red + blue != purple
Thu, 7 Nov 2013 00:52:20 +0000
Our country is so amazingly polarized. Virginia has long been thought of as a conservative/Republican-leaning state. But it voted for Obama both times. We've had a 36-year tradition of electing a governor from the party that does not hold the Presidency. Until yesterday, when we elected a Democrat for governor. A map on the state elections website shows a stark divide in the electorate. The Republican (red) won a large area of the state, rural and less densely populated. The Democrat (blue) took many urban districts, areas with concentrated population. Most of the cities that went Republican are not large enough to be names known outside the state. (I did notice that the Republican took Lynchburg, but that's Jerry Falwell's home base.)
As our population becomes more urban, this is a trend that doesn't look good for the Republicans. (There's a lot of trends that don't look good for the Republicans. When are they going to figure out that one of their biggest problems is their policies? The American people, as a whole, don't want what Republicans say we want.)
There was a Libertarian candidate whose supporters could have thrown the outcome either way. But I don't think he was particularly attractive to Republican voters, and to the extent that he did draw their votes I think it was because they were so disappointed with their party's candidate. I don't think either major candidate appealed much to his own party. (Many of us were just voting against the other party.) Since the outcome was close, the Tea-Party faction has concluded that their objectives and methods are still viable; moderates were hoping for an outcome that would squelch them.I think it would be interesting to have a list of all the county (or parish) names in the country, and next to each a little map showing which states have a county with that name. I notice lots of names turning up in multiple states. (Sort of like there's lots of episode names that get used by multiple TV shows....)
[This entry was originally posted as http://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/637773.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]
Our country is so amazingly polarized. Virginia has long been thought of as a conservative/Republican-leaning state. But it voted for Obama both times. We've had a 36-year tradition of electing a governor from the party that does not hold the Presidency. Until yesterday, when we elected a Democrat for governor. A map on the state elections website shows a stark divide in the electorate. The Republican (red) won a large area of the state, rural and less densely populated. The Democrat (blue) took many urban districts, areas with concentrated population. Most of the cities that went Republican are not large enough to be names known outside the state. (I did notice that the Republican took Lynchburg, but that's Jerry Falwell's home base.)
As our population becomes more urban, this is a trend that doesn't look good for the Republicans. (There's a lot of trends that don't look good for the Republicans. When are they going to figure out that one of their biggest problems is their policies? The American people, as a whole, don't want what Republicans say we want.)
There was a Libertarian candidate whose supporters could have thrown the outcome either way. But I don't think he was particularly attractive to Republican voters, and to the extent that he did draw their votes I think it was because they were so disappointed with their party's candidate. I don't think either major candidate appealed much to his own party. (Many of us were just voting against the other party.) Since the outcome was close, the Tea-Party faction has concluded that their objectives and methods are still viable; moderates were hoping for an outcome that would squelch them.I think it would be interesting to have a list of all the county (or parish) names in the country, and next to each a little map showing which states have a county with that name. I notice lots of names turning up in multiple states. (Sort of like there's lots of episode names that get used by multiple TV shows....)
[This entry was originally posted as http://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/637773.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]