By Yael T. Abouhalkah, Kansas City Star Editorial Page columnist
Recent headlines have trumpeted the fact that Hispanic voters supported Barack Obama by more than a 2-1 margin over John McCain on Election Day. But that support isn't as overwhelming as it first appears.
While Hispanic voters have high expectations for Obama, it's unclear how deep their enthusiasm really is.
Fact No 1: Obama received 67 percent of the Hispanic vote to 30 percent for McCain.
Fact No. 2: George Bush received 44 percent of the vote in 2004, far better than McCain did.
At first glance, McCain obviously did worse than Bush, in large part because Bush disappointed Hispanic voters with his four years of bungling in the White House since 2004, especially on immigration reform.
Hispanic voters say as much in polls, giving the president extremely low favorable ratings.
But here's Fact No. 3:
CNN Polling Director Keating Holland pointed out Democratic candidates have won an average of 64 percent of the Hispanic vote in the 10 presidential elections since 1972.
Bottom line: Obama's 67 percent rate of 2008 isn't that much higher than the average, meaning he barely beat the margin other Democrats had accumulated in recent years.
Obama does have important facts going for him. Hispanic voters were more confident he could handle the nation's major problems, such as dealing with the economy, education and health care costs.
But like all Americans, Hispanics will be waiting to see whether Obama delivers on his many promises.
If he doesn't, expect the GOP presidential candidate in 2012 to get a big boost in going after Hispanic votes.
Delicious
Digg
But wouldn't affect you Bruingirl....
I get the feeling that there is no amount of broken promises that would make you even think about voting for the "other guy" - not if the guy that made the promises was "the messiah". You'd drink some more Kool Aid and pull the switch for him again.
I'm With You On This, darbyhunt...
If the previous Democrats received 64% of the Hispanic vote, and Obama received 67%, then Obama received a slight increase of the Hispanic vote. Not earth-shattering, either way.
And wouldn't the last two paragraphs just be common sense, applicable regardless of the percentages? I mean, if you disappoint a voting group, more of them are going to vote for the "other guy" next time. You could make that same statement about women voters, or single voters, or voters under 30.
Off the mark on Latinos and the GOP
I think you are really off the mark here. Had he not run a disgusting campaign, McCain may have surpassed Bush's Latino numbers -- assuming too, that he had not done a complete 180 on the immigration issue. So in terms of immigration reform, Bush at least held firm on principle and certainly did no worse than McCain.
Regarding your claim:
"If he doesn't, expect the GOP presidential candidate in 2012 to get a big boost in going after Hispanic votes."
Is this some sort of guess on your part? It is wrong in a very spectacular way.
The GOP has talked about courting Latinos for decades and they have failed miserably. There have been opportunities to make progress and they have shown just how committed they are to this.
I see very few reasons to believe that the GOP will gain Latino support over the next four years. In fact, I see them losing even more of the support they currently maintain.
I don't get it, someone please shed light-
I know people and media like to break down the "racial" numbers to figure percentages on votes, and also democrats vs republican vs every other political stance under the sun-
One thing I really didn't get, and maybe people can shed light on for me is this:
On Msnbc, they had election coverage on their screens broken down into categories like, "white religious" "white democrats" "white people under 30 over 60"- Ie the whole point was, "white this and that" and never did I see over three to four hours time anything that had other standings about black, hispanic, asian voters and how they were tending to vote.
Why the whole focus on the white populus prior to the final tally?
And now, after everything is said and done, all we hear about is black, hispanic, asian etc...
Is the media just trying to navigate away from the whole racial bias, are they trying to give a broader spectrum of other races to show where weaknesses were or are in white votes and stands?
Is the media trying to paint a pretty picture or cover up an uglier one?
Anyone care to comment about this? I would really like to hear what other people think.