I'm not sure to be honest. The exit polls seem to indicate that they were not weighted correctly as they didn't favor Democrats enough. But we obviously need to be wary of exit polls. The firm election numbers should be out relatively soon. Those will give us a much better picture. If previous elections are any indicator, the Democratic vote is overestimated in the exit polls. They may actually slide back to the point where they are accurate, though that's nothing more than a guess at this point.

Well, lots o religious folks in that block too, although unlike the so-called religious right, I guess they would have to be classified fiscally liberal, socially conservative.

This shouldn't be surprising. But I think it's unfair to dismiss them solely based on affiliation. There will be plenty of time for this administration to do well or screw up. We'll know which way it's going long before 2012.

Yeah, but we knew what the religious right was going to do. The African-American voted against it in huge numbers. That was surprising to me.

Amen to that. Speaking as a liberal who earns enough money (joint family income) that he'll be one of the few taxed more by Obama, it would be easy to "vote my interest" and vote Republican, but then I'd be living in an unbearable country.

:D


Welcome back! You've been sorely missed - MBBF needs someone else to take the heat off of him for a while.


Maybe I'm being picky, but isn't it more likely (and/or correct) to say that the influx you're seeing is less "liberals" (with that far-left connotation) but more center or left-leaning Democrats? If NC used to be an "ultra-conservative rural state" wouldn't the addition of pretty much anyone, to say nothing of the addition of vast numbers of high-earning, college-degreed people, pull the state left regardless?

One of the more interesting random tidbits from the CNN national exit poll (I suspect the others would show similar, feel free to point out one that comes up differently).

60% of voters had decided their vote before September.
14% decided in September
15% decided in October
3% each in the past 3 days and past 7 days (the only two groups where McCain had the advantage)
4% decided on election day

Psst, flere.
Local Exit Polls - Election Center 2008 - Elections & Politics from CNN.com
(check out the breakdown of votes by education level - different skew in NC than in a number of other places)

NOTE: Below I was trying to answer flere's question about comparing to previous years. These numbers do NOT add, I'm coming up about 5k votes short on Obama's expected total & about 31k high on McCain's expected total, throwing things off quite a bit. After about two hours fiddling with these I didn't want to just trash them in case someone could spot an obvious math error somewhere. The problem may be there but it also may very well be that attempting to equally distribute the rounding (plus almost 12k votes for Bednarik in '04 that aren't explicitly accounted for in the exit polls) is combining to throw things off.

edit to add: Also see
CNN.com Election 2004

2004 NC Results
Bush - 1,961,166
Kerry - 1,525,849

2008 NC Results
Obama - 2,123,334 (up 597,485)
McCain - 2,109,281 (up 148,115)
Swing = 449,370 gain by Obama (+14,053 vs Kerry -435,317)

Difference Votes 2004 vs 2008
Total votes up 745,600 (21%) (3,487,015 to 4,232,615)
Net R votes up 148,115
Net D votes up 597,485

Number of votes by education level among voters, all D+R
No High School 4% vs 7.2% -- 139,481 vs 304,748 (up 165,267 net)
H.S. Graduate 22% vs 24.2% -- 767,143 vs 1,024,293 (up 257,150 net)
Some College 29% vs 27.2% -- 1,011,234 vs 1,151,271 (up 140,037 net)
College Grad 30% vs 28.2% -- 1,046,104 vs 1,193,597 (up 147,493 net)
Post Grad 15% vs 13.2% -- 523,052 vs 558,705 (up 35,653 net)
* added 0.2% to each group in 2008 to roughly account for CNN rounding

Votes by Education level, by candidate, by year
*Note that margin by group does not add exactly in 04, appears to be a combination of CNN rounding & about 11k votes for Bednarik
*Added 0.5 to some '08 groups to approximate CNN rounding & minimize differential

No High School
Bush 47% Kerry 53% - 65,556 to 73,925 (+8339 Kerry)
Obama 68% McCain 32% - 207,229 to 97,519 (+109,710 Obama)
Net change Obama +101,371

H.S. Graduate
Bush 52% Kerry 48% - 398,914 to 368,228 (+30,686 Bush)
McCain 52.5% Obama 47.5% - 537,754 to 486,539 (+51,215 McCain)
Net change McCain +20,529

Some College
Bush 61% Kerry 39% - 616,852 to 394,381 (+222,471 Bush)
McCain 55% Obama 45% - 633,199 to 518,071 (+115,128 McCain)
Net change Obama +107,343

College Grad
Bush 57% Kerry 41% - 596,279 to 428,902 (+167,377 Bush)
McCain 51.5% Obama 48.5% - 614,702 to 578,894 (+35,808 McCain)
Net change Obama +131,569

Post Grad
Bush 52% Kerry 47% - 271,987 to 245,834 (+26,153 Bush)
Obama 56% McCain 44% - 312,875 to 245,830 (+67,045 Obama)
Net change Obama +93,198

Yah! We can be like tag-team buddies!

Cool! I've decided to stop paying my mortgage. Thanks in advance. :)

I don't have to. It is very clear based on the proposals that have been voted on over the past few years, where those proposals originated from, and who the donors were in support of those proposals. While the votes in support may ultimately cross party lines, there isn't much doubt where they come from and who pays the most to get them through. This goes back 40 years.

You know very well what I am referring to, although you feign ignorance as part of some routine that you think might throw somebody off. There is a reason that the GOP base is now what was once the same crowd of states that had to be forced by SCOTUS to desegregate, even requiring the military be involved to keep order. That explains enough by itself.

A shame they don't have previous versions on their website.

Interesting, but I'd like to see comparators from earlier elections.


I refer you to my comments in Edward64's "Recession" thread.

I also think that the local GOP was hurt by the fact that Obama put a TON of effort into organizing and GOTV in the state, while McCain didn't do much (and came late). I think that was the right move for McCain (with such a large map to defend, he had to hope that the national numbers would shift and put NC out of play), but it did hurt downticket GOP candidates.

I am suprised McCrory lost b/c he seemed like the better candidate for Gov.

Dole losing does not suprise me. The "93rd ranked senator" campaign against her seemed very effective (the joke I heard after the election is that it will be very hard for her to turn over her office space to Hagan because Dole never bothered to learn where it was.) Her "Godless" ad was a horrible shootselfinthefoot move. And she didn't seem to really engage the race until the last couple of weeks. Voters notice that.

I don't know that there is much chance the Republicans can win at the presidential level with a small, fervent tent unless the Democrats screw up. Bush was pretty much the ideal small-tent candidate and he barely won in 2000 over a horrible democrat campaign even with Nader siphoning 3% off the vote and providing the margin of victory in Florida, New Hampshire, and Oregon.

If they go more moderate, they'll probably lose in 2012 by splintering off the religious right. But I have to think the religious right would learn pretty quickly, as the Nader Dems did in 2000, that splintering the party is incredibly poor strategically and they'd much prefer a center-right republican to a center-left (or worse) democrat. At that point the republicans would probably be unbeatable again.

DON"T FUCK WITH PALIN!

In the "let's see how much chance can play with the religious right" category, these were the winning numbers for the pick 3 in Illinois last night:

6 - 6 - 6

:D

I knew it! He IS the antiChrist! :eek:

I recreated the cross-tab for the presidential race of the national exit poll (using political party as the demographic). Due to not having decimals available, it isn't completely precise but probably close enough.

The presidential race voting breakdown, based on the exit poll respondents nationally was:
53% - Obama
45% - McCain
2% - Other/Refused to Answer

I looked at the various media websites, and most of them are currently reporting the popular vote split as:
53% - Obama
46% - McCain
1% - Other

The accuracy of the poll seems pretty good to me. Not all of the votes are tabulated of course, but I suspect that there wouldn't be too much movement away from the current spread.

Fox News says Sarah Palin didn't know Africa was a continent. Also that she refused requests to prepare for the Couric interview.

Actually, those are the numbers of the interceptions Rex Grossman is going to throw in his next three games for the Bears.

"It's all that biased Fox News's fault. Palin's Ronald Reagan re-born! Kill the unbelievers! Burn the heretics!"

Welcome to 2-3 pages ago. :D

If Grossman throws 18 picks in the next three games, that would only confirm the sign signaled by the Lotto.

On second thought, we're talking Rex Grossman...so nevermind.

See the edit of my original post. I tried pretty damned hard (for my own benefit as much as yours) but couldn't get the numbers to check.

Not sure whether it's a simple math error somewhere, a typo, combination of rounding over multiple sets of data, or even if it's just simply impossible to apply the exit polls and extrapolate back to the total, essentially revealing part of the difference between the exit data and the actual votes. If the latter is the case, then we're just landing in the ballpark somewhere.

One case of apples to apples I'm pretty sure of though, the well-educated component (college grad + grad school) of the NC electorate in 2008 vs 2004 was down from one exit poll to the next, making up 41% this year vs 45% the election before, while the less educated component (HS grad or less) rose from a combined 26% in '04 to 31% in '08.

Technically, from a pure methodological standpoint, it's probably not kosher to try to extrapolate exit poll splits to actual vote--since they are not truly apples to apples. But, with that being said, the poll splits should be relatively close to reality.

Without looking at your analysis, I think your numbers are probably close enough. Your numbers won't add up because you probably don't have the full cross-tabs, so you probably couldn't get precise percentages. Also if you are getting your exit poll data from a media source, they often won't report the results from third-party candidates or "other" or "refused". Finally remember that the respondent pool changes from question to question, since not all respondents answer all of the questions...

Good ol' Fred Phelps. I won't bother linking to this press release...........

In consideration of those who may have a faulty detector, I'm going to mention that the use of the word "good" in the same sentence as Fred Phelps name seems likely to have been intended as sarcasm.

I think Phelpsie just wants to go to hawaii.

With the rain here today, I don't blame him and wouldn't mind going myself.

More analysis...this is interesting:

As a sidenote to Obama's 66-32 blowout among 18-29 voters, check out how these same voters voted for the House. Not much different: 63-34.

So, in casting an identity politics vote for Barack Obama, a hip young (by political standards) African American, young voters were also apt to vote straight ticket for the Democrats down ballot. Nor is this new: the 2004 Democratic margin in the House among these voters mirrored the Kerry vote (+11 for Democrats vs. +9 for Kerry).

People have been focusing on whether the youth vote was up. It was -- slightly: going from 17 to 18 percent. But the real story about the youth vote is not how many "new" voters Obama got to show up. It's how he produced a gargantuan 25% swing among existing young voters, or those who were sure to vote for the first time anyway.

How big?

18 percent times a 25 percent increase in the Democratic margin equals 4.5 points, or a majority of Obama's popular vote margin. Had the Democratic 18-29 vote stayed the same as 2004's already impressive percentage, Obama would have won by about 2 points, and would not have won 73 electoral votes from Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, or Indiana.
So, to clarify here: Obama's youth margin = 73 electoral votes. Without the economic crisis, this would have been the difference.

But McCain didn't get elected.

One thing that is very noteworthy: Obama got 43% of the white vote, which is a higher percentage than Kerry or Gore got, and about even with what Bill Clinton got in 1996.

But you assume people are Republicans solely so they can pick on minorities. I'm a Republican because I'm for conservative politics. I'm for less government, less taxes, etc. That's not what Bush was about (I'm no fan of his either) and he's ruined so-called conservatism for a generation of youth (see the latest campaign for evidence of that). While I am a Christian, I'm also for loving your neighbor and your enemies. Believe it or not, they are one - not the divisiveness you see on TV or in the media, nor am I "cramming" Christianity down anyone's throat (God forbid I live to my convictions, right?). I'm just so sick and tired of being called an intolerant, cheating, racist because I have a moral response to what others deem a social issue. We agree to disagree, that's fine, but that doesn't make me some kind of brainwashed Luddite because I believe what I believe.

Bottom line - quit painting people with a broad brush as you have accused others.

Obama was considering who will be on his transition team long before Tuesday's election declared him the nation's leader, and several Republicans were on the short list.
Obama is thinking about bringing GOP Sens. Chuck Hagel and Dick Lugar on board, according to sources close to the president-elect.
Hagel, R-Nebraska, is a Vietnam War veteran and fierce critic of the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war.
Lugar, R-Indiana, is minority leader of the Foreign Relations Committee and worked with Obama last year to expand a program aimed at destroying weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union.
Also, the sources say Obama is considering adding Robert Gates -- Bush's defense secretary -- to his national security team.

No. I don't. I said I won't go back to the GOP, or want them to win in any election, until they attempt to purge that element of their party.


No problem with that. That's the kind of thing I said the party should get back to.


You don't have to like what anybody does, but the difference is when you think the power of the government should be used to stop something that you simply do not like, or enforce a belief based primarily on your religion.


I did no such thing. I can only assume you did not see the series of posts I made about these same points, because I specifically said the party needs to get out of religion and back to business. You must have seen my response to Jon, and not my post that he responded to. He was telling me that asking the GOP to get back to real business and out of attacks on minorities and the spreading of Christianity was like asking him to ""abandon the things that are most important to you & come work on the things most important to someone else."

so to Jon then, attacks on minorities & the spreading of Christianity are the things that are most important to him?

just want to clarify that (not that it surprises me tbh)

Looks like Putin will return to office in 2009 and hold the office for another 12 years. Scary stuff. Obama's going to have a handful on this front...........

FOXNews.com - Speculation Grows Over Vladimir Putin's Return as Russian President - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News

Putin's already the de facto President. This would just make official what's merely unofficial right now. So no change, basically.

I've been keeping an eye on the Minnesota SOS Election Results page. Coleman's lead over Franken is now down to 342.

That's one of the main reasons why I did not vote for McCain. If McCain had died in office we would then have had a person who can't wait for the world to end (The Rapture) in Sarah Palin, not a risk I was willing to take. I'll keep my post apocalypse curriosity to Fallout 3.

I believe that's his description of voters who have conservative social values.
I guess that's the new "Godless hell bound Dems".

On the way to work this morning, I heard of a number of options that might result from this, ranging from the automatic recount to court cases for each of them (and they spoke about that getting appealed to the State Supreme Court, which has judges primarily appointed by R's, but eventually could go to the US Senate which apparently has the ultimate judgment on the elections) to even calling for a new election. They referenced that option having been used back in '74 and it took roughly 10 months to get the senate seat filled. Pretty nutty stuff.

(sorry for the lack of detail, I only remembered bits and pieces)

Hey, I went out of town. Did I miss your admittance of being wrong when it came to the polling data pre-election and how it was borne out? Has it been admitted that the GOP we're lying to the public about McCain's feelings about Palin leading up to the final month of the election?

Cameron went much further in his report to O'Reilly commenting on the horror of the McCain staff as they became aware of her level of ignorance, particularly of the structure of federal government, the responsibilities of various appointments and the general workings of Washington, even before the convention.

She comes across as a very small-town American with virtually no knowledge of anything outside of her own immediate environment, an unwillingness to learn and a violent reaction to criticism (which confirms the Alaskan Republican's description of her as very insecure). The Couric interview, her refusal to prepare for it and her reducing to tears some of McCain's staff with her rants when she saw the media reports, illustrate all three.

I originally said of Palin that she is full of bullshit but that implies a deliberate deceit. I've changed my mind on that, I don't think she's that clever. What I took to be bullshit is in fact what we call 'waffle", excessive speech that hides a lack of knowledge - she talks on and talks on hoping you won't notice she doesn't know what she's talking about.

I simply can't understand why so many of you can't see through her. She is one of those personalities that is initially superficially appealing but turns out to be shallow and untrustworthy and I think a significant proportion of the electorate eventually came to that conclusion. That McCain should pick her as his running mate, knowing that there was a reasonable possibility that she might have to replace him as president, destroyed his "nation first" appeal and was reason enough not to vote for him. If the Republican party takes her up as a candidate next time then I have to agree with JIMGA that politics has indeed descended into a level of mediocrity that is frightening.

:D

Whenever I heard/watched Palin speak, she reminded me of classmates in high school or college who hadn't done their homework and so were completely unprepared to answer questions from the teacher/professor. They'd waffle, insert superfluous words, and hope to hit enough relevant notes to get the questioner to move on (and away from them).

Just a minor anecdote after the fact
The election was historic, but the turnout was not | [email protected]

[i]Georgians registered to vote in droves this year, but not even a presidential election for the history books was enough to bring them all out to the polls.

The raw number of voters rose dramatically, but a higher percentage of registered voters cast ballots in 2004 than in 2008, an election that was expected to draw more interest than any in decades. ... Hundreds of thousands of new voters registered this year, but judging by turnout numbers, many of them didn't show up.

"As easy as it is to get registered, people register and have no intention of voting," said Kristi Royston, director of the Barrow County Board of Elections and Registration.

About 3.9 million Georgians voted in this year's general election, up from 3.3 million in 2004. But turnout declined from 77 percent in 2004 to 74 percent 2008.
...
Around the region, elections officials reported early lines at many precincts, but crowds slowed to a trickle by mid-morning and did not pick up again until late afternoon, if at all. More than half Georgia voters - about 2 million - took advantage of the 45-day early voting period instead of voting Tuesday. ... [i]

I really think next time around they should make it nationally a week to vote.. and I'd also like the tradition of "dead silence" from the campaigns while they vote to continue, but I doubt THAT part will ever happene again

I really feel election day should be moved to a Saturday, so there's no issues with people having to take time off work (well, less issues, maybe).

I'd happily be for a longer voting period (a week?) except for the fact that there's no way to enforce a blackout on polling, even exit polling. Well, without being draconian at least, and even then there'll be some stuff on the internet. We already have problems enough with people on the West Coast deciding not to bother because the Presidential Election has already been called (or is about to be called).

But I think the most annoying problem of all is that it's effectively a 2-year campaign.

Yep, that'll work well. And turnout drops in every major college football town in the country.


Unrelated but related anecdote from small town politics I heard about today. Candidate borrowed $40k to use for her campaign ... for a magistrate judge's job in a county of 10k that pays about $20k per year. She lost by a margin of over 3-1, 3000+ to 1000+ votes.

Early voting seemed like a huge success this year and was well consumed in every state that offered it. Lets pick the state that has the best setup and make that federal law.

Cool. A "one-size-fits-all" solution. If it was a "huge success" at the various states level, then leave it alone. Why the fuck should it be turned over and mandated by Washington DC?

The fact that the McCain camp was SOOOOOOOOOOO unhappy with her, and her qualifications to be VP and add to the ticket....

while at the same time lying through their teeth to the American Public is amazing. Not shocking since it's what was suspected when they talked about it but nonetheless shocking in it's reveal.

Flasch, it's ok, you can turn it off now. Really.

my wife agrees w/ u bucc.

I think a week is excessive, but a 24 hour voting "day" ought to be doable. Open the polls at 4pm California time on Monday, close at 7pm New York time on Tuesday.

Do you literally mean 24 hours non-stop in each location? The reason I ask is because I'm wondering where you draw the line?

Presidential years only? All elections? All elections with a Federal office involved (i.e. every two years)? Some other criteria?

And the reason I ask that is because over the past decade or so there's already been problems in many areas with finding an adequate number of qualified (and willing) poll workers for the 12 hour cycle we have. I can only imagine trying to double that number. And even moreso trying to double that number for some elections where the turnout is in single digits due to overwhelming lack of interest far more than any sort of ease of voting issue.

Because it is a good thing and something like 20 states haven't done it yet on their own.

And there i think is a flaw of libertarianism. slavery was huge success. socially i think the federal government is best because it can avoid a small minority group (or interest group as hamilton referred to them) with lots of power.

more than the federal government, small/local governments think they know how "their" people should live their lives. (didn't your city change the delay of green traffic lights because they claimed to know what their drivers were thinking going through yellows?) more than the federal government, the few in power in local governments can tell people how to live according to their beliefs. (in fresno it is against the law the annoy a lizard in a park) there is certainly more separation between church and state on the federal level than on a lot of local levels. (wasn't it a small new england government that burned women for being witches?)

i think the federal government has become evil because it tries to intrude like local governments do. i believe in the concept of our federal system, because more than the other system it has the potential to LEAVE ME ALONE. an impossibility with local gov's.

economically it's a different story. they both take too much of my money to do stupid things, and not enough to do great things.

I called it, bitches!



College football commander-in-chief?

Considering that this year Barack Obama defeated two of the great political brands in America – the Clintons and John McCain – won at least 349 electoral votes and, of course, shattered a racial barrier few thought possible, perhaps he doesn’t need any advice.

Still, Mr. President, why the heck didn’t you mention your support of a college football playoff sooner?

“I think it is about time that we had playoffs in college football,” Obama said Monday on ESPN. “I’m fed up with these computer rankings and this and that and the other. Get eight teams – the top eight teams right at the end. You got a playoff. Decide on a national champion.”

Now, you’re obviously a shrewd and intelligent politician. Not revealing this until the eve of the election was a huge oversight, though.

There are few topics in America that generate such widespread support as the abolishment of the BCS. Other than four conference commissioners, few favor the current foolishness over a playoff.

The anti-BCS people are passionate, too. They have detailed plans, websites and emotional anger due to past disasters. Go ask a Southern Cal fan about 2003. They’d march on Washington if they thought it would help.

There were millions of single-issue voters available on this. College football could’ve been a game changer in some of your tougher states.

Consider Alabama. Sen. McCain defeated you 61 percent to 39 percent.

All you had to do was get your name on the ballot with a couple of on-purpose typos. Forget “Obama.” Had you’d been listed as “Go Bama,” you’d have locked up 50 percent of the vote.

The other 50 would’ve been easy. Just hold a rally at Toomer’s Corner and, in your best Bill Clinton, emote about “feeling Auburn’s pain” in 2004 when the 13-0 Tigers got shut out of the title.

Mitt Romney won the Republican primary in Utah this year by the percentage score of 95-5. This could’ve made that look like a squeaker. We’re thinking Georgia Tech over Cumberland, 222-0.

This is a true my enemy’s enemy is my friend kind of issue, too. Talk about “a new spirit of patriotism.” Joe Paterno would as soon wear white sneakers and contact lenses as vote Democrat. Appeal to his hatred of the BCS though and who knows?

Sen. McCain has always been an intelligent, principled and fair-minded man, so it stands to reason he too is anti-BCS. It’s unlikely he would’ve ceded the issue to you.

However, an attack ad could’ve featured footage of him supervising the coin toss at the Florida-Ohio State BCS debacle from January 2007. Add some haunting music, superimpose grainy head shots of Tom Hansen and Jim Delany and have a skeptical voice wonder why he was “palling around with sporting terrorists.”

All is fair in politics (and killing this horrible system), right?

Despite missing this opportunity, you won big on Tuesday. Still, 56 million people voted for Sen. McCain. The need for some kind of olive branch is needed and nothing would do the trick like extending it repeatedly across the hide of those BCS suits.

In case you didn’t notice, a lot of those red states were in the SEC and Big 12. If you end this corrupt abomination, they’ll let you drive the Sooner Schooner or play fetch with UGa VII.

The BCS is a central bureaucracy created to douse competitiveness and line the pockets of the rich and connected while defrauding the consumer of what is advertised. How American.

Testimonials are available. Southern California’s Pete Carroll on the BCS: “I think it stinks.”

Florida’s Urban Meyer: “You’ve got to blow it up.”

We could go on, from coast to coast, border to border, all creeds and school colors.

This is a non-partisan column (I declined preliminary offers to interview both candidates during the campaign since this is a place to go to get away from the election.) Now that it’s over and we know how you feel though, we’re holding you to it.

I’ll even reach across the aisle and compromise on my support of a 16-team playoff to embrace your rudimentary eight-teamer.

Look, dealing with war and rebuilding the economy, those are difficult challenges. This is simple. It could be resolved in a week. And, since you’re a politician and always eyeing the next election, it’s worth noting that delivering a playoff would go a long way toward ensuring that second term you’ve already started talking about.

Who would vote against the man who freed us from the tyranny of the BCS?

Everyone says a playoff can’t be done, that the entrenched interests are too powerful. No one even fathomed executive influence though. If Kennedy could demand a man on the moon, this should be a snap.

A suggestion for the inaugural address: “Mr. Delany, tear down this wall!”

Yes We Can.

You, my friend, are awesome.

Random election tidbit number 472,538 comes from today's Tom Taylor newsletter at radio-info.com

“Barack Obama spent massive amounts of money on radio” – but not with Radio One.

Radio division chief Barry Mayo’s clearly disappointed – not in the outcome of Tuesday’s election, perhaps, but with the spending patterns of the Democratic presidential candidate’s campaign. They’d figured that Obama would be spending more heavily with African-American stations. That money comes in through the “national” faucet, and it’s one reason national was down over 17% for Radio One in the third quarter. What's the rest of the story at Radio One, then?

I'm not actually sure what's more surprising here: that more money didn't go down that avenue or that a radio executive would be having problems figuring out that more wasn't spent with them because more wasn't needed.

Wait, the political aspect is more interesting, a clueless radio exec is increasingly par for the course.

Ill ask again.

anybody have any thoughts about the housing boom in the suburbs and the idea that many people whom in the past couldnt afford homes now could, spread the votes out in a way never seen before and thus leading to a shift in voting patterns helping change the outcome in this election as opposed to the patterns set in the past?

Sure. More diverse suburban communities played a part. But my sense is that the suburban vote was more affected by the fact that the economy, not foreign policy, was the driver of the electorate in this cycle.

Heck, I didn't even see you ask the first time ;)

I can see where that would affect the Congressional races but it shouldn't really have impacted the Presidential race any, the votes are the votes in that instance.

I don't perceive any particular advantage with regards to turnout in the primary metro suburbs (indeed, might even be more difficult depending upon the average commute time & such) so that's probably out of the mix. It might have affected the effectiveness of advertising slightly but since the majority of voters had made up their minds about the time candidates were selected that wouldn't seem likely to have shifted things.

Maybe the headache I'm fighting this morning is fuzzing my brain a little but I'm really not seeing how that would have played much of a role in the Presidential race (which is what I'm thinking you were mostly asking about).

Im not arguing either side but it dawned on me after thinking about the diversity in the neighborhoods we're selling in and a wonder if that was a new pattern that truly got into full effect during the housing boom. I'll agree that it most certainly did and will effect local elections HOWEVER it's a graduated scale downwards as unless you have a firebrand type running (McKinney / Brown) Im not sure that anyone pays more attention than the average when going down ballot to the point where you shrug and say, "never heard of 'em."

I think the population movement from places like California and the East coast to the Midwest and desert Southwest states could have an effect down the road. Those regions are having population increases as jobs dry up on the coasts, property values decline, and cost of living increases.

That may have played a role in isolated areas, but Obama simply did better than past candidates(or McCain did worse if you like). Looking through the exit polls shows that Obama outperformed in almost any category. The NYTimes map of which counties Obama or McCain outperformed in is almost all blue.

I'd argue the opposite (if I'm interpreting what you mean correctly), that the impact is heaviest at the lowest level & decreases as you move up the office chain.

GrantDawg's observation earlier about Newton County, GA for example. Not so much it, but neighboring Rockdale County was a GOP stronghold for more than a decade (closer to two decades IIRC) but as the white middle/upper middle class has moved further out the demographics have shifted & at this point it's a mixed area politically. Even the staunchest GOP strongholds in Georgia like Cobb & Gwinnett are becoming more diverse, as those more of the core GOP voters move further away from Atlanta & in turn create extremely safe voting blocks in multiple smaller counties (look at the counties surrounding Athens/Clarke County to see what I'm talking about).

It's really just a math thing when you boil it down. The smaller the political unit, the fewer relocations it takes to have an impact, so the changes are both more noticeable & have more impact at the local/county/district level than at the state or regional level.

Palin will be doing her first post-election interview with Greta Van Sustern (sp?). It'll be interesting to watch her demeanor now that the pressure is off.

Maybe Greta will ask her to name 3 nations in Africa. It isn't hard to name at least 3 of them.

Unless you're under the impression it's all one country

*rimshot*

Go ahead...and don't forget to include the name of the leader in each.

It would be very useful if he was running for VP.

I could cheat and look them up, but I will get right to the point and say that I only know the leader of one right now - al-Gaddafi in Libya. Counting Libya as a nation, let's go to Egypt and South Africa. That meets the minimum of my requirement. Given that she, reportedly, thinks Africa is one singular nation, I've bested her without even trying to get into naming the leaders. By the way, it is not a contest between her and I. It is about how much someone trying to be VP of this nation should know before they are chosen for the job.

Why stop with Egypt + South Africa? What about Niger, Chad, Nigeria, Mali, Tunisia, Algeria, Sudan, Kenya, Ethiopia, Ivory Coast, Namibia, Mozambique, Central African Republic..

Because the challenge was to name 3. Not as many as you can.

Honestly, based on the knowledge of friends of my HS senior daughter, it wouldn't surprise me if three out of four 18-year old high schoolers today probably think Africa is a country as well...and I'm sure most of them voted for Obama....

But...does Biden think Africa is a country? That would be the relevant question. Saying Palin knows as much about the world as the average high school student means we dodged a bullet earlier this week.

Has she never played Risk? :) That's where all of my geography knowledge comes from. There are, what, 7 countries in Africa?

When they are on the presidential ticket for a major political party, get back to us.

So if part of the electorate is stupid then it doesn't matter if the candidate is?

The biggest problem I have with naming African countries is when I start naming off countires that no longer exist there or changed names or whatever... What do you mean Zaire isn't a country there??? :) Way too many games with old maps of countries that get me confused!

To be honest though, I can absolutely tell you that I am far less able to name leaders of African countries than probably any other continent on the map..

Reminds me of the movie "Idiocracy" (which is a horrible movie that I don't recommend anyone watch.)

I don't see why we should stop at high school. I know plenty of pre-schoolers that can't tell Africa and South America apart. And you know those little guys are all liberals.

Yes. People want to believe that they could run for these high offices too, so voting for someone who doesn't seem to know more than them helps them feel better about their own prospects for the job.

It is just a theory and I'm not entirely serious about it, but there could be something to it.

+1 on the countries

+2 on the leaders - it's why i didn't even try - too many coups and revolts and etc. still far too unstable

YouTube - Animaniacs - Nations Of The World

Now them's fightin' words....loved that movie.

OW, My Balls!

I mainly knew most African nations by their name in Balance of Power. Yes, I'm stuck in 1987.

Hah Balance of Power. That was a sweet game. Maybe I've got those floppies around here still ...

I think I'd have said Congo/Zaire, South Africa, and Madagascar, which I believe are all from Risk.

Of course, I'm not trying to be a world leader... asking me to name countries is like asking Palin to name programming languages: not very relevant.

:+1:

I want to ride on the Time Masheen too.

It's amazing to me that people don't demand more of their presidential candidates in this regard. It's all fine and good to say you don't have to know all the countries in Africa to be a great person or even a smart person. But shouldn't there be some prep required out of people running for the position? Even a basic resume? I'm not just talking about Palin. Bush is another easy target, but there's plenty more. just because someone decides to run for the office shouldn't mean they're qualified for arguably the most powerful position in the world.

This gets me thinking, or wondering... I can think quickly of three Republican politicians who were national candidates the past several years that just came across as very "unintelligent" and had very laughable quotes in Bush, Palin and Quayle.

I try to think of equal failures on the Democrat side and have a tougher time with names. You have some definite Democrat whack-jobs like Jesse Jackson, but I never really viewed him as lacking in intelligence, just being completely insane. Most of the Democrat failures of the recent past seem to have been actually intellectuals that got way over their heads in some aspect such as Jimmy Carter or some of the late-80s Democrats.

I am sure that I just am not thinking of people.. have there been a Democrat equivalent to Bush/Quayle/Palin in the recent past that come across as just mind numbing? This actually has me curious, so please don't bombard me with the normal Democrat or Republican partisan comments, I am sure both sides have had their equal share of very bright and very ignorant individuals :)

That's because Democrats are elitist intellectuals. :)

Oh, right, you said not to say that.

I think 3 candidates in the past 30 years is not the worst thing in the world, and two were VP. It seems to me that Republicans believe more in a system than a particular candidate. They want a likable person that has a good team. Democrats want a strong individual that they feel can solve all of their problems on their own.

I am far from a political expert, though.

Zimbabwe - Robert Mugabe (although there is conflict) but probably lost election to Tshvingari (not sure how to spell it)
Egypt - Mubarak
Congo - Kabila (laurent's son, think his name is joseph??)
Libya - Qaddafi
South Africa - Mbeki

For fuck's sake, I can name five countries and their leaders off hand and I'm just a dumb farmer.

dola

oops, guess Mbeki is no longer president... as in a few months ago.

hey, ya still got 4 lungs!