THE PLANK MARCH 4, 2008
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TOLEDO, Ohio--One reason Barack Obama's campaign turned into such a
juggernaut over the last few weeks was that he made impressive inroads
among Hillary Clinton's base of white working class voters. Everybody
knew Obama could make college students and upper-middle-class
professionals swoon; after the South Carolina primary, it was equally
clear that he had a lock on the African American vote. But it wasn't
until the last few contests -- particularly Wisconsin,
an overwhelmingly white state where Obama won outright among voters
making less than $50,000 -- that Obama began to show he could win
blue-collar voters, too.
Ohio, though, has proven tougher.
After pulling nearly even with Clinton in the polls, in the last few
days Obama has slipped. And while the contest here is hardly a
must-win for Obama -- he remains the prohibitive favorite to finish the
primary race with the most committed delegates, no matter what happens
today -- Ohio is a must-win, or nearly a must-win, for the general
election.
After all, if white working class voters here have
serious problems with Obama, then white working class voters in other
states probably will, too. Already, we've seen a poll from Pew showing
that -- in a hypothetical one-on-one matchup with McCain -- a
substantial number of hewhite Democratic voters would vote for the
Republican ticket. Obama's ability to draw independents would still
win him the general election, this same poll showed, but not by a
sustantially larger margin than Clinton would.
So my question
for today is not simply how white working class voters here will vote
but why -- and whether the apparent ambivalence about Obama is
something he would have difficulty overcoming in the fall. To help
sort this out, I decided I'd continue what has become an election day
ritual for me, interviewing voters on the way out of the polls in order
to form some early -- and, yes, highly unscientific -- impressions.
For
my stake-outs, I picked two polling places in the northern part of
Toledo: an American Legion post down the street from a GM powertrain
plant and a church just a few blocks away from what is now a Daimler-Chrysler
Assembly plant. (It's the Toledo North plant where they make Jeeps; Clinton actually visited here yesterday before her rally at the University of Toledo.)
The two polling places cover nine precincts and a
little over 4,000 voters, most of them apparently working class white.
They are strongly Democratic by registration and, at least in the last
few elections, by vote. Incubment Representative Marcy Kaptur, who is
among the Democratic Party's most unabashedly populist members, has
carried these precincts easily in recent contests.
And what did I
find? On the one hand, this was clearly Clinton country -- with
sentiment running even more strongly for her than I expected going in.
I don't want to pretend that my canvassing of about two dozen voters
over the course of two hours was sufficiently random or large to
qualify as a poll. Among other things, it was a pretty raw morning
with blistering winds -- it's about 15 degrees with wind chill -- so folks weren't in the mood for long,
introspective conversations on why they voted the way they did.
Still, a few patterns emerged. I was struck by the fact that
nearly every voter I met -- all but one, to be precise -- told me that
he or she was voting for Clinton. The economy clearly loomed large in
their minds; experience, though, seemed to loom even larger.
One
such voter who was thinking along these lines was Richard Crawford, 61. A Teamster, he told me that
"NAFTA was number one for me" -- since, he said, the treaty had hurt
his business. But when I asked how he cast his ballot, he told me "I
voted
for Hillary, I don't think Obama has enough experience."
"I don't think he has enough experience," said Nancy Zalewiski, a
retired schoolteacher, mentioning that she was particularly interested
in electing a woman president. "But I'd like to see a Clinton-Obama
ticket."In
some cases, the key factor didn't seem to be so much as experience as sheer
familiarity -- with Clinton or, in some cases, the Clintons. It wasn't anything Clinton had said or done recently, they told me, so much as a comfort level with her that Obama -- despite all of his advertising and recent media coverage -- had yet to establish.
"I
just trusted Clinton more than I trust Obama," said Gary Rowe, a
reitred phone company worker, noting that his investments had done much
better during the 90s than they had done recently.
My one
outlier was a man named Harold Ornega, a retired city worker who told
me was unambiguously for Obama -- and unambiguously against Clinton.
"I'm for change and he's a fresh start," Ornega told me. "I don't want
any more of this tap-dancing around from politicians."
Ornega
was as enthusiastic about his position as anybody I heard all day; in fact, told me he was so opposed to Clinton that he wouldn't even vote for her
in the general election, although he didn't imagine himself voting for
a Republican, either. (He said he might just stay home, if that's what
happened.)
Of course, two of the Clinton supporters I met told
me the very opposite: they'd vote for McCain over Obama, if that's how the nominations came down. And one of them said she thought she'd have plenty of company. "I don't think Obama has enough
experience to be president, while Hillary has already been to the White
House," said Karen Randall. "I've talked to a lot of people who said
they
would vote for McCain over Obama."
Still, when I asked people about a hypothetical McCain-Obama matchup, most seemed determined to stick with the Democratic Party. One such person was Tanya Miller, another Clinton supporter. "You never know," she said, turning to Randall. "He might work out just fine."
--Jonathan Cohn
17 comments
True, Hillary has been to the White House-- but so have I! My family visited it when I was a kid. At the time, I had the same national security clearance as Hillary. Maybe I should run for president, too.
- ejbenjamin
March 4, 2008 at 1:21pm
Thank you. I kept wondering when some media type was going to look into the "will always vote democrat" group. Someone may say that will only vote for Clinton or Obama, but this is like a candidate saying they will not be a vice president: You don't want to change the chances of winning, but it doesn't hold after the primaries are over. There are plenty of people who will vote for the Democratic candidate come November, no matter what they say now.
- anonevent
March 4, 2008 at 1:38pm
Hilarious. Mr. Cohn, you need to ask Hillary to put you on her payroll. I knew the author of this one when I saw the title.
- ralphnelle
March 4, 2008 at 1:49pm
Interesting.... I think this fits with the theory that these voters are probably the last to jump on bandwagons. They feel relatively "comfortable" with Hillary because she's been around longer. The experience thing is probably a little soft. It's probably a substitute for "Who is this guy?" This is a question Obama has been answering pretty well in this campaign, although, it appears, not quite well enough among some voters. But I think he can answer it in the general election campain, particularly as he gets more and more surrogates these voters *do* trust to back him enthusiastically.
- jhildner
March 4, 2008 at 1:54pm
Agreed with anoevent. Voters are notorious for failing on hypotheticals.
- virginiacentrist
March 4, 2008 at 1:55pm
Seniority matters to union members. Seniority plus familiarity matters even more to midwestern, older union members.
I think Obama will have trouble in the fall if he doesn't surround himself with some reassuring, reasonably centrist and establishmentarian gray-haired foreign policy and economics advisers. If he doesn't find a way to get the likes of Samantha Power out of sight and away from microphones, I think McCain will win most of the meat-and-potatoes middle-aged midwestern vote.
- teplukhin2you
March 4, 2008 at 2:34pm
I love this species of article. "hey, I know anecdotal evidence is WORTHLESS," the earnest reporter disclaims, "but here's some great anecdotal evidence!" The result? Bunk! Hooey! Hokum! Flim-Flam!
Let me walk back into the law school building and get some "voices" of Iowa voters who say that, while they caucused for Obama, they'll never vote for Hillary if she's the nominee.
---Break----
I'm back. Wow! Look! I did it and four people told me that they'll never vote for Hill if she's the nominee!!! Oh boy, we're sunk in Iowa in November if she heads the ticket. That proves it. And Iowa is a swing state!! Guess we might as well quit now.
- ryanmacd
March 4, 2008 at 3:10pm
Tep: Did you read the piece on Obama's "policy shop"? Or the New York Sun piece descirbing his vast foriegn policy team which is, as the Sun put it, is representative of the "Democratic mainstream" ("establishmentarian"?) and includes plenty of gray-haired wise men? Pretty impressive to me. You are unduly fixated on Power, who isn't even his Mideast adviser -- that would be Daniel Shapiro, who leads that group for Obama according to the Sun. Meanwhile, Power hasn't been in front of a microphone for a very, very long time. You're confusing your own reading about her with recent events.
I don't think Midwestern working-class people care about Power. They need to be reassured about Obama, because he's new and different to them. The VP choice will help here. The loud backing of surrogates -- union leadership, Democratic leadership, etc. -- will also help. The fact that McCain has a horrible message on national security and the economy (and he's still in his Democratic-indecision-induced honeymoon and performing fairly crappily anyway) will help. Tweaking of the message in these areas will help. Some policy events will help. Obama came into this race facing a lot of skepticism which he's overcome -- sometimes quickly, sometimes more slowly. Rust belt working class voters have been his toughest nut to date, but my hunch is that he can win them over when the alternative is McCain.
- jhildner
March 4, 2008 at 3:20pm
OK, hildner, fair enough. I hope you're right. I agree that the supporters/surrogates can make a huge difference. Reprise of a Mario Cuomo-northeastern macho type introducing Obama a la "Bill Clinton, the Comeback Kid!" would help with these voters.
- teplukhin2you
March 4, 2008 at 3:46pm
Oh, hildner, whose idea was it to stage a "summit" with "muslim leaders"? That one reeks of Samantha Power, or someone with the judgment and maturity of a sophomore. Or maybe ti came from Oprah?
- teplukhin2you
March 4, 2008 at 3:58pm
Well tep, I'm not as impressed by the idiocy of this idea as you are, so I won't try to distance myself or the candidate from it.
- jhildner
March 4, 2008 at 4:28pm
tep, this is about the third time in half-an-hour that you've dissed the idea of such a summit. However, leaving aside Power at the moment, what is it about the idea that you think so ludicrous? It seems to me to be a powerful venue to make it clear that U.S. support isn't a free ride, and that muslim leaders have to do something about the modernity deficit (economics, roles of women, notions of politics) in their own societies.
If we are in fact going to reconfigure and renovate our public diplomacy -- which is an absolute must imo -- then things like that idea are going to be needed, as suggestions, as experiments, as concrete proposals. Some are going to be better than others. But I haven't heard a thing from Clinton about what she thinks of doing in this area, or even if she thinks ideas are useful things.
- ironyroad
March 4, 2008 at 4:42pm
tep: "Seniority matters..." I agree. And add to that tradition. There are Catholic high schools throughout Ohio where over 80% of the alumni live within a ten mile radius of the school. Not the students, the alumni. And I noticed Hillary dropping her g's all over Ohio this weekend...workin', strugglin', fightin'.... She's a piece of work, as they say in Cincinnati.
If she does well in Ohio, it'll be because she pandered to the poor and poorly educated. The people most screwed by Nafta, the people who don't realize what "centrists" the Clintons really are.
(I guess they don't teach elocution at Wellesley.)
- fougasseu
March 4, 2008 at 5:05pm
TOLEDO, Ohio -- Northwest Ohio may turn out to be Clinton Country, as I wrote earlier today . But that
- Anonymous
March 4, 2008 at 5:14pm
Irony - it's the kind of thing that makes my Russian friends and in-laws roll their eyes. Anyone who's spent a long time outside postmodern Europe and the US views politics as a struggle over power and interest ("interests defined in terms of power," as Morgenthau put it), period. If you want the muslim states to come around to our side, then you have to put forth a policy based on aligning the power equation in ways that make it clear their interests lie in not attacking or challenging us. The traditional diplomatic channels and institutions are more than adequate for communicating such an equation. A "summit" is a Davos-style stunt that might appeal to Paul Hewson or other rockstar gasbags, but it's a joke to any serious leader.
- teplukhin2you
March 4, 2008 at 5:29pm
On the other hand tep, one value of a summit, it seems to me, is the hearts and minds battle -- the purpose of the summit wouldn't necessarily be to change the minds of the other participants (any more than the traditional methods could), but rather to impress all those watching. In that way, the "show" could be valuable in a concrete way.
- jhildner
March 4, 2008 at 5:56pm
I'm sorry tep but I don't have a lot of respect for the Russian theory of democracy. In the Soviet era they thought it was weak, and their system was going to bury ours, and then they lost. There's a lot that Russians don't know. The problem, however, is more complicated than you say. There are Muslim leaders who are already on our side, and that has been a burden, because they are despots who have a massive interest in protecting their own power and thus we get identified with oligarchic robber barons like the late Shah, the late Saddam Hussein, and Musharraf -- rulers who have generated massive resentment in their own countries which can, in turn, be effectively manipulated by radical Islamists. People aren't stupid, but they can be driven by resentment.
To put it bluntly, there is no zero-sum game between extending and strengthening power and national interest on the one side, and trying to increase the stake of public diplomacy on the other.
A summit can be -- need not be -- a showboating stunt, but it can also produce important results. In particular, an American president being seen to take the concerns of the Islamic world seriously might have something to do with the objective you and I presumably agree on -- neutralizing and whipping Al Qaeda and its cohorts, and reducing the influence of fundamentalist Islamism.
- ironyroad
March 4, 2008 at 6:05pm