Republicans significantly boost Hillary's numbers in Mississippi

by Lefty Coaster, Tue Mar 11, 2008 at 07:45:27 PM EDT

Tonight Hillary has been the beneficiary of a large number of Republicans crossing over to vote in Mississippi's open Democratic Primary. I very much doubt that more than a few of these Republicans would vote for Hillary in November.

13% of the voters in Mississippi's open Democratic Primary were Republicans.

Exit Polls: Clinton draws Republican support
CNN) -- Are some of Mississippi's Republicans trying to cause mischief? Thirteen percent of the voters in today's Democratic primary identified themselves as Republican; they voted for Clinton, 78 percent to 22 percent. And 37 percent of the Democratic primary voters have a favorable opinion of John McCain; this group also went for Clinton, 62 percent to 37 percent.

We all remember HeadRush Limbaugh urging Republicans to hold their noses and vote for Hillary like in the story below the fold from Faux "News":

This is the presidency of the United States you're talking about. I want our party to win. I want the Democrats to lose. They're in the midst of tearing themselves apart right now. It is fascinating to watch, and it's all going to stop if Hillary loses.
So yes, I'm asking to cross over and, if they can stomach it -- I know it's a difficult thing to do to vote for a Clinton -- but it will sustain this soap opera, and it's something I think we need. It would be fun, too.
Faux

I'm really disturbed that Republicans who have no intention of voting for Hillary in the Fall are distorting the result of the Democratic Primary in Mississippi. As I write this with 60% reporting it is Obama 56% Hillary 41%. Now I have to take those numbers with a grain of salt.

I have to wonder if this will happen in the upcoming open primaries in Indiana and Montana.

UPDATE; This is where I got my 13% figure

% of Vote Clinton Obama
Democrat 71 33 64
Republican 13 78 22
Independent 16 48 48
MSNBC

Using the exit poll as a guide I estimated the Missippi Primary turnout to be about 400,000, then roughly 52,000 Republicans voted in the Mississippi Primary. If that is the correct number then

Hillary got about 40,560 Republican votes

Obama got about 11,440 Republican votes

Hillary got about 29,120 more Republican votes than Obama.

crossposted at D-Kos

Tags: mississippi primary, Republican crossover voters, Rush Limbaugh (all tags)

Comments

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hahaha

Republicans have been voting for Obama since Iowa but only NOW their crossing over is a bad thing...

Hasn't Obama been the big beneficiary or GOP and Indy votes???

I wonder if he would be sitting as pretty if every caucus and primary had been closed to Democrats only

by rossinatl 2008-03-11 07:48PM | 0 recs

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Re: hahaha

Not on this scale. Now the Republican Primary is a non-event.

by Lefty Coaster 2008-03-11 07:53PM | 0 recs

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Re: hahaha

When they were voting for Obama, they could have voted in the Republican primaries and had a say in that contest.

by Lefty Coaster 2008-03-11 07:57PM | 0 recs

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baloney, GOP primary was settled on Super Tuesday

by lombard 2008-03-11 08:44PM | 0 recs

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In this case

Clinton wins the voters who say that neither of them are honest and trustworthy by overwhelming margins.

I think we can safely say that most of those voters will vote McCain in November

by MILiberal 2008-03-11 08:04PM | 0 recs

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You're an intelligent person, right?

Surely you can see the difference between cross-over voters who likely had an intention to vote for Obama in the general, who were voting in the Democratic primary despite a contested Republican primary, and who had no possible motive of stirring trouble in the Democratic primary, as compared to the crossover voters now, who have increased in number and switched allegiance from Clinton to Obama, who are receiving marching orders from Rush Limbaugh, and who are delighting in the chaos it's causing in the Democratic party, especially with Hillary's fabulous new kitchen-sink strategy.

Further damning evidence (I realize math is difficult for you Hillary supporters, but bear with me):

I think these statistics from the exit polls clearly show most Republicans are not voting for Hillary because they like her (see http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/3 /11/204837/232/320/474613 and CNN exit polls):

70% of those who said neither Clinton nor Obama have a clear plan for the country picked Clinton
74% of those who said both do picked Obama
74% of those who have a strongly favorable opinion of McCain picked Clinton
75% of those who have a strongly unfavorable opinion picked Obama
25% of those who say that Clinton is not honest and trustworthy picked Clinton
7% of those who say that Obama is not honest and trustworthy picked Obama
19% of those who say that Clinton does not inspire them, voted for Clinton
4% of those who say that Obama does not inspire them, voted for Obama
87% of those who are inspired by neither Clinton nor Obama voted for Clinton
78% of Republicans picked Clinton
59% of White independents picked Clinton
56% of conservatives picked Clinton

Unless there are figures out there that prove the contrary, it seems that most Republicans vote for Obama because they do like him, whereas most of the Republicans who back Hillary have ulterior motives.

- Link

by SleepingWillow 2008-03-11 08:09PM | 0 recs

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Are these from the

Republican voters only? Do not see that in your presentation.

by DaleA 2008-03-11 09:09PM | 0 recs

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Re: Are these from the

Math is hard, huh?

by SleepingWillow 2008-03-11 11:42PM | 0 recs

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Re: Are these from the

Actually math is fairly simple and straightforward. Not so with incomplete data.

by DaleA 2008-03-12 10:56AM | 0 recs

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Re: You're an intelligent person, right?

It is the Limbaugh effect as Republican voters in higher numbers began voting for Hillary after Rush Limbaugh exhorted them to do so.

That was shown by the higher percentages of the Republican and conservative vote Hillary received between Wisconsin and Texas/Ohio, all open primaries. The intervening variable was Limbaugh.

by shergald 2008-03-12 05:41AM | 0 recs

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Rush told them

to vote for Clinton, so that is why they voted for Clinton.
Never were the conservative pundits telling Republicans to vote for Obama.

by fetboy 2008-03-11 08:10PM | 0 recs

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Rush copied Obama's trick

Throughout the primary season, Obama has been encouraging Repubs to "be a Dem for a day" and vote for HIM - and reassuring them they could switch back to Repub before Nov.

Obama is worse than Limbaugh - who only began pushing his trick last week.

by annefrank 2008-03-12 06:06AM | 0 recs

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Comparisons to other numbers

CNN's exit polls have Obama winning independents 53-43 and Hillary winning Repubs 75-25. That seems like an indication of shenanigans, as well. One would expect these numbers to match a little more closely if the votes were cast in good faith. Also, the numbers for those who see neither candidate as honest and trustworthy are almost identical to the republican numbers.

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primari es/results/epolls/index.html#MSDEM

by DPW 2008-03-11 08:46PM | 0 recs

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Re: Comparisons to other numbers

This is a little unrelated, but I also find it curious that Obama does so much better among white independents (getting 40% of vote) than white dems (only 23%). Wouldn't the partisan democrats be less inclined to oppose a candidate on the basis of skin color? Wouldn't we expect them to be more committed to civil right, open-mindedness, etc.?

This could be explained by several factors: younger voters tend to indentify as independents and less racist; Hillary's lopsided support may not be attributable to racism but, instead, more legitimate reasons; independents just don't like the Clintons, as we are often told.

Anyway, I just thought that was odd and that, maybe, these numbers don't reflect the intense racism some are reading into them.

by DPW 2008-03-11 08:54PM | 0 recs

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I have another theory

White Democrats are afraid that a dark skinned Presidential candidate would lose, just because he is dark skin.
White Democrats fail to realize that most independents are color blind on political issues, and that most conservatives and Republicans are not racist.
It is a new era people, please acknowledge that you are not racist, and neither is your neighbor. Very few people are going to vote against Obama just because his skin color is dark. I am guessing less then 5% would vote against Obama because they are racists, and that 5% isn't going to vote for any Democrat.
However, I think America is less ready for a woman president than they are ready for a dark skinned president. That statement applies to both men and women, and both Democrats and Republicans.
And please don't call me sexist, I am just giving my opinion on the mind frame of American voters, and I am against Hillary not because she is a woman, but because I think she is a vindictive, back stabbing, sleaze, and I don't want her running the military. Before this campaign season started I had donated to Clinton, because I wanted a woman president.

by fetboy 2008-03-11 09:11PM | 0 recs

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Re: I have another theory

That's actually something I should have mentioned. I'm in SC and did a lot of canvassing, etc. for Obama. A lot of white SC dems expressed strong doubts that Obama could attract white support--due to their familiarity with racism. I always thought it was odd because I've never really heard anyone around here say "I won't vote for a black man" (although, I'm sure there are at least a few folks probably think something like that privately but have the good sense not to say it out loud. Still, most of these people are republicans or old as dirt. Younger South Carolinians tend to have much more mature views on race).

by DPW 2008-03-11 09:21PM | 0 recs

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One other bit

Because of my occupation, I can't actively campaign (otherwise I would), but in my occupation I hear a lot of men and women say they won't vote for Hillary because she is woman. Fortunately most of those people won't vote, but they feel that a woman is not strong enough to lead the country or the military, and they see voting for a woman as like voting for a homosexual. And a lot of them still have some resentmeny towards the Clinton over the "don't ask, don't tell policy."
For the record, I support gay marriage, or more correctly NJ style civil unions, and I think it would be a good idea to let gay military couples also enter into civil unions.

by fetboy 2008-03-11 09:42PM | 0 recs

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Re: I have another theory

Just to add one thing: it's a bit depressing that the MSM would never think to analyze the disparity in terms of paranoia rather than racism.

by DPW 2008-03-11 09:26PM | 0 recs

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In the immortal words

"We have nothing to fear, but fear itself."

by fetboy 2008-03-11 09:33PM | 0 recs

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Re: Comparisons to other numbers

This is a little unrelated, but I also find it curious that Obama does so much better among white independents (getting 40% of vote) than white dems (only 23%). Wouldn't the partisan democrats be less inclined to oppose a candidate on the basis of skin color?

Them's be Southern Democrats. They're a whole 'nother critter.

This could be explained by several factors: younger voters tend to indentify as independents and less racist

BINGO!!!

Hillary's lopsided support may not be attributable to racism

This is Mississippi we're talking about -- EVERYTHING can be attributed to racism.

by RP McMurphy 2008-03-11 11:45PM | 0 recs

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Another interesting bit from DKos

Here's something else I find interesting in the exit polls, which is discussed in a front-page diary on dkos:

15% of those who would be dissatisfied with a Clinton presidency supported her, while only 4% supported Obama. Presumably tactical cross-over voters would be dissatisfied with the recipient of their vote, so if the republican voters (roughly 15% of the primary electorate, incidentally) were voting tactically, this appears to be evidence that they went for Hillary. Of course, these numbers don't really tell us whether the republican voters were voting tactically, but there is some corroborating evidence that some of that was occurring.

by DPW 2008-03-11 10:12PM | 0 recs

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What goes around

comes around. We have had people from the Obama camp courting these Democrat-for-a-day Republicans from the beginning, and even bragging about the positive impact for Obama in the early contests. It's a little late in the game to start complaining about their participation in our primaries. If we can assume that they were voting for Obama because they were inspired, we can probably also make the assumption that they are now voting for Hillary because they really don't like McCain, and see her as the lesser of two evils. Or we could assume that they have been trying to game our primaries all along, and have so far done a pretty good job of it. I don't like Republicans choosing our nominee, no matter who it favors, and think we should have closed primaries in every state. But like John Kerry said, "the roools are the rooools", and it is starting to look like what was good for the gander may also be good for the goose.

by georgiapeach 2008-03-12 07:10AM | 0 recs

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Re: Republicans significantly boost Hillary's numb

wait a minute: I heard this was good thing when republicans voted for Obama? who you are trying to fool?

by engels 2008-03-12 12:44PM | 0 recs