Black turnout is strong in early voting in South

[bigtree]

(AP) — 26 minutes ago

There have been predictions all year of a record black turnout for Obama. The first actual figures suggest that wasn't just talk:

_ In North Carolina, blacks make up 31 percent of early voters so far, even though they're just 21 percent of the population and made up only 19 percent of state's overall 2004 vote.

_ Roughly 36 percent of the early voters are black in Georgia, outpacing their 30 percent proportion of the state's population and their 25 percent share of the 2004 vote.

Democrats are outvoting the GOP by a margin of 2.5-to-1 in North Carolina, where early voting has been under way for a week. That's roughly double the margin from 2004.

More than 210,000 blacks who are registered as Democrats have cast early ballots in the Tar Heel State — compared with roughly 174,000 registered Republicans overall. Four years ago, the number of GOP early and absentee voters was more than double that of black Democrats.

In Louisiana, more than 31 percent of the early voters are black, and Democrats are topping Republicans nearly 2-to-1. In the crucial battleground state of Florida, nearly 55 percent of early voters are registered Democrats — well above their 41 percent share of the electorate in the Sunshine State.

Virginia, another Southern state that usually votes Republican — but where Obama is doing well in opinion polls — does not track voter registrations by race or party. But some of the largest increases in registrations this year were in Democratic-leaning cities with large minority populations.


read more: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iXAkBilVhjbpsgAAHfgp6kGEShvwD940EUUG0

[lynettebro440]

1. Sweet

they can't steal it if everyone votes.

[blue_onyx]

2. That's why I think Georgia will be an upset in favor of Obama

[bigtree]

3. huge factor

. . . in a lot of races which are being polled using 2004 and 2000 numbers. It looks like a revolution in the making.