Comments on Re: Mississippi Democrats are Awesome, but W. Virginia’s are Racist.
And Josh is a poopy-head!
I don't think you linked to Feit's post enough.
Who is Josh again?
I'm from North Dakota. About 5 percent of the state is Native American. Asians, blacks, and Hispanics make up less than 5 percent. The rest of us are whiter than a Saltine factory - and we went for Obama heavily.
Why isn't there anything in here about the demographics of Appalachia? Obama simply does bad there among the white working class democrats — thus the losses in Penn, Ohio, WV, etc...
Haven't you read TPM's account of that yet? Or Sullivan's?
And then Clarkj scrolled further down SLOG. Pwnt.
The lesson is, SOME whites won't vote for a black man, but blacks will vote for a white man. It blows away Clinton's "they won't vote for me because I'm white" theory.
Clarkj: North Dakota is full of working-class people, Democratic-NPL or otherwise, and he won here. I don't buy the "black people are scary" idea or the "Obama doesn't do well with white working-class people" idea. Sure, he lost Ohio and Pennsylvania, but he won Iowa and Nebraska. There's got to be a better explanation.
#3: A poopy-head!
Game Over, John Edwards is going to endorse Obama tonight.
Of course Mississippi's population is over 37% African-American.
And of course every Congressional District in Mississippi has the exact same prop... oh, wait.
Stranger needs to stop engaging these inbred, barefoot, illiterate scribblers.
There is something different about the way the virtually all-white culture of Appalachia responds to a black candidate than the virtually all white Democratic electorate of North Dakota or Iowa or Vermont or Idaho responds to a black candidate. The two differences that come to mind are level and quality of education, along with the related issue of economic prosperity.
Those non-Appalachian white states generally have good public education systems - their students score among the highest in the nation on standardized tests- whereas in Appalachia, the schools are severely underfunded and awful. In the non-Appalachian states, huge proportions of high school seniors go on to college. In the Appalachian states almost no one goes to college. As hard a life as farming can be, average Iowans or Vermonters are much wealthier than average West Virginians or Ohio Valley dwellers.
The difference is that whites in North Dakota or Idaho are secure in their station in life. They might not know many blacks, but they're also not threatened by a black person or other minority surpassing them economically. Economically insecure Appalachians are quite threatened by blacks and other minorities getting ahead of them. See, George Packer's reporting on this from Kentucky (http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/georgepacker/2008/04/the-race-in-eas.html).
Obama will probably have to write-off WV and KY. But, there are enough non-Appalachian Democratic votes in PA and OH that he can still win them. Especially, if he picks OH governor Ted Strickland as his running mate.
All I know is more women voters back Obama than Hils.
Shut up, Will.
Good analysis, Bill LaBorde.
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