Obama and Appalachia

John Marshall at Talking Points Memo argues that Obama doesn't have a problem with white voters or blue collar voters... but he does have a problem with voters in Appalachia (which includes significant portions of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Tennessee... and all of West Virginia. (But, notably, not enough of Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, or Alabama to offset his strengths elsewhere in those states.)

And the counties where Hillary has won big (65% or greater) coincide quite well with the Appalachian region. From Marshall's post:

There's been a lot of talk in this campaign about Barack Obama's problem with working class white voters or rural voters. But these claims are both inaccurate because they are incomplete. You can look at states like Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and other states and see the different numbers and they are all explained by one basic fact. Obama's problem isn't with white working class voters or rural voters. It's Appalachia. That explains why Obama had a difficult time in Ohio and Pennsylvania and why he's getting crushed in West Virginia and Kentucky.

If it were just a matter of rural voters or the white working class, the pattern would show up in other regions. But by and large it does not.

In so many words, Pennsylvania and Ohio have big chunks of Appalachia within their borders. But those regions are heavily offset by non-Appalachian sections that are cultural and demographically distinct. West Virginia is 100% Appalachian. If you look at southeastern Ohio or the middle chunk of Pennsylvania, Obama did about the same as he's doing tonight in West Virginia.

For Marshall's analysis of why Obama has trouble in this region, read his full post here.

Also, here's the New York Times' article on the West Virginia primary.