Obama Election Watch

There are nearly a half million eligible black voters in the state of Missouri. The vast majority of them are in the St. Louis or Kansas City metropolitan areas. In Missouri, more than 150,000 of the eligible black voters have not registered to vote.

A solid increase in the black vote in St. Louis and Kansas City would give an important boost to Obama’s chances of taking Missouri’s 11 electoral votes. To energize more black voters the Obama campaign can call on the standard measures of placing voter registration and issue-oriented advertising in black newspapers and on black radio stations in both St. Louis and Kansas City. In an effort to increase black voter turnout, Obama can almost surely count on a horde of eager volunteers at University of Missouri campuses in St. Louis and Kansas City. Also large numbers of students at Washington University, Saint Louis University, and historically black Harris-Stowe State University in St. Louis need to be enlisted to volunteer in getting out the black vote.

But increasing the black vote alone will not do the trick.

Recent polls in Missouri have shown McCain running ahead of Obama with white men, white women, senior citizens, and even young whites. Dean Debnam, president of Public Policy Polling, notes, “There aren’t enough black voters in Missouri for Barack Obama to win if he can’t make things more competitive among white voters.”

As is the case in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, Obama is having trouble connecting with working-class white voters in socially conservative areas. Remember that Missouri was a slave state and that it has a long history of tense racial relations.

In Missouri’s white working-class areas, Obama must make a convincing appeal on economic issues. He must show white voters why it is that the non-intervention, free-market ideology favored by McCain has brought on the financial troubles the nation now faces. Obama must show the folly of voting for four more years of the same unregulated economic policies that have consistently delivered unemployment and real income decline to millions of Missouri residents.

In Missouri there are large numbers of blue-collar workers who are employed in automobile and other manufacturing industries in communities surrounding St. Louis and Kansas City. Also, there are many coal, zinc, and lead miners in the state. These voters need to be informed of McCain’s callous voting record on raising the minimum wage, extending unemployment benefits, and giving tax breaks to companies that shift Missouri’s jobs overseas.

For purposes of responding to the current financial meltdown, McCain now pretends to discover the virtues of government regulation of markets. But, if elected, he will surely return to his previous ideology that denies any protection to the American worker.

Missouri has millions of voters in rural areas. In fact, there are more farms in Missouri than in any other state except Texas. Obama must show these voters that he offers a strong program for saving and strengthening the family farm. Obama’s plan calls for tax breaks for young people who buy their first farm. He also has proposed to reform federal crop insurance programs so that they favor and strengthen family farms. Rural voters in Missouri should be attracted by Obama’s proposal to ensure fair markets for family farmers who are faced with anticompetitive practices by large agribusiness concerns.

In small-town and rural Missouri, Obama needs to enlist the support of U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill, a popular first-term senator who is widely admired by white voters. McCaskill’s down-home style is attractive to working-class white voters. She was an early Obama supporter and some even mentioned her as potential vice president. She will be an invaluable asset to Obama in efforts to win white voters in Missouri.