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Obama will not win any Southern states, but I predict that he is going to do surprisingly well in many of them.

First, let’s get the “black vote” out of the way. Obama is going to get 95% of it, easily. Just as there are whites who may not tell the truth to pollsters, there are blacks who [despite what they reveal to pollsters] will, at the very last moment, cast their ballot for one of their own. They want a black man to win, plain and simple - because it’s “our time”.

As for black turnout - well, let’s just say that it is going to be phenomenal. There is no historical “predictor” of how blacks will turn out to vote for a black for president, of course. I sense polls are meaningless this time around, insofar as black turnout is concerned. In states with large black populations, like Georgia - this is going to give Obama a strong color-base.

Of course, “the black vote” - even with 100% of eligible blacks turning out and casting their votes for Obama - can’t do it for him. He has to get a proportion of the “White vote”, too.

Even in the conservative South, there remains a cohort of committed democratic white voters who will vote Obama. Certainly not a very large cohort, but I feel comfortable predicting that Obama will garner at least 25% of the white vote in these states, possibly more. You’ve got that share of “white guilters” who will vote for Obama to assuage their consciences, and also another group of “broken glass ‘rats” who are going to vote for the ‘rat candidate no matter what. After all, we have the “broken glass” contingent on _our_ side, as well (and I’m pretty much one of ‘em!).

As I stated at the outset, Obama won’t win any of these states, but he will run more strongly in them than any non-Southern democrat has done in a long time. The race factor actually HELPS him down South.

Interestingly, I think the states in which McCain will do best will be those that have a “mix” of blacks (not constituting a lopsided percentage of the population, vis-a-vis nationally, but not “overwhelmingly white” states, either). Again, the race factor comes into play here. In states with next-to-no black population (such as Iowa), it’s easy for white voters to feel magnanimous towards blacks, because they have little actual _contact_ with them in day-to-day life. Often their only perceptions blacks are formed by what they’ve seen in the media, etc. Not so in those states where white populations are forced by proximity into frequent contact with blacks - these whites “know better” regarding the true nature of race relations and cultural conflicts, and their vote is going to reflect this.

The states in which Obama will do best are the “lily-white liberal” states, such as Vermont. These people are the “dreamers” to whom liberalism calls loudest. McCain will be trounced in them.

Of course, we still have to wait and see what happens in the debates, if indeed they occur. I’m wondering if - after last night’s performance, which I didn’t watch but in which others think McCain did surprisingly well against Obama - the Obama campaign will start looking for some possible way in which to scuttle the upcoming “real” debates, or, in lieu of that, find a way to “tilt them” to their candidate’s favor.....

All predictors are off this year. This will be the first presidential election in which race plays a major role. Folks don’t want to talk about this, even folks right here on FreeRepublic, but race is the “elephant in the room” this time around. I have no problems with that; it’s time things like this were discussed openly, without fear of having the taunt of “racist” hurled around.

- John