Why Black Voters Will Cost Kerry The Presidency
Horserace blog
Regular readers are well aware that I think this election is over, that George W. Bush will be reelected. There are two reasons why I think this is the case:
1. Kerry is going to under-perform badly among black voters relative to Gore’s performance in 2000.
2. Bush is going to over-perform among Catholics relative to his performance in 2000.
It is in this post that I want to explain my reasoning on the first issue. However, first we are going to have to put the final nail in the coffin of presidential polling. The only way you can come to understand the real nature of the presidential race is if you first understand how the polls utterly miss this nature.
The Problem with Sub-Groups in Presidential Polls
When you look at the details of a poll, you will always notice the sample size as well as the margin of error. These two numbers are related: the larger the sample, the smaller the margin of error. The reason that pollsters use a sample of between 700 and 1,1000 voters for their samples is because beyond that, you would have to add a lot more people to reduce the margin of error by just a little bit. It is an issue of increasing marginal costs versus declining marginal benefits.
However, there are serious methodological gaps in these polls. Black Americans form one such gap. Think of it this way. In 2000, blacks made up 10% of the American electorate. A survey of 1,000 people will probably have (accordingly) 100 black voters in its sample. The margin of error just got a whole lot bigger for any questions you wish to answer about black voters. You are taking a sample of 100 people to measure a population of 24 million voting-age people.
It gets worse, though. Within that sub-sample, say you wanted to measure trends in the presidential race among black women. Well, that puts your sample size at roughly 50 people. Suppose you want to measure trends in the presidential race among urban black females. Well…guess what…once your sample drops below 30 people, you can’t say a damned thing about that group.
But let’s go back and suppose you are just looking at those 100 black voters. In 2000, Gore carried 91% of black voters. That would amount to 91 voters in your sample in 2000 saying they would vote for Bush. This year, Kerry is running at roughly 70% of black voters. That would put him at 70 black voters. This difference will, as I shall argue in the next section, be the determining factor in this election. And yet, in a poll of 1,000 voters, the difference between Gore and Kerry is only 21 human beings, which works out to 2.1% of the sample. It is just too small for a poll to pick up.
Again, publicly-released presidential horse-race polls are useless. Nobody should put any stock whatsoever in them. To find the truth, we must dig deeper.
Black Americans and the Democratic Party
Black America has been voting solidly with the Democratic Party since the 1960s. They were part of the Roosevelt Coalition beginning in 1932, but a sizeable portion had remained with Republicans. Thanks to Kennedy’s support of and Goldwater’s opposition to the Civil Rights Act, Johnson’s Great Society, and Nixon’s divide-and-conquer strategy in 1968, blacks switched to the Democratic Party and have never left. After 1968, Republicans were lucky to score 15% of black voters on a presidential ticket. The average level of black support for Republicans has been about 12%.
While blacks have been reliable voters for the Democrats, almost every other sizeable demographic has not been. There has been an interesting phenomenon in the Democratic Party in the last 25 years. Its voting coalition has been slowly decaying. The first obvious sign of this were the Reagan and Blue Dog Democrats. After that the South fell away. After that union workers began voting increasingly for Republicans, and union workers began declining as an overall percentage of the American public. Abortion has pulled a good chunk of Catholics away. Issues surrounding homosexuality have amplified this problem. What largely remains of the original coalition is urbanites. Urban voters continue to vote solidly Democratic (this is why the 2000 county-by-county map looks so striking). But the cornerstone of Democratic hegemony among urban voters is the black portion of urban voters.
What does this mean for the Democrats nationally? Well, it basically means that for the Democrats to compete against Republicans, they have to pull an ever-larger proportion of their dwindling base. At this point this means black voters. They are only reliable and sizeable group of voters. Thus, the more the rest of the base decays, the better blacks must perform for the Democrats for the party to do well nationally.
See, the Democrats have money. They have gobs and gobs of money. Wealthy white people are actually just as inclined to vote Democrat as they are to vote Republican. This is how Howard Dean got so much money and virtually no votes.
What they are lacking is a core voter base. You can see this all over the nation as the number of safe Democratic states have fallen away. Think about Minnesota. Think about the whole South. The entire South (including West Virginia) has, in the last 40 years, transitioned from being safe Democrat to safe Republican. Several perennial swing states are no longer in that condition – Missouri, Arizona, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana. As a matter of fact, much of the Democrat’s electoral position has nothing to do with a solid base (as the Republican’s position does), but is due to Republican Party incompetence or corruption (or both), particularly in Illinois and California. That gives the Democrats a foundation of more than 70 Electoral Votes to add to their natural base in the urban Northeast, which is the only safe spot left for them. This puts a band-aid on their wound. But the wound remains. They lack a solid foundation of base voters.
As the Democrats base has diminished, their reliance upon black voters has increased dramatically. Al Gore only won the popular vote because he netted such a large proportion of the black vote, which voted at an extraordinarily high level for him.
Nationwide, Al Gore carried a whopping 91% of the black electorate, which constituted an impressive 10% of the entire electorate (proportional, by the way, to the black adult population, which constitutes 10% of the voting-age public). That means that of the 105 million of us who voted in 2000, 10.5 million blacks came to the polls. Black turnout in 2000 was low relative to white turnout, but it was high relative to previous levels of black turnout. Of the 22.0 million black Americans of voting age, 45% of them came to the polls. Gore carried roughly 9.4 million of them, Dubya only pulled in 937,000. That gave Gore a whopping 8.46 million vote net advantage over Bush. The trend was quite pronounced in key states.
In Florida, blacks constituted 15% of electorate on 11-07-00. This is more than the percentage they constitute of total eligible voters. They went for Gore by 93% to 7%, giving him a net advantage of 751,352 votes in a state decided by 537 votes.
In Ohio, blacks constituted 9% of the electorate on 11-07-00. Again, this is more than the percentage they constitute of total eligible voters. They went to Gore 89% to 9%, giving him an advantage of 355,471 votes in a state decided by 166,735 votes.
In Michigan, blacks constituted 11% of the electorate on 11-07-00. This is about the same percentage that blacks constitute of total eligible voters. They went to Gore 91% to 8%, giving him a net advantage of 335,214 votes in a state decided by 217,279 votes.
One can get a sense of just how necessary blacks are to the Democrats not just from these numbers, but from a consideration of the big picture in 2000. Bill Clinton was a popular President who presided over a time of peace and prosperity. His vice-president was considered approvingly, though without the same affection that Clinton enjoyed. And yet, he only won the popular vote by 500,000 votes. This is virtually unprecedented in American history. It only happened in 1960 when Kennedy broke into the Republican hegemony in the Northeast to take the top job from Nixon. Today, the Democrats’ base has shrunk so much that despite a popular president, a roaring economy, and no international turmoil, they can barely squeak into a popular vote victory.
This is the most important point: to win the popular vote in 2000, they had to get an unprecedented output from the last vestige of their base, black America. Black America had to fill in all the gaps that have grown in the last 25 years – the gaps from a loss of Catholics, Southerners and union workers. These gaps have gotten to the point that in 2000, blacks could only barely cover them nationwide (and they failed to do it in the Electoral College, particularly in Missouri and Ohio).
The problem for John F. Kerry is that Bush/Cheney realized all of this three years ago, and have done their letter best to ensure that such results are impossible in 2004. There is no way Kerry can get that many black voters to the ballot box, and get them to vote so heavily in his favor. This year, blacks are not sufficiently pro-Kerry to cover the serious gaps in the party’s base.
The Current Situation Among Black Voters
Two weeks ago, the latest Pew Poll came out showing Kerry enjoying 70% support among blacks. Just today The Center for Policy and Economic Studies announced that in their poll, Kerry enjoyed 69% support among blacks compared to 18% for Bush. They conducted a similar poll at the same point in the 2000 race. It showed Gore 74%, Bush 9%. According to this poll, then, Kerry is underperforming among blacks by roughly 14% of the vote, a statistically significant difference. What would that mean if these numbers hold for the next month?
If there were a perfect replay of Florida, Kerry’s total would shrink by 122,312 votes.
If there were a perfect replay of Ohio, Kerry’s total would shrink by 62,207 votes (making Nader’s absence on the ballot this year wholly irrelevant).
If there were a perfect replay of Michigan, Kerry’s total would shrink by 56,542 votes.
If there were a perfect replay of the national vote, Kerry’s total would shrink by 1,459,966. In other words, Bush would win the popular vote by about 1 million votes!
John Kerry simply cannot win this election if he performs among blacks 14% worse than Gore did. There is no where else in America he can make up those votes. The Democrats have no other constituencies from which they can draw their voters.
As long as these numbers hold, this election is over, ladies and gentlemen. 14% of black America has decided so.
Note that you will never, ever, ever (!) see this reflected in the national horserace polls. Again, this change amounts to the shifting opinion of 14 people in a 1,000 person poll (10 people in a 700 person poll).
Why Has This Happened?
There are two broad, fairly obvious, reasons that Bush has netted 14% among black voters. He has done a good job and Kerry has done a horrible job.
Bush Has Done a Good Job By:
Reaching out to black ministers. These men and women have great sway among black voters. They can convince them that Bush is worth voting for, and they can effectively exhort them to get to the voting booth.
Promoting measures that are popular among blacks. This includes school reform, the ban on gay marriage, promotion of faith-based charities, and immigration reform.
Eschewing hot-button Republican issues that alienate blacks. These include hate crimes legislation, amplifying welfare reform, racial profiling, affirmative action. Black Americans are very conservative in important respects. They are suspicious of Republican fiscal policies (not to mention they are suspicious of Republicans in general), but they frequently agree with Republicans on important social topics. Generally, Bush has emphasized the right issues and deemphasized the right issues.
Placing black Americans in important leadership roles in his cabinet. The most obvious examples are Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell. But, in all honesty, the one who has probably done the most good is Rodney Paige, Secretary of Education. He has probably made a personal difference in his personal tours across the nation (which the press never reports).
Bush was Lucky Because:
Terrorism as an issue galvanizes conservatives without alienating black voters. There is no other issue that has this effect.
Neither drug issues nor crime issues have been an issue during his presidency. Both are issues that can cut against Republicans among black voters.
Bill Clinton is out-of-action. There is no American politician with the kind of appeal that Bill Clinton has among black voters. In 2000, Gore dispatched Clinton especially for this task (the supposed spat between Clinton and Gore due to Tipper not liking him was pure spin, designed directly for the consumption of female swing voters in the suburbs – the plan all along was to use Clinton where he is most useful).
Kerry Has Done a Bad Job By:
Not reaching out to black voters personally, early and often. This is why we see him panicking at the moment, spending so much time among blacks.
Not effectively deflecting Bush’s cultural offense. Kerry has consistently flubbed answers on gay marriage in particular. He also comes across as generally non-religious. His claims of religiosity seem quite phony, which especially hurts him.
Not emphasizing Democratic issues which play well among blacks. For instance, he waited too long to push for an increase in the minimum wage, his tax reforms are mostly business-oriented and therefore not appealing to blacks.
Not finding an effective wedge issue. The NAACP did this to great effect in 2000, thanks to hate crimes (remember the “James Byrd” ad?).
Being unable to personally appeal to black voters in an effective manner. This one speaks for itself.
Pissing off important black politicians and failing to court others. In particular, his failure to show up at the National Conference of Mayors particularly agitated Mayor Kwame Kilpatrict of Detroit, who complained publicly about Kerry’s snubs. In general, the only black politician Kerry effectively courted was Jim Clyborn of South Carolina – and this was all the way back during the South Carolina Primary.
Can Kerry Come Back?
All of this is why Kerry has been doing what he has been doing lately. It is why he has campaigned so heavily in black neighborhoods. It is why he is pushing this draft issue. It is why he is talking about voter suppression. His push of the issue of the flu vaccine might also be a play to black women, who are more likely to have charge of children than white women. He knows that he loses this election unless he enjoys the same percentage of black voters, who in turn come out in the same percentage overall, that Gore enjoyed.
Can this work? Can Kerry make up the ground among blacks? He cannot make it all up. Too much of Bush’s gains are due to the things Bush has done, things which simply cannot be undone (e.g. the gay marriage issue, his support among black ministers in key areas). Furthermore, he cannot make up for six months of incompetent campaigning among blacks in three weeks.
He can, however, make some of it up. He is trying to do that now, and look for that to be successful to an extent. However, his problem is that the properly run presidential campaign will, by this point in time, have the base voters locked-and-loaded such that a direct and unadulterated appeal can be made to swing voters. The reason for this is threefold: A. Swing voters are only paying attention in October, while base voters pay attention more consistently throughout the year; B. The issues that bring swing voters to the polls are different from the issues that motivate base voters; C. What motivates the base can frequently alienate swing voters.
Thus, Kerry is not simply losing time to focus on the swing voters by campaigning to base voters, he is alienating the swingers. Swing voters, who are mostly white and mostly suburban, are turned off by charges of massive voter fraud, which is Kerry’s major pitch right now to black voters. Swing voters think Bush won in Florida in 2000 fair and square. For Kerry to be spouting the opposite does less than nothing for him among swing voters. It hurts him among them. Thus, every point that he reclaims among black voters comes with a cost of voters among swing voters.
Conclusion
Bush/Cheney ’04 is an excellent example of a good campaign. Kerry/Edwards ’04 is an excellent example of a bad campaign. For instance, Bush/Cheney pushed gay marriage early in 2004 when swing voters were not paying attention but when base voters and evangelicals (i.e. potential base voters) would be. They locked the base in first, under the swing voter radar. Now, they can push swing voter concerns and ignore base voter concerns – thus eliminating the potential for conflict between the two. Kerry/Edwards, meanwhile, spent the spring and early summer appealing to swing voters. This was reflected in the polls, but his advantage was actually ephemeral, as those swing voters were not really paying attention, let alone making up their minds. Meanwhile, he let his base sit, utterly ignored. It was only in October, sometime after the first debate, that Kerry realized the sorry situation he had placed himself with the base. Now, he must ignore and even alienate swing voters to get those base voters on board.
Ultimately, this election proves that presidential campaigns still matter. Bush/Cheney ’04 is much better than Kerry/Edwards ‘04, and they will win because they are much better. jaycost.blogspot.com |
