Obama's fictional "White Problem" & Republican's Real "Bush" Problem

There are two stories that emerged from last night's elections. First, Obama was defeated substantially in West Virginia where few considered to be a battleground state until Clinton declared it so last week. And secondly, the Republicans lost a third-straight special congressional election, this time in MS-01, a solid GOP seat where Bush received 62% of the vote in 2004. What is the more significant news story? The former was expected and does nothing to change the delegate math or narrative, but the latter is disastrous news for Republicans looking to prevent another November election night sweep that occurred in 2006 when Democrats gained 31 house seats and Republicans picked up none. Until Bush is out of office, this trend will continue. So while Obama still has some work to do with rural Appalachia white voters, the Republican Party’s poor brand and its voters’ lack of enthusiasm right now tell us a WHOLE lot more about the overall political climate than last night’s West Virginia results do. Republicans have a Bush problem they can't seem to shake. Possibly because their policies continue on the same destructive, obstructive, counter-productive path.

Speaking of rural Appalachia white voters, Obama hasn't exactly been winning over the hearts and minds of white Democrats in West Virginia and the rest of Appalachia. But this doesn't signify that Obama has a "race problem" and can not attract white voters. Instead of looking at the exit polls, we need to start looking at the results from the primaries and caucus for an idea of where Obama's strengths and challenges lie, specifically the significant white support he received in rural Idaho, Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska, North Dakota, and suburban Colorado and Wisconsin. Obama doesn't have a white working class problem, he has a white rural Appalachia problem. And that problem may just be that Clinton enjoys strong support in this region. Until the campaign turned more contentious over the last few months, most Clinton voters, according to the polls, were fine with supporting Obama. I don't think recent polls that show Clinton supporters unwilling to support Obama are a good indicator of how they will vote in November. One thing for sure is that Obama's appeal is not limited to African-Americans and higher-income, highly-educated whites. To illustrate this point, I ran across these really cool pre-West Virginia maps, which highlight the counties where each candidate has won with 65%+ of the vote. Obama on the left and Clinton on the right:










It would be great if pundits and politicos would recognize and acknowledge that race doesn't appear to have been much of a hindrance for Obama in the Democratic primaries, except, it appears, in Appalachia and in some regions where descendants of Appalachian migrants settled, such as the Ozarks (Clinton home state) and Oklahoma. Obama doesn't appear to have much of a problem with white voters. But it seems quite likely Appalachia has a bit of an Obama problem.

What will prove to be very intriguing is how the recent Edwards endorsement and eventual Clinton endorsement will help to ease this voter disconnect. I'll tackle in future posts what this will mean in individual states come the McCain vs. Obama general election.