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I agree Poquoson 7.This is true. Virginia would very well be a red state if including NoVa and excluding Hampton Roads as well.
The largest city by population in HR voted for McCain by a narrow margin in 2008 and for Romney by a wider margin in 2012. All of the most recent national and statewide electoral maps place HR as squarely purple. According to one demographic breakdown I saw from WaPo the primary split between red and blue in HR during the most recent presidential and senate races were racial. HR's AA population were heavily democratic however HR doesn't have the number of liberal whites that NOVA has. So by demographics and electoral maps alone it suggests that Virginia would be a squarely red state excluding nova but keeping HR. Obviously it would be considerably "redder" without HR but keeping it wouldn't be substantial enough to alter the states politics.
I take it no one ever bothered to look at the general election results before stating what is and isn't so. Maybe folks should look at them and see if "NoVA" could've "carried" Virginia without Hampton Roads.
Also, do half of you people even know WHAT and WHERE NoVA is...as far as counties it does/does not include? Several of those counties are not blue and even PW and Loudoun has a strong red base.
I think people have the wrong idea about NC. The state is not moving "backwards" or becoming more conservative. The 2010 election was a landslide for the Republicans, nationally, not just in NC. That election just happened to coincide with gerrymandering and Republicans were able to give themselves almost permanent power in state government. The people of NC don't actually support what they're doing, but they have gerrymandered themselves in so they're not accountable to voters.
Yeah, as far as I know, NC is becoming more liberal, but the gerrymandering in 2010 by the Republicans in power has stifled that change.
I think it's a matter of time before the Republicans implode in NC because they aren't listening to the people of the state and they are making voters who typically sit out the midterm elections motivated. Now, I doubt that all can be undone in 2014 given how badly the state is gerrymandered now but I do think that there will be inroads made in 2014.
In 2012, NC voters cast more votes for Democrats for US House seats yet Republicans control 9 of the 13 seats. The same sort of gerrymandering exists at the state level.
As for the original question from the OP, without NOVA , I think that NC would actually be more liberal than VA. One would have to remove NC's most progressive area (the Triangle) to make a side by side comparison that would put VA as more liberal. Nova has a greater impact on VA because it represents a larger percentage of the voters. Remember, VA has 1.6 million less people than NC.
NC has turned backwards lately, and its not that liberal. In fact NC IMO is on the downfall.
How is that so
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