Mississippi: McCain 50%, Obama 44%

The latest Rasmussen poll from Mississippi has John McCain ahead of Barack Obama 50% to 44%.

While this may look like good news for McCain, it’s actually good news for Obama. Mississippi has been a solidly red state for a long time and is one of the few states to vote against Bill Clinton in both 1992 & 1996. In 2000 Mississippi went for George W. Bush by 17%, and in 2004 it went for Bush by nearly 20%.

While it’s still a long shot for Obama to win Mississippi, he may do better than any Democrat in the state in a very very long time. Without a doubt a big part of that is that black people are 37% of Mississippi’s population, if their voter turn out rates are extremely high – it could be enough to flip the state to Obama. It’s not so much that the Obama campaign is counting on a higher percentage of black voters as they typically vote for Democrats by a large margin anyway, it’s more that they are counting on a higher level of voter turnout based on a higher enthusiasm level for Obama compared to for John Kerry or Al Gore.