Via Powerline, I see that Patrick Ruffini has returned to his blog after being the Bush-Cheney '04 webmaster. His post today is excellent reading on how the popular vote shifted in many areas that would surprise the casual observer. This map shows, on a county-by-county basis, where the President improved his popular vote showing. As Patrick writes:
While not enough to shift any states into the Bush column, President Bush’s marked improvement along the Northeast Corridor lays a strong foundation for their return, one or two elections hence, into full-fledged battleground status. This development also lays waste to the notion of evangelical “values voters” being solely responsible for the President’s popular vote margin.
The key question for the Democrats is whether they understand this point--that they cannot ascribe their electoral failure in 2004 to only a set of "values voters." They should be thinking more broadly about where they lost ground.
Patrick also links to a very informative post by Robert David Sullivan, who has devised a map of the U.S. with 10 political regions of roughly equal population. It is the best commentary on the 2004 election (based on changes since 2000) that I have seen and offers interesting suggestions about where each party might look to gain ground in the 2008 campaign.
2 comments:
For one thing, it is time to stop losing elections by running with the promise of a tax increase. The heck with deficit mongering. For another, the heck with the youth vote. Go after older households. Social Security and Medicare slicing should have been constant themes. Want to live like a Republican, vote Democratic!
It'd be great if the Democrats would nominate candidates with Elvis, ala Bill Clinton, rather than a succession of dull grey men. Mondale, Dukakis, Gore, Kerry... when will we learn?
Nominate a dynamic candidate, and more states will be in play. Top generously with a dynamic message and crisp framing, and we're in like Flynn.
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