The monied burbs and 2012
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  The monied burbs and 2012
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Author Topic: The monied burbs and 2012  (Read 1398 times)
Devils30
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« on: November 09, 2012, 11:55:00 PM »

Was anyone surprised that Obama won Loudoun County, VA, Somerset NJ, Delaware PA, and the Denver burbs by almost as much as 2008? A lot of commentators more or less suggested these places as certain to flip back to the GOP.
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Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee
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« Reply #1 on: November 10, 2012, 12:02:31 AM »

Delco? No. The others possibly, but it depended on how well Romney ran his general election campaign, and we all know how that turned out.
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Devils30
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« Reply #2 on: November 10, 2012, 12:03:49 AM »

For Delaware Co I'm talking about the fact that Obama improved from 2008, not that he won.
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Skill and Chance
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« Reply #3 on: November 10, 2012, 12:06:15 AM »

I'm not surprised about Northern Virginia because of all the federal employees, but I thought it would swing back enough that Loudoun would be closer.  I am surprised about all of the Denver counties holding for Obama.  Colorado will be thought of as a blue state quite soon if they can't be won over even by a "moderate businessman" candidate.  It's interesting that the northeastern wealthy areas largely held for Obama, including much-hyped CT while all the Midwestern ones flipped.  Given Romney's background, I was expecting the opposite.  
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pa2011
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« Reply #4 on: November 10, 2012, 08:19:21 AM »
« Edited: November 10, 2012, 08:21:09 AM by pa2011 »

Loudoun is not that surprising when you also consider it's 8 percent black, 15 percent Asian, and 12 percent Hispanic. The eastern part of the county near Dulles Airport is really diversifying, rapidly.  Throw in overall left-leaning trends in Northern Virginia, not hard to fathom Obama won it, narrowly.  And these trends will continue in presidential elections. if anything, Democratic performance in Loudoun will likely only grow in future elections, despite its wealth.

Virginia Democrats problem is how do they get similar turnouts in state elections. If they can figure out how, Virginia may soon one day almost become a lean-Democratic state.
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pa2011
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« Reply #5 on: November 10, 2012, 08:29:30 AM »
« Edited: November 10, 2012, 08:32:01 AM by pa2011 »

Also, many of these burbs are not all subdivisions with $1 million plus homes. Increasingly, even well-off suburbs are being dotted with new apartment/condo/townhouse communities. Democratic-leaning voters often reside in them. And one thing Obama camp perfected is getting into those buildings/developments early and getting their voters out.  

If you can turn out a few mid-rise apartment complexes in say Loudoun, the number of votes out of them can quickly equal or overwhelm two or three traditional, single-family, predominately white, monied, subdivisions. And that doesn't even take into account that just cause a wealthy husband and wife are voting Republican, their college-aged kids who may live with them, very well may not be. Many suburban college-aged children often feel more connection to the values of the neighboring city. Two kids can quickly cancel out the votes of their parents.
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« Reply #6 on: November 10, 2012, 09:24:56 AM »

Delaware is fast becoming an extension of Philadelphia. Much of Romney's gains were actually with affluent suburban whites; check out Chester and Bucks in PA.
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traininthedistance
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« Reply #7 on: November 10, 2012, 01:26:31 PM »

Delco is mostly inner burbs, with sizable black populations near the Philly border and in Chester.  And most of the Republican areas in Delco are middle-class '50s era development in places like Springfield and Marple, which I don't think are particularly monied, at least not by Northeastern suburban standards.  (By national standards, that's another story since the Northeast is pretty wealthy all around) Loudon I am not surprised to see stay with Obama, just because of the swing-state ground operation.

Somerset was a pleasant surprise.  I figured Romney would be tailor-made for Somerset.  I think part of it might have been that NJ was the one state where Sandy really did swing things Obama's way in an appreciable way.
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