The Catholic vote is the 2012 bellwether

[xchrom]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/the-catholic-vote-is-the-2012-bellwether/2012/05/03/gIQAXkJhyT_blog.html?hpid=z3

?uuid=bYUUQpSjEeGBW6iVzwEIbg
Pope Benedict XVI greets the faithful during the weekly general audience in St. Peter's square at the Vatican, Wednesday, April 25, 2012. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

Among Catholic registered voters, Obama and Romney each took 46 percent in 19 days worth of Gallup tracking polls between April 11 and April 30. The numbers among Catholics were a virtual mirror image of the head to head matchup among all registered voters where Obama took 46 percent to Romney’s 45 percent over that same time period. (Because of the large sample sizes — Gallup polled almost 2,000 Catholic registered voters over those 19 days — the numbers are even more reliable.)

It’s not just this presidential election where the Catholic vote serves as a leading indicator of the national vote.
In the five presidential races prior to this one, the candidate who carried the Catholic vote won four of them. The lone exception was in 2000 when then Vice President Al Gore won the Catholic vote by two points (and the popular vote by .5 percent) but lost the presidency to then Texas Gov. George W. Bush.

In fact, in the last two presidential contests the Catholic vote has tracked almost exactly with the popular vote. In 2008, President Obama carried Catholics by nine points and beat Arizona Sen. John McCain (R) by seven points nationally. Four years earlier, Bush won the Catholic vote by five points and beat Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry (D) by three points nationwide.

[benld74]

1. Opinion : any catholic who votes GOP has a head full of holy water, nothing else

[tabbycat31]

2. or their only issue is abortion

I know plenty of that type.

[KamaAina]

3. Well, that makes sense

American Catholics tend to vote like... well, Americans. The Catholic vote pretty much mirrors the national vote as a whole, unlike, say, the evangelixcal vote.

[WI_DEM]

4. The lone exception was in 2000 when then Vice President Al Gore won the Catholic vote by two points

The lone exception was in 2000 when then Vice President Al Gore won the Catholic vote by two points (and the popular vote by .5 percent) but lost the presidency to then Texas Gov. George W. Bush.


except he didn't lose the presidency. It was stolen from him.