The Race for the Democratic Nomination

Jay Cost has a very interesting analysis of where things stand in the race for the Democratic Presidential Nomination.

I am very interested in next week's election in West Virginia. Everybody expects Hillary Clinton to win, but I can't help but wonder if they'll be surprised by the size of the margin.

We can reasonably expect it to be enormous. From a socioeconomic standpoint, West Virginia is almost entirely comprised of the sort of counties that Obama has done poorly in. The median white income in West Virginia is about $30,000 per year. African Americans comprise roughly 3% of the state's population. This puts it somewhere between Belmont County, Ohio and Greene County, Pennsylvania. Clinton won 72% of the vote in Belmont and 75% in Greene.

He also points out that only one Democrat has won the White House while losing West Virginia - Woodrow Wilson in 1916. I doubt that Obama can count on a Teddy Roosevelt splitting the Republicans this time around though.