"No Democrat has won a majority of white voters since Lyndon Johnson in 1964."

[Clio the Leo]

Cant we STOP this BS before it gets out of hand? Anyway, WHY does it matter? Do white votes count MORE? I thought we dispensed with that 3/5ths rule years ago.

Obama Strongest Dem Among White Voters Since Carter
by Jonathan Singer, Sat Oct 25, 2008 at 12:21:13 PM EDT

We have known for a long while that Barack Obama is on track to peform more strongly among white voters than either John Kerry or Al Gore. Now a new crunching of numbers indicates that Obama may run the strongest within this demographic of any Democrat since Jimmy Carter.

Barack Obama, the first black major party nominee, is positioned to win the largest share of white voters of any Democrat in more than three decades, according to an exclusive Politico analysis of recent Gallup and Pew Research Center polling.
The most recent two weeks of Gallup polling, which includes roughly 13,000 interviews, show 44 percent of non-Hispanic white voters presently support Obama -- the highest number for a Democrat since 47 percent of whites backed Jimmy Carter in 1976.

<...>

No Democrat has won a majority of white voters since Lyndon Johnson in 1964. John McCain has shuffled between 48 percent and 50 percent support in recent weeks -- which would be the lowest share for a Republican candidate in a two-man race since Barry Goldwater's run.

<...>

A Politico breakdown of the Pew polling shows dramatic improvement for Obama among whites since early September on the question of who would do a better job "improving the economy." White women, who last month were split, now believe Obama will do a better job "improving the economy" by a 49 to 35 percent margin. White men, who had favored McCain by 10 points, are now split with 41 percent preferring Obama and 43 percent McCain.

The growth in Obama's share of the white vote cannot be divorced from the growth in his share of the vote of the entire electorate, so the fact that, if the polling holds, Obama would be the first Democrat in 32 years to earn a majority of the popular vote makes it unsurprising that Obama would perform the best of any Democrat among white voters in that same time span.

http://mydd.com/2008/10/25/obama-strongest-dem-among-white-voters-since-carter

[sharp_stick]

1. Not quite yet

a lot of the old segregationists are still around but they are becoming fewer and fewer. I don't think we'll ever see an end to racism, at least not in our lifetime but it's becoming weaker all the time.

[hfojvt]

2. why do we need to stop a two year old article?

Has something been said more recently? Also, if it IS true that Obama got more white votes (by percentage) than Kerry, or Clinton or Dukakis or Mondale, then perhaps we can stop the whole "white Americans are freaked out by a Black President!" theme that we on the left have repeated almost every other week since Obama was elected.

[Ter]

3. We can stop it by not bringing up two year old articles.

Just sayin'. :)

[davidinalameda]

4. why are you so offended by this

there are plenty of articles about the number of Latino votes republicans and Democrats get; Asian, women, gay, etc

lighten up francis

[bluestateguy]

5. He only needs 42% of the white vote to win in 2012

and that number will dribble down in subsequent election years are whites make up less and less of the electorate.

[elocs]

6. I heard this subject come up yesterday while listening to NPR,

that Obama got fewer votes from whites than did McCain. So for me it is one day old, not 2 years old.

[struggle4progress]

7. The "average" picture is useless: we need district level info

[Jennicut]

8. OMG! You mean there are more then white people that can vote in this country?!

As a white female myself, I find this whole discussion ridiculous. The percentage of minorities is growing and someday white may be the minority.