Only 22% African American? Seems to be an underestimation to me.
According to this poll, it seems Election Day voters are heavily Republican. Therefore less Blacks will vote tomorrow, pushing down the overall Black share. They made up about 26.5% of the early vote, which makes up about 60-70% of the overall vote. If only 15-20% of tomorrow's voters are Black, overall Black composition could go down to 22%.
Yes, but African Americans are 22% of North Carolina's electorate as a whole. While their turnout on election day might bring down their total % of the vote, I just don't believe that they'll only makeup 22% of the total turnout.
If you assume the margins are about right, that African Americans are going 93% for Obama, whites about 37% for Obama, and "other" about 50% for Obama, and you apply those numbers to the share that white, black and "other" make up in NC, that gives Obama between 47 and 48%. But that's assuming that Blacks only show up in their exact proportion of the electorate...
Also, if you look at the party breakdown, the overestimates both Democrats and Republicans, not reaching enough people who don't associate with a party. In NC, voters with no party make up 22% of the electorate, up from '04, while Dems and Reps are both proportionally down from '04. I can't know for sure, but I'm guessing many of these new voters who refused to associate with either party will skew a bit towards Obama.
Add up these little things, and it spells a slight Obama victory to me.
Ordinarily black turnout is below their share of the electorate though. It isn't a given that they will be a much larger share of turnout than of electorate even with more enthusiasm.
