Woo Who?

So Obama has won it. That is good I guess. I will miss Hillary's never ending campaign though. I think the whole process has been very good for the Democratic party. An end was necessary though. One thing on my mind now that the primary is ostensibly over, is the need for Clinton's voters to become Obama voters. As I mentioned before, I think this will happen.

However, other commentators, one's with actual platforms from which to broadcast their ideas have been discussing the need for Obama to woo Clinton's supporters. These calls generally focus on the two to three groups that Obama must win over. These groups are women, working class whites, and Reagan Democrats.

Before discussing these groups, it should be pointed out that any call for Obama to woo Clinton voters must also explain why those voters didn't vote for Obama in the first place. Given the minuscule policy differences between Obama and Clinton, Obama's wooing shouldn't be too difficult as there should be no major hang up for Clinton voters to switch their support. However, as was well documented in the final primaries, a portion of Clinton supporters appeared to be voting for her because she was white. It seems to me that there isn't much Obama can do to woo these voters. Their support is just lost. Now, in this election, that shouldn't be as big of a deal as it has been in past elections, as many of those who would never vote for a black man are already Republicans, who wouldn't vote for a Democrat of any skin color. The main take away point here is that Obama cannot woo the voters who voted against him because he was black, and the explanation of voter motive is necessary to any discussion of the efficacy of Obama's wooing efforts. This point is dodged by many of those calling for a woo-athon by Obama as they do not want to confront the ugly reality of Hillary's support as the race progressed to its conclusion.

Now, returning to the three groups. I am not sure how Obama can woo working class whites for many of the reasons I laid out above. I think these voters are for the most part low information voters and therefore can be further subdivided into two categories. First, the aforementioned racists. The only information necessary for these voters to make up their minds is the color of the skin of the candidate. That is it. Obama will never win these voters. The second group of low information voters would be non-racist ones. This group of Clinton voters voted for her based off her name recognition alone. They didn't really every get to know Obama or care about him. They heard the name Clinton, and that was all they needed to make a decision on how to vote. These voters can become Obama voters after they get to know Obama more and more. So these voters should definitely be targeted for wooing, but this can be done in the manner of a normal political campaign.

Moving on to women, I don't know what can be done here. I am guessing that the numbers of women who are going to only vote for Hillary is pretty low. Basically, the core of her support, women over 65 doesn't form that large of a voting bloc in the US. The 2007 population estimate says there are approximately 22 million women over the age of 65. Assuming they break 60/40 for the Democratic party with no independents, that means that around 13.2 million of them are Democrats. This isn't a constituency to be sneezed at in an election where the Democrat might get 65 million total votes. In such a case, those 13.2 million voters would be almost 20 percent of the Democratic total. Very obviously this is an necessary constituency for Obama to woo, but there are several questions that are unanswered here. First, how many of these voters are Clinton and Clinton only voters? Probably not very many. Second, of those in this group who have qualms about Obama, what can he do in a practical manner, to address their concerns about his candidacy? I would assume there is very little he can do beyond continuing to wage an aggressive campaign against John McCain drawing the appropriate contrasts between McCain and himself on the issues important to these voters.

The last group to discuss is the fabled Reagan Democrats. They are not really fabled, they do exist, but there are two problems with them for this election. 1) They are old, and not that much of the population anymore; and 2) Most of them are Republicans now. A person who was 18 in 1980 would now be 46. This means that every Reagan Democrat out there is at a minimum 46 years of age. This is a relatively advanced age. I realize that young keeps getting defined upward, but 46 is not very young. The second issue is that these voters are Republicans. If they voted for Reagan twice, H.W. once, if not twice, Dole and all the rest of the Republicans for president and/or Congress. They are Republicans now, regardless of whatever party they nominally identify with. This is not a constituency that really exists in a meaningful way for the Democratic party. Efforts to woo them are a lost cause, and surely Ms. Minnesota and D.C., Geraldine Ferraro, is not the best person to consult as to what is the best way to approach this constituency.

I don't have a conclusion.