By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/
Over the next few posts I will be previewing a select few competitive Senate elections. These posts will focus less on individual personalities and more on overarching state dynamics – what parts of the state vote Democratic, swing, and vote Republican.
By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/
A few maps of Ohio’s presidential elections are posted below, for your enjoyment. Each map comes with some brief analysis.
(Note: Because the Times stopped updating before all absentee/provisional ballots were counted, this map does not fully reflect the actual results. I have corrected the discrepancy.)
Senator Barack Obama wins Ohio by 4.6%, a solid but unimpressive victory. Mr. Obama performs poorly in traditional Democratic areas – the northeast and even Cleveland – but offsets this with unique strength in Columbus and Cincinnati. Senator McCain runs strongly in the Republican base.
More below.
It’s been a bit since the Massachusetts election, in which unknown Republican Scott Brown emerged to upset the favored Democrat Martha Coakley in one of union’s deepest-blue states. Since then, Democrats have been recalibrating their strategy.
In a previous post, I outlined the results of how a tied election might look like. Let’s take a look at the prediction:
Now let’s see the actual results:
More below.
This is the second part of a series of posts analyzing the swing state Virginia. It will focus on Republican Virginia. The third part can be found here.
History
After the Civil War, Virginia constituted a reliable Democratic stronghold. Conservative Democrats such as Harry F. Byrd, who controlled the state’s politics for decades, typified the state’s politicians.
Like many southern states, Virginia enacted a strict set of voting restrictions which successfully disenfranchised blacks. However, it never voted as overwhelmingly Democratic as the Deep South; only one Democrat (FDR) ever won more than 70% of the vote.
Earlier than most Southern states, Virginia began moving Republican, beginning in 1952 (when it cast the ballot for General Dwight Eisenhower). Republican strength rested upon the mountainous west (Republican even in the days of the Solid South) and the fast-growing, Republican-leaning suburbs. The west still votes Republican, but the suburbs are changing fast.
More below.
This is the first part of a series of posts analyzing the swing state Virginia. The second part can be found here.
During the ’08 campaign, the political beltway famously defined Virginia as a Republican stronghold gone Democratic. For ten straight presidential elections, the state had reliably turned up in the Republican column. President Barack Obama, however, promised to change that – and he did.
More below.
This is the second part of two posts analyzing Virginia’s 2009 gubernatorial election. The previous part can be found here.
When Democrats nominated State Senator Creigh Deeds, they nominated a rural, moderate Democrat designed to win the small towns and rural regions of western Virginia. In an ideal situation, Mr. Deeds would have carved out a coalition similar to former Governor Mark Warner’s.
In 2001, Mr. Warner won a 5.13% victory over Attorney General Mark Earley, based largely upon rural support in western Virginia.
Mr. Warner is famous among Democrats for this achievement (remember, this was just two months after 9/11). He went on to become a successful and very popular governor; in 2008, Mr. Warner ran for Senate and won double his opponent’s vote. Since Mr. Warner, no other Democratic candidate has ever built a coalition similar to his.
More below.
This is the first part of two posts analyzing Virginia’s 2009 gubernatorial election. The second part can be found here.
A normal observer might see the above map and naturally conclude that the Democratic candidate lost a landslide election. This is not always the case. In the 1968 presidential election, for instance, the state of New York looked like this:
Although it does not look like it, Democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey won the state: 49.76% to 44.30%.
More below.
By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/
Last year, former governor Sarah Palin famously campaigned on a theme of “real America.” This widely derided message implied that only “real Americans” vote Republican.
Yet there is something to Mrs. Palin’s theory. However unintentionally, it lays bare a fundamental truth of American politics.
More below.
By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/
American concern for global warming appears to have reached a nadir. Poll after poll indicates that Americans are more skeptical of global warming; meanwhile the Senate cap and trade bill has been left for dead. As with so many other liberal issues nowadays, the news is grim.
Most pundits attribute this skepticism to partisan politics. The theory goes something like this: with partisan bickering at an all-time high, Republicans are tending to reflexively oppose any Democratic proposal, and vice versa. Because preventing climate change has become associated with liberals, Republican voters are now automatically treading against it. This Times article exemplifies the strain of thought; it is titled “Rising Partisanship Sharply Erodes U.S. Public’s Belief in Global Warming.”
There is only one problem with this theory: it is not true.
More below.
By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/
It can be easy to become immersed in Beltway politics, in which names like Tim Pawlenty, John Ensign, and Harry Reid are instantly recognizable – or debates over the Stupak Amendment can rage on for hours.
One wonders how much of this filters down to the average voter. Does he or she really know what the public option constitutes? How important, really, are the 2010 congressional elections to the normal citizen?
Several days ago, some political comments made by a non-politically-obsessed friend provided me some insight into how “normal” people think.
More below.