Obama Win Requires Four-Part Coalition

By Charlie Cook
© National Journal Group Inc.

September 3, 2008

This column was originally featured on nationaljournal.com on September 3, 2008.

There are a dozen ways to slice and dice this year's electorate and how it breaks down. Indeed, every pollster and analyst seems to do it a bit differently.

One way is to think of a stool with four legs. The first and easiest-to-predict leg this year is the African-American vote. Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is incredibly strong among black voters.

RT Strategies and Cook Political Report pollster Thom Riehle calculates that Obama needs to pull at least 91 percent of the black vote to have a good chance of winning. Reaching that threshold looks very likely. Some analysts think that he will get as much as 95 percent. Four years ago, 11 percent of the voters who cast ballots in the presidential contest were black. Now, Riehle says, Obama needs to raise that number to at least 13 or 14 percent, a goal that looks reachable.

The second leg of the stool is Hispanics. Although Republicans John McCain and George W. Bush have taken immigration positions that don't anger Hispanic leaders, others in their party have created an enormous headache since 2004 for those charged with GOP outreach to the Latino community. As a result, Obama looks reasonably strong among Hispanics; some analysts expect him to get 69 percent of that vote.

Riehle says that Obama is on track to win the Hispanic vote comfortably and that the real question is whether Democrats can boost the Latino turnout, even though Hispanics are less enthusiastic about Obama than are African-Americans and young, college-educated whites. Riehle estimates that for Obama to have a good chance of winning, he needs Hispanics to be 5 or 6 percent of this November's voters.

The third leg is whites younger than 50. Riehle argues that Obama needs 45 percent of their votes to have a good chance of winning. Getting less than 43 percent would be a killer, he says. Others estimate that the Democrat needs to break even among this group. Obama is very strong among younger whites with at least a college education, but he is considerably weaker among those without a college degree.

Although Obama is doing well with those first two "legs" and perhaps breaking even with the third, his biggest problem--and McCain's greatest opportunity--is the fourth leg: whites who are least 50 years old. Some pollsters and other analysts focus most on white working-class voters. Others point to noncollege-educated whites. Still others point to older working-class whites or whites ages 65 or older. However this bloc is sliced, these are the voters who naturally might be more resistant to change, who might be troubled by Obama's race or background, and might simply find it easier to identify with McCain.

If McCain can win this leg strongly, he will keep this race close. And then it could go either way. If Obama manages to get this group to feel comfortable with him, then his "time for a change" and Democratic Party advantages can kick in--and this race could become a rout.

Given this year's strong "change" climate, Bush's unpopularity, the tendency for voters to want to give the other party a chance after one has controlled the White House for two terms, and the current Democratic advantage in voters' party identification, this race ought to be a sure thing for the Democratic nominee. But resistance to Obama is making it close--just as a stool with only three of its legs can stand but is shaky. Whether the fourth leg is defined as whites over 50, working-class whites, or whites over 65, McCain's challenge this week is to firm up his grip and keep Obama from adding the final leg to the stool.