Replies

". . . Can the Boustany Campaign make enough inroads into the combined Democrat group to pull this out? I hope so and it may also be that the Cravins / Mount groups may have antagonized each other enough so that Cravins / Carriere supporters won't cross over in sufficient numbers to give the win to Mount. . . ."

Yes; I am convinced Boustany can win this race. Cravins was the African-American candidate and probably had little chance to win the seat in a runoff, so the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee intervened with LOTS of ads to help Mount make the cut. But if you look at the vote totals you posted you will see that, even with all of the help Mount received, she made the runoff with less than a 1% margin of victory over Cravins. Many of Cravins' supporters are not happy about this and I believe Mount will have trouble energizing the African-American vote on her behalf. She can't "play the race card" because it won't fly with the African-American voters in southwest Louisiana to begin with - though St. Landry Parish may be an exception - and it would only antagonize the white voters she needs to win anyway. I also do not expect the Democratic base to become enthused either. I rate Boustany's chances as very good for these reasons, to which I may add that he should be able to run a better-financed campaign.