The Minority Vote

According to Washington Monthly's Kevin Drum, the desperation you smell coming from the Bush campaign may be due to their lack of support of minorities in the battleground states:

THE MINORITY VOTE....Hmmm. Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio has just finished a survey of 12 battleground states and finds Bush and Kerry tied with 47% of the vote apiece. But when he weights for minority turnout based on the 2000 exit polls, Kerry is ahead 49.2%-45.7%. And when he further updates the weighting to take into account the most recent census results, Kerry is ahead 49.9%-44.7%.

As Fabrizio blandly puts it, "It is clear that minority turnout is a wildcard in this race and represents a huge upside for Sen. Kerry and a considerable challenge for the President's campaign." More accurately, if Fabrizio is right — that Kerry is ahead by 5% overall in the battleground states — Kerry is a sure winner on November 2.

CNN reported yesterday that Kerry is beating Bush among Hispanics by a 2-to-1 margin, the same margin Gore beat Bush. Considering the rapid growth of that population, however, the Bush team has always said they need to get up to 40% to win. Also, there was a recent poll that showed Bush doubling his African American support from 2000 to 18%. That would be huge for Bush, but I'd be surprised if it's accurate and even if it is, Clinton's return to the campaign trail is probably returning some of that vote to Kerry.