How People Will Vote

The way I see it, both candidates have their core constituencies. Note I didn't say base because only one candidate has the entire base of their party but more on that later.

For Senator Obama, I see him winning nearly unanimously the following voter blocs:

African-Americans

Pro-abortion voters

College liberals

For Senator McCain I see him winning nearly unanimously the following:

Veterans

Pro-life voters

People who believe terrorism is still a major issue

Now here's where it gets tricky. Senator Obama has not shored up his base as one would suspect he has. Two key groups will either not vote or vote against him and they are two groups that he needs badly. Here's some thoughts on both:

Unions:
In the past, unions have been devout Democrats. Mostly, that was not just union leadership but the rank and file as well. this time, that's not the case and I know because I work with labor unions every day. They are strictly anti-Obama for the most part and the reason are myriad. Whether it be gun control, taxes or race, they are going into the booth and pulling that lever for anyone but Obama. In 2000 and 2004, I saw the way the various laborers unions such as equipment operators, laborers, dockbuilders, iron workers and electricians mobilized and got out the vote in that special union way. This time I'm just not seeing it.

Hillary supporters:
Hillary supporters are pissed. First they were upset and stunned that Democratic party leaders kicked Hillary to the curb and those she supported over the years shunned her for Obama. The use of the race card against Senator and former President Clinton had to hurt deeply. But no, they couldn't stop there, they then poured lemon juice and salt in the wound by picking the hapless Joe Biden and laughing at Senator Clinton and then having the chutzpah to force ask her to campaign for them. As Laura W. shows and I posted video of in the previous post, they are mad as hell.

I didn't even include Hispanics who have an ambivalence towards Obama and feel that he doesn't speak for them at all.

McCain has his base locked up however. His inclusion of Palin quieted the conservative element and she added much-needed life into a dull campaign. The GOP base will be out in force.

Now I'm not saying McCain will win but am saying that it's not going to turn out exactly as the media is hoping. Once folks get in the booth and they're in private with their own thoughts, anything can happen and I believe it will.

Obama's Open Flank

One of the dirty little secrets that has not been fully addressed by the Obama campaign nor the media is Obama's problem with Latinos--a bloc that could be easily exploited over the illegal immigrant issue (a major reason McCain is on the fence on border control).

The estrangement was on display earlier this week:

While Senator Obama worked a warm audience at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Miami this week-end, protesting Bush and Mc Cain's “tax-cuts for the wealthy” and promising billions in federal hand-outs, a small group of Cuban-Americans stood outside the Intercontinental protesting Obama himself.

More specifically, they protested some of Obama's top advisers: Gregory Craig, who serves as Obama's chief advisor on Latin America, and Erich Holder, who heads Obama's vice-presidential selection team. Both of these gentlemen had key roles in “legally” perfuming the shanghaiing of Elian Gonzalez. At the time, Craig served as lawyer for Elain's (sic) father, (i.e Fidel Castro), and Holder served as Deputy Attorney General under Janet Reno.

"That was eight years ago,” Obama responded when plans for the Cuban-American protest were announced last week. “Obviously it was a wrenching situation for the families, but I'm running for president in 2008 and my focus is: how do we create a Cuba policy that will create political freedom on that island and allow the people who live there to prosper?"

Granted, that was eight years ago but it still is an open wound to many in the Cuban community. A child was sent to an island prison run by a despot against the wishes of his dead mother and her living family. He was sent with a gun to his head and he was sent because of the actions of two of Obama's advisers. That's not very appealing to the Cuban-Americans in Miami. Besides, exactly what timeframe are we allowed to re-visit, five years, seven years? That would leave McCain's history with the Keating Five off-limits, would it not?

But that's just one case of Hispanics challenging the Obama campaign. The secret that no one speaks about yet is a known fact for those who live in areas of large Hispanic populations is that many Hispanics just plain don't like African-Americans and vice-versa. They've been living in the inner cities with one another for decades but have never quite learned to trust each other.

Without the Hispanic-American vote, Obama will have a difficult time in battleground states such as New Mexico and Colorado and having two major players in the Elian Gonzalez tragedy working for you probably isn't going to help.

I leave you with this, an incident that shouldn't have happened that Craig and Holder were directly responsible for. I would say an incident that did much harm to our international standing: