Democratic Constituencies Dominate Early Voting In Georgia, NC

So far, the early voters in both Georgia and North Carolina heavily tilt toward Democratic constituencies. Both states publicly report unusually good--and useful--data on the demographics of their early voters. Here's what we know so far (data courtesy of Michael McDonald at George Mason University):

GEORGIA EARLY VOTING (as of 10/20/08)
Early votes: 691,507
Percent white: 60.7%
Percent black: 35.6%
Percent women: 56.1%
Percent men: 41.1%
2008 early vote as % of 2004 total vote: 20.8%

NORTH CAROLINA EARLY VOTING (as of 10/18/08)
Early votes: 279,274
Percent white: 69.9%
Percent black: 26.5% (That's five points higher than their percentage of NC registered voters)
Percent Democrat: 54.1%
Percent Republican: 29.7%
2008 early vote as % of 2004 total vote: 7.9%

The big question to which we won't know the answer until after the election is this: is Obama getting out folks who might not have made it to the polls on election day, or is he just getting folks who would've voted anyway? If the former, he should win handily.