Gosh, I can’t quite put my finger on what’s bothering me about this analysis of Romney’s performance in Florida from CNN’s Juan Carlos Lopez here, but it’s just not right.
How Romney won Florida’s Latino vote
Huhwha? Did I miss something?
As Mitt Romney dominated the Florida Republican primary Tuesday night, he also captured the bulk of the votes from Latinos in the state, with 54% of their ballots. But how did he pull that off?
His victory could be seen as somewhat surprising for a candidate with a tough stance on immigration, who promised that if he were president, he’d veto the Dream Act that would legalize young undocumented adults who came to the United States as children if they attend college, join the armed forces or meet other requirements.
But Romney’s methodology for winning their votes reveals a more focused, calculated approach to securing the fastest-growing voter demographic in the state and the country, and could prove to be a hurdle for President Obama in the general election.
Oh, that’s it. Florida’s Republican primary is closed, so the only Latino votes the Marquis de Mittens captured were in fact 54% of registered Republicans. Please, somebody tell me how Mitt getting, say, 54% of the African-American vote in a closed GOP primary means he could prove to be a hurdle for President Obama in the general election. I’m eagerly awaiting that explanation.
But it’s the independents there who voted for him in 2008 — and the 400,000 in Florida who list no party affiliation — who are at real risk of being lured to the Republican side in 2012. They will be the prize in the November election, and where Obama — who starts with a 60% lead among all Latinos in state polls — may end up battling Romney over the growing Latino vote.
So a 60% lead among the total Latino voting population in the polls makes President Obama vulnerable to a battle with Mitt Romney among Latino voters in Florida. Got it. If we’re expanding the definition of “battle” to include Wellington and the Prussians smooshing Napoleon all over the Belgian countryside at Waterloo, then Lopez is spot on. Good call, CNN.
redshirt
Your LIBERAL media at work!
Maude
Well, this would mean that Mitts would win 75% of the Dem votes.
It is truthiness.
ant
It’s really really hard for the republicans to win the presidential election without Florida.
Martin
See, this is why I say that primary results should be reported based on the % of registered voters captured. That would have prevented this lie from even starting.
SteveM
Dear Entire Mainstream Media: Please stop pretending that Cuban immigrants in any way belong in the same category as other Latinos. Number one, they get concierge service as soon as they set foot on U.S. soil; number two, they are loved by the same wingnuts who hate all other Latinos (even those who are third- and fourth- and fifth- and tenth-generation Americans) because they hates them some commies.
Surly Duff
The majority of Prussians residing in Florida also voted for Romney in the primary.
Trip McNeely
You called the guy both Gomez and Lopez in the post. Good post though, I liked it.
billiecat
Actually, Wellington called Waterloo a “near run thing.” A better analogy would be to the Battle of the Nile (with Obama as Nelson, of course).
schrodinger's cat
In other MSM news, NYT is speculating on the Democratic nominee for 2016. What a useless bunch of hacks.
boss bitch
Romney’s loss in November is going to hurt really bad for these guys who are bending over backwards to make him seem like a formidable opponent.
Josie
How can he ignore the fact that the “growing Latino population” in the nation as a whole will not vote the way the Cubano Latino population in Florida votes? I live in an area where Latinos are in the majority and I can guarantee you they will not be voting for Romney. This reporter is spouting nonsense.
rlrr
@boss bitch:
They’ll just claim Romney lost because of voter fraud…
Calouste
Via TPM
Well, the man is a Tea Party Rep, so we can count that as a confession.
Calouste
@billiecat:
Yeah, Waterloo is not famous because it was such an easy victory, it’s famous because it was Napoleon’s last act, and because by the standards of the time it was very bloody.
dmbeaster
@billiecat: Well, when the Prussians finally showed up, it put all end to the near run thing being orchestrated by Wellington (who had probably won the battle by then anyway), and turned it into a rout. But I also prefer to think of Obama as Nelson at the Battle of the Nile anyway.
jacy
At least we know who stole McMegan’s calculator.
And a “smooshing Napolean” sounds vaguely like a sex act performed with a pastry. Maybe I’m just hungry.
Maude
@schrodinger’s cat:
The NYT wins the hat award, the hat from the last thread.
Walker
Journalists are innumerate. News at 11.
AnotherBruce
Here, let me try this math thing out.
80% -20% = 60%.
So if my ‘rithmetic is right, Even figuring some undecideds, Obama is going to score 4 Latino votes to every one for Romney.
Yep, CNN sure has “the math”, in much the same way Karl Rove used to have it.
Jay C
Actually, to use a Waterloo analogy, commenting about Romney’s big “Latino lead” in Florida is more like Napoleon’s PR crew running back to Paris with breathless dispatches about how they had kicked the Prussians’ asses at Quatre Bras, and so the campaign was basically over, and the folks ought to get about hanging up the bunting for the Emperor’s victory parade.
Yevgraf
On a hilarious note in Birther land, even a wingnut Georgia ALJ had to shoot the morons down.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/80417613/Farrar-Welden-Swensson-Powell-v-Obama-Judge-Malihi-Final-Decision-Georgia-Ballot-Challenge-2-3-2012
The weeping in FReakville has started already.
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/*/index?brevity=brief
Joseph Nobles
Obama better watch out. 100% of Latino votes in the GOP primary were for a Republican.
David Hunt
@Josie:
I don’t know where you live specifically, but I’d give two to one odds that the Republican establishment in your area spends a good deal of time trying to figure out how to insure that they don’t vote at all. It looks to me that the way that they plan to deal with the decline of their lily white demographic is to make sure that those people are still the vast majority of eligible voters. Jim Who?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Walker:
Fixt that for you.
True story: this morning, before taking my kids to school, we had the TV tuned in to the Today Show (please don’t ask why) when they led with a story about how Israel might attack Iran in the next 3 months. Up pops Richard Engel, reporting from on-location in the Middle East. Unprompted, my 12-year old says to me: “Hey, I recognize him. He’s just about the only actual reporter they have left, isn’t he?”.
Out of the mouths of babes, etc.
scav
@Joseph Nobles: Yeah, I don’t think Obama’s won a vote yet. This is not good.
BGinCHI
Obviously that dude stayed in a Holiday Inn Express last night.
Josie
@David Hunt: I live in Texas and they are fighting with the DOJ right now over a strict voter id law that will attempt to do what you are suspecting. The only positive thing is that we have terrible bus service in South Texas, so you really do need a driver’s license to get around. The elderly Hispanics, however, will be at a disadvantage if the law stands.
Frankensteinbeck
@Yevgraf:
I am going to laugh myself to death. I didn’t follow the Freep Link, because they’ll just depress and annoy me, but I’m reading the court document. The judge bent over backwards to give the birthers their day in court, and was left going ‘This is it? This is IT? This is your case?!’
BGinCHI
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Your kid is smarter than Luke Russert. It’s a good start, but a low bar.
Villago Delenda Est
@jacy:
“I hear my adversary is working on a dish called ‘Beef Wellington’. I must develop the Napoleon first! If this pastry is to bear my name, it must be richer. More cream!”
Zifnab
Well, duh. Mitt’s got nothing to lose. That makes him dangerous!
But seriously, are you really acting shocked to hear a MSM news outlet tell you why there’s good news for
John McCainMitt Romney?Linda Featheringill
@Yevgraf: #21
note in Birther land:
From a comment at that site.
“I guess the argument that your dad has to be a US Citizen doesn’t apply any longer.”
Was citizenship ever decided solely by the father? In recent times.
bobbo
This is the same stupid media that brought you “Obama has a Jewish problem” or “Obama has a Latino problem” or “Obama has a white working class problem” when he was getting a slightly smaller share of those Democratic votes than Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary.
Sadly, many stupid Dems bought it too.
Freaking maroons.
IM
@Jay C:
As far as I remember that actually happened: the victory at the battle of Ligny was celebrated in Paris. Of course, at that time, Napoleon had already lost at Waterloo.
Linda Featheringill
more on the birther trial.
Another commenter:
“The fact that he was born in Hawaii and THEREFORE a natural born citizen makes absolutely no sense.”
I don’t understand. Isn’t Hawaii a part of the US?
Elizabelle
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Smart kid.
Villago Delenda Est
@Linda Featheringill:
No. If you could prove that either parent was a US citizen (obviously easier to do with the mother in the case of the father not being around 9 months after conception) you are a US citizen. There are millions of people around the world who claim to have been fathered by an American (usually some military member who was just passing through) who are SOL on getting US citizenship via parentage.
BGinCHI
@Linda Featheringill: Not to Abe Simpson.
Villago Delenda Est
@Linda Featheringill:
No, it’s “exotic”. Unlike, say, Myrtle Beach.
schrodinger's cat
@Maude: I was kinda hoping Tunch would win the hat. He could have so much fun with it!
burnspbesq
@schrodinger’s cat:
We’ve been speculating here for the better part of a year. What’s your beef with the Times getting into the act?
Chickenjuice
When did we start looking for cogent analysis on CNN?
burnspbesq
@Frankensteinbeck:
The appeal papers should be even funnier.
Suffern ACE
@Linda Featheringill: Goodness. That would mean my mother isn’t a citizen. I thought the beef was that you needed to spend XX number of years before or after 18 and if you left the country, your time didn’t count, especially if your mom dragged you to Indonesia. It’s like social security quarters. So bascially you all born not-citizens when your father isn’t a citizen and had best not travel, especially not to Pakistan where only non-US citizens can go – or something like that. Or so they said was the law in 1961. I had a tough time following the argument then and I’m not going to research it again now.
Cap'n Swag
What insightful analysis from CNN. That almost makes this quote by Romney look coherent:
burnspbesq
@Villago Delenda Est:
“There are millions of people around the world who claim to have been fathered by an American (usually some military member who was just passing through) who are SOL on getting US citizenship via parentage.”
SOL? Not if they play in the Bundesliga.
burnspbesq
Straight from the horse’s, umm, mouth.
http://www.orlytaitzesq.com/?p=31124
Anoniminous
So …
How many RW lunatics didn’t get their legal information and/or law degree from MSU?
Where:
MSU = Make Shit Up
Yevgraf
@Frankensteinbeck:
If you can’t make a wingnut ALJ see your case, it is time to fold up the gold fringed flag of the Admiralty court and go home.
I suppose there might be some Justice of the Peace in Hogwallow Mississippi that might be willing to issue an arrest warrant for Obama, but the list of people who can be persuaded by a racist Jewish Moldovan-Israeli dentist/realtor/lawyer is rapidly dwindling.
chrome agnomen
@burnspbesq:
that comment thread (now closed) is a carnival of goodness!
Chris
@SteveM:
In my experience, it’s not so hard to find white wingnuts from Florida who’ll wail about how “those Cubans ruined Miami!” Their party may not listen to them, but there’s a lot of them out there.
shortstop
At the risk of riling up some supporters of HRC in the 2008 primaries, this is identical to the deluxely stupid argument that Obama couldn’t win NY or CA in the general.
John
Are you suggesting that one has to expand the definition of a “battle” for that word to encompass the Battle of Waterloo? That’s hard for me to get behind.
burnspbesq
@chrome agnomen:
Oh, my.
I especially like the one that says, in relevant part, “NDAA was drafted to put the Birchers away.”
We should be so lucky.
burnspbesq
Spellcheck on this blog is stupid throw rocks at it.
That was supposed to be “Birthers.”
Polar Bear Squares
Don’t worry. Romney has the “non-plantation” vote locked down in the black community. Unfortunately that’s only about 1,500 people. Who knew.
MikeJ
@burnspbesq: Birchers, birthers, I’d be happy either way.
Chuck Butcher
Try about 5 minutes of CNN’s Erin Burnett to see just how hard they’re trying to become FauxLite. You might make 10 minutes of Wolf before you think you’re now stupider than going in…
2nd place to Faux really eats at them, so of course they try for their demographics.
schrodinger's cat
@burnspbesq: We have been speculating about the Republican nominee for 2012, not the Democratic nominee for the next to next Presidential election. Was it a slow news day? I was just wondering. Why does that make you upset?
Svensker
@Yevgraf:
Jaysus. Those guys are sick.
chrome agnomen
@burnspbesq:
potato/potahto
p.a.
I think we’ve just found Nate Silver’s new intern!
Villago Delenda Est
I am, above all else, interested in a stable, as predictable as possible society.
What these guys did was profoundly destabilizing, and thus create the conditions for people to get desperate enough to consider violence as an attractive option to resolve things.
This terrifies me. Because I’ve studied enough history to know that the upshot is never what people thought it might be…it’s worse.
dj spellchecka
“Obama starts with a 60% lead among all Latinos in state polls”
i’d note he only won 57% of the hispanic vote in florida in 2008…