Saturday, January 26, 2008

Obama wins South Carolina in a rout

Tonight, Barack Obama pulled off the strong victory he needed. He couldn't just win, he had to win by a solid margin and he had to do decently among white voters. Well, he won by 28 percentage points, better than any polls predicted (he now has won more delegates and votes than any other candidate). According to the exit polls, he won 80% of African Americans, without a gender gap.

But he also did better than expected among white voters, winning about a quarter (and a plurality of young and college-educated white voters, proving a generational gap exists - not a racial one). Anyway, this ensures the race stays heavily contentious through, at the very least, February 5th.

The massive turnout by Democrats in these primaries also continues to impress, showing an energized Democratic base waiting to kick Republican ass in November. Kos has a good post up on that here.

For now, you can read Caroline Kennedy's "A President Like My Father" and watch Obama give a hell of a victory speech:

2 comments:

Alexander Wolfe said...

Well done!

Nat-Wu said...

Of course the Clintons have been trying to sell the idea that Obama was expected to win because of the Black vote since Nevada. What they don't want us to focus on his is strong support from such a wide cross-section of voters. He may have gotten less white voters than either Edwards or Clinton, but he got the most youth votes, the most women's votes and the most Black votes. Imagine what would happen if Edwards dropped out! Even if every last one of Edwards voters had gone to Hillary, she still would have lost! That's amazing. This just shows that there's still a long way to go and we can't give up on Obama yet. GOBAMA!