Clinton's Greatest Political Strength May Be Hiding in Plain Sight

[DemocratSinceBirth]

February 9, 2015 Much of the debate about Hillary Rodham Clinton's potential appeal to female voters may be focusing on the wrong group of women.


Probably the most frequently asked question about Clinton's possible coalition as a Democratic nominee in 2016 is whether she can win back the working-class white women who have moved away from her party since 1996. On that issue, the evidence is ambivalent in months of early polling that pits Clinton against potential Republican nominees.

But polls over the past year almost invariably have found Clinton improving—often substantially—over President Obama's lackluster 2012 performance among white-collar white women.

Those college-educated white women have been the fastest-growing part of the white electorate in recent years. If Clinton as a nominee could cement the gains she's shown among those women in most national and state polls over the past year, she would present Republicans with a formidable demographic challenge, even without improving among any other white voters. Her greatest potential strength, in other words, may be hiding in plain sight: her potential connection to the white-collar white women who most resemble her.

All polls of the 2016 race at this point are recording only distant impressions long before most voters have seriously focused on their choices. The actual campaign, and events yet to occur, will inevitably scramble the equation.


http://www.nationaljournal.com/next-america/newsdesk/clinton-s-greatest-political-strength-may-be-hiding-in-plain-sight-20150209

[stevenleser]

1. K&R, GOP is not going to be able to come close to Hillary.

She wins by 10 points and carries in a Democratic Senate and close to if not over the line for a Democratic House on her coattails.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

2. The math is against the Republicans in a general election, that's for sure.

But I have learned to take nothing for granted.

[djean111]

3. As a woman, the gender of the presidential hopefuls is of absolutely no interest to me,

nor will it have any influence on my vote - primary or general election.
Carly Fiorina, Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin - would I have voted for one of those? Nope.