So how did Wisconsin become a blue state anyway?

[old timey villain]

I have a feeling Wisconsin is going to be one of the most heavily contested states in this election. But I don't think anyone would have said that 4 years ago.

It looks like WI has always been more D than the nation (it was a Dukakis state in 1988), but the trend really took off in the 1990s. Clinton had no trouble winning it, then it was very very close in 2000 and 2004. And then (weirdly enough) it has this HUGE swing for Obama. And now it's close again.

What is going on there??

[Torie]

The Catholic German vote has something to do with it. It tends to be dovish for starters. McCain blew in the Red River valley. But they are orderly folks, and dislike pieces of paper that have lots of red ink on them.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Unions.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

It's not a blue state.  It's a swing state.  Bush only lost it by about 5,000 votes in 2000 and about 11,000 in 2004.

[Brittain33]

It's not a blue state.  It's a swing state.  Bush only lost it by about 5,000 votes in 2000 and about 11,000 in 2004.

When was the last election that it swung to vote for a Republican?

Wisconsin was close in 2000 because Nader siphoned off a lot of liberal votes. I don't believe Bush was within striking distance of 50% in the state.

[Person Man]

Yeah. Its hard to imagine a Kerry state to be up for grabs. That election, though could have been worse, was a disaster for the Democrats....and Wisconsin last swung in 1984, when only Minnesota voted for Mondale..and before that, it voted for Reagan twice, but so did 43 other states. Its hard to see Wisconsin finally going Republican, but Indiana went Democratic in 2008, so I guess anything is possible in these sort of purplish-bland states.

Really, though. I just think that Midwestern states are really just like America as a whole. They're not quite North, They're not quite south- they just vote based on the urban/rural divide, not because they have a unique political culture....or so it seems. Wisconsin has a similar amount of people that Indiana but maybe they are distributed differently? The Indianapolis looks small compared to Milwaukee, for example..but Indianapolis population is twice the size...maybe there's a lot more small towns in Indiana and denser urban centers in Wisconsin?

[TJ in Oregon]

Yeah. Its hard to imagine a Kerry state to be up for grabs. That election, though could have been worse, was a disaster for the Democrats....and Wisconsin last swung in 1984, when only Minnesota voted for Mondale..and before that, it voted for Reagan twice, but so did 43 other states. Its hard to see Wisconsin finally going Republican, but Indiana went Democratic in 2008, so I guess anything is possible in these sort of purplish-bland states.

Really, though. I just think that Midwestern states are really just like America as a whole. They're not quite North, They're not quite south- they just vote based on the urban/rural divide, not because they have a unique political culture....or so it seems. Wisconsin has a similar amount of people that Indiana but maybe they are distributed differently? The Indianapolis looks small compared to Milwaukee, for example..but Indianapolis population is twice the size...maybe there's a lot more small towns in Indiana and denser urban centers in Wisconsin?

The biggest political difference between Wisconsin and Indiana is that in Indiana the rural areas vote very, very Republican overall but in Wisconsin many of the rural areas are pretty swingy. The Milwaukee metro area generally helps Republicans in the net vote category once you factor in the super-Republican suburbs. It probably doesn't come out that different vote-wise than Indianapolis even though they are very different cities. The same with Madison and Gary. But the rural areas are quite different.

[Person Man]

What do you think causes that? Southern transplants? They are almost as R as blacks are D. Midwestern Whites are just modestly R and Yankee Whites are probably lean D.

[All Along The Watchtower]

What do you think causes that? Southern transplants? They are almost as R as blacks are D. Midwestern Whites are just modestly R and Yankee Whites are probably lean D.

More rural, and most of the cities are smaller. Look at the parts of Ohio and Illinois that border Indiana for comparison (especially Ohio), as well as southwest Michigan.

[sg0508]

A ton of blue collar workers in the burbs and in the cities that normally favor democrats over republicans.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Alot of suburbianites from Cook county flocked to the surrounding cities of Madison and Milwaukee during the Clintonian yrs which made it a blue state.

[Miles]

From what I gather, the white rural voters (like in WI-07 and WI-08) are much less hostile towards Democrats than their counterparts in the southern or Great Plains states.

[minionofmidas]

Media preferences for simple, false dichotomies and an illogical color scheme.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Media preferences for simple, false dichotomies and an illogical color scheme.

This, so much.

[mileslunn]

Its just as urban as Minnesota and more so than Iowa so no real surprise.  Milwaukee is pretty sizeable city to begin with.  For those comparing to Indiana, lets remember the Upper Midwest tends to have a much stronger Democrat component than areas south of the Great Lakes as well as you get close to the Ohio River you are starting to get somewhat more southern in culture and the evangelical population is quite large, even bigger than the Upper Midwest.  Except the plains and Mountain West states, generally the further north you go the better the Democrats do, only in the Plains is GOP support roughly the same North to South and in the Mountain West it is the reverse due to the large Latino population in the southern parts.  I am not sure if its a coincidence or there is a good reason, but it seems in more northern areas people are more supportive of more social programs i.e. Scandinavia in Europe or Canada being more socialistic then the US, so maybe that trend also applies to the US otherwise historically it was pretty tough to survive if poor as opposed to in warmer climates.

[Stranger in a strange land]

What do you think causes that? Southern transplants? They are almost as R as blacks are D. Midwestern Whites are just modestly R and Yankee Whites are probably lean D.

Few Southern transplants, but rural Indiana is very culturally similar to rural parts of the South (same goes for most of Downstate Illinois and Western Ohio).

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

Racism?