Welcome to the Coming Race War
The results aren't in yet, but it's becoming increasingly clear from the exit poll data and the glum mood on Fox News that Barack Obama is probably going to win re-election tonight. And the excuse-making from Red America has begun, and it basically comes down to: The Whites lost.
Fox's analysis (and they're not alone in this) has focused on the demographics of Obama's coalition. It's no secret that Obama lost among white voters in 2008 (though he did better than any other Democratic in a one-on-one race since Jimmy Carter) and is expected to lose them again tonight. He makes up for that loss with overwhelming margins among non-white populations. In 2008, that fact was subsumed beneath the popular notion of a wave of youthful voters carrying him into office.
But now that the romance of 2008 has worn off, and no one can appeal to the magical lure of hope-and-change, Fox is getting increasingly blunt in its racial analysis. Megyn Kelly is talking openly of the "racial divide" in we're seeing tonight, and Bill O'Reilly is lamenting that "the white establishment is now the minority... It's not a traditional America anymore."
So if Obama pulls this out, expect to hear a lot more of that kind of talk: The votes of non-white Americans are not "traditional" votes. The blacks and the browns want one of their own in charge.