Karl Rove says McCain electoral support is weakening

Great Debates
1

After one or two rather ridiculous implications that some of us can talk about nothing but Obama, I’ve decided to start this second thread that concentrates on McCain. I do think it’s only fair that McCain supporters have a place where they can argue for what they perceive as the virtues of their candidate.

On Fox News Sunday today, Fox News analyst and Republican political strategist Karl Rove presented his updated electoral map that is based on movements since Hillary Clinton’s endorsement of Barack Obama. He now paints the map this way:

Obama - 245
McCain - 222
Toss up - 71

The toss up states are North Dakota, Michigan, Missouri, Virginia, Ohio, and New Jersey.

According to Rove, Obama’s notable gains have been among older white women and Hispanics, but especially the former. And so McCain has lost Pennsylvania.

For debate, a number of issues: (1) Is McCain wasting time, money, and resources trying to court Hillary’s constituency, and if so, how much longer can he waste it? (2) Is McCain vulnerable on other demographic fronts as well, and if so, what are they? and (3) Is McCain taking the South for granted in the hopes that stereotypes about white male bigots in the South are true?

I think he is indeed wasting time courting Hillary’s people, because when Hillary returns to the campaign she will remind them of McCain’s stance on a number of issues including abortion and security (with the premise that America would be less safe with his saber-rattling and endless foreign occupations). I also think McCain will be more and more vulnerable among Jews and evangelical Christians, both of whom will become disenchanted on the one hand with his waffling over Hamas and on the other with his half-hearted faith of convenience. And finally, I believe it is a mistake to take for granted states like North Carolina, whose demographics change practically by the month, and whose urban centers like Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, and Asheville become increasingly populated by what McCain would call elitists.

I think Karl Rove is worried, and I think McCain should be too.

2

It’s early…we haven’t gotten a chance to really smear Obama and his Baby Mama yet. :wink:

Seriously… it is early. It will be interesting to see what happens when they debate and present different views on taxation, the judiciary, national security and other things. It seems that Obama isn’t anxious for that to happen.

3

Not that I think Turdblossom (GWB’s nick for Rove) has anything valuable to say, but that notion, if it existed, would be further weakened by Rove’s regarding ND and NJ as tossup states. If Obama wins ND, it’ll be because he won big. Same for McCain if he wins NJ.

4

Don’t trust anything Rove says. Don’t assume he’s wrong, don’t assume he’s right. Check independent sources.

Jeez, who are you, Hillary?
Everything Rove says is full of tiny traps that are ever so slightly wrong. Probably on purpose.

5

I can’t imagine Obama winning Virginia - I think we are at least two presidential elections from that happening one off polls not withstandinglink

6

Gotta say the same about North Dakota. They tend to vote heavily for the Republican candidate. It’s been 44 years since they went Dem, and it was 28 years before they did that.

It’s wayyyyyyy to early to take these things too serious. Talk about it in late September.

7

Mark my words, but don’t ask me to bet:

Obama will win Virginia.

8

I think it’s a safe assumption that Obama will take practically every black vote in the country but Alan Keyes’; and white voters will not be so united; and Virginia is 20% black, so that’s a head start right there.

9

It is but … we have heard this song before and in 2004 in Virginia Bush ended up beating Kerry 53.68% to 45.48% or by about
262,000 votes out of a little over 3 million cast … it looks like Bush got roughly 11% of the Black Vote nationwide, so assuming that won’t happen again, there still needs to be ~6% of the total vote to switch from McCain (+200,000ish voters) or there needs to be 100’s of thousands of eligible unregistered black people in Virginia who have never voted before and now will register & vote and no one can leave Obama who voted for Kerry.

I think it is trending Blue and if it continues in 8-20 years this will be a truly competitive state - we can all see it coming. Only one State has ever elected a Black Governor & that is these good folks.

Having said that, I think were I on the Obama Strategic team working on the 50 state electoral strategy I would not build it around counting on winning VA in 2008

Closer than the 70’s 80’ early 90’s, ya -But I am not buying it is a “toss-up” or even all* that* competitive.

10

electoral-vote.com has McCain polling ahead in ND by 6 points and Obama ahead in NJ by eight points. There are several states that Rove doesn’t mention where the margin is considerably closer. I suspect Rove just picked a random blue and a random red state and put them “in play” to get people talking about his electoral analysis.

11

Need it be pointed out that Rove is known for falsehood? ANYTHING he says is suspect. The only sure thing is that he likes pubbie wingnuts to win, and giving false confidence to the other side might well just be another in his bag of tricks.
After all, he managed to get dubya there in the first place.

12

I guess I’m not clear on why anyone should give the slightest credence to anything Rove says.

13

He is a Fox News analyst and Republican strategist.

14

Like I said…

15

The quandary I’m in is that I essentially agree with Rove. I don’t think there’s much of a chance at all that the 2008 electoral map will look much like 2004 or 2000. Both McCain and Obama are from the more populist wings of their respective parties, meaning that neither has really the same kind of Blue State-Red State appeal that Bush/Gore/Kerry have. Voters are going to judge them by slightly different criteria.

I can’t guarantee what states Obama will win, but in Purple states, what with this being a Democratic trending year, means that Obama is going to have the wind at his back in states like Virginia.

So, whatever one thinks of Rove, just because a fool says the sun is up doesn’t mean that it is actually night. So what is my quandary? If you all think Rove is making something up as some kind of psychological warfare, then what I’ve been thinking about how Obama is going to run in this election is a lie that I believed before Rove even said it. Say it ain’t so!

16

:stuck_out_tongue: Too funny.

-XT

17

Rove has been a very successful political operative – look what he did for Bush considering the worthless material he had to work with. What he thinks might well be insightful, even now; not that that necessarily has anything to do with what he says.

18

Does Karl Rove have a house in Oregon by any chance?

19

Remind me why there is no element of racism in that ?

20

You’re missing one of the ‘X Factors’ in Virginia politics.

Mark-fucking-Warner. Possibly the most popular public figure (as Governor) in Virginia since Robert E. Lee. It’s just not possible to calculate how well thought of he is in the state. If he could have run again for Governor it would have been a landslide of unprecedented proportions.

Combine a general trend blue, with Obama motivating the black vote, the demographic center-of-gravity shifting to the DC suburbs, and Mark Warner having coattails UP-ticket in his Senatorial run and you’ve got 13 electoral votes that are highly likely to switch this time.