The Need For North Carolina
By Elex Michaelson
April 30, 2008
If the fight for the 2008 Democratic Presidential Nomination were a tennis match, both candidates have held their serve so far. Essentially, Senators Clinton and Obama each have won the states where their base demographic of voters is most prevalent. To actually win the match , Clinton needs to break Obama’s serve and win North Carolina.
Clinton’s base is older women, blue-collar workers, Latinos, Jews, and white Catholics. In states where a one or a combination of these voters are most dominant (California, New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas, Nevada, Pennsylvania), Clinton has won significantly.
Where African-Americans, young people, highly educated and affluent voters are more widely seen (South Carolina, Mississippi, Maryland, Virginia, Illinois, etc), you can count on an Obama victory.
Washington is the only exception where Obama won over working-class and older whites to dominate a state in a somewhat unexpected victory.
Using the past as a predictor (dangerous to do this year), Clinton will win Indiana with Obama taking North Carolina.
A win in Indiana helps keep Clinton in the race and intensifies her rationale that Obama “can’t close the deal”; a loss would instantly intensify pressure for her to step aside.
Almost everyone in the pundit class thinks Obama will win North Carolina—Real Clear Politics says the Illinois senator has a ten-point lead there. That’s exactly why Clinton needs to not only make it close, but win the state!
For Clinton to show that Obama is “unelectable” and that the recent Jeremiah Wright comments are like a political nuclear bomb, she needs to win on his territory. Clinton could prove that she has widespread appeal beyond her “base” and that Obama’s best days are behind him.
A Clinton North Carolina win would dramatically change the media storyline and stop making her seem like a scrappy fighter in second place to a formidable opponent locked in a neck-and-neck battle.
North Carolina’s Governor Mike Easely is betting on a Clinton win; he endorsed her yesterday. Whether his machine can help her as much as Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell’s or Ohio Governor Ted Strickland’s is unlikely. But if it does, it would turn this already incredible race on its head entirely once again.
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