politburo diktat 2.0

Here’s a poll of Tennessee voters that shows Hillary Clinton with a 14 point lead (HC 34%, BO 20%, JE 16%, DNK 30%).

But upon digging into the data, and considering recent trends, there is considerable reason for hope in Tennessee, i.e. hope that Obama will come in first. Briefly, the poll is old and it has a lot of undecideds, especially black voters.

Among whites (70% of the Dem. voters in 2004), the poll shows HC 39%, BO 14%, JE 20%, DNK 27%. And among blacks (30% of voters), it shows HC 22%, BO 40%, JE 1%, DNK 37%. The poll concluded on Jan. 22, before the South Carolina primary and Teddy’s high profile endorsement.

First, the black vote: African-Americans broke for Obama 4-to-1 in South Carolina. Current polling in Hillary’s own New York City shows 3-to-1. It’s reasonable, if slightly optimistic, to forecast that, in the end, the black voters in Tennessee will go the same way as in South Carolina. In terms of the poll data, one would project that Obama gets all of the undecided black vote; also some of Hillary’s black supporters in the poll could change course.

Next, the white vote. 27% of whites were undecided. Just split that 11-11-5, i.e. the undecided white voters split evenly between Hillary and Obama, not many for Edwards. This would allocate the white vote: HC 50%, BO 25%, JE 25%.

Now the multiplication. Whites are 70% of the total, so those percentages become: HC 35, BO 17.5, JE 17.5. Blacks are 30% of the total, so their percentages become: HC 6, BO 24, JE 0.

Add these up, HC 41, BO 41.5, JE 17.5. A narrow win for Obama.

So these are the key assumptions: Barack gets 25% of the white vote, Edwards remains competitive among whites, and Barack gets 80% of the black vote. (Or if Barack got 27% of the white vote, he’d only need about 75% of the black vote; an equally plausible outcome.)

On Super Tuesday, Tennessee should report fairly early in the evening. Look for an Obama win. Because if he can’t win in Tennessee (with results approximately like this), then it’s gonna be a looooooong night for the hopemongers.

Update: As soon as I finished this post, a NEW Tennessee poll came out. It’s from a different outfit, so it may be tricky to compare them. But it is more recent, and, in this new poll Obama is up to 60% of the black vote (20% of which remains undecided). So, one could infer that he picked up all the previously undecided black voters who have now made a choice. Among whites, his share is up to 22%.

I’m very encouraged with new data; I thought perhaps I was blowing smoke above, but this new poll shows my projected trends are right on track.