There are two ways to read Pew's numbers on evangelical voters and the '08 election. You could read them the way Mark Hemingway does, emphasizing the fact that Obama is currently running a point behind where John Kerry was among white evangelicals at this point in the 2004 race. Or you could read them as good news for Obama, since McCain is currently running eight points behind where George W. Bush stood at this point in '04. I'd choose the latter reading. In July of 2004, only 4 percent of white evangelicals said they were undecided about whom to vote for. Now 12 percent say that they are - and while it's possible that nearly all of those undecideds will come home to the GOP once the chips are down, undecided voters do tend to break against the incumbent party, which seems to open a pretty sizable opening for Obama.
When all was said and done, Bush took a whopping 78 percent of the white evangelical vote in 2004. If Obama can hold the evangelicals who are supporting him now, and swipe two-thirds of the undecideds, he'll hold McCain to just 68 percent of this demographic - which could easily turn out to be an election-tipping difference. The opportunity is there. Obama just needs to figure out if he's willing to take the political risks necessary to exploit it.
Update: Obama's performance at Saddleback (and McCain's) will probably be at least mildly important in determining how those undecided evangelicals cast their votes.
Ross, I think the more relevant comparison would be 2000. It’s not really fair to compare McCain’s figures to the figures of a 2004 incumbent who was very popular with his constituency at the time.
Since he himself isn’t an evangelical, McCain doesn’t have the enthusiastic evangelical backing Bush had eight years ago. OTOH, the October Surprise revelation of Bush’s old DUI caused many evangelicals to stay home at the last minute, cutting Bush’s comfortable five-point lead a week before election day to a toss-up. If we assume that McCain doesn’t have a similar skeleton lurking, or that any McCain surprises are balanced by Obama ones, then a steady though less fervent evangelical support for him should at least match Bush’s 2000 performance.
As for evangelicals actively supporting Obama rather than just sitting it out, I don’t see it. Social justice? Is Obama more connected with it than Kerry and especially Gore claimed to be? It’s not like they ran as the injustice candidates. Religiosity? In Obama’s case, that’s probably more a minus than a plus with evangelicals. Better a pagan nature worshipper like Gore or even an eccentric Catholic/Paulist Kerry than a Wright disciple. Young voters more enamored of Obama’s cult of personality than devoted to evangelical principles? Sure, there will be plenty, but they’ll be voting as swooning Gen-Y Obamiacs, not as evangelicals. It’s a separate discussion entirely.
As for your musings about Obama touching the third rail on abortion so as to attract evangelicals, that’s a please don’t throw me in the briar patch idea if there ever was one. IMO he’d still pick up essentially no support - Dems trying to weakly pander to so-cons are like Repubs who try to weakly pander to the entitlement crowd. There’s no audience, because anyone focusing on the issues in question can see that the other party means it 1000% more. What backtracking on ‘any abortion is a good abortion, any time’ would do to Obama is turn still more of Hillary’s supporters to McCain.
But I hope Obama sees if differently and tries to be all things to all voters simultaneously.
Posted by Patrick | July 21, 2008 9:47 AM