Michael, I find interesting that race loyalty is only assumed in minorities. You could have mentioned that Clinton, a white person, got 70% of the white vote, which is also an ample majority, and wondered if her race had anything to do with it. But no, only blacks are being thought of as voting racially, because no one wants to accuse whites of voting racially, since that would be accusing them of racism. And yes, I see the double standard.

Yet race does play a role obviously. I’m not going to pretend like I think that the black vote isn’t influenced by the race of the candidates. But it irritates me that almost no one bothers to check on other races. For instance in Ohio race also played a role, but in this case the majority of people who said race mattered to them voted for Clinton.

My wordpress buttons are entirely messed up, so I can’t link well, but you can see for yourself here:
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120477250817815783-D50zDCK0XENIio2E3GCVomBqGPg_20080404.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top

Claudia, even at 70% though there’s a big difference from the 90%. At the 70% level, I can still believe that the majority of it is people voting for the candidate that they truly believe meets their preferred criteria, speaks to their needs, etc. (I admit some of that could be subconsciously that the person identifies more with the person of the same race.) But when you get to any demographic group voting as such a monolithic bloc (and 90% is certainly as monolithic as it gets in these situations), it feels a lot more like they’re specifically voting that way due to racial identification.

I’m a bit more sympathetic to the argument that black people would have more reason to feel that someone else who is black would best represent their needs, BTW. It’s a bit racist to think that way, but I can actually understand it, because of our history.

It may be worth noting that Mississippi is not exactly a typical area of the US.  It is at least possible (I would argue extremely probably actually) that historically-based racial tensions, and therefore race-based voting, is vastly more likely there than in the US in general. 

In support of that thesis, consider some of the states with minimal numbers of African American voters.  Typically, Obama won them, and by substantial margins.  Rather runs counter to the "It’s All About Race" thesis, doesn’t it?  Now if you had said "In the Deep South, It’s All About Race" you’d have been on much safer ground. 

It’s likely that some people, regardless of race, vote on race. There is no real evidence that you have presented so far to suggest that MORE blacks voted based on race than whites. To do that you would need to know the results in an election without race based voters.

For example, if Barrak would win a race-blind Lousiana ~70-30, then white and blacks would be equally racist and you would end up with numbers of exactly 90-10 and 70-30, with 60% of each population voting on race alone!

Now, you might say that given the national polls that the number should be closer to split at 50/50, unfortunately, that still doesn’t speak well for Louisiana as that would mean that 80% of blacks vote based on race, while 40% of whites vote based on race as well. Hardly heartening for either side.

Of course, this assumes that race-blind whites would behave identical to race-blind blacks.

Math check: For those interested, here’s how I did the math, which could of course have some error. If we divide each group in to race-based voters and non race based voters, and let r = the fraction of a particular population voting on race, t = the voting habits of the race blind voters, and p = the results of the polls, then:

p=(1-r) * t + r

would explain the relationship between racist voting and poll results. If we solve for r and then assume that t will be the same for both groups (that is to say, that race-blind whites would behave identical to race-blind blacks) and keep in mind that t for clinton would be (1-t) for Barrak, then we can plot the two graphs and see things like when they cross (which tells us the underlying true race blind preference if blacks and whites are equally motivated by race) or what the levels of racist voting must be in each group if we assume what the result would have been in a race-blind election.

It’s hard to take y’all seriously when you get the state wrong. It was MISSISSIPPI. Not Louisiana.

You’d need a lot more information from voters in the Mississippi primary to sustain a racism claim. To begin with, you’d need enough info to know that black voters did not vote more heavily for Obama simply because his message appealed to them more than Clinton’s. Tough one to answer, that. You’d also need to quantify and/or exclude gender as a pro- or anti-Clinton vote factor. Are black voters being racist by preferring the black candidate, or sexist by rejecting the female candidate? 

Good luck sorting it out. Empirically, at least. If you’re just determined to find one way or another regardless, any "evidence" will confirm whatever you wish.

LOL, I didn’t even notice the erroneous reference to LA.

I think you’re right, Tully, but it’s just my gut reaction that if 90% of a group hears a message from a candidate who is the same race (or gender, or whatever) in a more appealing way than the message from the candidate who’s not the same race or gender, that something is going on there. And in the case of race, because of historical racial tensions here I don’t even really fault blacks for that kind of subtle (perhaps subconscious) anti-white racism. In fact if anything, I fault black voters less for voting en bloc for a black candidate than when they’ve shown the tendency to vote that way just for the Democratic party in general (which is a voting pattern that leads to a group getting taken for granted- no interest group should ever make it known to a party that they’re in the bag for the party no matter what.)

At first African-Americans seemed to see Clinton as a safer bet, but have obviously switched over once they saw that Obama had a good chance to get the nomination. While Obama has tried to stay away from a concentration on race, comments made by the Clinton campaign have been interpreted to be racially motivated, which of course convinced black voters to flock to his side.

Also, 24% of the white vote Clinton received was from REPUBLICANS, who were urged to vote for her by Rush Limbaugh- of all people. Either he wants the nomination fight drawn out and bloody or he thinks Clinton would be easier to defeat in November.

I think it’s safe to say that racism is playing a role in this election, but in a way that is being overlooked by many (for reasons having all to do with being politically correct), which is working to Obama’s advantage. It may just be that Obama will become the Dem nominee, or this country?s first black President. And when that happens, far from being propelled to that spot in spite of his race, that very attribute is what may have contributed to his victory. You’re right that the black vote percentages in many of the states that Obama has won are ridiculously high, and they suggest that many African-American voters are being swayed by something other than just Obama’s stand on the issues. It just goes to show that African-Americans can be just as guilty of judging someone on the basis of skin color as any other group. Whether or not the results of that will be in the country’s best interest remains to be seen.   

I’m the same as Stephen Colbert: I am color blind and can’t see race, only Americans.