Nov 5th, 2008 at 4:11 pm
The McCain Belt
Interesting map available on the NYT home page shows the places where McCain did better than Bush did in 2004:
You can see why John McCain’s principled stand against higher taxes on the wealthy would have a special resonance in this region. Liberals who thought race had something to do with those appeals should be ashamed of themselves.
186 Responses to “The McCain Belt”
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November 5th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Is that little white spot in the middle of Arkansas Bill’s residence?
November 5th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
You can see why John McCain’s principled stand against higher taxes on the wealthy would have a special resonance in this region. Liberals who thought race had something to do with those appeals should be ashamed of themselves.
What a strange logical leap. Race had something to do with how Southerners voted. McCain made a lot of noise about higher taxes on the wealthy. Therefore… race had something to do with that noise? What? No. Race had something to do with how Southerners voted; McCain made a lot of ineffectual noise about taxes. How does this establish any kind of linkage between the two? You might as well say, “race had something to do with McCain harping on talking to Ahmadinejad w/o preconditions, because look, he talked about it and the people who broke for McCain are racists, QED.”
November 5th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Nice map. Here’s a cool cartogram of the election:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/
November 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
Of course, the actual data says that Obama won the hardcore racost vote by 57%-41%. But far be it from me to point out actual data about who racists voted for.
Non harcore racists voted the same as non-racists.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
This is all about race. These are good ol’ boy counties unaffected mostly unaffected by growth that turned VA and NC blue. Obama, as a black man, was totally unacceptable here.
http://www.sunstateactivist.org/ssablog/
November 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
That vile red blob in Colorado must be Colorado Springs. What a dump.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Oh, God…I live in Arkansas. What an embarrassment!
November 5th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
i looked at the exit polls for whites. the large black % obscures the gains by mccain in large parts of mississipi and alabama.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Asher, you got punk’d….
November 5th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
You can understand why Alaska & Arizona got a little more red. Southern Louisiana probably got redder for demographic reasons. The rest, well…
November 5th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Redder portion looks like Appalachia.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
BTW, I think it’s pretty clear why Obama dominated the voting among hardcore racists, by 57% to 41%. Obama specifically appealed to the hardcore racist demographic – and quite effectively, I might add.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
I think Matt was being sarcastic. Apparently that was lost on some readers.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
What a strange logical leap.
–Lee Atwater, 1981
Nice to see that only a tiny fraction of the country has voters who are still falling for the “Progressive taxation is welfare! Welfare! The government will take your money and give it to black people!” nonsense.
Kind of funny there are still folks out there pretending the Southern Strategy doesn’t exist.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Yes he’s being sarcastic.
That is quite literally, the big fat gut of America. There is one reason and one reason ONLY for Republicans to do better than 2004 in ANY area:
Bill Ayers! No, wait, Rev Wright! Hmm… hold on… Hussein! Nah, maybe it was… socialism?
November 5th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Oh, look! It’s all! Al, my friend, let me welcome you back with a hearty FUCK YOU.
Redder portion looks like Appalachia.
It is Appalachia, plus some people out west who really are afraid of socialism, and some serious voter caging/intimidation.
Damn, where’s the map for where Obama did better?
max
['Just want to see.']
November 5th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Well that proves it, Lee Atwater said something 27 years ago. Clearly he must have forseen the McCain campaign. You’re all idiots. If a Republican can’t talk about taxes, what can he talk about? I’m happy to admit that race is the reason why Obama underperformed in the Deep South, but that doesn’t tell us anything about the intent or effects of McCain’s taxes talk.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
poe’s law strikes again!
November 5th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
Obama dominated the voting among hardcore racists…
This is cute, and it makes me wonder about the metrics and methodology for determining whether someone is a “hardcore” racist, a “serious” racist, a “mild” racist, or a “just slightly uncomfortable with other races, but unhappy about it” racist, or simply not racist at all.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
The map is not on the NYT home page anymore, and I can’t seem to find it. Can someone post a direct link?
November 5th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Of course these are all areas where Obama didn’t campaign. Plus, the areas devastated by Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Ike and allowed to rot by the Bush Admin.
Also, someone noticed (Andrew Sullivan?) that Obama won among all non-white-male demographics in the Southern states.
Oops, plus the redneck factor. I have a few redneck friends and relatives, they would have to work hard to vote against Palin. (Btw, a redneck is someone who celebrates the designation, it isn’t a slur.)
November 5th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Susan: Colorado Springs? No, check your geography. That’s Saguache county, population 5,917, significantly to the SW of Colorado Springs. CS is in El Paso county, which appears white on this map. How about before you call whole places “dumps,” you get your facts straight.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Permanent link. Well more than one map; well worth flipping through all 15 pieces.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/flash/politics/20081104_ELECTION_RECAP/electionChange2.swf
This is the direct link to the map. Hope it works.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
And Susan: I don’t know where this chart gets its data, but even if Saguache voted more for McCain than they did for Obama, the county still went for Obama:
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/county/#val=COP00p6
November 5th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
BTW, I also assumed that red spot in Colorado was Colorado Springs, but it isn’t- it appears to be Saguache County. Anyone have any idea why it swung so markedly?
November 5th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
What the map represents is a validation of Dr. Howard Dean. If you don’t campaign somewhere. You probably won’t be able to compete very well. How much time did Kerry spend in Indiana in 2004? And Obama outperformed Kerry by huge margins there.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
Of course those are also regions of the country that revere the military and would be inclined to support a POW war hero more than a fratboy.
Yeah, I think they’re racist, but it’s a point that should be acknowledged by the boy blogger.
As should how much Palin and her life choices mean to the hardcore pro-life.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
@Rob Mac: here is the direct link to the flash slide show:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/flash/politics/20081104_ELECTION_RECAP/electionChange2.swf
November 5th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
NS: I think I’m the only Susan here, and someone is punking me (i.e. I wasn’t the one to make the comments re. Col. Springs). The language used in that post even sounds like a guy. So I think that whoever wrote it is just being provocative.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Re American Citizen’s comment “Southern Louisiana probably got redder for demographic reasons”
————
Yep. Bush tried to drown all the Negros in New Orleans. The ones who could swim got scattered to the four winds by a FEMA “evacuation”.
That’s one hell of an “evacuation” — when you never come back.
Plus it was a neat way for Bush to prevent mass demonstrations on TV by people who had been fucked by his incompetence.
Karl Rove put Cheney into stitches in White House conferences by leaning over and whispering “FEMA Evacuation”. For variety, he switched to “Spreading Democracy”.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Note also the effects of Karl Rove’s ethnic cleansing plan for the Gulf Coast.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
Matt is being very serious. To those unfamiliar with United States geography, the red area is where all of the super rich live. They don’t like being taxed.
President Obama should just build a fence around that area and declare it a no-man’s land, like Manhattan in John Carpenter’s Escape from New York.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
Re “Of course those are also regions of the country that revere the military and would be inclined to support a POW war hero more than a fratboy.”
———-
A “POW war hero” who was a naval aviator — who did NOT serve in the Marines or Army combat units. Who came back, married his rich heiress, and never showed a sign that he gave a fuck about his fellow brothers in arms. At least John Kerry told the nation that Lyndon Johnson had his head up his ass.
A “POW war hero” who sent 4500+ soldiers to their deaths in an unnecessary war — another Vietnam.
Good thing John McCain “supports” the troops — I hate to think what he would do if he was out to fuck them.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:13 pm
This is cute, and it makes me wonder about the metrics and methodology for determining whether someone is a “hardcore” racist, a “serious” racist, a “mild” racist, or a “just slightly uncomfortable with other races, but unhappy about it” racist, or simply not racist at all.
As we recall from the primary campaign, according to Matthew, “racist” means someone to whom the race of the candidate was important in their vote. I now accept Matthew’s definition of “racist”.
According to the Exit Polls, with respect to voters for whom the race of the candidate was the most important factor in their vote, Obama won by 58% – 41%. That’s my definition of “hardcore racist” – someone who thinks that race was the most important factor in voting. Given Matthew’s initial definition of racism, that seems to fit extremely well.
The Exit Poll also breaks down voters for whom race was an “important factor” (regular racists), a “minor factor” (mild racists), and voters for whom race was not a factor (non-racists). As I noted above, regular racists and mild racists voted approximately the same as non-racists.
Accordingly, the only group that Obama really, really appealed to was the hardcore racists.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Since Matt assured us just a few days ago that “the rich vote Republican,” what this map shows is that rich people are overwhelmingly concentrated in the south, and are very thin on the ground in the northeast and California.
Er, wait….
November 5th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Matt, it’s not race or taxes. The good ol’ folk in the border states just can’t help themselves when they have a chance to vote for a blue blood francophile surrender monkey.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
Actually, this map agrees with a map of the Upland South.
African Americans never really settled in these areas in any heavy quantity, since they were never cotton-producing areas, nor did they turn into industrial areas around WWII when migrations started.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Aren’t these all areas that Obama would have had serious trouble winning regardless of what McCain’s message was?
I mean, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, West Virginia, and Oklahoma?
I wasn’t in love with the way McCain ran his campaign, but it seems like a stretch to use Appalachia’s refusal to vote for the black guy as evidence that the white guy’s tax talk was meant to appeal to racial prejudice…
I doubt the Democratic performance in that part of the country would have been much different if McCain himself had dropped out of the race and endorsed Obama.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Al
Exit polls are based upon people being willing to admit that they are racist (and that only works if a racist knows they are racist, which many don’t).
November 5th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
Aren’t these all areas that Obama would have had serious trouble winning regardless of what McCain’s message was?
I mean, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, West Virginia, and Oklahoma?
I wasn’t in love with the way McCain ran his campaign, but it seems like a stretch to use Appalachia’s refusal to vote for the black guy as evidence that the white guy’s tax talk was meant to appeal to racial prejudice…
Exactly. And to be honest, I’m not sure Hillary could have pulled it off, either (well, maybe Arkansas- but even then, we’re talking Hillary, not Bill. It would have been a tough one).
November 5th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
That’s my definition of “hardcore racist” – someone who thinks that race was the most important factor in voting.
I don’t care if that’s Matthew’s definition, it’s still a really stupid one. Can you really not see the difference between a black person voting for Obama because of race, and a white person voting for McCain because of race? Maybe if there had been 43 black presidents and zero white presidents, then there would be non-racist reasons for the white guy to vote for McCain, based on race — just like in our universe, where there have been 43 white presidents and zero black ones, it’s not necessarily racist to vote for Obama on racial grounds,
I’m not defending that line of thought — I think there are much better reasons for voting one way or another than race. For me, race was a very, very small point in Obama’s favor.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Ah, the old “only white people can be racists”…
November 5th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
Since Matt assured us just a few days ago that “the rich vote Republican,” what this map shows is that rich people are overwhelmingly concentrated in the south
Mixner
God, I don’t have the time it would take to unwind the logical errors in that, but they’re there.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Aren’t these all areas that Obama would have had serious trouble winning regardless of what McCain’s message was?
Sure, but that doesn’t explain them becoming more pro-Republican than they were four years ago. Lots of other areas that would normally be difficult for a generic Democrat to win got more favorable to the Democrat this year- given everything else in the last four years, you’d expect at least a mild pro-Democrat shift even if the Democrat doesn’t win. That’s what happened in Utah, for example- very, very conservative, very pro-Bush in 2000 and 2004, and voted overall for McCain, and yet (acc. to the NYT data) shifted blue this year- was less for McCain than for Bush. So the question is why did this red region buck the trend and become more pro-(R), not why did Obama lose this region?
I don’t think the ‘they like the military’ theory carries much water (else they would have been fairly pro-Kerry); I don’t think Palin explains it (if it were that, CO and UT would have held steady); the 9th most powerful man in America says it isn’t racism
… so I’m left without theories.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Ah, the old “only white people can be racists”…
OK, if that’s really what you think I just said, I give up.
On the off chance you were being sincere: no, of course black people can be racists. They can be racist the same way white people can: if they hate people of other races and think they’re inferior. Voting for a black candidate out of racial solidarity doesn’t mean they’re racist, because it doesn’t mean they think white people are evil/inferior. A white guy voting for a white candidate out of racial solidarity … well, he might not be racist, either, but I can’t quite think of a non-racist explanation.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:33 pm
What the hell happened in MS? Only the north east hills show a surge. I’m guessing that either 1) the Negroes have taken over most of the State, or 2) most MS counties were already so far in the bag for the GOP, they had reached saturation… there was no “more” there.
I’m guessing saturation. One more heavy election, and there’ll be a flash flood of white folk down the River.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
I think we need to overlay this map with one showing where Budweiser is the preferred beer. Saguache county in Colorado is rebelling against domination by Coors.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Al isn’t being quite clear about it, for obvious reasons, but here’s what he’s arguing: Blacks who said in exit polling that they were happy to vote for a black man for president are “hardcore racists” and morally equivalent to whites who refused to vote for Obama because he’s black.
I heartily hope that Al’s argument is picked up and pushed by as many Republicans as possible. It should do wonders for their electoral success.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
Bush did a good job of increasing the Republican share of white high-school drop-outs. Seems McCain has continued the trend. This is now the Republican base, where do they build from there?
November 5th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Blacks who said in exit polling that they were happy to vote for a black man for president are “hardcore racists”
Well, people for whom the most important reason for voting for someone is race – yeah, they are hardcore racists.
There is, BTW, no breakdown of how many racist voters (hardcore or otherwise) are black and how many are white.
Let’s also recall that it was racist during the campaign to suggest that Colin Powell might be endorsing Obama because they are both black. Now you are telling me it is not racist to suggest that someone might vote for Obama because he’s black? What an odd contradiction.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Luis -
I agree with you that it’s almost certainly racism, but what I’m saying is that I don’t think that it was racism by John McCain.
I think that no matter what, that corridor was never going to vote for Obama. I just don’t buy the interpretation that McCain successfully used coded racial appeals to improve his performance in those states (which were already in the bank).
I think that McCain’s performance there improved simply by virtue of the fact that Obama is black, not by any active effort on McCain’s part to exploit the racism that already existed.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
and morally equivalent to whites who refused to vote for Obama because he’s black.
Oh, and also, there are no moral arguments in my comments whatsoever.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Let’s say that racism is the working hypothesis for what’s going on here. Are Arkansas and Tennessee really _that_ much more racist than the rural counties of Virginia, Indiana, North Carolina, etc.? AR and TN look disproportionately red.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Hey, looka there, in the lower left corner of Pennsylvania – it’s John Murtha’s district!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania’s_12th_congressional_district
Seriously people. I’m from western PA, and I never particularly liked Jack Murtha, but when he made that gaffe about Obama not running well in his district because of redneckism and racism, it was a straight-up Kinsley-defined gaffe: an accidental telling of the truth. He shouldn’t have said it, but I liked him better for it – I did not think he had that in him. By no means is everyone there like that, but enough people are to make this map. If you look at this map and don’t see the aftereffects of racial attitudes, you are willfully blinding yourself.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Matt: ah… I see what you mean. It’s really hard to say, of course. I’d tend to say that the screaming about socialism late in the campaign triggered the latent racism; see, e.g., Karen Stenner’s ‘Authoritarian Dynamic’ for research into this phenomenon.
November 5th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Sorry, the blog software mangled the link to Murth’s district map:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania%27s_12th_congressional_district
November 5th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
FlipYrWhig: it’d be interesting to control this data for AA population/turnout and other demographic shifts. The history and demographics of Appalachia v. the piedmont of the Carolinas is a long and complicated one; someone more expert than I should weigh in.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
This map looks identical to the areas where Hill did better than Obama.
Who knew Hill and McSame were such similar candidates?
November 5th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
I’ve been in that region before but on my summer tour to the west this year, motorcycle from Michigan, I had to detour to Eastern OK, so I went right through the heart of the Bible Belt. From the southern tip of IN across KY and AK there is a palpable feeling one gets about how this Christian identity is almost everything there. Two things stand out. It’s poor and the newest and nicest building in town is the Baptist church.
I stay on the state highways and every town was the same in this regard. I kept getting the sense that the churches were the best business in town.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
“Oh, and also, there are no moral arguments in my comments whatsoever.”
Ah, I see. You’re just playing semantic games. Any error that a reader makes by ascribing moral content to an accusation of “hardcore racism” is strictly the fault of the reader.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
Most American racists are black. Everyone knows that. Al’s just reminding us.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
As someone living in the belly of this beast [albeit the blue island in the middle of it], I’d say that this is the result of a combination of factors. First, as has already been pointed out, Obama effectively conceded much of this territory [He only touched down in TN once in the past year, and that was for the Nashville debate]. Another, and I suspect far more potent, factor is religious; Palin energized the Religious Right, and a complilation of exit-polling data by *Christianity Today* [HT Sarah Posner] shows that southern evangelicals were more solidly Republican than evangelicals elsewhere. White racism is most certainly a factor, but that’s really reductionist [and Matt's glibness in automatically trotting it out has less to do with analysis than with knee-jerk liberal self-congratulation]. White southerners continue to vote according to cultural politics, and a campaign that made exploitation of the resentments of native-born, rural and small-town whites vitually its only raison-d’etre bore poisonous fruit with this pattern. Much as we might hate him, George Bush always ran more inclusive campaigns. A lot of those resentments are bound up [often quite subtly] with race–but they go a lot deeper. That, I’m sure, can scarcely matter to you guys, but it matters to me, because I know [and like] a lot of the people who live in these places. They’re suffering the consequences of Republican misrule as much as anyone, but keep getting blinded by these cultural appeals–appeals that get reinforced by the sorts of cheap shots epitomized by this post.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
Damn, where’s the map for where Obama did better?
Everywhere that’s white on this map. He did particularly better in Indiana, but everywhere else is a reasonably deep blue, iirc.
Beyond that, in Mississippi about one third of the electorate is Black. While McCain did somewhat better with the white vote in Mississippi than Bush (He got 88%, whereas Bush got 85%), Obama made massive gains in the Black vote – Kerry got 90%, and Obama got an astonishing 98% of the Black vote in Mississippi. Thus, basically, Kerry’s share of the white vote there was so terrible that there wasn’t much room for improvement for McCain there. Whereas Obama made significant gains on Kerry’s share of the black vote. So Mississippi was considerably more Democratic this year than in 2004. Bush won the state by 20, whereas McCain only won it by 14.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
This map can put to rest the notion that white people in general are a problem. It’s pretty close to a duplicate of a map showing where people with Scotch-Irish ancestry predominate (other than the obvious AZ/AK area). Apparently we have a very specific ethnic problem, not a race problem.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
I wasn’t in love with the way McCain ran his campaign, but it seems like a stretch to use Appalachia’s refusal to vote for the black guy as evidence that the white guy’s tax talk was meant to appeal to racial prejudice…
Wow, I can’t believe how many of y’all are reading waaay too much into Matt’s statement. He wasn’t drawing a correlation between taxes and race, folks — he was snarkily pointing out that the areas in question aren’t particularly wealthy, and therefore it wasn’t McCain’s crowing about taxing the upper crust that appealed to these voters. Rather, he believes it was racism that was the decisive factor.
Really, is it that hard? I think MY left his best commenters over on the Atlantic.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Pretty sure the Saguache County Colorado result on this map is an error. The county went to Obama 62.5% vs 56.9% for Kerry according to the interactive NY Times map. Has been a pretty reliably Democratic place over the years (very poor and quite Hispanic) so it’s too bad to see them get a bad rap like that.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Re Says You’s comment “Who knew Hill and McSame were such similar candidates?”
———-
Er..see
http://www.extrememortman.com/john-mccain/stoli-talk-express
(Scroll down to the photo — then read about the vodka drinking sessions )
November 5th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
1st off…someone went crazy with a red marker all over Arkansas and Oklahoma(where I’m at when not in college)…kinda sad as a black guy in that area.
But, as people pointed out it is too reductionist too simply
point out race as a factor. Case in point: Bobby Jindal. Louisiana is a nice red shade, but they’ve got a Gov. of Indian descent. In my estimation, I feel it’s culture and religion that play bigger roles. If you’ve got a candidate of any color that can talk the talk, you’re going to see improvements over Obama, probably. Obama just didn’t speak to the pro-NRA, anti-abortion, etc. sentiment that you need for the South.
Oh, and one other thing, please progressives out there, we gotta acknowledge that this country has come SO FAR in race relations and taken leaps ahead in a few decades. Esp. in terms of youth attitudes. I feel like we’re way to eager to bash our Southern fellow citzens with a steadily shrinking club.
November 5th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Ginger Joe -
You can see why John McCain’s principled stand against higher taxes on the wealthy would have a special resonance in this region. Liberals who thought race had something to do with those appeals should be ashamed of themselves.
That is clearly drawing a correlation between taxes and race – I’m pretty sure that MattY is saying that an appeal to racial prejudice did in fact have something to do with McCain’s stand against higher taxes.
Maybe it did – but this map isn’t very strong evidence of that proposition, in my opinion.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Remember this map? Where Clinton won with >65% of the vote in the Dem primary:
http://images.dailykos.com/images/user/899/Clinton65.png
What a coincidence!!
November 5th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
70,
Uh, do you compeletely not understand snark and sarcasm?
Let em try and explain. People argue that there are racists who vote for McCain, McCain defedners say no they vote for him for other reasons such as taxes. Matt pointed out the dark red areas that voted for McCain in higher % than Bush, and then is sarcastically saying it must be the message on taxes while clearly implying that taxes had nothing to do with it. What is different about McCain vs Obama as opposed to Bush vs Kerry that would drive these counties even further into the Rep column?
November 5th, 2008 at 7:19 pm
This region can also be defined as the “noodler” belt.
http://www.catfishgrabblers.com/slideshow.htm
November 5th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Al, let’s look at who African Americans have voted for in the past.
2004 – Kerry. White guy.
2000 – Gore. White guy.
1996 – Clinton. White guy.
1992 – Clinton. White guy.
1988 – Dukakis. White guy.
1984 – Mondale. White guy.
1980 – Carter. White guy.
I could go on and on. The record shows that African Americans love voting for whitey. They almost never vote for black guys in presidential elections. I’m pretty sure that means they aren’t racist.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Also, Al, you remain a moral shitstain, and STFU.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
eric k -
I understand snark and sarcasm. I think you’re missing the point of the argument.
MattY says that liberals should be ashamed of themselves for suggesting that embedded within McCain’s message on taxes was a coded appeal to racism.
He’s being sarcastic and snarky – he’s really saying that liberals shouldn’t be ashamed at all; they were spot on in this assessment – McCain’s tax talk really was a cover for some sort of appeal to racial prejudice. He offers this map as evidence of it.
As I said above (52) – I agree that white racists probably supported McCain in greater numbers than they supported Bush – and that’s the point that’s been more or less proven by this map.
I do not agree that their stronger support resulted from anything McCain said or did – it resulted from the simple fact that Obama is black.
My opinion is that these people were never going to vote for Obama no matter what was said about him, and, for the most part, they live in states that were solidly McCain. McCain had no incentive to appeal to their prejudices.
The fact that McCain’s support in these areas rose, relative to Bush’s in 2004, is, in my view, confirmation of the region’s pre-existing racism, not the candidate’s desire to exploit racism.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
Any ideas out there as to why Alabama is almost completely excluded from this trend? It looks wierd.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:37 pm
Accordingly, the only group that Obama really, really appealed to was the hardcore racists.
That explanation was every bit as amusing as I’d have hoped for. The methodology for asking whether people are “racist” (definition accepted arguendo) is asking them.
This methodology makes no account for the fact it might be more socially acceptable for a black person to positively affirm race as a factor in voting for a black man than it is for a white person to say they wouldn’t vote for a black man. Seems like a pretty basic (and obvious!) methodological flaw to me.
It’s funny, though, that a candidate that only “really, really” appealed to “black racists” pulled shy of 64 million votes. How many “black racists” are in the electorate, are we supposing?
November 5th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Northern Alabama is part of Appalachia. It is predominately white and included among the counties voting more Republican than in 2004. Southern Alabama is mostly African-American, so of course that area went more for Obama.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
While race may be an issue in this area, I think there’s something else also at play. Lay a map showing the most powerful influence of the Southern Baptist Church over this map, and I’d be willing to bet they will match up everywhere but in Louisiana.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
“You can see why John McCain’s principled stand against higher taxes on the wealthy would have a special resonance in this region.”
Um, what arguably had special resonance in this region is that John McCain is not black. But there is zero evidence in these data that McCain’s tax chatter in particular had special resonance for these folks.
November 5th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
the actual data says that Obama won the hardcore racost vote by 57%-41%.
Others have pointed out that these are fake figures, but let me just ask:
What would it say about the competence of the right’s candidate if he couldn’t carry the Klan while running against a black man?
November 5th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
1) There is another explanation for Appalachia’s voting pattern that you open-minded liberals are overlooking: Coal.
2) Jesse Jackson campaigned in Appalachia in 1984 as part of his attempt to build a Rainbow Coalition — and he found support in parts even though he was an outsider.
3) Appalachia suffered a lot during Bill Clinton’s Administration. The bottom fell out of the Coal Business — in part due to its cyclical nature tied to the price of oil. In part due to Bill and Al’s environmental agenda.
My home county suffered 35 percent unemployment during the Clinton Boom. With no sign that anyone outside the region gave a shit.
4) That’s why Bush got strong support from the Coal Industry and he reciprocated when he gained office. The economy has been much better during Bush’s two terms.
5) The Coal Barons know that they are dead if a carbon tax is passed and so they have used all their influence to turn people against Obama and the progressives. They LIVE There — you guys don’t — so their arguments are what gets heard.
And if a coal operator fearful of bankruptcy uses racism against Obama, well that’s just another hammer in the toolkit.
NOT an unchangable feature of the landscape. If some Baptist preachers blast the godless Obama, it’s because they know who’s putting the big donations in the collection plate.
6) Dirty politics? Sure. But before you judge, try living through an economic collapse — in which large numbers of friends and neighbors lose their homes and their life savings.
7) That red streak on Matthew’s map is from Al Gore and Bill Clinton wiping their behinds on Appalachia in the 1990s.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
The week before election day, people in Appalachia were hearing that this is Obama’s position on the coal industry:
http://www.tricities.com/tri/news/local/article/palin_unleashes_new_attack_against_obama_on_coal/15852/
—————-
“(MARIETTA, OHIO) – Seizing on a newly released audio tape picked up by the Drudge Report, Sarah Palin took the opportunity here in coal country to accuse Barack Obama of “talking about bankrupting the coal industry.”
“He said that, sure, if the industry wants to build coal-fired power plants, then they can go ahead and try, he says, but they can do it only in a way that will bankrupt the coal industry, and he’s comfortable letting that happen,” Palin said. “And you got to listen to the tape.”
The audiotape Palin was referring to was recorded by the San Francisco Chronicle in a Jan. 17 interview.
“Why is the audiotape just now surfacing?” Palin asked, leading someone in the crowd to shout, “Liberal media!”
“This interview was given to San Francisco folks many, many months ago,” Palin said. “You should have known about this, so that you would have better decision-making information as you go into the voting booth.”
November 5th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
I canvassed SE Ohio for Obama. The locals understood exactly what “redistribution,” as used by McCain, meant. And it didn’t mean their taxes were going to be lower.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Among the darkest red areas of that map is a cluster of counties in east Kentucky where my mother’s people have been since the first half of the nineteenth century.
My 3rd great-grandfather George Martin – who spent his whole life there – served in the Union infantry. Another 3rd great-grandfather John HD Holliday – who also spent his whole life there – served in the 14th Kentucky Cavalry, Union Army. His wife Ara Ary Begley – the daughter of a Democratic politician – was a spy for the Union; she rode a hundred miles on horseback to warn the Union Army about the presence of a Confederate unit in Perry County. These aren’t unusual stories.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
aw, asher et al. Me too, once or twice. Matt’s sarcasm is to be savored.
the wealth in Appalachia is so appalling. All those native Anglo/Scotch/Irish from long lineages of pioneer stock (like me) have accrued vast wealth in Trust. So much they trust no one…esp. ’strangers’ in furrin cars, and darkies resenting their vast wealth.
don williams is more thoughtful. I think Obama should do a lot visiting there and come up with stimulus packages for the region. As FDR did which had gratified huge paybacks for FDR’s landslide wins. Go to the where the opponents hunker down and surprise ‘em, Obama. (a visit to Alaska wouldn’t be a bad idea either.)
I don’t think Matt overthought this to the point that any sort of leap between tax policy and demographics of hard core McCain votes are involved. Obama might have just been too much for these locales to handle. And likewise, not enough African-Americans to counter their (white) votes. Just an anomoly except for the states they are in.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
I would add that if you look at the numbers you have to conclude that some of the people who voted for Barack Obama in California also voted for Proposition 8.
Mr. Obama did not even so much as mention it let alone speak out against it.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
I don’t have the time to look it up, but I can almost guarantee you that he mentioned it at least in one instance.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
Re Linus’s comment: “These [family histories of service in the Union Army] aren’t unusual stories.”
I concur. My family has been in the eastern Kentucky region since 1810. My great-great-great-grandfather, Achilles Williams, had two nephews who served in the Union Army. Including the Union raid into southwest Virginia to destroy the Confederacy’s salt mines at Saltville.
Sometimes what’s perceived as racism is protection of turf — just as I would get my white ass whipped if I walked into certain areas of Philly without a black friend. There’s also a tradition of distrust for outsiders from strikebreakers bought in during the union wars and from the screwing the region received from outside capitalists.
Finally, I think some men who serve time in prison pick up a racist viewpoint from the gangs — and spread it when they return to their communities.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Back in June, someone (maybe TPM) had a map that showed counties where Hillary got 60%+ against Obama in the primaries. That map looked almost exactly like this one. The band across the South and up into PA is roughly Appalachia. While it is true that Obama carried more of the vote among persons for whom “race was important” there seems to be a hard core anti-black vote that is geographically prominent in the red states.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
Don Williams, I definitely appreciate your insight; none of us can really supply your kind of experience I bet. I grew up in Oklahoma and Texas, which are pretty much the Camelots’ of Big Oil…so your post definitely got me thinking about the consequences of “green” energy having similar harsh effects on those economies. An ill planned transition that only values environmental goals would do no service to the people that livelihood’s depend on the fossil fuel biz. Texas, is no doubt more diverse in its economy w/ more sectors like a IT and finance.
So true…the hold of the SBC on Southern states has been there for yrs. However, youth are chipping away at it a little. It’s a key diff. other than race, because say, Iowa or Wisconsin are quite white, but do you see SBCs every few miles?
McCain was miles behind Huckabee in direct faith appeals to this group (Palin in between or ahead of Huck) and still…
November 5th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
too many steves: A white guy voting for a white candidate out of racial solidarity … well, he might not be racist, either, but I can’t quite think of a non-racist explanation.
Translation: Racial solidarity: great if you are non-white, evil if you are white.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
Susan Says:
November 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
That vile red blob in Colorado must be Colorado Springs. What a dump.
It is Saguache county and there be untapped oil and natural gas there. The county has high poverty rates, I would guess they wanted McCain to push for drilling there.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Uh Matt, Matt Y is saying exactly what you are, you really aren’t getting it.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
of course there is nothung racial about obama getting 95% of black people voting for him, because we all know how easy it is to get 95% of people to agree on everything. listen ,there are people that didn’t vote for obama because he is black, there are people who voted for obama because he is black. neither is a very good reason.
November 5th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
I noted this elsewhere, but there are actually two distinct cultural regions in Appalachia: (1) a northeast part centered around Pittsburgh that goes up to parts of New York, down through most of West Virginia, and takes in bits of Ohio and Maryland; and (2) a southwest part centered around Knoxville, Tennessee, that picks up at the bottom of West Virginia and goes down through parts of Kentucky, Virginia, and Alabama. If you want a graphic demonstration of the difference, just try to tell someone from Western PA he has the same culture as the people in Eastern Kentucky, or for that matter vice-versa.
This is important to note because if you look at this map, although Obama didn’t do great in northeast Appalachia, it wasn’t until he got to southwest Appalachia that the bottom fell out. To me that suggests it is an oversimplification to call this a purely racial issue, because clearly some other nuances of culture are making a difference.
November 5th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Why did Mississipi, Alabama, and South Carolina buck this trend? Because whites in those states ALREADY voted nearly universally Republican in pres. elections(in MS, the number was close to 90%!).
One thing Yankees don’t understand is that for years white Southerners have been more likely to be Republican as their states have high proportions of black residents. So the “Deep” or “Lowland” south has virtually no room to become more Republican, as the black population is highest there and whites almost always vote Republican in national contests.
What you see in this election are whites in states with smaller black populations, but similar socio-economic problems as the Deep South, suddenly voting more like whites in those Deep South states. States likes NC and VA have smaller % of populations that are black–so whites are less Republican in general, but more importantly, those states are full of Yankees!
November 5th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
it never never never ceases to amaze me, the sheer number of unintelligent, unthoughtful people who think of racism in America as a symmetrical set of possible attitudes: people who sincerely believe that black folks can be, and are, racist against white folks, in the same way as vice versa.
here’s a clue: members of one set of people enslaved the other set, who were, as a group, immiserated for generations, unto the present day, as a result of a vast set of decisions.
racism refers to a history of systemic relations. it’s not just about attitudes.
how can any of the ignorant fools who post here on race not understand this? it’s not rocket science…..
white guys who cry racism: is there any more pathetic set of motherfuckers out there?
November 5th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Oh, and it takes a special sort of a–hole to call black parents “racists” for being happy that when they tell their kids they can be anything they want, those parents can now point to a picture of Barack Obama as proof.
November 5th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Re: But before you judge, try living through an economic collapse — in which large numbers of friends and neighbors lose their homes and their life savings.
See: Michigan. To be sure. I don’t live now and haven’t since 99– got out before the bottom fell out– but I’m back often enough to know what collapse in slow motion looks like.
And yet– even though Obama’s putative green agenda ought threaten the moribund auto industry as much as the coal industry, Michigan still gave him a double digit margin.
November 5th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
What was it in Virginia? 96 percent of black people voted for Obama? Yeah.. that has nothing to do with race, does it?
November 5th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
What are the literacy rates in the McCain belt?
November 5th, 2008 at 10:14 pm
It looks like quite a few of these voters live in Appalachia. The way these voters reacted you would almost think Obama had threatened to bankrupt the entire coal industry or something in a question and answer session with some left coast newspaper like the San Francisco Chronicle. Since nothing like that happened I think it is much easier to jump to the conclusion of racism. (Logic died a slow, agonizing death. Those left to witness it weren’t even sure what they were watching but reports are democrats neverwho never recognized the south with his Messianic campaign. No loss considering most southerners already worship one Messiah.)
November 5th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
Before the website decided to butcher my entry the last part actually read: “Those left to witness it weren’t even sure what they were watching and reports are that democrats never recognized it in the first place. Kind of like their candidate never recognized the south with his Messianic campaign. No loss considering most southerners already worship one Messiah.”
November 5th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Hey Nick, Webster has this to say on racism:Main Entry: rac·ism
Pronunciation: \ˈrā-ˌsi-zəm also -ˌshi-\
Function: noun
Date: 1933
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2 : racial prejudice or discrimination ………Odd I don’t see a damn thing about ’systemic’ anything. I guess it’s fun to make up your own definitions and then call those who don’t have a copy of the ‘Nick’-tionary ‘ignorant fools’ but it truly doesn’t make you superior in your thinking nor your logic. So…BUGGER OFF!!
November 5th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
#94, (and others)
the deep red Sagauche blob in Colorado, in the Yglesia graphic caught my eye also.
but when I go to the NYT map, it shows all Colorado counties in
shades of blue, even El Paso County (Dem from 32% to 40%!)
Even KS to the east shows a surprising amount of blue-tinged
counties (Eastern CO, and Western KS are quite similar)
November 5th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
Interesting. I live in the area, on Signal Mountain near Chattanooga, and my mother’s side of the family has lived in these parts for many generations. My take: these areas have relatively few African-Americans, while the whites tend to be independent, traditional, but low information. Because there have been so few blacks, there has been very little real racism in the past: slavery, lynchings, etc., were rare, and pro-Union sentiments were strong. OTH, black-white inter-racial marriage might be statistically more common than in a lot of other areas. The schools are more racially integrated than in almost any other area of the country.
I think Ignorance of Obama was probably more important than the color of his skin: he had an obvious Muslim name, two Muslim fathers, went to grammar school in a Muslim country, etc.., If that is all you know about him, and you think we are in a war with Islamic extremism (military service is another big part of the local tradition) then not voting for the guy is not hard to understand, especially if his opponent is Scotts-Irish, which is something you do understand. Irrational? Based on the limited information at their disposal, not really. Racist? Even less so.
November 5th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
This thread is really going downhill. I think it’s the view of a small, irritated contingent that Obama got elected by racists, but just in case … We all know that the history of America and voting is not equal between white and black. This leads to behaviors that aren’t equal, so you can’t draw simplistic equalities:
1. The average black voter has voted for white politicians before, because there are so many of them (like previous major-party Presidential candidates). If he or she votes for Obama in part because he’s black, that does not mean he or she refuses to vote for white people. That isn’t racism.
2. There are non-black voters – not many, perhaps – who will refuse to vote for a black candidate in part because he is black. That’s racism.
November 5th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
No Ben, that is called prejudice. And if a black guy is given the same chance of voting for a black candidate and a white candidate and chooses one because he is black it’s called prejudice.
The same way if a white guy chooses a white candidate over a black simply because he is white.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
I live in this area of the country. Blount County in East Tennessee gave 68% to Bush in 2004 and 69% to McCain. Not much of a change. But other counties in the Cumberland Plateau area of Tennessee went much harder to the GOP.
The reason is mostly – but not entirely – race. And pure ignorance. But also that Obama never visited this part of the country. As a result, a lot of deeply ignorant people could let some fundamentally idiotic misconceptions of Obama (a Muslim, etc.) fester. The local media never had a chance to cover him so voters across WV, KY, TN, AR and OK never heard their own trusted sources describe Obama in reasonable terms.
This is arguably the least educated swath of America – particularly white America. But notice that Obama did just fine over in North Carolina. I visited some rural counties in western NC and spoke to lots of folks in humble houses. They were enthusiastic about Obama and had read about him in the local press when he visited Asheville. The ads on TV all the time there helped ease the anxiety poor white voters had about Obama.
In Tennessee we got no Obama ads. The caricature festered here because Obama never came by to challenge it.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Those (JonF and others) who identified these counties with Scots-Irish are absolutely correct. It’s not “poor white racists,” it’s a much more specifically identifiable ethnocultural group.
Note that the map displays places that went more Republican than 2004. The 17th-C. Scots-Irish immigrants (for whose descendants Nate Silver and others have accounted by looking at census reports where they self-designate, ethnically, as “American,” no hyphen or modifier) migrated west through Tennessee and Arkansas toward Oklahoma and east Texas after they populated/colonized the Appalachian mountains. In coal country, unlike in the further reaches of their diaspora, they were heavily unionized early in the 20th C. and became a reliable Democratic voting bloc. This effect lasted, somewhat, until this year (Kerry won counties in SW VA, eastern KY, and southern WV in ‘04). Likewise Arkansas had a lingering Dem influence because of Clinton.
Now in that NYT map we see a strongly positive “delta-GOP,” i.e. increase in the Republican vote-getting in those counties. Meaning, these folks suddenly found a reason besides the cultural conservatism, guns, evangelicalism, etc., to vote Republican in much larger numbers this year than they did in ‘04 or ‘00 or before. (Those cultural factors have been present for at least 20 years now.)
This doesn’t prove, but it is unpleasantly (for me) consistent with the notion that the main difference this time around is that the Democratic candidate was black.
Lastly, I’ll just note that these are the same people of whom Jim Webb, bless his heart, has said: “The greatest realignment in modern politics would take place rather quickly if the right national leader found a way to bring the Scots-Irish and African-Americans to the same table, and so to redefine a formula that has consciously set them apart for the past two centuries.”
I still think he’s right – and I’m afraid we’d better not hold our breath.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Luke Lea,
I agree with you re: generalized ignorance about Muslims. A woman at the dentist’s office just told my mother today that she thought Obama was a Muslim. My mom almost started laughing at her.
But the race issue is real here. A lot of poorer whites think the government is going to take what little they have and give it to undeserving blacks. And they think Obama will do the bidding of “welfare queens.”
The Scots-Irish stuff is nonsense. I love Jim Webb but essentializing about Scots-Irish traits is a fool’s errand. People are independent-minded here because the demographics have changed so little for so long. Oh, and they’ve been exploited like hell by timber and coal companies. Go up to Grundy County, TN, and you’ll see.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Re Dan’s comment “It looks like quite a few of these voters live in Appalachia. The way these voters reacted you would almost think Obama had threatened to bankrupt the entire coal industry or something in a question and answer session with some left coast newspaper like the San Francisco Chronicle. Since nothing like that happened I think it is much easier to jump to the conclusion of racism ”
—————–
1) But something like that DID happen.
2) Here is what the McCain/Palin campaign told the voters in Appalachia on MONDAY:
a) In a January interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, Obama said:
“If somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can,” Obama says on the recording. “It’s just that it will bankrupt them because they’re going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.”
2) This was the usual Republican Tactic of Lying By Omission — because they left OUT the part where Obama argued for investment in Clean Coal technology that would reduce greenhouse emissions and would allow the continued use of coal.
3) In my opinion, Sarah Palin went from Lying by Omission just into just straight lying — because she later said:
“He [Obama] said that, sure, if the industry wants to build coal-fired power plants, then they can go ahead and try, he says, but they can do it only in a way that will bankrupt the coal industry, and he’s comfortable letting that happen,” Palin said.
This was a deliberate lie –because Palin knew Obama was talking about how coal could adapt to stronger emissions standards and continue as a viable industry.
4) But it took TIME for newspapers to put out corrections and clarifications — to identify how Palin and McCain were deceiving the voters.
That could NOT be done before voting started and the corrections never reached part of the voters anyway.
THAT is why McCain and Palin held onto this story from January and released a deceitful account ONE day before the election. They KNEW there wouldn’t be time to correct their deceit. They also calculated that their lies would not be exposed because the news media would be focused on the election returns.
5) You can’t blame people whose livelihoods are at stake for acting on the lies they were being fed.
6) This incident shows that Palin is a lying bitch who doesn’t deserve any respect much less any position in national politics. Her ambitions consumes her — moral principles are something she left in the Alaskan wilderness.
But I told you that weeks ago. But instead of destroying her in the Debate, ole Joe Biden pulled the courtly Southern gentlemen schtick.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081103/pl_politico/15221_1
November 5th, 2008 at 11:29 pm
Don,
That it did happen was my point. I was using sarcasm.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
Here’s the main difference between voting for a black man out of pride, vs. voting for a white man for the same reason. In this country, anytime people have organized for “whiteness,” it has generally been in order to oppress against some other group (e.g., blacks, Jews, immigrants). However, whites have often organized around ethnicity in order to support and promote their group, and NOT to oppress anyone else. That’s why Irish Catholics voting overwhelmingly for Kennedy or Mormons for Romney aren’t considered bigoted votes against, say, Protestants. They’re voting FOR one of their own out of pride, not AGAINST someone else out of prejudice. The same is true of many blacks voting for Obama.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Why would a stance against taxes on rich people have any affect on those locations? There’s hardly any money in there.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:42 pm
While I truly find Daughter and other moral relativists amusing I also find this apologist thinking very dangerous. While your pride theory may seem valid on the surface a deeper look unravels the loose threads. Though it wouldn’t necessarily be ‘bigoted’ for Mormons to vote for Romney or Irish Catholics for Kennedy, it would be if they set aside their own idealogy and principles to elect someone simply for this rather shallow reasoning. I think we can consider the late Dr. King an expert in this area. I don’t think content of character can be remotely reflected by one’s melanin nor his religious background. Charles Manson just so happens to be from my homestate. Would it be okay with you if I showed my hometown pride and elected him to the White House?
November 6th, 2008 at 12:01 am
That red splotch in Colorado? That would be rural Saguache County. Saguache, per Daily KOS, voted FOR Obama by a huge 27% margin. Makes me wonder about the map and/or conclusions being drawn about it.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:27 am
From Glaivester:
Glaivester: Definition – complete moron unable to comprehend a simple syllogism or the pattern of non-racist voting long established by black people (thanks Hamilton-Lovecraft):
2004 – Kerry. White guy.
2000 – Gore. White guy.
1996 – Clinton. White guy.
1992 – Clinton. White guy.
1988 – Dukakis. White guy.
1984 – Mondale. White guy.
1980 – Carter. White guy.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:43 am
The Republicans who pretend that MLK would have found 95% of black people voting for the first black candidate racist are totally fucking insane.
The black population of this nation has long demonstrated that it is perfectly willing to vote for a white candidate so long as that candidate reflects their views. The black population has also demonstrated that, given a choice between a manifestly unqualified black man and another candidate, they will choose the other candidate – or has every one of these idiots crying over non-existent racism forgotten Alan Keyes?
Want to demonstrate black racism? Find some examples first. The bullshit you clowns are spreading (but at least you have the shoes for it) doesn’t cut it.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:50 am
is asher really that dumb or is Asher really palin?
November 6th, 2008 at 6:57 am
Here’s the link to the map in question from the NYT. It’s no wonder the link here just goes to the front page of the NYT, because the map doesn’t show what Think Progress wants. Go look at it. Compare the election results this year with previous election years (not just 2004). According to Think Progress it shows that almost the entire country is more racist than it was in 1992!
November 6th, 2008 at 7:30 am
A couple random thoughts:
(1) It is possible the last-minute “coal surprise” had something to do with this effect, but on the other hand that wouldn’t really explain the difference I noted between northeast Appalachia and southwest Appalachia.
(2) Comparisons to the elections of 1992 and 1996 could be expected to be more mixed in terms of net party difference because of course those are two other cases of a Democratic candidate winning by a sizeable margin. But I think a comparison to those elections is still instructive and actually confirms the basic pattern. Obama did better than Clinton in a healthy mix of counties throughout the Northeast, Midwest, Mountain States, West Coast, Southwest, and Southeast. But there is the same pattern in Appalachia and the Upland South of Clinton doing almost exclusively better than Obama.
November 6th, 2008 at 7:39 am
eric k –
No, MattY is definitely not saying the same thing I am.
MattY is saying that McCain’s talk about cutting taxes was yet another example of the Southern strategy in action – that the tax talk was really talk about cutting support for welfare programs that disproportionately benefit minorities. (See anonymiss’s comment at 14, quoting Lee Atwater).
I am saying that McCain’s talk about cutting taxes was just talk about taxes. I am saying that it would have been counterproductive for McCain to treat tax talk as a coded way of talking about race.
Did the Republican Party use tax talk as a way to talk about race in the past? Of course – Atwater admitted as much. But since then, lower taxes have, in the minds of Republicans, become a worthy goal in and of themselves. Most R’s don’t think lower taxes are good because the resulting government policy screws minorities, they think lower taxes are good because “they just are”.
That McCain talked about taxes and that the least progressive areas of the country refused to vote for the black candidate is not proof that McCain deliberately used his tax talk to appeal to the racist sentiment that runs through those areas.
I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree with regard to our interpretations of MattY’s comment.
November 6th, 2008 at 7:49 am
In 1992 and 1996 Clinton did better than Obama did this year in much of the country, not just the Appalachians, and Obama won by a much larger margin.
November 6th, 2008 at 7:52 am
Being that I live in Arkansas and can understand turn out, the Republican Party here actually ran numerous candidates in the mainly Red areas on this map. They only hold 25 seats out of 100. There is a general feeling here that people are mad at the DEM leadership because of the failing economy. The Dems control all 5 statewide seats, both US Senate Seats, and most local elected seats. They also had 6 field staffers and numerous campaigns going on.
I think its incredibly short sighted by everyone on here to call Arkansas racist, especially when all our elected officials were campaigning for Obama. This turn out was based on local issues, and is reflected in the fact that Republicans picked up 6 new House seats and won a State Senate seat where 800K was spent (a record in AR). Educate yourself before you label. The leadership in this state has been pulling the African American vote every year for ten years…
November 6th, 2008 at 8:06 am
Bilby,
First, you say: Obama won by a much larger margin.
In 1992 Bill Clinton got about 53.3% of the two-party share. In 1996 he got about 54.7%. We’re still counting, but it looks like Obama is going to get around 53-54% of the two-party share. So, actually, the margins are roughly comparable.
Second, you say: In 1992 and 1996 Clinton did better than Obama did this year in much of the country, not just the Appalachians.
It is certainly true that there are many more counties around the country where Clinton did better than Obama, as opposed to the relative lack of counties in most of the country where Kerry did better than Obama, which is not surprising given that Clinton had a comparable total margin to Obama, and Kerry did not. But conversely, there are also counties around most of the country where Obama did better than Clinton, which again is what we should expect given the comparable margins. Generally, this sort of intermingled mix of better-for-Clinton and better-for-Obama counties in most of the country is the pattern one would predict knowing that two members of the same party won by similar margins.
But there is a definable region where Clinton did better than Obama in almost every county, as opposed to there being a mix of Clinton and Obama counties. And that is basically the same region where Kerry did better than Obama, unlike in most of the rest of the country. So, once you consider the fact that Clinton did much better across the board than Kerry, and indeed did comparably well to Obama, you can still see the same pattern.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:01 am
re Colorado Springs/ El Paso County polls
Impressive GOTV effort by Obama campaign deserves some credit, in this strongly Republican county. Students especially got organized. Total voters increased by more than 20,000 in 2008. Republicans lost vote share in 2008.
McCain 59%, Bush 2004 – 67%
Obama 40%, Kerry 2004 – 32% (rounding)
Reducing Republican share in El Paso county was important part of strategy, as it allowed Democratic dominance in other areas, like Denver, to swing Colorado electoral vote to Obama.
Colorado vote totals by county 2008 and historical
November 6th, 2008 at 9:16 am
You have a good point DTM. But how did Appalachia vote after a second Clinton term? In 2000, West Virginia , Kentucky and I believe even Al Gore’s home state of Tennessee voted for Bush.
Plus other factors have not been fixed between 1992 and now. As I noted, Appalachia’s economy has done significantly better under Bush than under Clinton. I personally think that has been a FALSE prosperity — based on pissing away $6.5 Trillion in debt — but people focus on their personal experience and they remember what it was like the “tree huggers” were in charge.
The oncoming recession is going to alienate a LOT of blue-collar workers away from the Democratic Party — because the bad effects are going to hit blue collar workers in the construction trades especially heavily. Not too many new houses are going to be built — and I suspect Home Depot and Georgia Pacific are going to be laying off people.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:20 am
It appears that the image no longer matches the data on the NT Times site, at least in terms of Saguache county, which did actually went bluer.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:38 am
PS I’m not saying that there is not some racism in Appalachia. Nor am I arguing that people should blame the difficulties in their local economies solely on Democratic economic or environmental policies.
But I do think Obama could disrupt and fragment the Republican machine in Appalachia if he talked to Jesse Jackson about the region, if he visited the region, if–in short –he showed some signs of giving a shit. Jesse understood the parallels between Appalachia and black urban areas — the isolation from the mainstream, the dominance of local bosses, the poverty, the gun violence and the drug addiction.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:04 am
that map looks like the poison ivy rash I’ve had on my leg for the last few weeks.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:06 am
Don Williams,
Using the tool Bilby linked, the comparison between 2008 and 2000 results in basically the same pattern, but with a bit more red in general (which again makes sense when you factor in that Gore did better than Kerry in general, so Obama improved less relative to Gore than Kerry in general). I might note that is true right down to Gore doing better more in southwest Appalachia than northeast Appalachia, although if I hadn’t seen the Kerry map I may have assumed that was just a Tennessee favorite son effect.
Incidentally, I absolutely agree Obama would be wise to think about how to make inroads in this region. For one thing, I suspect all this represents an opportunity for him to find a few more marginal voters in likely 2012 battleground states such as Missouri, Ohio, North Carolina, and Georgia. For another, although this is pure speculation on my part, my sense of the political culture in these areas is that four years of Obama proving he is a mainstream political figure (and, yes, not a Muslim) would go a long way to creating opportunities for gains in this region.
In other words, I very much agree this is not some sort of simplistic racists-who-will-never-vote-for-a-black-guy thing. It is likely much more complicated, and thus addressable by President-elect Obama.
November 6th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Here is a county-by-county red/blue map. I think comparing R and D counties in general may be a better gauge of the country than looking at which counties went more red than last time.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/countymapredbluer1024.png
November 6th, 2008 at 11:14 am
I am from North East Tennessee, and first of all, I have to say that the hypocrisy in this thread is astounding. It’s very disturbing to hear the Appalachian stereotypes and insults being thrown around while talking about how the entire region is racist because they voted Republican. Most of what has been posted here about the region is completely wrong and ridiculous. Educate yourselves before speaking, you’re starting to look like country yokels…..
Anyway, I cannot speak for everyone who lives here, and I’m afraid my knowledge of the regions dynamics isn’t as vast as Don’s, but I can tell you why my family and friends voted republican this year. Obama is pro-choice and his values scare them. They perceive Obama as a borderline socialist and do not trust his economic policies. I cannot count how many times I’ve heard someone scorn the idea of his “universal” health care, citing higher taxes and inflation as the result, no matter what Obama’s ads might claim. The idea of redistribution is blasphemous and the people around me are genuinely scared that the country is going to turn into a welfare state. If Obama had been white, they would have not voted for him, because it is his ideas that they are fundamentally opposed to.
Now, if McCain had been black and Obama white, following the logic of this thread, the entire region would have swung democrat. Which is absolutely hilarious.
I might not agree with those around me here in the region ( the two party system is a joke) but the ignorance in this thread makes me angry. The most racist person I know who lives here is actually from southern Alabama, but I’m not stupid enough to think that most white people there are, too. The people here that I know care more about whether you’re going to church every Sunday than the color of your skin and that is what is reflected in their voting choices.
November 6th, 2008 at 11:26 am
Here is a map showing coal production by county. Matches up pretty well with Matt’s map. Maybe the map has something to do with BHO’s comment about bankrupting coal plants and coal companies.
http://pubs.usgs.gov/mf-maps/mf-2330/milici1.pdf
November 6th, 2008 at 11:32 am
Another thing I noticed. The red areas in OK and AZ and CO are all heavily populated by native americans. Are they notoriously anti-black voters?
November 6th, 2008 at 11:36 am
Re Heather’s comment “I cannot count how many times I’ve heard someone scorn the idea of his “universal” health care, citing higher taxes and inflation as the result, no matter what Obama’s ads might claim. The idea of redistribution is blasphemous and the people around me are genuinely scared that the country is going to turn into a welfare state. ”
————–
1) So what do they think of stealing $3 Trillion from Social Security in order to “redistribute” $2 Trillion to the richest people in the country.(2001 Tax Cut /Federal Deficit) and $1 Trillion to “redistribute” Iraq’s oil deposits from the natives to Exxon?
2) What do they think of Bush’s move last month to “redistribute” $1.5 Trillion from our taxes to Wall Street?
That looks like a hell of a “Welfare State” to me — but for People making over $1 Million a year. How many of those are there in Appalachia?
Hear any local preachers ranting about that “blasphemy”? At a time when we have millions of poor people in this country — did you preachers ever read Matthew 25:41-45?
3) I also curious about what such fiscal conservatives as yourselves think about the fact of a $11.3 TRILLION federal debt — $9.3 TRILLION of which was incurred by the personal signatures of Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H Bush and George W Bush.
Who do you think is on the hook to pay off that $11.3 Trillion debt — Jesus?
November 6th, 2008 at 11:50 am
How much of the difference between Obama’s performance in Arkansas and Kerry’s performance in Arkansas can be attributed by the differing levels of support for each candidate by a certain well-known former governor of Arkansas, and/or the fact that Obama defeated that governor’s wife in an occasionally-acrimonious primary campaign?
There’s a pretty sharp line between southern AR and northern LA when I would expect the areas themselves to be nearly identical and served by the same media.
November 6th, 2008 at 11:58 am
PS to Heather: When the reasons people give for voting Republican don’t make sense, that makes us wonder whether there are other reasons.
On the other hand, outsiders don’t recognize their mental mistakes in reviewing statistical data. For example, someone making $50,000/year in Appalachia lives a hell of a lot better than someone making $50,000 per year who lives in Manhattan or Los Angeles. “Middle Class” is a RELATIVE term that has to take the local cost of living/cost of housing into account.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Don Williams: I think Jesus could pay off the debt if there were true separation of church and state and the churches were required to pay taxes like any other corporation. Jesus paid his taxes (and his disciple’s) with a coin taken from the mouth of a fish. Seems to me his followers should do likewise, though I think modern day preachers would have a tough time catching fish — much less finding one with a coin in its mouth.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Useful Map,
Actually, I suggest comparing the maps in a little more detail. Notice how much of Appalachian coal country is northeast of the southern border area of West Virginia, up into Ohio and Western PA. And yet if you look at the county difference map in detail, that part of coal country was much less subject to the observed effect than the part starting at the southern border of West Virginia and heading further southwest.
Now that doesn’t mean the “coal surprise” wasn’t a part of all this. For example, one could imagine it interacting with, say, different levels of campaigning (e.g., Ohio, PA, and the parts of West Virginia in the Greater Pittsburgh media market basically got a lot more information about Obama than the other parts of coal country). For another, maybe there are different levels of economic dependence on coal. And so on.
Still, as I mentioned up above, to me it is striking this transition occurs right about where there is a cultural transition between northeast Appalachia and southwest Appalachia. So I am leaning more toward a cultural than an economic explanation.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
This whole discussion is predicated on BULLSHIT…
All this map says is that these red areas liked JOHN KERRY more than Barack Obama. Thats where the comparison is drawn from.
The closest thing the relevant or plausable I read here was a comment/justification on “Likeing the Military”. If that was real reason for these areas vote preferences then they would have voted strong(er) for Kerry (even if not enough for Kerry to win). While I disagree, at least this theory could hold water.
As far as all the folks chomping at the bit to call Blacks Racist for voting for Obama, It is clear that they would like to justify there OWN PREJUDICES. African Americans(I’m White BTW) Vote Democratic in similar ratios in all elections. I’ll concede Obama pick up more of the Black vote simply because there was more of it. And YES Race was a factor in turnout, but the race factor was NOT Racism but PRIDE.
There is nothing wrong w/ Knowing how much harder an African American(from experiance or observation) has to work to succeed and being Proud that he has.
So, I’m Proud.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Heather,
The thing is, we are looking at places where Kerry systematically did better than Obama (despite Obama in general doing better than Kerry). And so it isn’t sufficient to point out that Obama is, say, pro-choice, because so was Kerry. Going farther back, in 1992 the people in these regions actually supported Clinton to enough of a extent that he actually won states like West Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee, even though he was also pro-choice, proposing a universal health care plan at the time, and so on.
Now that said, it may well be that the people you know perceived Obama as being far more “scary” in terms of his values than Clinton and even Kerry. But I don’t think Obama’s policy positions alone are enough to explain why they would feel that way.
Again, though, I agree characterizing this as just a race effect is likely a gross oversimplification. And as I noted to Don Williams above, I suspect that the next four years may go a long way toward reassuring some of these people that Obama is not in fact an unusually “scary” Democrat.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
One of the interesting bits of satire on David Allen Grier’s new Comedy Central show last night was that racists in the KKK might have actually voted for and actively supported Barack Obama, if only to bring out the racism in more moderate whites. I sincerely hope that violent race crimes are not increased in rural America.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
Were you being sarcastic with that comment about race not being a factor?
I don’t think race was a giant factor in the final vote count, but the exit polls confirm that there was some impact. Clearly some American blacks were more inclined to vote for him because he was black, and some white voters were inclined not to for the same reason.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
DTM
I concur that there is a difference between southern Appalachia and northern Appalachia. Starting somewhere east of Bluefield, WVA. Although people in southwest Virginia seem to like the people of the Pittsburgh -Wheeling area more than they like the aliens of Northern Virginia, for example.
Because of Appalachian terrain and the directions of roads , I think the interaction is more east-west with other southern counties than North-South. The towns on the western slope of southern Appalachia for a time had a lot more business dealings with Cities on the Ohio Rivers (Huntington,WVA etc) than with Piedmont areas on the Eastern seaboard because rivers flow that way, were the early transport corridors for lumber, and because the (steam) railroads had to follow the rivers. In the last 50 years, extensive road building has removed a lot of the geo-barriers, however.
Southern Appalachia is culturally different from the South, although there is a mingling. Bluegrass music is separate from the Nashville Country-Western industry, for example. In fact, one of the senior leaders of Bluegrass Music –Ralph Stanley — put out an endorsement of Obama in an Obama campaign ad. And the United Mine Workers are largely in Appalachia.
November 6th, 2008 at 12:54 pm
The Assault Rifle Ban of Sept 1994 also pissed people off — although I think there was a delayed effect. I.e., people joined the NRA because of the ban but it probably took a year or so for NRA mailings to turn a new member into a true believer –i.e., a supporter of NRA’s Republican partner.
November 6th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
Looks to me like Katrina-land (LA), oil/ng drilling-land (TX/OK), Hillary-land (AR), and coal-land (WV, KY, TN). Matt’s trying a little too hard to see racism here.
November 6th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Don Williams,
I think your East-West theory is correct. In fact I once talked to someone who knew the history of northeast Appalachia very well, and he explained it was culturally distinct from southwest Appalachia largely because of a series of transportation connections (including Braddock’s Road, the National Road, the Pennsylvania RR, and Pennsylvania Turnpike, plus a host of waterways) allowing different migration, urbanization, and industrialization patterns.
November 6th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Dan,
I find it amusing that you call me a moral relativist when you know nothing about me or my values. But to address your point: black people don’t vote for other blacks just because they’re black. There have been plenty of black candidates who haven’t garnered a majority of the black vote. If OJ Simpson were running, he’d generate as much disgust as your hypothetical Charles Manson candidate. But if we like the candidate and his/her values, and he or she is African-American, then yes, we’ll feel an extra measure of pride in voting for one of our own.
November 6th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Racism? No – John Edwards.
That’s the chunk of the South that swung to Clinton and Gore for three elections, and then stuck with John Edwards in 2004. It’s just north of the “black belt”: LOTS of poor rural white folks, not so many lot of black folks.
So, the first time in 20 years there isn’t a white southerner on the Dem ticket, what else do you expect?
November 6th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
You can see why John McCain’s principled stand against higher taxes on the wealthy would have a special resonance in this region. Liberals who thought race had something to do with those appeals should be ashamed of themselves.
I knocked on hundreds of doors in SW Virginia. I can assure you that the Obama tax plan is not what ’scared’ people in this area – but rather the otherness of Senator/Pres Elect Obama.
SW Virgina voted 2-to-1 for McCain. They also voted 2-to-1 for Mark Warner [Dem] over the Republican candidate Gilmore. That means 1/3rd of voters voted for Warner and for McCain – despite Warner vigorously campaigning on Obama’s behalf. I can assure you that – after having spoken with hundreds of people – it is the black ‘muslim’ baby-killer thing that swung people toward McCain – not the difference in tax policy.
Thanks : )
November 6th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Those are the Scots-Irish parts of the country, which is what John McCain is: a pugnacious Scots-Irishman.
C’mon, Matt, you’ve got to read David Hackett Fisher’s “Albion’s Seed” one of these days if you want to understand America.
November 7th, 2008 at 12:01 am
I would argue that in 2004, the Republicans get out the vote consisted of putting gay marriage ban initiatives in a number of states (Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Ohio, Utah and Oregon), many of which ended up on the bluer side of the spectrum on that map. Some of those voters probably would not have showed up to vote based on GWB’s popularity leading up to that election (heck, it could have been enough to tip Ohio, tipping the election in Kerry’s favor).
This time around, they had a candidate the base wasn’t terribly excited about, no issue like the gay marriage bans to really get them to the booth, and a bad economy.
Their opponents stayed on message, had more money, and had the ghosts of election’s past, who I would say felt like a boxer fighting someone in Don King’s stable, knowing that a knockout was the only way to ensure you won.
November 7th, 2008 at 12:09 am
DTM, in 1992 Clinton got 43% of the vote. In 1996 he got 49%.
The point remains that compared to 1996 and 1992, this years vote is much more Republican, even with a Democratic victory with a larger margin.
November 7th, 2008 at 12:13 am
What I mean to say is over a wider area. There’s a reason why the only comparison in this article is to 2004, because comparing to earlier years doesn’t show the “McCain Belt.”
November 7th, 2008 at 12:20 am
In case it got lost upthread, here again is the interactive map from NYT. On the left you can click “voting shifts” then use the slider to compare 2008 results to prior election years.
November 7th, 2008 at 7:14 am
Nice troll, subby.
November 7th, 2008 at 8:49 am
If you look at Bilby’s link, you’ll see what he says. McCain won a much higher percentage of the vote –across a lot more states — than did Bob Dole in 1996.
That’s not necessarily because people would vote for white Southerner Bill Clinton but not for Black Candidate Obama.
It may have been because John McCain was a lot more attractive candidate than was Bob Dole — who had pissed off a lot of gun owners by letting the Assault Rifle Ban pass without Senate filibuster.
November 8th, 2008 at 8:40 pm
anonymiss said:
“Nice to see that only a tiny fraction of the country has voters who are still falling for the “Progressive taxation is welfare! Welfare! The government will take your money and give it to black people!” nonsense. ”
And isn’t it funny just how much of that “McCain Belt”, the most richly red part, only became developed and industrially viable as a result of the Tennessee Valley Authority?
Gawl-Dang FDR and the Demi-crats commie public works projects!
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