Could Mississippi turn blue?
An article in Thursday's Financial Times says that it very well could.
http://www.ft.com/...
Granted, the article downplays any hope for an Obama victory. But it cites the enthusiasm generated by Obama as a key to Democratic Senate candidate Ronnie Musgrove's electoral hopes. A very high turnout of black voters brought out by Obama's campaign could give Musgrove the margin he needs for victory.
But there's more afoot. Many white voters are reconsidering their allegiance to the Republican Party. They are voting not just for a conservative white Democrat like Ronnie Musgrove, but for Barack Obama, too.
Least surprising are the younger white voters, even ones from Republican families.
For some, Rebekah Mills, a 21-year-old student at the University of Mississippi is the face of change. Ms Mills' parents are Republican but she keeps Obama signs in her yard even though they have been ripped.
She has been verbally at-tacked on campus and has had "dog mess" thrown on her door by a "mentally un-stable" neighbour who "used the N-word", but she says she is "stuck on Obama" because he will not perpetuate the policies of George W. Bush, the president.
Change isn't just for the young, though. Even lifelong Republicans are coming around.
Camille Watkins, a white woman visiting Oxford from Kosciusko, a deeply conservative part of Mississippi, whispers gleefully when asked over breakfast that she is voting for Mr Obama although she has been a Republican all her life.
"I'm finally old enough to do what I damn well want with my vote and I feel he is going to bring a change," Ms Watkins says quietly, so her friends cannot hear. Her views were shaped, she says, because she is utterly "sick" of Mr Bush.
Finally, even some white Mississippians who are struggling with deep racial confusions are having a change of heart about voting for Obama.
Among other white voters, support for Mr Obama is tangible, but more muted. Jay King, a middle-aged construction worker, seems almost pained by his own shifting views on the presidential race. After months of supporting Mr McCain, he now believes he could be "persuaded" to vote for Mr Obama because the Democrat is simply "making more sense". Mr King then launches into an explanation of how Mr Obama is "not [really] African American".
"Your average African-American is out for what welfare can do for him," Mr King says matter-of-factly. "I don't think he'll give blacks what they want."
And with that, I'm well and truly gobsmacked. If Obama's message of getting government back on the side of middle-class Americans is getting through this far, then maybe Obama can win in Mississippi, too.