Gebe Martinez/Politico misleads about role of "Hispanic vote" in Obama win

Ethno-boosting hack Gebe Martinez of the Politico offers "GOP must tone down rhetoric to woo Latinos" (link):

More than 10 million Hispanics voted last week, up from 7.6 million in 2004. If Hispanics were removed from the tallies, McCain would have had the winning edge in the battleground states of Indiana and New Mexico. Latinos also were a major factor in his losses in the former red states of Colorado, Nevada, Virginia and Florida. President-elect Barack Obama’s Latino support in Florida was 57 percent; in 2004, Bush’s was 56 percent.

And, if Martians voted, Bobarr would have won. Meanwhile, back here on Earth, see this:

According to the usual suspects, the benchmark in garnering Hispanic votes for Republicans is Bush's 40 percent showing in 2004. So what would have happened if McCain had matched Bush's performance, instead of the 31 percent he actually got? Based on CNN's exit polls, McCain still would have lost Nevada, Colorado, Florida, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, not to mention, say, California and New Jersey. Conversely, even if Obama had won 90 percent of the Hispanic vote in Texas, instead of 63 percent, he still would have lost the state. With the possible exception of North Carolina, where the results were close but the number of Hispanic voters is too small to register in the exit poll, there doesn't seem to be a single state where the Hispanic vote was critical to the outcome.

Politics · Wed, 11/12/2008 - 12:22 · Importance: 1