked if Hillary's supporters would be upset if she won the nomination 12% YES compared to only 3% of Obama supporters. Similar numbers were seen in the MS primary. If you took away 12% of Hillary's support in a general election plus another 3% of AA support, Hillary would lose OH by over 200K votes.
When you factor in AA support in key swing states and also the fact as Gallup has recently pointed out that Hillary is considered untrustworthy by the public, Hillary and Obama need SOLID AA support to win. Hillary has more working against her though in these two states in a general election if she were to win the nomination even though Obama won either/or the pledged delegate count or the popular vote.
My argument in this diary has been that AA support is crucial to a democratic victory no matter who is the nominee and Obama would be able to maximize the AA vote in ways that other democratic candidates have not. However, at the end of this, we all need to be behind whomever is the nominee. Of course, as an Obama supporter, I think that he is the better candidate and I want him to be the nominee and I think he will be. As furious as I would be like many of his supporters if he were to lose by some back room deal, I would at the end of the day support the nominee because McCain is not to be trusted. For all of those Clinton and Obama supporters who disagree, you need to seriously think about a vote for John McCain. If you take a look at his voting record you will see that contrary to how the media has portrayed him as a "Maverick" he is far from it. Instead of claiming that one side won't vote for the other, we need to figure out a way to get all sides to vote for the Democratic nominee. I will admit that I have told myself that I wouldn't vote for HRC if she stole the nomination but I realized that I would be voting against my interests and I have been encouraging many African-Americans to NOT vote against their interests as I would encourage those white working class voters and latinos to not vote against their interests if Obama gets the nomination.
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/r esults/states/OH/P/00/epolls.0.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/r esults/states/PA/P/00/epolls.0.html
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