Wasn't 1992 a realigning election?

[Applezz]

When making election predictions, don't we always follow every electoral map since 1992? Think about it: between 1968 through 1988 the Republicans always won the presidential elections by landslides (except for '76 because Carter was from the South and even then it was the only close race).

After 1992, President Clinton has strengthened the liberal movement and made the country pretty evenly divided between liberals and conservatives. Before Clinton, the country was pretty far to the right. Now the country is completely divided and polarized.

What do you think?

[justfollowingtheelections]

Not really.  Clinton won quite a few southern states that have gone republican since.  I think the 2000 map would be better map to base our predictions on.

[Padfoot]

I think its hard to classify the '92 election as a realignment election because it falls under the same rule as the '76 election.  Carter and Clinton were both Southern Democrats who managed to revive enough Southern white support to win.  Plus, there was a major third party presence that makes it harder to look at trends between the two dominant parties.  As far as realignments go, I don't think there is any evidence that they occur on a nationwide scale.  IMO they are mostly regional and even then it takes several elections for them to actually set in and become permanent.

[Stranger in a strange land]

No: Clinton won partly because he was able to pull the Democratic party significantly to the right of where it had been before. And even then, the Republicans made huge gains in 1994.

[phk]

Well certain states that hardly ever voted Democratic went Democratic for the first time like California, Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maine, Delaware, New Hampshire and seem to have stuck that way. Which is somewhat realigning, I suppose. 

I think many of the trends that manifested itself were slowly getting their start in 1992 with NoVA, Bay Area burbs, Philly burbs, So. FL becoming more and more D.

The Southern eV's were totally won on personal appeal however.

[RIP Robert H Bork]

No: Clinton won partly because he was able to pull the Democratic party significantly to the right of where it had been before. And even then, the Republicans made huge gains in 1994.

No, Clinton was a hardcore liberal in 1992, and then when the Republicans won in 1994 he claimed their platform as his own just so that he could be reelected.

[RIP Robert H Bork]

Well certain states that hardly ever voted Democratic went Democratic for the first time like California, Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maine, Delaware and seem to have stuck that way. Which is somewhat realigning, I suppose. 

I think many of the trends that manifested itself were slowly getting their start in 1992 with NoVA, Bay Area burbs, Philly burbs, So. FL becoming more and more D.

The Southern eV's were totally won on personal appeal however.

You forgot New Hampshire. However, unlike the others, NH is more of a battleground.

[War on Want]

No

[Mint]

No: Clinton won partly because he was able to pull the Democratic party significantly to the right of where it had been before. And even then, the Republicans made huge gains in 1994.

No, Clinton was a hardcore liberal in 1992, and then when the Republicans won in 1994 he claimed their platform as his own just so that he could be reelected.

That's a laughable claim. Even in 92 Clinton was running on ending welfare as we knew it, cutting waste, tax credits to stimulate growth, aggressive crime control, etc. Hardly ideas you'd see the Jackson or Wellstone types proposing.

[Rob]

Yes, in the sense that the most important political story of this generation- the ongoing GOP collapse in (non-southern) suburbia- began that year.

I think its hard to classify the '92 election as a realignment election because it falls under the same rule as the '76 election.  Carter and Clinton were both Southern Democrats who managed to revive enough Southern white support to win.

Clinton was able to win back some of the ancestrally Democratic southern white vote, but you can't compare that to 1976. Unlike Carter, Clinton would have won without carrying a single ex-Confederate state, and even Dukakis and Mondale had won significant support among parts of this demographic.

[Mint]

Yes, in the sense that the most important political story of this generation- the ongoing GOP collapse in (non-southern) suburbia- began that year.

[Mr.Phips]

No way 1992 was  realigning election.  Democrats actually lost ground in Congress that year and did so big time in 1994. 

[Jeff from NC]

Clinton picked up a number of states, but some of them had been only marginally Republican to begin with.  Dukakis nearly won California, Maryland, Illinois, and Pennsylvania - mainstays of the current Democratic coalition.  Clinton's strong showing in the South hearkened back to the Carter era and doesn't coincide at all with the states Obama won in 2008.

And more generally, Democrats had been doing well in the Northeast and the west coast for a while, so regionally it was merely the continuation of older patterns.

So I don't see 1992 as a realigning election.

[Mr.Phips]

Clinton picked up a number of states, but some of them had been only marginally Republican to begin with.  Dukakis nearly won California, Maryland, Illinois, and Pennsylvania - mainstays of the current Democratic coalition.  Clinton's strong showing in the South hearkened back to the Carter era and doesn't coincide at all with the states Obama won in 2008.

And more generally, Democrats had been doing well in the Northeast and the west coast for a while, so regionally it was merely the continuation of older patterns.

So I don't see 1992 as a realigning election.

Southern states like Kentucky and Georgia were probably won solely because of Perot. 

[Marokai Backbeat]

Clinton picked up a number of states, but some of them had been only marginally Republican to begin with.  Dukakis nearly won California, Maryland, Illinois, and Pennsylvania - mainstays of the current Democratic coalition.  Clinton's strong showing in the South hearkened back to the Carter era and doesn't coincide at all with the states Obama won in 2008.

And more generally, Democrats had been doing well in the Northeast and the west coast for a while, so regionally it was merely the continuation of older patterns.

So I don't see 1992 as a realigning election.

Southern states like Kentucky and Georgia were probably won solely because of Perot. 

Georgia maybe, but Kentucky; I don't think so.

[hcallega]

No it really wasn't. Maybe if the Democratic party had bucked the left rather than return to it's roots then it would have been a realignment. 

[Mr.Phips]

No it really wasn't. Maybe if the Democratic party had bucked the left rather than return to it's roots then it would have been a realignment. 

They sure tried bucking left.  Look at 1993-1994 and universal healthcare, gays in the military, gun control, a tax increase. 

[nclib]

Well certain states that hardly ever voted Democratic went Democratic for the first time like California, Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maine, Delaware and seem to have stuck that way. Which is somewhat realigning, I suppose. 

I think many of the trends that manifested itself were slowly getting their start in 1992 with NoVA, Bay Area burbs, Philly burbs, So. FL becoming more and more D.

The Southern eV's were totally won on personal appeal however.

You forgot New Hampshire. However, unlike the others, NH is more of a battleground.

New Hampshire voted for Bush in 2000. As for the topic question, while this year's election had EV and PV totals, and number of states won similar to 1992, more states actually voted the same way in 2008 as they did in 2000 and 2004 more than any previous election. So that would point to 2000 as being more of a realigning election, especially in reference to regional and urban-rural voting patterns.

[J. J.]

Well certain states that hardly ever voted Democratic went Democratic for the first time like California, Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maine, Delaware, New Hampshire and seem to have stuck that way. Which is somewhat realigning, I suppose. 

I think many of the trends that manifested itself were slowly getting their start in 1992 with NoVA, Bay Area burbs, Philly burbs, So. FL becoming more and more D.

The Southern eV's were totally won on personal appeal however.

The Phila 'burbs went Republican for House, Senate, and Governor in 1994, and for Governor and Senate in 1998, with the House seat that flipped being close.

[Rob]

The Phila 'burbs went Republican for House, Senate, and Governor in 1994, and for Governor and Senate in 1998, with the House seat that flipped being close.

Yes, following the pattern set by the breakdown of the Solid South. Northern suburbs began voting Democratic at the presidential level in 1992, but it took some time for those trends to be seen downballot as well.

[J. J.]

The Phila 'burbs went Republican for House, Senate, and Governor in 1994, and for Governor and Senate in 1998, with the House seat that flipped being close.

Yes, following the pattern set by the breakdown of the Solid South. Northern suburbs began voting Democratic at the presidential level in 1992, but it took some time for those trends to be seen downballot as well.

The realignment should be seen across the board, within 4-6 years.  It wasn't in PA.

[Rob]

Within "4-6 years?" Why? Or did you just pull those numbers out of your ass? Realignments have never worked that way in American politics.

[A18]

In case you haven't figured it out yet, "realignment theory" is just a particularly bizarre form of numerology. You're not supposed to get it; and if you do, it's a bad sign.

[Husker]

I would argue that 1992 was more of anomaly than a re-alignment for the nation as a whole. The economy was in a slump in 1992 and Clinton was able to appeal to the blue-collar democrats that had voted for Reagan and have probably voted republican since Clinton. I would say the urban-rural divide had its roots in the 1960's and came to full fruition in 2000. In 1992, many rural counties, particularly in the lower midwest and the south, went democrat in a way that had not been seen since 1976 and hasn't really been seen since. Had the economy been trucking along smoothly in 1992, Bush Sr. likely would have been re-elected and the decline in rural blue-collar democrats would have continued. Instead we saw numbers jump back up to near 1976 levels for a brief time in those aforementioned rural areas. So in that regard 1992 was an anomaly.

States like IL and CA went through re-alignments in 1992 because that is around that time that the urban vote began to effectively drown out the more rural conservative vote. Democrats have also been aided in IL this decade by the self-destruction of the GOP, but that's neither here nor there. Overall though I would argue that 1992 was sort of a stumbling block in the country's swing to the right. However, I would argue that 2006 election was the first kick back toward the center and 2008 election continued this push toward centrism.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

In case you haven't figured it out yet, "realignment theory" is just a particularly bizarre form of numerology. You're not supposed to get it; and if you do, it's a bad sign.

Yes, and also a really bad system of determinist periodization. Which like all determinist periodizations makes no sense what so ever, except as a 3 second amusement.