2008

With the elections just two days away now, it was a very busy week here at NDN. Yesterday, our recent polling on immigration reform was featured in the lead article in the Wall Street Journal, an excellent piece by Jonathan Weisman:

Between 2000 and this year, the Hispanic electorate will have doubled, to 12% of voters, according to Census data and NDN, a Democratic group that studies the electorate. That growth has been concentrated in once-Republican states, not only in the Mountain West but in the South. By 2006, Hispanics represented 31% of voters in New Mexico, 13% in Nevada, 11% in Florida and 8% in Colorado.

President Bush and his political team were able to ride that wave, nearly doubling the GOP's share of the Latino vote from 21% in 1996 to 40% in 2004, according to exit polls. Then came 2006 and the Republican Party embrace of get-tough legislation on illegal immigration, followed by Republican efforts to kill bipartisan bills to stiffen border enforcement and provide illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship.

In 2006, Republican support among Hispanics fell to 30%. Even Sen. McCain, who co-authored the bipartisan immigration legislation, does not appear able to reverse the trend. An NDN poll in August, when Sens. Obama and McCain were virtually tied in the polls, found Sen. Obama leading among Colorado Hispanics 56% to 26% and Nevada Hispanics 62% to 20%.

Simon hit on similar themes involving the Hispanic electorate and the country's changing electoral map in the San Francisco Chronicle and Bloomberg. His election analysis was also featured in DemFromCT's daily poll roundup on DailyKos, which linked to his front-page Huffington Post article, as well as in Newsday, the Arizona Republic, and the Huffington Post (again).

Andres was also featured in the Wall Street Journal speaking about the increasing importance of early voting, Michael was featured in the Council on Foreign Relations discussing energy prices and cutting carbon emissions, and Rob was featured in Grist speaking about clean infrastructure and a second economic stimulus.

Finally, aside from the print and Web media, NDN also made several TV appearances last week. Our event with Simon and Joe Trippi was broadcast on C-SPAN, Simon went on BBC World News to discuss the election (relevant section begins at 1:40), and Andres appeared on several Nevada TV channels, including Fox and ABC, condemning illegal voter suppression tactics targeting Hispanic voters. 

Both candidates are fighting to make their closing arguments to Hispanics over the less than three days until the Presidential election as they appear tonight on Univision's internationally known variety show, "Sábado Gigante."  Even non-Spanish speaking Americans throughout the U.S. have heard of the famous host, "Don Francisco" and his beautiful female co-hosts.  The show takes a more serious turn tonight, as it airs Don Francisco's interviews with Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain during which they discussed the most pressing issues in the Hispanic community.  Sen. McCain gave his interview in Sedona, AZ, Sen. Barack Obama taped his during a campaign visit to Miami, FL.

These interviews began in 2000 during George W. Bush and Al Gore's presidential campaigns, and followed with Bush and Kerry in 2004.  You can watch tonight's interviews with Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain when they air during the show's second hour, at 9 p.m. EST on Univision (check local listings).  

In reviewing the polls today the trend lines continued unaltered - Obama holds his commanding lead with no evidence that the race is in any way breaking towards McCain.  As DemFromCT's am report shows there was no meaningful movement towards McCain overnight and Obama's numbers held.  Gallup's 3 daily tracks released at 1pm this afternoon have all sorts of bad news for McCain, with the 2 likely voter tracks each now having the race 52-42 for Obama.  For all this talk that the late breaking vote may break to McCain there is no evidence of this. What still must be terrifying to the national GOP is that there are so many late polls with Obama ahead by 8-12 points, and with their man still mired in the low 40s. 

I offered some thoughts yesterday on why the race the broke the way it did this Fall.  Called Keys to the Fall: Obama Leads, McCain Stumbles, you can find it on the Huffington Post (where it ran on the home page for almost 24 hours) or a version right here on our blog. 

So.....I was asked by a newspaper to offer my predictions for Tuesday.  I committed to Obama 53, McCain 46 and Obama claiming 353 electoral college votes.  But given the polls of recent days there is a remote but growing possibility that Obama wins by 10 points or more.  

Also if you haven't seen it read Jonathan Weisman's front page political story in the Wall Street Journal today.   It includes this passage, which includes data and arguments that will be familiar to our readers:

Demographics also shifted in the right places to give Democrats a lift. In Colorado, Virginia and North Carolina, the influx of a younger, more-educated populace brought voters more receptive to the Democrats' message. A concerted Republican campaign to curb illegal immigration turned a wave of new foreign-born voters against the GOP in Florida, Nevada and Colorado, just as the Latino vote in those states was growing.

Between 2000 and this year, the Hispanic electorate will have doubled, to 12% of voters, according to Census data and NDN, a Democratic group that studies the electorate. That growth has been concentrated in once-Republican states, not only in the Mountain West but in the South. By 2006, Hispanics represented 31% of voters in New Mexico, 13% in Nevada, 11% in Florida and 8% in Colorado.

President Bush and his political team were able to ride that wave, nearly doubling the GOP's share of the Latino vote from 21% in 1996 to 40% in 2004, according to exit polls. Then came 2006 and the Republican Party embrace of get-tough legislation on illegal immigration, followed by Republican efforts to kill bipartisan bills to stiffen border enforcement and provide illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship.

In 2006, Republican support among Hispanics fell to 30%. Even Sen. McCain, who co-authored the bipartisan immigration legislation, does not appear able to reverse the trend. An NDN poll in August, when Sens. Obama and McCain were virtually tied in the polls, found Sen. Obama leading among Colorado Hispanics 56% to 26% and Nevada Hispanics 62% to 20%.

In Colorado alone, more than 70,000 new Latino voters have registered since 2004. An Associated Press-GFK poll released Wednesday found that 16% of Colorado's likely voters identify themselves as Hispanic -- and 70% of them back Sen. Obama.

The growth of professional havens in Northern Virginia, the Research Triangle of Raleigh-Durham, N.C., and the Boulder-Denver corridor of Colorado may also be contributing to the changing electoral landscape. Voters in such places tend to be younger, more ethnically and racially diverse and less interested in social-conservative issues, such as abortion and gay marriage. And there are a lot of them: 83 million so-called millennials between ages 19 and 37, compared with 74 million Baby Boomers between 51 and 69.

530pm Update: This from today's Washington Post track analysis: 

In today's Washington Post-ABC News daily tracking poll, Obama holds a 53 to 44 percent lead over McCain, unchanged from yesterday, and little in the survey suggests that trimming the margin would be an easy feat.

For the first time, the slice of likely voters who report they will "definitely" vote for Obama has (by just a hair) now reached 50 percent, a milestone which George W. Bush never reached in Post-ABC tracking polls in 2004 or 2000, and the number of movable voters - those who said they could change their minds or who remain undecided - has slimmed to 7 percent.

McCain's campaigning over the past week has not convinced more voters that Obama is a risky choice, nor has he gained ground as the candidate better able to handle taxes or the economy. (Obama holds a 13-point advantage on taxes, his largest of the campaign, and a 14-point lead on the economy.) For the second time in Post-ABC polling, Obama has crossed into majority support as the candidate better able to manage an unexpected crisis.

One plus for McCain: Strong enthusiasm among his supporters has moved up a bit to 41 percent, the highest level it's been since the Republican convention, but still far behind the 68 percent of Obama supporters who are deeply enthused by his candidacy. 

Las Vegas -- NDN, a Washington, DC-based progressive think tank, yesterday held a news conference with U.S. Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada and several Hispanic community leaders -- Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated individuals -- to denounce deceptive practices targeted toward Hispanic citizens in an effort to prevent them from voting.

According to news reports and anecdotal evidence, some Hispanic voters have received calls asking for personal information and telling them they can vote over the phone, which is not a legal practice. Reid, NDN and others urged Hispanic citizens to make their voices heard by voting on Election Day.

Said Senator Reid: "Any effort to silence voters' voices is despicable and runs counter to the principles of our democracy. I commend Univision and others for taking this matter seriously and for taking action. I call on the people who are behind these tactics to stop immediately so we can have a fair election that allows every voter to be heard."

Said Andres Ramirez, Vice President of NDN's Hispanic Programs: "Any voter who has encountered disturbing suppression tactics should call the Nevada Secretary of State. We are increasingly concerned about the smear campaigns and deceptive tactics targeted at the Latino community, and we want to educate voters about their rights."

Citizens who feel they have been victims of such a scam should call the Nevada Secretary of State at 775-684-5705.

At yesterday's news conference, Reid, Ramirez and the public officials and community leaders unveiled a new PSA airing on Univision in Reno and Las Vegas taped in response to the disturbing phone calls. Univision-affiliated radio stations in Nevada also are airing this PSA on radio. Click here for Fox News video of the conference.

Reid and NDN were joined at the news conference by several Hispanic leaders, including State Assemblyman Ruben Kihuen, State Assemblyman Moises Denis and Geoconda Arguello Kline, President of the Las Vegas Culinary Union Local 226.

Following this effort in Nevada to safeguard the Hispanic vote, Fundacion Azteca America encouraged the Hispanic community to get out and vote with a "No Te Espantes Ve y Vota" ("Don't be Scared, Go Vote") voter turnout rally today in front of the L.A. City Hall, aiming to dispel any misconceptions, fears or doubts that first-time voters may have leading up to the November 4 elections.

Participants included: Luis J. Echarte, Chairman of Fundación Azteca America and Azteca America Network; Nora Vargas, Executive Director Latinos Issues Forum; Eric Garcetti, President of the Los Angeles City Council; Gilbert Cedillo, California State Senator; Rocky Delgadillo, Los Angeles City Attorney; John Trasviña, President and General Counsel of MALDEF and Los Angeles City Council members Richard Alarcon, Jose Huizar, Janice Hahn, Jan Perry and Tom LaBonge.

With eerie foresight, fifteen years ago, the Onion published an article about "Roy the Forklift Driver," who had a few things to say about President Clinton. The echoes of this in the Joe the Plumber story are almost too much to bear.

The ad "war" has become more of a "conquista" in the case of Spanish-language media. The fact is that Sen. Barack Obama has at least two or three times the amount of resources available than that of Sen. McCain to spend on Spanish language media, and he's spent this week making one last big push "en Español." The big news last night was Sen. Obama's half-hour infomercial during which he made "closing arguments" to the American public, and he demonstrates his recognition of Spanish-dominant Hispanics as part of the American fabric by also airing his ad on Univision, Telefutura, and Telemundo - all major Spanish-language networks. Sen. McCain has not put out a Spanish-language ad in weeks, while Obama has had several new ads up every week. Obama's latest ad, "Por Encima" or "Rising Above," caps the most aggressive Spanish language media effort in presidential campaign history. "Por Encima" follows T.V. and radio ads on health care, taxes, immigration, college affordability, early voting and "The American Dream," which features Senator Barack Obama as the first presidential candidate to speak in Spanish for the entirety of a 30-second general election television ad. This is not only a momentous occasion for presidential politics, this is an historic reflection of the importance of the Hispanic community.

In the past weeks, I’ve been discussing the use of new tools in this election cycle. There can no longer be any doubt that these new tools are playing an increasingly important role in elections; for example, a fascinating new article by Sarah Lai Stirland in Wired magazine explores the definitive success of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama’s organizing operation (the model for which was engineered by two Harvard professors), and its integration with Obama’s social networking site, my.BarackObama.com. From the article:

…Obama is the first to successfully integrate technology with a revamped model of political organization that stresses volunteer participation and feedback on a massive scale, erecting a vast, intricate machine set to fuel an unprecedented get-out-the-vote drive in the final days before Tuesday's election.

"I think what was recovered in this campaign is the sense of what leadership is, and what the role of the technology is, so that you get the best out of both," says Marshall Ganz, a public policy lecturer at Harvard who designed the field-organizer and volunteer training system used by the Obama campaign. "The Dean campaign understood how to use the internet for the fund-raising, but not for the organizing."

"We've really poured a lot of energy and thought into making this focused on real-world organizing activity," says Chris Hughes, the 24-year-old co-founder of Facebook, who left that company last year to help Obama with his online organizational efforts.

Obama’s advanced, tech-savvy new organizing system has undoubtedly helped him in this election cycle (as Simon explained in another great Wired article a few months back); he used this new model in the primaries in Iowa and South Carolina, which he won, while sticking with a more traditional strategy in New Hampshire, which he lost. Obama's model works because it brings people together, makes them a part of a team, and gives them easy ways that they can translate their inspiration and enthusiasm into concrete action.

But with the election coming to a close in just a few short days, it is worth it for us to take a step back and recall just why all of this matters in the first place. These developments aren’t exciting because of their novelty, or because of our innate love of all things shiny and new. They aren't exciting solely in the context of electing a particular candidate. They are exciting, or they should be exciting, because technology is making citizens not just better informed but also more involved, allowing them to participate more directly and more effectively in government, which makes our nation itself more authentically democratic.

As Simon and Joe Trippi argued at our excellent event here earlier this week (watch the C-SPAN footage here), this trend cannot and must not end with the election. To be successful, the next president must be someone who embraces the new era of politics. Senator Obama in particular stresses ownership and involvement, and often reminds us that change comes from the bottom up. We will be watching to see if, should he win the presidency, his actions match his rhetoric.

With the launch of new sites like BigDialogue and WhiteHouse2.org, the tools are there waiting to be picked up. These sites aim to give people a more direct voice in governance. In the words of BigDialogue’s founder David Colarusso, “the way we interact with Government is about to change, and the shape of that change is up to us. The Internet is not just a way to raise money or mobilize supporters. It's a way to shrink the distance between people and politicians. For the first time in history, it's possible for hundreds, thousands, or even millions of people to have a single conversation.”

I highly encourage everyone to visit both of these sites and try them out. These are some of the most exciting new tools that I’ve seen in a long time; the question is, will our next president embrace them, or ignore them?

<shameless plug> NDN has been at the forefront of advocating for an increased use of social networking sites in politics; to learn more about the myriad possibilities of social networks, read our New Politics Institute's New Tools paper, "Leverage Social Networks." </shameless plug> 

U.S. Sen. Barack Obama maintains his focus on the economy in two new TV spots, "Rearview Mirror" and "Something." Personally, after last night's extremely well-produced 30-minute spot, I find these ads a little underwhelming, but take a look and decide for yourself:

The Kos Daily Track now has it 50-45, and the Pollster.com average is 49-44.  Earlier this week these measures had it at 7.  Today it is 5.  

For the last several weeks we've been offering an analysis which anticipated McCain getting up into the mid 40s in the final ten days, reclaiming natural ground lost due to his very shaky fall campaign.   We argued that For McCain to make the race competitive rather than just interesting he would also need to see a drop in Obama's number, something, importantly, that has not conclusively happened yet.  There also isn't any evidence that McCain has made inroads in the key battlegrounds, places where the superior financing and ground operation of Team Obama will insulate their campaign to some degree from any late national tightening trends. 

So, five days out where are we? Obama still holds a commanding lead with McCain showing some sustained signs of life.  The Arizona Senator is in the immortal words of Monty Python "not dead yet."