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If you want to understand without a great deal of effort why the 2012 presidential contest is so close and how it might turn out, you should read two articles right away: Ron Browstein’s latest column for National Journal, and a piece published at TNR by Nate Cohn earlier this week. They both say basically the same thing: Obama is retaining much of his 2008 levels of support from minorities and college-educated whites, while slipping significantly from his already poor levels of support from non-college educated whites. Fortunately for the incumbent, the “new coalition” voters are making up a steadily larger part of the electorate, while the blue-collar whites (particularly men) who were once synonymous with the Democratic Party are becoming a steadily smaller part of the electorate.
This dynamic goes a long way towards explaining why Obama is competitive in North Carolina but is surprisingly vulnerable in places like Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa: his support was already about as low as it can get among non-college-educated whites in NC, but they represented an important part of his 2008 vote in the midwest. Poll variations largely reflect different assumptions about turnout among different categories of voters, with Republicans still hoping an economy-driven “discouragement factor” will depress turnout among Obama’s “new coalition” voters, and Democrats still hoping conservative lack of excitement about Mitt Romney will affect GOP turnout.
Moreover, this way of looking at the electorate is driving a lot of strategic decisions by the campaigns. The importance of placing a floor under losses among non-college-educated white voters helps explain the Obama campaign’s (or more accurately, Priorities USA’s) focus on Romney’s wealth and taxes. You get the sense the Romney campaign buys the idea (shared by many political scientists) that non-college educated whites will make up a disproportionate share of the undecided vote, and will overwhelmingly break towards the challenger late in the campaign if the economy does not significantly improve.
What is harder to assess, via either polls or public “messaging,” is how good a job the two campaigns and their parties are doing in voter targeting and GOTV preparations, though reportedly the Obama campaign sank enormous resources into these tasks early on.
In addition to the pieces by Brownstein and Cohn, you might also want to take a look at Alan Abramowitz’s first presentation of his 2012 election model, which—surprise, surprise—suggests a very close election, with one important variable—second quarter real GDP growth—unavailable until later this month.
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jjm on July 12, 2012 10:19 AM:
Gee...I wonder who was responsible for the loss of blue collar jobs? Wasn't it all that offshoring? And who was avid to offshore? The GOP, perhaps because they thought it would hurt Democrats to shrink the labor vote for them?
Well, that might be working. But because they are so shrunken, blue collar white guys don't count as much anyway. Methinks the GOP is both stupid and very shortsighted.
berttheclock on July 12, 2012 10:20 AM:
One thing which baffles me is the persistent comments by some on the right about President wiping out our Constitution and taking away rights of the people. I have seen this used by right wingers slipping in political comments on sports blogs, such as those at the KC Star. What rights have been taken away?
An aside, Mr Kilgore, but, I must respectfully disagree with you concerning the ratings of "Newshour". Last night, my wife and I watched via On Demand, the third episode, where Aaron Sorkin really tore into the Tea Party and how it is corrupting this nation, especially, as it is bankrolled by the Koch Brothers. Five Stars, Ed, Five Stars.
stormskies on July 12, 2012 10:44 AM:
So let's see how this really adds up. Obama is far ahead with the women's vote, far ahead with the African-American vote, far ahead with the Hispanic, Asian, and Native American vote, and only trails in the beyond dumb fuck blue collar white man vote.
And yet the corporate polls want to make believe the race is close. Really ? And just how many American are being 'conditioned' by this propaganda so that if the corporations and the media that they own succeed in getting corporate automaton Romney installed as the president no one will be surprised.
Bottom line.
Peter C on July 12, 2012 10:47 AM:
And non-college-educated white voters will vote for Romney because ... he's white and they are stupid??? That's awfully simplistic, isn't it? They got clobbered by the Wall Street fatcats but will vote for the Bain Capital guy (who looks just like the guy responsible for their last three layoffs) - the one who thought that bankruptsy for GM was a great idea - the one will personally get millions in tax breaks when his policies go into effect? That guy???
He's the guy who was a bishop of a religion which thinks that any of those non-college-educated white voters who don't convert to his religion are going to hell.
I think non-college-educated white voters are simply not paying attention yet. Politics is so unpleasant (and this is an intentional tactical move by the right wing) that they've not engaged yet. But, when they do, they won't want to vote for the guy that layed them off.
Zinsky on July 12, 2012 11:14 AM:
Conservatives hatred of and disgust for a black man in the White House far outstrips their ambivalence toward Willard Romney. They would rather their own liver than allow a Negro to remain in the White House.
Jerry Clark on July 12, 2012 12:00 PM:
President Obama "surprisingly vulnerable" in Minnesota?
I'm a Minnesotan, and that's news to me. Every poll I've seen gives the President a comfortable margin here, and Nate Silver's (and others') maps have Minnesota a solid blue.
Minnesota, which you mention in the same breath with Wisconsin and Iowa, is neither of those states and shouldn't be confused with them. Each of these three Upper Midwestern states has its own political dynamic.
c u n d gulag on July 12, 2012 12:55 PM:
Things were SOOOO bad in 2008, that people were able to overlook race.
Even some people who were borderline racists.
They saw that McCain was going to be Bush III, and, in case something happened to him, he had chosen a female, less smart, less funny, and less verbal, version of Gilligan.
Now, the economy still sucks - but it's "Sucks Lite."
It's no longer in a nose-dive, and they can blame Obama for not being able to overturn, fast enough, over 30 years of Conservative policies to destroy the middle class, and can vote for the richer-than-rich white guy instead of the black one.
And it doesn't matter that this time, following that "Gilligan's Island" theme, that their candidate is Thurston Howell the IIIrd.
Of course, the Obama campaign has to spend the next 3+ months reminding these people, that Mitt looks like the guy who ordered the guy who ordered the guy who ordered the guy who ordered the guy who ordered the guy who was the one who laid them off when outsourcing, insourcing, and/or offshoring their jobs.
In ad's, I'd picture Mitt as the guy who goes around hobnobbing with other rich people, arriving in a loooooooong white stretch-limo, and exits it wearing a tux with white gloves, a cape, a gold-handled-diamond-tipped cane, and a monacle.
And who, when he comes into the mansion for the dinner party, takes off the cape and drops it on the floor on purpose, then slaps the poor servant who didn't catch it in time across the face with his white gloves, hits him/her with the cane, and then fires him/her.
You could even dub in his pal Trumps venomous voice, screaming "You're FIRED!!!"
I think that ad would work nicely.
A bit over the top, but...
Raskolnik on July 12, 2012 1:49 PM:
1) Obama is not vulnerable in Minnesota.
2) Iowa does not effect the electoral calculus.
3) We'll see about Wisconsin. InTrade gives Obama a 73% chance to win; I would put it closer to 4:1.