Another Obama Night

I'm sitting here trying to figure out how the Virginia and DC results could be better for Obama. 100% of the vote? While the exact dimensions of his victories will await final vote counts, exit polls reflect those last SUSA surveys--he's winning across virtually every demographic--including women, older voters, working class voters and Latinos, all previous Hillary voters. Black voters make up about 30% of the voters in Virginia, so even his astounding 90% of that vote can't account for this. Obama won just under half of the white vote, according to exit polls. Obama is also getting substantial support from independents and Republicans.

The networks called the race for him instantly as they did in DC. The polls in Maryland are remaining open for another hour and a half, ostensibly because of ice storms, but probably because the Maryland political establishment, which is backing Hillary, hope that the voters they hope are coming back home from their federal jobs in Washington will get to the polls, so to at least increase her vote total and give her more delegates. Turnout everywhere is major, even with this bad weather.

Actually the networks are paying more attention to the Republican races, still too close to call in VA more than an hour after polls closed, because the dominant voters are conservative Evangelicals. Not only is this a dramatic repudiation of McCain (even if he pulls out a narrow victory) but it also indicates where Republicans might go in the general if Obama is the candidate. The turnout for the Dem primary is running 2 to 1 over the GOPers, which can indicate a lot of things, but it does suggest that non-ultra conservatives are either staying home or voting for Obama.