very true. Even at the height of the GOP when Reagan won in 84 he only got 9% of the black vote. If the dems had an actual black guy to vote for like they did last year, he’d have done no better than McCain did. Reagan got 34% of the Hispanic vote in 84, about the same as McCain got.
The difference is he got 66% of the white vote vs 55% of the white vote and the white vote itself shrank from 86% of the total to 74%.
The GOP will never get more than around 10% of the black vote barring some massive change in politics or them running a black candidate. Even then a conservative black guy won’t get more than around 20-25% at most. See Steele in MD, Swann in PA, Blackwell in OH, etc... A moderate black guy like Powell would do better but I think even he would have gottena round a third of the black vote at most.
Hispanics are somewhat similar. W was an exception being from TX, having Jeb in FL with his Hispanic wife, etc... and he did make inroads but the immigration thing hurt the party badly. I don’t see them topping 35% or so any time soon.
We just have to a better job of maxing out the white vote. McCain still got 55% in the worst anti-GOP yr since 76 and the worst economy/recession in a generation. But it will be tough. Even in 2004 with a good economy, having terrorism/natl security and moral values as major issues, and outspending the dems, W still topped out at 58% and that just won’t cut it going forward. McCain could have replicated W’s totals last year and he’d still have lost by 2 or 3 pts.
Excellent post.
In 1960, Nixon got forty-five percent of the Black vote. In 1964 Goldwater only got about twenty percent. It's been declining ever since. But why did Goldwater, who was not racist, get far less Black votes than Nixon? Steele briefly mentions the Goldwater debacle. Goldwater opposed the 1964 Civil Rights bill in its entirety. A good part of the bill certainly was flawed, but when Goldwater rejected the bill (he later said he made a mistake), that doomed the GOP in the minds of many Black voters. The GOP became the party of evil, white racists who wanted to keep minorities down.
That perception, wrong as it is, has remained in the consciousness of Black americans ever since. If today Republicans got forty percent of the Black vote, there would be virtually no Democrats in congress.