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Yet for some reason, people stubbornly want to believe that every single person on the West Coast is a pie in the sky bleeding heart hippie, even though the baaaaad ignorant East Coast is outdoing them on that.
Not to mention, church attendance and religious affiliation is lowest in New England. Even lower than anywhere on the west coast.
I don't know if the Pacific Northwest transplants are necessarily making the region more liberal. Generally the Californian diaspora is more conservative than the people who have stayed put in California. Not sure about people from other parts of the country moving to Portland and Seattle though. Lots of "lifestyle" transplants attracted to the Portlandia image, but I'm not sure their numbers are large enough to significantly change political trends.
I wasn't thinking of transplants. I could be wrong; but hasn't the Seattle metro gotten to be a higher portion of the population?
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I could be wrong, but I don't see a conservative surge in New England the way Wisconsin is becoming redder.
I think you're right; I don't think there's anything equivalent. The overall trend is anything bluer though some Republicans have done well recently I wouldn't call it a surge; just the normal back and forth of politics.
Not to mention, church attendance and religious affiliation is lowest in New England. Even lower than anywhere on the west coast.
But more people identify as non-religious in the Northwest than New England by far. New England has a lot of (very) nominally religious people, who say they are Catholic, Jewish, or some mainline Protestant sect, but never actually practice it.
As I said upthread, a lot of it depends upon what you mean by conservative. It's certainly true that politically speaking, New England is more Democratic than Oregon/Washington (with the exception of New Hampshire). I don't actually think in the U.S. system Republicans are truly conservative any longer however - arguably the Democrats are more conservative in the sense that Edmund Burke wrote about when he formalized the term.
In one sense of conservative - the "small c" sense - I think New England does win. New England is simply a more traditional part of the country. Divorce rates are a bit lower. Parents are less likely to give their children weird names. Especially in the small towns, people put great emphasis on historic preservation and local history. Local culture doesn't really emphasize individualism, but how someone can be a good member of the community.
I have lived my entire life in New England and have extensively traveled the region. New Englanders are liberal when it comes to their thinking. They are progressive and generally have a let live laissez-faire philosophy. It sometimes is rather libertarian. New Englanders however generally lead rather conservative lives behavior wise. The divorce rate is among the lowest in the nation. People are generally frugal and live within their means. Families are tight-knit and live in close proximity. Displays of wealth of are considered vulgar. Traditions are important and adhered to. Conformity, while not mandated, is prevalent. New Englanders basically believe that people should be able to lead the lives they want. The lives that most New Englanders want and lead is however very traditional.
I feel New England is more conservative. Rural PNW is fairly libertarian, but those libertarians are more similar to liberals in many ways. I have friends in central Oregon who I think sum up the PNW pretty well, they consider themselves libertarian, but start asking environmental questions and they answer like the most liberal people in the world. PNW and New England have fairly different cultures, relative to the rest of the US. New England is much more traditional and because of that, more conservative. An example I can think of is Quebec, Canada. Voting wise, it's a pretty liberal place, one of the more liberal places in North America. But start traveling around the rural areas and people live fairly conservatively and traditional lives, regardless of political affiliation. I have a friend who is from Maine, he has been a registered Democrat since he was young, yet he's hugely pro-gun, military, pro-strong families, etc. He's also pro-gay marriage and okay with high taxes. I still consider him conservative and not a liberal or progressive. I don't consider PNW people who are libertarian leaning conservative at all. My friends from Oregon stuck out like a sore thumb here in Kansas, and my friend from Maine fit right in. (I think Kansas is a ok standard to check from. ) I realize those are just a few people, but they all consider themselves "normal" people from where they are from.
I will say, once you pass over the mountains, Eastern Oregon and Washington are completely different and as conservative as can be, but I kind of feel like the PNW ends at the mountains.
That's just my opinion, of course neither place is really conservative relative to other parts of the US.
New Englanders may live conventional lifestyles, but that doesn't mean that they are conservative with politics.
Most Pacific Northwesterners live pretty conventional lives too. For example, the average age of first marriage in Oregon for a woman is 26.4 years, which is similar to most Midwestern and Southern states. Oregon and Washington also have fewer singles than "traditional" states such as Ohio, Michigan, and Mississippi.
I find that the Pacific Northwest as well as California, is SELECTIVELY liberal. Not so with New England. I vote the Pacific Northwest.
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) I realize those are just a few people, but they all consider themselves "normal" people from where they are from.
