Romney's overrated white vote swing

[Devils30]

It really was nothing or extremely little in most parts of America. Obama stayed strong in the northeast, slipped a tad in the midwest but just a couple points. Same with the south as McCain had pretty much maximized the southern white vote in LA, MS, GA, northern FL and it had nowhere to go this year. That's why all the deep south "trended" Dem.
On the other hand, Romney sure ran the score up in Appalachia once again. We thought Obama was bad there in 2008 the swing was even more ridiculous this year. Southern WV had a few Kerry 60% or more counties have Obama under 30%! That said, coal country barely bleeds into PA, OH, VA and the impact overall was minimal at best. Romney mostly just ran the score up in KY, WV.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Well then I guess this election did not reflect the war on whites.

[Antonio the Sixth]

They went from McCain+4 to Romney+20, right? I'd say that's a pretty huge swing.

[Devils30]

No, McCain +12 to Romney +20, an 8 point swing that was disproportionally in WV, KY, UT, ID, WY, TX type of places

[Sbane]

Fun facts: Even with a 2008 turnout model (with 74% whites), if whites and non whites voted for Romney and Obama respectively by the same margin as they voted in 2012, Obama would have still won. If minorities had swung by the same amount as whites this year (8%), Obama would have still won due to the higher minority share of the vote.

[Antonio the Sixth]

No, McCain +12 to Romney +20, an 8 point swing that was disproportionally in WV, KY, UT, ID, WY, TX type of places

Ah, I see. Yeah, not that impressive. A good economy could swing some of those back to the dem candidate.

[freefair]

Yeah, the "Shallow South", Utah and the Plains seemed to be the only states that actually trended more Romney with white voters.

[Reaganfan]

It's a bad strategy to have. I've been there. Feeling good after Bush's win, which was really a 49+1 type of strategy that has a short shelf-life.

You can't plan on always winning elections by getting a tiny bit of white Americans, a few college girls, and then minorities every single time.

[Brittain33]

It's a bad strategy to have. I've been there. Feeling good after Bush's win, which was really a 49+1 type of strategy that has a short shelf-life.

You can't plan on always winning elections by getting a tiny bit of white Americans, a few college girls, and then minorities every single time.

40% is not a tiny bit.

Not that I disagree with the fundamental point--you simply can't extrapolate into the future and say this means Democrat dominance. For the same reason "Bush won 97 of the 100 fastest growing counties" in 2004 didn't mean that all future population growth would favor Republicans. New candidates will remix the math and the issues at play. Republicans will have to lose the gratuitous and nasty racism of some of their spokesmen and learn to be more sensitive, and not just because it's "politically correct,” but some approximation of the Republican platform with a ticket led by an old white guy will win the presidency in the future.

[Ty440]

Looking at the state exit polls it  looks like Obama going from 43% of the white vote to 39% of the white was result of a collapse with white men, white women pretty much held firm from 2008.

Example: OHIO

White Men       2008  Obama 45%            McCain 53%
                        2012  Obama 36% (-9)     Romney 63%  (+10)

White Women  2008 Obama  47%            McCain  52%
                        2012 Obama  46% (-1)     Romney 53%  (+1)

Approximately  10% of white men swung from Obama to Romney in Ohio , while only 1% of white women did the same.