Thursday, October 30, 2008

BARACK OBAMA, JOHN MCCAIN

Some Interesting Numbers in the Early Voting in Nevada

Campaign Spot reader Mark noticed this story, and while I don't think this justifies a "McCain's gonna win Nevada! McCain's gonna win Nevada!" dance, I do find it interesting.

Exit polling of early voters conducted by a local political consultant suggests a close presidential contest in the Silver State: Democratic nominee Barack Obama had the votes of 50 percent who had voted, while Republican nominee John McCain had 48 percent of the early vote.

Sample size on that one is an impressive 7,147 responses. Keep in mind, in the RCP average, Obama is ahead by 7.4 percent.

Then there's this story on who's come out to vote so far in this state:

Analysts have predicted that new voters, young voters and Hispanic voters will turn out in record numbers in this election. But as Nevadans continue to flock to the polls, turnout among those three groups is lagging, at least in the early going.

While turnout statewide was nearly 25 percent through Sunday, it was just 20 percent among Hispanic voters, 14 percent among voters under 30 and 15 percent among those who didn't vote in the last three elections, according to an analysis of state early voting records through Sunday prepared by America Votes, an organization that works to mobilize voters.

Over at the Atlantic, Marc Ambinder assures us that if these demographics haven't turned out to vote, it's just because the Obama campaign wasn't really trying:

One Las Vegas newspaper noted that fewer young people and Hispanics were turning out early in Nevada than would be expected if Obama's demographic profile was mapping exactly to the early vote. A sign that the early vote is not trending in Obama's direction? Not really. Hispanics in Nevada have no history of voting early; neither do young voters; the Obama campaign's early vote efforts are focused on other slices of the electorate there. And the overall numbers point to a massive surge of sporadic Democratic voters.

Okay.

10/30 10:35 AM Share