That is easy to explain - considerably more urban than neighboring states and a larger minority population.  Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota are totally different as they are somewhat similiar to northern Illinois outside Chicago but you don't have nearly as strong and rural/urban split and likewise amongst the white vote, the Dems tend to do much better.  When compared to Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan; an easy way to look at it is remove Cook County from Illinois, leave Indiana as is, remove Cuyahoga County from Ohio, and remove Wayne County from Michigan and I suspect you would find the results are pretty close.  Likewise the only reason I think Obama does better amongst white votes in Illinois then those other three states is due his strength amongst whites in Cook County.  I suspect Romney probably got close to maybe even over 60% of whites outside Cook County whereas I suspect Obama won the white vote in Cook County by 10-15 points.  Also Illinois has the highest African-American population of any Midwestern state and its Hispanic population is substantially larger than any neighboring state.

I recall Kosciusko county being the most heavily GOP and it was also in 2008.  I don't believe Obama got under 25% in any Indiana county and only a handful did he get under 30%.  In terms of the swing it seemed for the most part pretty close to uniform or at least there wasn't any area that swung really hard or any that went in favour of Obama.

Forum was the closest on the Ontario election and they were pretty much spot on for the recent provincial by-elections.  I agree I would be shocked if the Tories lost Calgary Centre nonetheless I think they are more likely to lose there than Durham although I doubt they will lose in either.  Central Calgary is not a left wing riding, but its pretty centrist; its not as conservative as some might think.  If it were a battle between the Democrats and the Republicans, the Democrats would win hands down and likewise between the PCs and Reform Party I think it would go PC.  Also some of it may be local candidate as before the nomination the Tories had a massive lead, but there was a lot of controversy as I believe Joan Crockett is not well liked by local Tories and she also hails from the WRA side, not the provincial PCs so some provincial PCs I've heard are supporting the Liberals so this maybe more a local candidate thing.  Think of it like Indiana and Missouri for the senate races.  Romney easily won both states, but their GOP candidates who were unpopular with the establishment and too extreme lost. 

Its true the Tories didn't do as bad amongst minorities as the GOP, although lets remember the GOP still got 27% of the Asian and Latino vote which is not far what the Tories got amongst visible minorities (it was 31%) the difference being the Tories only need 40% to win a majority whereas the GOP needs 50% to win or close to it at least.  In terms of the Jewish vote, I should note that amongst the Catholic vote outside Quebec you had a similiar swing and likewise amongst the Italian community I think the Tories picked up quite a bit.  According the studies on the Canadian vote, the Tories did well amongst immigrants who had been in Canada over 10 years (note the Jews are mostly born in Canada), but the NDP won those who immigrated in the past 10 years.  Also although Jason Kenney likes to boast how Tories did better amongst immigrants than native born Canadians, if you look at which provinces the immigrants live in, I am not so sure.  The Tories did worse than the national average in Quebec and Atlantic Canada which asides from Montreal has relatively few immigrants and I suspect the immigrant vote there dragged them down, albeit in Alberta they probably did significantly better so the two cancel each other out.  By contrast most immigrants live in Ontario or Western Canada and in those areas the Tory vote was higher than 42%, in fact I think it averaged over 50% if you take Ontario + Western Canada.

I should note it is not totally unlike what happened to the Irish, Polish, and Italians in the US.  Prior to Reagan in the 80s, those groups use to go heavily Democrat, but now favour the Republicans although it was probably more competitive than the white vote as a whole considering most live in the Great Lakes and Northeast where the white vote only narrowly went for Romney and off course he lost those states due to his clobbering amongst the non-white vote.  Interestingly enough both Reagan and Bush sr. won the Asian vote in the US.  Although I wonder if this has partially to do with the fact the fast growing group amongst Asians is the East Indians who in both countries are the least conservative in voting patterns.

In sum I think it has less to do with Israel or more to do with the fact the Tories were underperforming amongst them to begin with.  I suspect those living close to the downtown still go Liberal or NDP.  It is more the 905 ones the Tories won amongst and 54% is not that far off what the Tories averaged in the 905 belt.  You will notice a similiar split with the Italians, Greeks, and Portuguese; i.e. they go Liberal or NDP in the 416 while Conservative in the 905 where an increasingly large number live now. 

Don't know they can do much here, but it seems the BC re-distribution was heavily tilted in favour of the Tories as the NDP would have won fewer seats despite new seats being added.  Off course too there is the incumbency as well as the amount of resources the party puts in so it is quite possible in ridings the NDP knew they had no chance of winning they just didn't bother putting anything into them thus meaning no matter how you re-drew the map it would favour the Tories, albeit I don't totally buy it. 

As for Quebec, I think if you use the 2006 and 2008 election results you can see it was badly drawn up when you consider especially on the Island of Montreal they combined a couple of staunchly separtist areas with staunchly federalist ones.  The 2011 election masked this as the NDP was able to appeal to both separtists and federalists but still for the sake of community they probably should be separated.

North Carolina for starters considering how close.  Indiana and Missouri are possible although I am not sure if they would have been stupid enough to state something along the lines of legitimate rape even if their views on most issues are close to Akin and Murdock.  They certainly wouldn't have won any states Obama won.  I think states like Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, and Montana, they probably would have won, but the polls would have been close enough the Obama campaign would have probably actively campaigned in those states rather than writing them off like they did.  

Now had they chosen Huntsman, I wonder how many Obama states would have gone for him.  I think he would have won Florida and probably Virginia and Colorado.  Not sure about Ohio though as he wasn't that great a fit for that state.

Bucking the swing of the rest of the South and actually giving Obama an improvement.  



What happened around N.O.?  Did everyone move back?  Either way, awesome stuff from my 2nd favorite major U.S. city, I guess 2008 was a GOP candidate maxed out.  



for the sake of reminiscing, here's me and my crew at the Katrina recovery effort in 2009.   

Possible that much of the Black population who was displaced from Hurricane Katrina returned.  It could also be amongst the white population there was a slight improvement (In Alabama Obama went up slightly according to the exit polls) as many of the older more racist ones have died in the last four years while the younger ones who became of age vote on issue not race, albeit considering how heavily the white vote in the rest of the country swung against Obama I am skeptical of this.  Mind you McCain got close to 85% of the white vote in Louisiana in 2008 meaning there really wasn't much room for growth left to being with.

Obama most certainly won the Vietnamese vote. Democrats usually win the Vietnamese vote in San Jose (and I suspect the PacNW but I'm not certain), but usually lose it in Orange County. This time he won it in both places.

I am guessing they won every Asian subgroup as usually the Vietnamese, Filipinos, and Koreans have tended to lean GOP, whereas Chinese and Japanese leaned Democrat.  The East Indian which are the fastest growing have tended to vote more heavily Democrat than any of the other Asian groups thus that might explain why it is harder to win the Asian vote than 20 years ago (Both Reagan and Bush Sr. won the Asian vote both times).  In fact of the non-white groups, I am thinking the Cubans were probably the only one the GOP carried and even there it was just barely.  Possible albeit unlikely they carried the native Hawaiian who tend to be quite conservative and also the Cherokee as Oklahoma is 15% Cherokee and went massively Republican. 

http://blog.lib.umn.edu/cspg/smartpolitics/2012/11/death_of_the_battlegrounds_the.php

The 2012 presidential election is the only cycle since the birth of the modern two-party system in 1828 to be decided by less than 15 points nationally and yet have less than 10 percent of its contests decided by fewer than five points.

The national race was very close, yet only 5 states were decided by 5 points or less.  Things sure have changed a lot since 1976, when we had a whopping 20 states with margins of 5 points or less....including California, Texas, and New York.  Imagine how wild that race would have been to follow if modern polling and the internet had existed back then.

The country is also a lot more polarized today so if everyone around you despises a certain party/ideology, there is a good chance you will fall in line.  Also lets remember back then a 10 point swing over a month's period was not uncommon whereas today you will notice only a small number of voters swung between parties; generally the Democrats and Republicans had a firm 47% base who would vote for them no matter what and only 6% up for grabs, whereas back then the number of firm supporters was likely under 40% for both parties. 

You have it backwards. The age gap is because of race. Not vice versa.

Partially true although amongst whites 18-29 it was a lot closer than amongst older whites never mind I suspect Romney's huge majority amongst whites 18-29 in the South probably skewed the results somewhat too.  Lets remember in the New England states and Pacific Northwest or even Upper Midwest which are fairly white, Obama did much better amongst younger voters than older ones.  Off course this is not unique to the US.  In Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, parties on the left tend to do better amongst younger voters than older voters.  In the 2005 British election, the Conservatives came in third at under 20% amongst the under 30 crowd while won the over 50 crowd.  Likewise here in Canada, the NDP (left wing party) won the under 30 vote while the Conservatives got close to 50% amongst the over 65 crowd.  People tend to be more idealistic when young while get pragmatic and also more resistent to change as they get older.  Also the marriage gap may be a reason too since amongst married men vs. married women, there wasn't much difference, whereas amongst unmarried women; Obama did significantly better than unmarried men although he won both and those groups would be highest amongst the young and the old.

I'm almost certain Obama won people of Scottish ancestry. It's the wealthiest ancestry group in the country, but they're heavily concentrated in New England and the rich-liberal parts of the NYC area.

OTOH, I seriously doubt Obama won Hungarians. True, most Hungarians in the US are Jews, but they're heavily Hasidic Jews, who vote overwhelmingly Republican in Presidential elections (like 90% McCain, probably similar for Romney). I don't think there are that many Reform or Conservative Jews from Hungary, and those are the Jewish groups that vote Democratic (plus Orthodox Jews outside of the NYC area).

There are very few self-IDed people of English ancestry in the South. It's basically New England (+upstate NY) and the Mormons. I think New England English would outvote the Mormons, but it's hard to say for certain.

I'm pretty sure of the recent European immigrants, Bosnians voted for Obama... Though I have no numbers to back that up.

They're Muslims. It would be shocking if they weren't at least 75% Obama, given recent trends.

It is true New England has the highest number of people of Scottish ancestry much like English thus Obama would win there, but I think the Mormon states are quite high as well as in the South it is above the national average and considering the GOP wins amongst the whites are much larger 80-20 or 75-25 as opposed to 60-40 than the South, I am pretty sure Romney won those of Scottish ancestry never mind pretty much everywhere in the US has at least 1-2% of Scottish ancestry.  I guess if you go by self-identified you might be right as many in the South identify as "American" as opposed to Scottish and in the Midwest most probably have some German, English, Irish or some other ancestry that makes up a greater part of their heritage and thus identify with that group.

I also wonder how Obama did amongst whites born outside the US.  In Canada and Europe the population overwhelmingly wanted Obama to win yet many from those countries tend to assimilate fairly quickly especially if they come from an English speaking country or came as a child.  My guess is Obama did better amongst Whites born outside of the US than born in the US, but I don't think it would have been nearly as lopsided as the polls in their home countries were for who they wanted to win.  After all I know anicdotally there were several Canadians living in the US who voted for Romney despite the fact only 10% in Canada wanted Romney to win.

As for the Bosnians, I believe most are Muslim as well so that probably would explain them going for Obama as the GOP are pretty unpopular amongst Muslims regardless of where they come from.  Not because Obama is Muslim (as most Muslims know he is not) but rather Islamophobia is quite rampant in the GOP so it would be pretty tough to vote for a party that is anti-Islam if you were a Muslim.

CNN shows Romney winning it by 20 votes but could go either way.  Good barometer for young voter turnout as outside of State College I imagine it votes heavily Republican like the rest of the Central Tier of Pennsylvania but usually the Democrats do really well amongst college students.

Has West Virginia ever gone solidly Republican in every county before?  This was not too long ago a fairly Democrat state.  After all it was the only state Dukakis carried that Obama didn't and likewise Clinton carried it twice.  Mondale and McGovern may have not won the state but they did better than Obama did in 2012.  Mind you a lot probably has to do with the fact the Democrats traditionally were strongest in the coal areas and Obama is seen as the antithesis of coal production.  Interestingly enough in Ohio he had a strong second place in the coal counties and he only narrowly won those in 2008 so it seems the swing there was much weaker than West Virginia and Pennsylvania; in fact had it been as strong as West Virginia it might have hurt his chances at winning Ohio.

I think the two rural counties in Middle Tennessee which went for Obama in 2008 I believe went GOP for the first time in a long time if ever.  Also Chataqua County, New York didn't back the winner for the first time since 1952.

I know Romney won the white vote by 20%, but I wonder if you broke it down by ethnicity if Obama would have won any of them.  Here is my thinking

Possible but probably not - Norwegian, Swedish, and Finnish (I know he didn't win the Danish of the Scandinavians but it seems he did well in areas the other three are large), Polish, Czechs, Slovaks, Italians, and French.  Belgians and Austrians are possibilities although due to limited data tough to say.

Amongst those from Southern and Eastern Europe, most are in blue states, but Romney did win the white vote in most of those although I believe the Democrats have traditionally done well amongst those groups.  The French is kind of tough as in Louisiana I am sure it went heavily Republican, but in the New England states I suspect Obama won that group.

Likely won: Russians (most are Jewish), Hungarians (high number of Jewish and mostly in urban areas), Southeastern Europeans (asides from the Slovenians and even that he may have won, most came in the last 50 years and in largely in the big cities), Portuguese (Most are in Hawaii, California, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts and Obama won the white vote in 3 of the 4 states mentioned), Greeks (Usually in big cities like Chicago, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles and few in the rural areas), Spanish (they are counted as Hispanic anyways I believe); and Middle Eastern (Turkish, Arab, and Iranian which in most countries are counted as minorities rather than white, but I think I saw a poll showing 60-70% of them went Democrat).

Lost: Danish, Germans, Dutch, English, Welsh, Scottish, Scots-Irish, Irish, and Swiss

Those groups are mostly in heavily Republican areas in anyways.  Danish include a large number of Mormons; Germans are probably close to the white average as not many in the South where Obama did worst amongst whites but no many either in New England where he did best.  I am guessing it was a 60-40 amongst them.  Dutch are quite rural and in the case of Michigan and Iowa the areas where they settled the most heavily went mostly heavily GOP.  English are strongest in New England, Mormon areas of the Mountain West and the South so 2 of the 3 are staunchly GOP while only one favours the Dems  Scots-Irish if I had to guess were probably the group that went most massively Republican of all white groups.  Irish may have historically favoured the Democrats and it is true some centers where they are most noticeable like Chicago and Boston still go Democrat, but considering how they are over 5% pretty much everywhere in the US I find it hard to believe Romney didn't win here.

Off course nowadays ethnicity doesn't matter but still location of where they settled has an impact as well as 80% of children vote the same way as their parents.

It is a landlocked state, lacks a large metropolitan areas (Minnesota has Minneapolis and Wisconsin has Milwaukee which are much larger than Des Moines) and is one of only a handful of states that are over 90% white so asides from tradition, is there any particular reason the Democrats are still competitive here?

Vermont is the whitest state in the union, one of the least urbanized yet it is the bluest of the lower 48 excluding DC.  Why is this?  I understand why it would go Democrat but the size of the margin seems quite big and it is not as though it is a poor state either.  In Britain and Canada the areas that go heavily for parties on the left that are overwhelmingly white and rural tend to be quite poor, not near or above the national average income.  If it were like Maine or New Hampshire where the GOP gets over 40% that would at least make some sense.  And also Vermont used to be one of the safest GOP states so is it more of anti-Southern state, otherwise it goes against whichever party dominates the South.

I know I have a lot of questions, so instead of clogging up the forum with separate ones, I thought I would put them all in one, but feel free to just answer anyone of them, so here they are below.

Washington: How come Jefferson County is so heavily Democratic, similiar to King County and San Juan County which make sense, but why is not your typical Dems in the 50s and GOP in the 40s like the rest of Western Washington.

California: How come Santa Cruz County goes almost 80% Democrat as I don't think its minority population is any higher than the statewide average and it is a smaller urban centre, not a large one like San Francisco

Hawaii: How come Honolulu county is consistently the GOP's best showing in the state as this is the most urban county?

Arizona: How come Pima County usually goes Democrat while Maricopa County usually goes Republican as I thought the results in both counties would be similiar on average.

Montana:  How come Silver Bow County and Deer Lodge County still go massively Democrat since most other White Working class counties have swung over the Republicans but not here.

New Mexico: How come some Northern counties go over 75% Democrat since I know they have a large Latino population but this would either mean they are winning big amongst the non-Hispanic white population or the Latino population is going close to 90% Democrat.

Texas: Why is Austin so liberal compared to the rest of the state?  Any special reason.

Wisconsin: I know Dane County is strongly Democrat, but how come despite not being a small urban centre and very white, the Democrats routinely get over 70% here as opposed to say a 60-40 split.  And also how come the Milwaukee suburbs going usually over 60% GOP, while the rural areas are quite competitive; usually it is the suburbs that are competitive while rural areas that go heavily GOP.

Indiana:  Whats up with Perry County going Democrat as it is not part of the Rust Belt in the north, lacks a major urban centre, and is very white.

Ohio:  I know Ohio State University is in Athens County but 66-31 for Obama seems big, is the university the main employer of the county?  And also how come Ashtabula County which is fairly rural and white goes Democrat by more than 10 points.

New Hampshire: How come the GOP does best in the southeast which is the most heavily populated part of the state as opposed to the North or southwest which are far more rural.

Vermont: How come the GOP's best results are the border towns with Canada as they are right next to the most left wing Canadian province of Quebec so I would have thought like neighboring New York they would go more heavily Democrat not less.  The numbers are their own make sense, just not why they are more Republican than the rest of the state.

Massachusetts:  Whats it with Berkshire County going more than 75% Democrat as it is fairly rural and very white.  Yes I know it is in New England, but still over 40% of whites in New England voted for Romney and I would suspect in the urban centres the white vote would be more heavily Democrat than the rural areas.  This went almost as heavily Democrat as Boston which doesn't make sense.

North Carolina: How come Buncombe County went Democrat as I believe it is fairly white compared to most of the state and also in the case of Orange County the Democrat margin seems like the type you would expect in a minority-majority county in the South, not one like this

Georgia: What is the reason Clarke County goes so heavily Democrat.

Any answers to any of these would be appreciated, don't bother trying to answer all of them.

My guess is it has to do with a state capital as they have a high number of civil servants and likewise a higher rate of unionization.  Could be wrong but it might be a backlash to the GOP anti-union stances.  Off course I think the GOP anti-union stances probably helped them more than hurt on a whole, but they would have gained from this more in the suburban areas and smaller towns, while hurt in the large urban centres.

I know Obama won big amongst African-Americans, but I am quite surprised to see he got 100% in some precincts as I believe around 6% of African-Americans and over 10% amongst African-American males voted for Romney.  Or could it be the African-Americans who voted for Romney are the more well off ones who live in the suburbs where their numbers are much smaller so tough to gage how they vote?

Did Obama win any of the municipalities that were over 95% white and likewise did Romney win any where the white population was under 80%?

I think Bucks County is the wealthiest of the Philadelphia suburbs, also it is the whitest too.  If I am not mistaken I believe Obama did worse amongst whites in Pennsylvania than Kerry, the big difference is turnout and share of the electorate amongst non-whites was up from 2004.  Likewise I believe Montgomery County is more middle class while Delaware County has a larger minority population although I suspect Obama probably narrowly won the white vote in both.

I suspect a lot has to do with the type of Republicans here.  Many are moderate Republicans who probably think the party has swung too far to the right.  As for why it didn't happen earlier, my only guess is many people are loyal to a certain party and always vote for it no matter what; much like whites in the South didn't swing to the Democrats overnight, it took time; so the older voters continued to vote GOP out of tradition, but as they died off, they weren't able to replace them with newer voters as the newer voters voted more based on ideology rather than tradition.  Otherwise every four years, some of the older voters die and some new one's either through becoming of age or naturalization (not really a factor here) are eligible to vote so you have to take this into account. 

I am guessing a lot of areas that went for Obama are Native American majority areas or close to, but how come Bush won those areas.  Did Bush do better amongst Native Americans or did they just not show up in large numbers in 2000 and 2004?