Nelson on "race":

the polling remains very much in the news today, and may prove critical to understanding the dynamics at work in the Democratic race over the next month...but, interestingly, apparently not for the Republicans.

"Race" is, alas, perhaps the correct word here for its double meaning. This morning's New York Times has a very disturbing analysis by the respected pollster Andy Kohut, taking a hard-nosed look at what may explain how the same pollsters and the same models were so right-on with the N.H. Republicans, and so very off-base with the N.H. Dems.

One of the "big questions" about the Obama candidacy has been "is America ready to vote for an African-American"? (This is the parallel question on Hillary Clinton, of course, "is America ready to vote for a woman?")

We have long argued that one of the attractive things about both of these people is that Clinton is a politician who happens to be a woman, and Obama a politician who happens to be Black...neither is running mainly on their race or gender.

Regarding Obama, that may turn out to be dangerously naive, apparently, especially within the Democratic Party.

More after the jump.

before getting into the very disturbing matter of "race" as it appears to have been a factor in New Hampshire, and thus by implication to the electorate at large, we should note that the N.H. vote has brought forward a far more objective (respectable?) issue when comparing Clinton and Obama...the matter of professional experience.

There seems to be something of a consensus flowing from NH that the Obama phenomenon is more of a 'movement" which allows him to finesse the experience question, whereas Hillary is using the fact of her experience as her primary selling-point.

So as long as Obama can seem to be riding a wave, he can float right over the hard-nosed experience question, the analysis goes. But once the wave crests, then the voters calm down and take a more critical and/or objective look at the experience factor.

You have to think this single question, or "issue" is likely to prove even more critical, regardless of whether it's Clinton or Obama, if the Republicans nominate Sen. John McCain...but let's save that discussion for a more appropriate time.

Now...about "race"...in a nutshell, pollster Andy Kohut's argument is that past election analyses have proven that white voters in the lower income brackets, and/or voters in the lower educational brackets (that is, voters with no college) are far more likely to vote against an African-American candidate, than are voters above a certain specific income and education levels.

New Hampshire has a lot of both categories of poorer white voters, he notes...

What also may explain how the pollsters "missed" the surge toward Hillary is that these socio/economic categories...yes, we have "class politics" in America, pious denials not-with-standing...is that these "lower classes" don't like to be polled, and tend not to participate in polls.

Kohut makes the argument that the pollsters have been aware of this for many years, and that the models used try to take this into account.

OK, so what happened, this time, in New Hampshire? Apparently the bias model, potentially a problem in itself, was exacerbated by the now clearly ill-advised decision not to poll in the last 24 hours, up into election day.

This therefore not only missed any decision against Obama, or shift toward Hillary by the "lower classes" of Democratic voters, it also missed the last-day movement to Hillary by a significant number of women voters, following Mrs. Clinton's now famous "emotional moment" on Monday.

That "moment" has already been analyzed up and down from every perspective, and is something of a Rorschach test. For the "Hillary Haters", the whole thing was a fake, and some even charge that it was "staged" by her Campaign.

For more decent-minded folks, including her supporters, it was a genuine moment of truth, proof that the "private" Hillary is, after all, a real human being...with all of the normal human emotions...and not just the "policy wonk" normally on display.

We first heard it, then saw it, and wonder how anyone could doubt that it was genuine, no matter what you think of her personally, or professionally.

And for what it's worth, we were told by the Obama Campaign yesterday, and have seen it confirmed today, that the woman voter who asked Hillary "the question"...."how can you stand it!?"...ended up voting for Obama.

Of course, no mention of Edwards.