Lots of Paths to 50% + 1

There's a bit of consternation about Hillary Clinton's open statement that her base is "much broader" because it consists of white non-college voters, while Barack Obama's consist of eggheads and African-Americans. It's the first time Clinton herself has explicitly said that her voters are more important--usually this is left to surrogates-- but that's not what bugs me. After all it is at least true and Clinton ought to be able to observe demographic facts like this without being called names.

The first thing that's annoying is that Clinton's statement not true! Non-hispanic whites who don't hold a Bachelor's degree account for 46.4% of the population. African-Americans and college-educated whites account for ... 32% of the population. On top of this, white voters in the Upper Midwest and West seem to prefer Obama, both in primaries and in general election polling.

The second reason is that millions of non-college whites have voted for Barack Obama! Clinton's hold on the non-college white vote is not as strong as Obama's hold on the African-American vote. When you combine this with the preference of white voters in the West, you end up with two relatively equal sized coalitions.

The third reason that, in a 50-50 nation, small changes in the demographic coalition in any direction could lead to victory. If you take Kerry's 2004 coalition and just bash McCain for abandoning immigration reform, that would be enough to win the election. So would shifting the black vote from 85-15 to 95-5. So would improving Democrats' standing in the suburbs by a few points. So would shifting the median income at which a majority of whites vote Democrat up just a few notches. There's just no need to focus solely on rural and smalltown working-class whites when it comes to electability.

Comments

[Shock Mouse]

There are lots of reasons it's a dumb statement, but primarily the way they keep talking like the demographics of Democratic Primary results are more important than actual polls of the entire country, is purposefully ignorant and upsetting.

[prospero]

I guess Michigan's not in the upper midwest.

[Neil the Ethical Werewolf]

prospero, the polls I've seen show Obama beating McCain in Michigan, while Clinton loses to McCain. Given that there wasn't a primary that featured both Clinton and Obama, this is all we have to go on for that state.

[Stephen]

It's the first time Clinton herself has explicitly said that her voters are more important

I can't find this quote. I can't even find this implication, even though that's the conclusion to which the Obamasphere has jumped, again.

It's simple spin - it's not racist spin, it's not even controversial spin. Obama has a small weakness among non-college whites, and Hillary wants to spin that into her having a general election advantage: "I have more appeal to the largest bloc of voters."

She's wrong, of course, for the reasons you point out. But she's not being evil.

[Joe]

"I can't find this quote. I can't even find this implication, even though that's the conclusion to which the Obamasphere has jumped, again."

This is utterly ridiculous. Both Obama and Clinton lose if their opponent's base abandons them in the general election. The only thing that Clinton could possibly be saying that would make the remotest sense is that her base would be more likely to abandon Obama than vice versa. In other words, WORKING CLASS WHITE VOTERS ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN BLACKS/EDUCATED WHITE VOTERS BECAUSE THEY WILL BE MORE LIKELY TO SWING DEPENDING ON THE NOMINEE. There is no other plausible interpretation of what she is saying.

Now, this sentiment, in and of itself, is not racist. The racist part is unspoken. It is that the white working class voters will not vote for Obama BECAUSE HE IS BLACK. If this is what Clinton means -- and it is hard (though not necessarily impossible) to see how it isn't -- then she is effectively saying "vote for me because white people won't vote for him because he's black." That is indistinguishable from saying "vote for me because he's black," and it's a disgustingly racist sales pitch.

At least she's saying it out in the open now, but she should still be run from the party.

[ikl]

I thought that the "hard working" part of the quote was the most offensive part. I don't think that Clinton meant precisely what she said, but what she actually did say was pretty racist if taken at face value.

[Nicholas Beaudrot]

I don't think it's a very large leap from "much broader" to "more important".

[Stephen]

Joe, all-caps is rude.

Hillary said that non-college whites are her base, and that base is larger than Obama's coalition. According to Nicholas, the second part of her statement is utterly true. Non-college whites make up 14% more of the population than African-americans and college whites together. Where Hillary is wrong is trying to make non-college whites a monolithic group that have not been supporting Obama. Hillary did not say that non-college whites will not support Obama, dumbass. Again, she said that her coalition is bigger than Obama's, therefore she's more electable in the general.

You and the fucking idiots like you "should be run from the party" for turning this primary into such a massive freak show of hysterical, unfounded conclusions and over-the-top desires to purge the bad Democrats.

I wish there was some way for Hillary to get the nomination so we can see if you people would actually stay away from the polls or vote for a 3rd party candidate in enough numbers to put McCain in the White House. That would be fascinating to watch.

[ikl]

Call people names is not a good way to win friends. Especially when you are calling out other people for being rude.

[Stephen]

I don't think it's a very large leap from "much broader" to "more important".

Oh, come on, Nicholas. Yes, if Hillary is suggesting that her coalition is broader - that is to say, consisting of more people - than Obama's, then yes, she's saying it's "more important."

But you and I both know that your statement and everyone else's big freak out is about how "more important" means "whites are inherently more valuable than blacks" and "those uppity darkies need to get back to pickin' cotton, dadgumit" and "Nathan Bedford Forrest, Jefferson Davis and Hitler are my heroes."

[Stephen]

Call people names is not a good way to win friends. Especially when you are calling out other people for being rude.

Thanks, mom. I'll send you card on Sunday.

[ikl]

Stephen, if you are going to act like that, stop concern trolling about rudeness. That's all I'm saying.

[Stephen]

ikl,

If you're going to call only me out for responding to someone else's completely over-the-top reaction to a comment of mine - seriously, Joe completely lost it - then you can expect me to get snippy.

And being a concern troll is saying "Call people names is not a good way to win friends. Especially when you are calling out other people for being rude," not just telling someone flat-out that they're being rude. See, 'cause you're "concerned" with my ability to "win friends." Funny how that works.

[Scott K]

ikl, I wanted to back you up on your initial comment. The comment on "hard working Americans, white Americans" suggests an emphasis on the idea of "hard-working Americans" being at least predominantly "white Americans". I don't think that was intentional on Hillary Clinton's part, since it feeds into the same frames used by pundits, analysts, and certain pollsters whose last name begins with "P". However, the ill-conceived choice of words primes people to interpret what comes after in a racial context.

Nicholas, it seems to make more sense to me to parse Clinton's argument more simply and point out that the number of Obama voters is greater than the number of Clinton voters, hence that would imply a bigger coalition. Thus, the argument fails. Focusing on African-Americans, college-educated, whatever you want, that falls into the same error of framing that Clinton committed... the fact is, the people who voted for both candidates are a pretty diverse bunch.

Stephen, take a boxing class or go to the gym and work out some of that frustration. You're being snide to people who did nothing to merit the snark.

[Joe]

"Hillary said that non-college whites are her base, and that base is larger than Obama's coalition. According to Nicholas, the second part of her statement is utterly true. Non-college whites make up 14% more of the population than African-americans and college whites together. Where Hillary is wrong is trying to make non-college whites a monolithic group that have not been supporting Obama. Hillary did not say that non-college whites will not support Obama, dumbass. Again, she said that her coalition is bigger than Obama's, therefore she's more electable in the general."

Thanks for the gratuitous name-calling.

If Hillary is saying that her base of the Democratic party is bigger than Obama's base of the Democratic party, and thus she is more electible, then she is an idiot speaking nonsense. But I don't think she is an idiot. I know, she knows, and everyone knows, that Hillary can't win if African-Americans and educated whites don't vote for her, and Obama can't win if he doesn't attract the large majority of her working class white voters. The only way her statement makes sense is to interpret it as her saying that her base is much more likely to desert Obama than vice versa. Thus, her base (working class whites) would be, almost by definition, more important (because its votes could go either way). I find it very difficult to interpret her statement as meaning anything else.

Again, it's not racist except to the extent that she is implying that her base will not vote for Obama because he is black. While there is a slight chance that she believes this for non-racial reasons, I don't think that this is the case.

[Stephen]

If Hillary is saying that her base of the Democratic party is bigger than Obama's base of the Democratic party,

Which isn't what she said. She's arguing electability in the general.

But we're talking about Hillary, so of course everyone needs to assume that she's just being evil.

Stephen, take a boxing class or go to the gym and work out some of that frustration. You're being snide to people who did nothing to merit the snark.

Fuck you, Scott. Really. If I wasn't trying to defend the simple idea that Hillary Clinton isn't a vicious, racist she-beast intent on ruining the Democratic party and destroying the world, you wouldn't think that, given Joe's hysterical response to me, I'm the one overreacting.

Hillary isn't the problem in this primary. Hillary's campaign people aren't the problem, the super delegates aren't it, and for once the media isn't even the problem. It's the Obama supporters who have to impute evil motives to anyone who dares to suggest that there could be a different choice for the Democratic nomination.

Perhaps it's because he's not running as a progressive. He's to the left of Hillary on some things, to the right on others. He's just as willing to play nice with the worst the GOP has to offer in Congress as Hillary. Since there's no compelling ideological reasons to support Obama over Hillary, it comes down to identity polititcs. But assuming that Hillary is only still in the race because she's evil and everything she says is evil and all her supporters - which I'm not but I would be if she became the nominee - are evil is just stupid.

[Sir Charles]

Stephen.

Easy there buddy -- not so hard on the readers or you'll be hurting our valuable franchise here and all of the revenue it generates.

I have to say, I had exactly the same reaction to Hillary's remarks as did Joe and several others. (I am also tired of the media doing the same thing, i.e. seeming to view white votes as somehow more valuable or authetic in some strange way.)

Anyway, let's all play nice.

Except with respect to that Matt dude who dropped by the other day -- fuck that guy. :-)

[Corvus9]

You know, before reading this thread, I was kind of missing Stephen. After reading it, not so much.

I don't really give a shit about Clinton's statement that her support is "much broader" than Obama's. That's just bullshit framing, like trying to call taxes "citizenship donations" or something. Obama just has more support. "The End." Cue trees exploding and Jim Morrison.

The offensive part is the bit about "working, hard-working Americans, white Americans" supporting her. I mean, there are ways you can parse this so it's not evil. You could say that she meant "working, hard-working Americans, [and] white Americans" Where the hard workers and the whites are separate. But you are still left with whites and the working class being the most important than, well everyone else, including blacks. And Democrats don't win anything without highly disproportionate African-American support.

And of course, the other way of reading it, those categories are all descriptives of a singular group, wherein being a hardworking American means being white, and vice versa. And that shit is racist in like nineteen different ways.

And Joe, everyone knows that caps are rude. Use italics. They confer a level of Latinate class upon everything written. Even calling someone and their ilk fucking idiots.

[Scott K]

Which isn't what she said. She's arguing electability in the general.

As far as I can see, she seems to be making the argument based on Democratic-primary data. The primary and general elections are not comparable. For one thing, I'm willing to bet that the percentage of "Hillary-haters" in the Democratic Party is lower than the general electorate (despite recent evidence).

As for the rest of what you said, I never said Hillary was evil. Nicholas didn't say that, as far as I can see. Same with ikl. Joe wrote an analysis of how he perceived the comment (WITH SOME CAPS) and then stated his personal reaction to what he was led to conclude. He used strong terms that I certainly wouldn't agree with, but if that's his opinion, fine-- it's a minority opinion and I think you are smart enough to know that. Yet you chose to resort to personal attacks by proxy of name-calling, and have used less than charitable terms to non-Joe personalities who haven't expressed similar sentiments.

Hillary Clinton is a Democrat, and she has done plenty in service of the cause. I would also have voted for her in the general if she won, though I am an Obama supporter myself. So I don't agree with the last sentence of Joe's first post. Is that what you've been looking for someone to say?

Now, someone give me enough information on this "Matt dude" so I can decide if there's sufficient cause to say "fuck him"... :-)

[Sir Charles]

Scott K.

We at the Cogblog strive to be responsive to our readers -- when we are not busy insulting them.

Anyway, Matt seems to have been a hit and run troll who posted this comment the other night in Nick's "Too Close to Call" post:

"The only person that could get more blind votes from blacks then the Democrats do now, is a black Democrat. He may be a Muslim, He may be a racist, but hey he is black and that's all that matters. Oh and they’re holding out ALL the lake county votes until after they finish counting all the absentee votes there. Lots of black grandmas in the hood that can’t make it to the polls. Holding out these results until after Hillary gives her “victory” speach was clearly planned."

I was charmed as you might imagine.

[Joe]

"And Joe, everyone knows that caps are rude. Use italics. They confer a level of Latinate class upon everything written. Even calling someone and their ilk fucking idiots."

I'm just not sure whether this comment section uses [, < or {, and I'm too lazy to do a test to find out.

As for disagreeing with what I said, I'm curious -- how many people on here think Clinton *means* something other than "I'm more electable because working class white people won't vote for a black man"? If the answer is something else, please specify.

(For instance, this is plausible: "Obama has been painted as an out-of-touch elitist by (me and) the Republican party, and working class folks won't vote for an elitist. That said, his tribal draw among African-Americans is strong enough to override antielitist sentiment, so you really need to look at white working class voters to judge the damage the elitist classification is causing him." But if this is her case, she needs to make it a lot more explicitly than she has to date.)

[Corvus9]

"I'm just not sure whether this comment section uses [, < or {, and I'm too lazy to do a test to find out."

Too lazy, huh? No wonder you support Obama.

I too, a Obama supporter, am too lazy to figure out how that stuff works. I mean, I support I could just write my posts first in a Word file, but, hey, Obama supporter.

[Scott K]

Thanks for the clarification, Sir. In that case, fuck him. :-)

I find that I enjoy this blog partly because others respond to my comments, instead of getting drowned out in a sea of trolls, spam, knee-jerk ideologues, and WAY too many people that are saying the same thing as I am. It's depressing to feel that one isn't being very original. The bloggers are a draw too-- I was already reading Nicholas Beaudrot and litbrit via other sources, but the rest of you are at least halfway intelligent (in order to protect myself from pre-emptive action, I refuse to rank you guys! ;-))...

[Sir Charles]

Scott K,

Ah, to have achieved the rank of "halfway intelligent" --ha! -- reminds me of an old Lou Reed quote where he bitched about spending a year working on a record so that Robert Christgau could give it a B+ in the Village Voice.

I agree as well that being the 400th commenter on Eschaton isn't exactly edifying -- not that I don't love the site, but it's too big to have a conversation.

I may not be the most intelligent blogger here, but I am willing to challenge my fellow Cogbloggers to some sort of drinking/bowling competition (isn't that redundant) to prove I am the most 'murican.

[Scott K]

Sir,

Don't forget the Prince Albert piercing with a flag lapel pin... now THAT would prove your love for your country. :-D

[Ron]

Her claims of a broader coalition would be more credible if she had won the most contests and the most votes. In reality, not so much.

[Sir Charles]

Scott,

I have a flag lapel pin through each nipple. Makes my shirts fit kind of funny.

[Matt Weiner]

Hi Charles! Can I come back now?

[Sir Charles]

Hi Matt W.

I've got to believe that the Matt with whom I was -- hmmm - conversing -- was other than you.

So welcome back.

[Matt Weiner]

Oh good. (I'm pretty sure I've never posted here under anything but my full name, and now that I think of it I vaguely remember some Matt being more of a schmuck than I'd been.)