These numbers are misleading because the President's popularity among African-Americans is on the order of 91%. Barone calculates that his popularity among the remaining 88% of the electorate who aren't African-American is more like 39% positive.
He points out that in most states or districts in which there is a likelihood of a party change in the fall election, relatively few of the voters are African-American (Arkansas, Florida, and Illinois are exceptions). Barone concludes:
The state of opinion in the real political battlegrounds of 2010 is considerably more negative toward Barack Obama than top-line poll numbers suggest.
How does the concept of "negative coattails" sound?
