Voter turnout thread... (Beaver, Nixon, Republic: legally, offices, teaching)

[nei]

Originally Posted by ex-burgher

Maybe it's because they are so white (?)

Upstate NY suburbs and many Boston suburbs are probably just as white.

[nei]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

As I documented before, that is because Colorado went from +9R in 2000, and reliably a Republican state absent extremely unusual conditions since 1952, to +2D in 2008. The former is not a plausible "swing state", but the latter is. Of course this is for presidential elections--congressional, statewide, and local patterns can and often do vary.



Colorado was 12.9% Hispanic in 1990. In 2010, it was 20.7%. Combined with Hispanic voters favoring the Democratic candidate pretty heavily in the last couple presidential elections, that explains a lot of the change in Colorado's status.

According to exit polls, Colorado's white electorate (78% of voters) went 44% for Obama while 75% of Hispanic voters went for Obama. For Pennsylvania, whites were also 78% of voter and went 42% for Obama. Pennsylvania's non-white voters went even more strongly for Obama than Colorado's.

Pennsylvania Presidential Race - 2012 Election Center - Elections & Politics from CNN.com

The state where Obama did the best with white voters is Vermont, 66%. Hawaii could be more, but exit polls for it weren't listed. The only state Obama won the majority of white voters were all the New England states, the Pacific Northwestern states (Oregon & Washington), Iowa and maybe New York state (tied in the exit polls). The election results in the northern New England are the same as how whites voted, as there almost no non-whites in northern New England (though they exist, I've seen 'em!)

[Katarina Witt]

It is incorrect to assume that most Hispanics are Democrats. Bush actually did well with Hispanics.

The Hispanic Vote Elects Bush

Romney, OTOH. . . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...n_1842864.html

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by Katiana

Brian, you can think that Colorado was the tipping point all you want. However, the election was called for Obama before Colorado was called for Obama.

Same with Florida. Everyone was acting like Obama needed Florida to win. He won long before Florida finished counting votes.

Originally Posted by Katiana

It is incorrect to assume that most Hispanics are Democrats. Bush actually did well with Hispanics.

The Hispanic Vote Elects Bush

That's because many Hispanics are Catholics. Although Catholics as a whole are more liberal than other religions, Hispanics tend to be more conservative Catholics.

[sparrowmint]

Originally Posted by Katiana

It is incorrect to assume that most Hispanics are Democrats.

Why? Bush never had a majority of the Hispanic vote, and he only did decent with them against Kerry (45%, not even half). Your source even says as much. John McCain did poorly with them as well, not much better than Romney did. And 8 years ago is 8 years ago. Therefore, in recent political history, it's perfectly correct to assume that "most" Hispanics are Democrats, and they will remain so until the Republicans put forth more faces that don't froth at the mouth with ethnic and racial hatred over the very idea of Hispanic immigrants.

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by sparrowmint

Why? Bush never had a majority of the Hispanic vote, and he only did decent with them against Kerry (45%, not even half). Your source even says as much. John McCain did poorly with them as well, not much better than Romney did. And 8 years ago is 8 years ago. Therefore, in recent political history, it's perfectly correct to assume that "most" Hispanics are Democrats, and they will remain so until the Republicans put forth more faces that don't froth at the mouth with ethnic and racial hatred over the very idea of Hispanic immigrants.

Her issue is with your using the word "most" instead of "a larger percentage."

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by nei

Seems like Pittsburgh has the most Republican-leaning outer suburbs of anywhere in the Northeast (including DC, Baltimore and Upstate NY), though it's hard to judge as it depends on how county boundaries are drawn. (Except in New England where election results are given by town.)

It's getting that way, although really only a few towns in the closest counties to Allegheny are true exurbs (mainly in Butler, some in Westmoreland, and a few in Washington). Pittsburgh's small enough and cheap enough it hasn't seen crazy sprawl though. It's mostly just the rural/small town voters just keep getting more and more conservative as the old people who remember having union jobs die off.

[Katarina Witt]

Originally Posted by eschaton

One interesting thing I noticed looking at statewide totals in PA.

On the whole, Obama did a bit worse in PA than even the national swing against him of roughly 5%. But it wasn't distributed evenly.

He did better in Allegheny County (adjusting for national swing) in 2012 than he did in 2008. Compared to the nation at large, the county got around 2% bluer. It seems my former concern the county might shift to the right (as Obama did 5% worse than Kerry did in 2004, adjusting for swing), was unfounded.

In most of outer Western PA, Obama continued to decline. Erie of course remains stable Democratic, albeit narrowly.

The weird thing though is three counties got a tiny bit more Democratic. In Lawrence and Beaver counties, Romney did only around 2.5% better than McCain in 2008. Adjusting for national swing, this meant the counties got about a half percent less Republican than the median. Mercer County was more extreme - Romney got 50.6% of the vote, compared to 49% for McCain in 08, and adjusting for national swing, it got about 1.3% more Democratic than the nation as a whole. In contrast, the lower Mon counties (Washington, Greene, and Fayette) continued to swing rapidly to the right, as did Cambria county.

I wonder what the difference is? They are all along the Ohio border in a row, so maybe some penetration of Ohio ads made a difference in the race? Or perhaps it was slightly higher black turnout? All of them have higher black populations than the rest of rural western Pennsylvania.

Anyway, it's interesting. It suggests to me maybe the decline of the Democrats in the rural portions of SWPA isn't as inevitable as I believed.

It's pretty amazing. When I was a kid, Beaver County was strongly Democratic. I'm too lazy to look up stats, but "heavy majority" is not too strong.

[nei]

Originally Posted by Katiana

It's pretty amazing. When I was a kid, Beaver County was strongly Democratic. I'm too lazy to look up stats, but "heavy majority" is not too strong.

see

403 Forbidden

[Caladium]

Originally Posted by Hopes

Same with Florida. Everyone was acting like Obama needed Florida to win. He won long before Florida finished counting votes.

Yup. It was you guys in PA who settled the matter, as far as I'm concerned. And NH. They wasted a ton of money on relentless advertising in my swing state and the win was clinched long before our votes were registered.