McCain’s Vulnerabilities Exposed
As I write this, I am watching Clinton strategist Terry McAuliffe on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, and he’s wearing a bright yellow and green Hawaiian shirt. Even Terry knows it’s over.
Hillary Clinton beat Barack Obama by 36 points in Puerto Rico this weekend, and in two days Obama will likely become the Democratic nominee for President. Welcome back to the bizarre world of the Democratic Presidential nominating process.
The last two primaries will be held tomorrow in South Dakota and Montana. It is our sense that Obama will declare that he is the nominee on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning at the latest. While Clinton may elect to take her battle to the credentials committee at the convention, we think it is more likely that she will suspend her campaign later this week and ultimately endorse Obama.
General Election Preview
LCG conducted a national survey of 1,000 registered voters May 26-28th. The following are the highlights:
- The poor economy is THE driving force in this election. The economy is by far the most important issue for Americans, eclipsing Iraq by more than a 2 to 1 margin. Healthcare and social/moral issues are tied for third.
- President Bush is dead weight for nearly every Republican running in November. Bush’s favorability is at 32%. More importantly, nearly half of voters (49%) have a “very unfavorable” opinion of the President.
- McCain and Obama start the election with similar favorability ratings. Both have similar unfavorable ratings (approximately 40%); there are, however, some differences among specific sub-groups:
- McCain does better among those who are married, non-Catholic Christians and evangelicals.
- Obama does better among those who are younger, not married, have college degrees and are non-Christians.
- In a head-to-head, Obama is beating McCain by a very narrow margin (44% to 40%). As we have said before, we believe that Obama will get a 10-point bounce once he is officially the nominee and Clinton voters “return home.” Having said that, this data is instructional as to where the strengths and weaknesses lie for each candidate:
- McCain is not doing well enough among men to bridge the historical gender gap with women. The presidential voting pattern for the last 20 years suggests that the Republican candidate needs to win among men by at least 8-12 points to make up for the party’s usual gender gap with women. The so-called gender gap is not one-sided. McCain wins men by four points but loses women by 10 points. This is a problem.
- In fact, the problem is so severe that McCain is losing women by 12-14 points among every age cohort except for women 65+, where he is running even with Obama.
- McCain will not win Independents on his reputation alone. Obama is winning among Independents by about 8 points. Yes, McCain is favorably viewed by Independents but that is not translating into actual votes at this point in time.
- Obama is cutting into historical GOP success with white voters. At this point, McCain is only winning the white vote by two points. Compare that to 2004 when Bush beat Kerry among white voters by 17 points (58% to 41%).
- McCain has not yet secured the GOP base. McCain is winning among evangelicals by 25 points, getting 56% of that vote. However, this is 22 points below what Bush got against Kerry in 2004 (78%). In fact, Bush captured 80% of the evangelical vote in 2000 against Gore. Certainly, a lot will change between now and November, but If this level of evangelical support continues in the summer and fall it will make a McCain victory virtually unattainable.
- McCain is not doing well enough among men to bridge the historical gender gap with women. The presidential voting pattern for the last 20 years suggests that the Republican candidate needs to win among men by at least 8-12 points to make up for the party’s usual gender gap with women. The so-called gender gap is not one-sided. McCain wins men by four points but loses women by 10 points. This is a problem.
It is way too early, and the contour of this campaign will shift and morph a hundred times, but all of the available evidence suggests that the Democratic nominating process has energized the electorate in favor of Obama, the national issue climate favors Obama and the trend in party identification favors the Democrats and Obama.
People ask us the same question all the time: Can Obama really win this thing? Sometimes the answer is staring you in the face.
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