Either Cohn or Judis, the two at TNR who most love to make November projections on the basis of primary results, should extrapolate from these numbers to conclude that "it looks like Hillary would win 10 percent of the black vote in November, and Obama would only win 28 percent of the white vote, so either way the democrats are doomed."

Would you say the black voters were disproportionately more race-conscious than the white voters?

Any chance Mississippi could be in play in the general? Assuming blacks turn out at a little above their percentage of total population (say 40%) and they vote for Obama at the same 9 to 1 ratio they did today, and assuming  (for the sake of argument) there are one million voters in Miss, that would net 40(.9)  = 36 or 360,000 votes.  Assuming as well that the non-white non-black 3% divides their votes evenly, Obama would have to get 140/570 of the white vote, or just under 25% to win the state.

Seems like a tall order, but not impossible.

naomi,

Wishful thinking.  If you check the exit polls from '04, blacks did turn out at 34% of the vote, around their share of the population, and Kerry won them 90-10.  He lost whites 85-14 and the state by 20.  Obama could do a little better, but not enough to make the state competitive.

85-14! That's astounding.  That has to the highest white Republican vote in the country, even higher than Utah.

Well, Obama got 40% of the white vote in Georgia, so it's not completely hopeless.  But it looks like he aint gonna win Missy.

Actually, if you assume that blacks and whites are equal in number and that, apart from racial voting, they would split 50:50, then Obama's extra 40% of blacks represents 20% of the electorate.  Similarly, Hillary's extra 22% of whites is 11% of the electorate.  Together that's 31% of the electorate.  The finding that 33% of the electorate considers race in voting is there not inconsistent with the outcome, at least not on its face.

A black Democrat can't win Mississippi?  I'm shocked, shocked.  And there must be gambling going on in this establishment.

The good news is that its a red state anyway.  No loss.

White DEMOCRAT not white in the general elections. That's not the same thing.

ralphnelle, that's an absurd misconstruction of the point that Cohn and Judis were trying to make.

In re the MS black vote, Clinton got what she deserved in light of her lack of response to Ferraro's remarks.

I wouldn't read too much into this racial imbalance.  It's skewed, to be sure, but in Georgia's Super Tuesday primary, Obama got 43% of the white vote according to MSNBC.  My money's on the hordes of white "independents/Republicans" who jumped in line to vote for Clinton and extend the contest further, per Lord Limbaugh's wishes.

Then again, Obama only got 25% of the white vote in Alabama that same day. Hm.

Yeah, never mind.  I didn't know about those 2004 results... how Kerry lost whites 85-14 in Mississippi.  I guess the Deep South really is a lost cause, for the time being at least.

It seems that Obama has now erased Hillary's gains of last week.  With the net pick up in California of 8, the gap in pledged delegates is now bigger than it was before TX, OH, etc.  Some big win for Hillary.  It's all downhill from here.  She'll pick up a bit of a net gain in PA and given more than that back in the remaining states to arrive at the convention further behind than she is at this moment.

It's all over but the fat lady singing.

My esteemed colleague Chris Orr can't figure out how the vote in Mississippi can have been so racially

This is a surprise?  A month or so back I overheard a couple of dudes on the subway all jazzed to get out there and vote for Obama - and they thought Obama was his first name.  Yep, they called him Obama Barak a few times.

But I'm sure they were with him on all the issues.

Yes, and my 80 year old grandmother can cite McCain's positions chapter and verse as she gets ready to pull the lever for him in November.  

Well no, not really. She just knows he's the old white guy Republican who was a war hero.