Talk Elections

This might be the only primary election where the Democratic Primary is more interesting than the GOP one this year (I think none predicted that Judd would come that close in WV).

Arkansas DEM:

57% Barack Obama
31% John Wolfe
12% Uncommitted

Arkansas GOP:

74% Mitt Romney
12% Rick Santorum
  9% Newt Gingrich
  5% Ron Paul

Kentucky DEM:

63% Barack Obama
37% Uncommitted

Kentucky GOP:

76% Mitt Romney
  9% Rick Santorum
  7% Newt Gingrich
  6% Ron Paul
  2% Uncommitted

Arkansas

Wolfe: 50%
Obama: 46%
Uncommitted: 4%

Romney: 74%
Paul: 12%
Santorum: 9%
Gingrich: 5%


Kentucky:

 Obama: 68%
Uncommitted: 32%

Romney: 68%
Paul: 15% (due to daddy factor)
Santorum: 11%
Uncommitted: 3%
Gingrich: 3%

KY:
Romney        63
Paul              14
Santorum      14
Gingrich          7
Uncommitted   2

Obama            71
Uncommitted   29

AR:
Romney        65
Santorum      15
Gingrich        13
Paul               7

Obama            47
Wolfe              28
Uncommitted   25

Obama will do better in KY simply due to:

1. Eastern KY Democrats are still so loyal to the party that they'll vote for him anyway (at least Elliot)

2. Blacks/urban whites in Louisville and Lexington. Also, it's rumored that Republicans had a GOTV effort for Judd in order to embarrass Obama.

1.  Did you look at the map for 2008 in Eastern Kentucky? 

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How about this trend?

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2.  Do Democrats ever just own up and take responsibility for their own shortcomings?  Or is every bit bad news always the wascawwy Wepubwicans' fault?  Emanuel Goldstein must be the GOP leader!

Not most of it, but Elliot, at least.

Arkansas:

Obama High 50s

Romney High 60s

Kentucky

Obama Low 70s

Romney High 60s

It's the last time I get up at 3am or so in the night to watch primary returns. Next time will be the conventions.

What about June 5th? You have Super Tuesday and the Wisconsin recall.

Ah yeah, forgot about that recall.

My Arkansas prediction (probably way off):

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Obama: 61%
Wolfe: 39%

With 17% Obama leads uncommitted 56-44.

:(

Obama up 67-33 now (25% in)

Obama losing a ton eastern counties. Down 41-59 in Elliott with 100% in.

Where are you getting these results? I'd like to see bandit pop in here and explain how Kentucky's beloved Obama is doing so poorly to this uncommitted guy.

Try here:

http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/KY/38672/82563/en/md.html?cid=150

If you have a better reason for it I'd sure love to hear it. :)

I'd say the dire state of eastern Kentucky accounts for half of it.

He got, what, 25% (?) of the vote in KY last time when he wasn't an incumbent President. I don't think it's that. Not to mention that states with equally terrible economic situations have provided him with easy victories.

There have to be SOME republicans trolling this primary

Why the hell would you even be in the Democratic Party in the first place??

This result cries out for a separate Democratic primary results map by county on the Atlas.

I don't believe you were ever actually a Democrat, of course, but the idea that Obama's melanin content might be responsible for his unusally poor performance in traditionally Democratic white, working-class areas is hardly radical.

The usual response is something like "no, he's a poor cultural fit!", which is true, but is a bit of a crummy argument when you consider that John Kerry, the effete liberal aristocrat, won >70% landslides in the same states in '04.

EDIT: Also, no-one's ever actually said that strawman argument you posted. For the record.

Kentucky has a closed primary.

John Wolfe leads 184 votes to Obama's 128 in Arkansas.

Obama now up 62-38 in Arkansas

results page, for the curious: http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/AR/39376/82642/en/summary.html

Obama now leads 71-29 according to Politico.

Uh, Obama is beating "uncommitted" handily.

So why did Obama collapse in parts of WV and KY in 2008, when it was a bad economy under Republicans?

To say that there aren't "cultural differences" that influenced Obama's performance in Appalachia and the rest of the upper South... you really have to be delusional.

 

RON PAUL WON A COUNTY!

No he didn't.  The AP's tally doesn't match the Kentucky Elections website.  According to the latter, Romney received 227 votes in Trigg County, not 27.  Which makes more sense.

Really all this does is show up the absurdity of what passes for a party system in the U.S and its attached institutions (namely primaries). Democrat = what they are, but Obama does not speak to them, has never tried and wouldn't even know how to. Most are probably only voting in the primary for local races and the like.

Not to say that there's no bigotry attached, oh, no, no. But things are often a little more complicated than they seem. In any event, people who see themselves as being on the left ought not forget that we're dealing with a despised and socially excluded minority group here (even if that isn't exactly how they would see themselves). Which doesn't mean that it's wrong to find this sort of display ugly, but it does mean that...

Thanks for ruining my day. :(

Let's see how Bandit tries to spin this...Obama is apparently going to be competing in Kentucky this fall, yet he can't even get 60% of Democrats to show faith in him?

Didn't I already explain it here?

Beating "uncommitted" with under 60% of the vote is absolutely terrible and embarassing, especially for an incumbent President. With Republicans coming out for Romney, as well as a majority of Independents and a good chunk of Democrats, Obama doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell in Kentucky.

1) Hardly anyone voted.

2) "Uncommitted" is better than the clowns who ran against Obama in other states.

3) Obama did much better than he did in the 2008 primary.

Uncommitted got 40% in Michigan in 2008. Whether you want to admit it or not, Uncommitted is a strong candidate and a force to be reckoned with.

Uncommitted isn't even a person.

Of course Obama did better - there's a huge difference between "Uncommitted" and a former first lady and Senator who has Southern roots. This primary was basically Kentucky Democrats having the option of giving Obama a "stamp of approval" and saying he deserves reelection. When less than 60% of Democrats are showing confidence in him, well, you have a problem.

That makes uncommitted so popular. For an identified politician to have a 45% approval rating these days is incredibly high.


In November, Romney can forget Elliott County and Jefferson too, so let's get that cleared up right now.

Not to defend Bandit here... because suggest Obama has a chance in KY is ... yeah...

But the fact that a) this is an uncontested primary with no consequences b) turnout is VERY low c) Obama has always been a bad cultural fit (on quite a few fronts) with this area and it's not that surprising...d ) combine all of that you end up with only the really hardcore pro and con coming out... the big whack in the middle who don't really care stayed home.

It's silly to try to spin it too positively, equally, it's silly to make this out to more than it is.

I think what is interesting to look at, not only here but also in NC, LA, and OK (thus far) and to a lesser extent in MO, AR, and TN (where there were smaller not-Obama shares, but they were at least noticeable) is the urban/rural split that piles up in a lot of cases.  Once you get outside of Tulsa, Little Rock, and Louisville, you have Obama struggling to win these states (all but 950-odd of Obama's margin in KY can be found in Jefferson County; excluding Pulaski County, he's got a 9000 vote margin in AR; excluding the counties with Tulsa and Oklahoma City, IIRC Obama either falls under 50% in OK comes very close to doing so...and most of those votes against him in LA weren't cast in Orleans Parish, either).

Also, the "nobody voted" point is partly applicable in OK and LA, but in AR, KY, NC, and WV there were "live" primaries on the ballot in much of the state as well.  Turnout wasn't great, but I would argue that it was at least somewhat representative of the party electorate because of that.

For the record, Obama handily won Campbell County in today's primary.

The AP is a bit further:

AR: 59-41 Obama

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/elections/2012/by_state/AR_President_0522.html?SITE=CSPANELN&SECTION=POLITICS

KY: 58-42 Obama

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/elections/2012/by_state/KY_President_0522.html?SITE=CSPANELN&SECTION=POLITICS

I find it interesting that Romney did just about equally well in Kentucky and Arkansas (67 to 68%).  It seems like he was equally strong in urban and rural parts of Arkansas, while in Kentucky he was strongest in the urban areas and was held in the 50s percent wise in some rural counties.

Ok, so that's the Cincy suburbs.  And the margin I see there is 22%...slightly ahead of the statewide margin, but really only by a little bit.  It's interesting, though, because that suggests that he was well ahead in major cities (or heavily black areas, I suspect), on par in suburbs, and behind in rural areas.

Campbell County is also 97% white.

On the other hand, "uncommitted" won some rural precincts in Campbell County (which probably all have about 3 Democrats each).

True, but not to put too fine a point on it...
A) That's urban/suburban whites, not *ahem* rural whites; and
B) He [i[still[/i] dropped 39% of the vote there to "Uncommitted".

To be honest, I'm not sure whether "Uncommitted" or "Random NoB" would have done better (it's an excellent topic for debate, honestly)...TN's results suggest that Uncommitted is a bit weaker than simply having a name to mark off, as do OK's (MI in '08 may suggest this as well).  However, that evidence is in no way overwhelming.  Still, it's not clear either way.

Everything is as I expected except for Obama's KY numbers. Ouch!

Romney is getting more votes than Obama in Arkansas.

Green Papers said that Uncommitted was also on the ballot in AR. Otherwise I would have gotten AR and KY within about 5%.

Underestimated Paul in KY and AR though. Didn't expect him to do much better than in the other Deep South states.

No...TGP is rather vague about uncommitted-the-ballot-option being on the ballot in a lot of places because it doesn't differentiate between it and automatically uncommitted delegates (i.e. Superdelegates).  For example, I was worried that we wouldn't get a "show" in KY because I didn't see a separate name on the ballot (and I think VA indicates an "uncommitted" line despite the primary being canned for want of a second name on the ballot).

On KY, I ran down a list of counties with large variations from the mean either way.  I've got the following:
Tie:
Calloway

Uncommitted over 50%:
Hopkins (55%)
Barren (53%)
Bullitt (53%)
Muhlenberg (53%)
Green (54%)
Fulton (51%)
Wolfe (52%)
Russell (52%)
Estill (54%)
Leslie (58%)
McLean (56%)
Simpson (56%)
Powell (59%)
Fleming (56%)
Trigg (59%)
Lawrence (53%)
LaRue (56%)
Pendleton (50%)
Hart (51%)
Jackson (52%)
Elliott (59%)
Mason (55%)
Mercer (56%)
Owen (59%)
Morgan (59%)
Jessamine (53%)
Webster (57%)
Lee (59%)
Bourbon (53%)
Nicholas (54%)
Bath (50%)
Grant (58%)
McCreary (55%)
Harrison (51%)
Washington (56%)
Spencer (55%)
Magoffin (51%)
Lyon (56%)
Montgomery (55%)
Anderson (55%)
Rockcastle (52%)
Clinton (56%)
Henry (53%)
Christian (55%)

Uncommitted over 60%:
Letcher (69%)
Breathitt (64%)
Perry (68%)
Union (65%)
Carlisle (66%)
Graves (65%)
Marshall (61%)
Pike (65%)
Livingston (64%)
Crittenden (62%)
Bracken (60%)
Robertson (60%)
Ballard (63%)
Caldwell (63%)
Logan (61%)
Johnson (63%)
Hickman (64%)
Trimble (60%)
Martin (65%)
Floyd (64%)

Uncommitted over 70%:
Knott (73%)
Harlan (74%)
Todd (71%)

Uncommitted under 30%:
Fayette (24%)
Edmonson (26%)

Uncommitted under 20%:
Jefferson (18%)


I ignored counties with uncommitted between 30% and 50% (as being expected variations).  Fayette is Lexington; Jefferson is Louisville; and Edmonson is in the middle of nowhere, over 90% white, and constitutes a very odd outlier.  On the other end, Knott, Harlan, and Letcher are in the far east while Todd is in the western part of the state.

This is so sad to me. Yes, it's an embarrassment to Obama and the Democratic party, but I think it reflects more of the voters themselves.

You can call them hicks, racists, bigots, idiots, or what have you. And while I have to admit that prejudice probably plays a big role in their protest votes as opposed to any sort of difference in opinions on policy, I think the vote also reflects their desperation.

A lot of these people are still democrats because it's in the family. They come from a long line of Democratic party supporters and just haven't changed their registration. But these days, they not only feel neglected by the Democratic party but from America as well. The restructuring of America's economy (one based on manufacturing to one now based on tech/service/information) has left them behind and in a sorry state. And from a demographic standpoint, the "browning" of America hasn't affected their communities, especially in Appalachia, and they look on a more diverse nation as completely foreign and strange.

They're scared of the "new America," they feel neglected, and they see Obama as representative of a country that they just don't understand. And in response they've become more insular, backward and downright angry. And of course anger prompts us to do things that aren't so smart, like voting for a prison inmate over the president out of spite. I think Obama was right when he made the guns and religion comment.

if Obama is a good leader though, he will try to make things better for them, even if they refuse to give him any credit.

Here's another factor we haven't even considered yet: A small number of these "uncommitted" voters (especially in urban areas) are folks who think Obama isn't liberal enough.

Some of Romney's best counties in KY were in the eastern coalfields, such as Leslie where he got 74.5%.

A negligible amount if any at all. At least in Kentucky.

Oh, it exists. Trust me on that.

I think your attitude towards them is a bit patronizing, particularly with respect to the folks in coal country.  Yes, there is undoubtedly an element of race there, but there is also undoubtedly an element of opposition to Obama's environmental policies (such as the recent coal regulations).  There, it has nothing to do with a "new America" and plenty to do with their jobs.  Had Obama faced a nominal opponent in PA, we might not have seen the blowouts we're seeing in parts of KY, but he'd definitely have dropped rural counties outside of Pittsburgh, for example.  The same can probably be said of Ohio as well.

Likewise, some of it does come down to the "God, guns, and gays" issues...but there, I think it's fair to say that a lot of them aren't so much "left behind" as much as a lot of them more bluntly have refused to surrender their party to forces they strongly oppose.  These are folks that Bob Casey would have won had he run in '96, for example.

But part of it is also that in these states, the local parties are genuinely out of step with the national party, if only out of sheer electoral necessity.  Joe Manchin can't get elected on an Obama coalition...he might get to 40% on that, and such would be a stretch at this point.  So the state and local folks have to keep reaching for a far different group than they would look towards elsewhere or face electoral oblivion for at least a generation, if not several.  And since they're already in office in a lot of places (even if not in control), they have a credibility that Dems who've been in perpetual opposition at the state level for a while simply don't have (and can't have).

What we're seeing here is in no small part the simple fact that the state and national parties are wildly divergent because your local pols in a lot of places aren't willing to take the alternative of decades in opposition.  Maybe doing so would be "courageous", but I think Yes Prime Minister put it right when saying that something being called that meant it would lose you the election.

Maybe my attitude is a bit patronizing. But if they want to act like children and vote for Keith Judd out of spite, then my natural attitude toward them will be patronizing.

And I think "Obama's war on coal" meme is spectacularly overblown. And why are Republicans trying to hammer this into the ground? Because it provides an excellent red herring for voters in West Virginia and Kentucky who already hate Obama.

The administration has tried to adjust coal regulations, but it's not based on a desire to wipe out the coal industry. It's one that promotes alternative energy sources and cleaner extraction of fossil fuels. And let's face it, the coal industry has not been to a friend to the environment.

Also, natural gas prices have become cheaper than coal which has hurt the industry. So market forces beyond Obama's control have probably done more to hurt the coal industry.

And yeah, you're right about Manchin and the like. Democrats in Georgia also pandered to a decidedly different coalition of voters than Democrats did nationwide. The only difference is that most of these Democrats had the good sense to become Republicans. I wish WV would do the same.

On the one hand, I'll grant your point...though I think it is fair to say that many of them simply saw "the other guy" and, without knowing who he was, voted for him.  This happens from time to time (and I'll bet Lyndon LaRouche is wishing he was young enough to have gone out one last time...preferably with a non-felon-vote-banning home state so he could launch a "cleaner" disparate impact-based suit over delegate allocations*), and it has resulted in some hilarious results (Witness what happened in IL one time, when quite coincidentally some LaRouchites upset the "official" candidates in statewide primaries).

However, to build on my earlier remarks:
What is key to the modern Democratic Party being as (relatively) uniform as it is would be, as near as I can tell, being able to assemble a coalition of minorities (primarily blacks, but also Hispanics and, in a few cases, Asians) and (generally urban) liberal whites that can get you to around 40%, and then realistically hoping that a combination of moderate whites and/or disgruntled voters will put you over 50%.  As long as a coalition can get to 40% on a regular basis, it can take over one party.

Where things go haywire in a couple of states (AR, OK, WV, and KY in particular...all states Obama has been plugged under 60% in the primaries) is that this just doesn't play out.  The minorities aren't there in large parts of WV or KY, and the urban population isn't there to add up a bunch of liberal votes, either.  So the "old" Democratic coalition has been able to hold on, in no small part because the post-1960s left is probably held to about 15-20% in those states...leaving what I will call "inertial" Democrats (your old coalition) holding a fair part of the Democratic Party: They just don't have places they can even really put "their people" up for election in large numbers outside of a city or two, and those cities can't even hope to hold off the rural areas.

What is perhaps more surprising, though, is that there haven't been "incidents" like this on the Plains.  Some of this may be luck (nobody making the ballot in NE or SD), but the Democratic Parties there were also smaller to begin with, I believe (hence my "take over")...they weren't the "party of government" for the mid-20th Century in some cases, and in other cases they had the benefit of more liberal leadership (for example, George McGovern).

============================================

*Ok, I'm going to run a counterfactual to explain what I mean.  Let's assume that LaRouche were to stand in for Wolfe, Judd, and Uncommitted.  It's not unreasonable...the man cleared the ballot in VA in '96 in the face of a 10,000 signature requirement that Newt and Perry couldn't clear this time, so let's assume that he clears the bar.  Let's also assume that he's able to change his domicile to somewhere that lets felons vote (say, Maine).  LaRouche also makes sure to file his delegate slates properly (something that neither Wolfe nor Judd did), removing that technicality.

Now, the Dems do what they've done before and send out their "Not a Democrat" letter.  LaRouche wins delegates in five states (LA, AR, OK, KY, and WV); assume that the total number is the same but that he sheds some delegates in KY to a split with undecided (an automatic ballot option) and give them back to him in OK.  That would probably give him around 60 delegates, give or take.  The Democrats refuse to seat them.

Naturally, Lyndon files suit.  Nobody is shocked.  However...at this point, he adds to the usual arguments a point that booting his delegates will have a disparate impact...namely, disenfranchising about 250-500k rural white voters in five states (whether that it the intent of the rule or not [it probably isn't], if you apply a disparate impact rule, potentially in conjunction with the ban on the "White primary" from 1944 onwards, it doesn't matter what the intent was).  There is probably ample polling evidence to back this up.  At this point, the Democrats have two problems.  One is legal (the claim is probably valid) and the other is political (whether it's LaRouche or not, the GOP can hammer home a message: "Hey Joe Sixpack in Coal Country!  Guess who doesn't care about your vote?")...and the latter has the room for blowback down the ballot if the state party isn't careful.  The one saving grace for them, in this case, is that "it's LaRouche".

Does a court interject?  I'd be surprised if at least one district court didn't.  You have five states in five separate circuits (4, 5, 6, 8, and 10), so LaRouche would probably be able to forum shop a bit...and there might well be some suits from his would-be delegates as well, just to spice things up a bit.

And of course, I think the odds of an interjection grow if LaRouche manages to add a few delegates in other states to his pile (NC, AL, and VA [where he thresholded in two CDs in '96] come to mind).

Does what I'm saying make sense?

Edit: Just for a more unlikely hypothetical (i.e. never in a million years because of his aims and his current affiliation), but assume that for whatever reason Paul had run as a Democrat instead of as a Republican.  I think that would distill the hypothetical sufficiently, with the exception that LaRouche has been running as a Democrat exclusively for about 30 years.

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Of course IRL, this time we have four far more defective candidates...three who didn't file slates (Judd, Rogers, and Wolfe), one of whom is a convicted felon sitting in a jail cell (Judd), plus one who is pretty blatantly "tampering" in the process (Terry) (plus uncommitted, where you could at least argue for an order to compel the Democrats to at least not seat pro-Obama delegates), but there's still the argument to be had.

[bFor the record, I expect any such suit to fail[/b]; however, the standing for such a suit pretty clearly exists, and I can definitely see an argument out there on their behalf (that at the very least, the party leadership shouldn't get to decide whose votes are valid and whose aren't in a binding primary).  Had Obama lost a state, there might be an even stronger claim for such a ruling.

Very nice post. We already know Obama isn't a great president though.

I'm saddened that Obama hasn't lost a state primary.  Just to see how the media would handle the issue, and what the convention would do to an entire state delegation that has a majority pledged to another candidate, when Obama is supposed to be "unopposed".  I'd also like to see Romney lose to Paul somewhere, or a majority of GOP voters to still support someone else, just for the spectacle and the embarrassment in causes.  All of this makes for good political theater.

There's a certain element of that in my preferences, I'll admit.  It would also make for interesting legal theater, as I noted...none of the previous lawsuits have ever, as far as I can tell, dealt with an outright win by the "rogue candidate" in question.

Those racists! Waaah.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/whats-the-matter-with-kentucky/2012/05/23/gJQAMF5hkU_blog.html

Thats right.

This is what Obama was dealing with in Kentucky last cycle.  (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CnJ6UuIJb4)

Well, Obama walked away from Christianity when he completed his, err, recent evolution. At least according to his own words.

Sounds like those fears were founded.

care to explain?

“I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Now, for me as a Christian…it is also a sacred union. God’s in the mix.” - Barack Obama, 2008.


Either he is no longer a Christian, or he has decided to rewrite the teachings of Christianity, or God has been tossed out of the mix. I wonder which answer Obama prefers.

Uh, a personal belief isn't the same as a political stance.

Most likely the first or the third.  Hopefully the first.

It certainly helps to have the President on the correct side of history.

It was in 2008. Many of these voters are highly unlikely to vote for someone who does not share their values and faith.

Well, and it seems that a lot of voters were at least mistrustful of him on the issue regardless of what he might say.  So I guess one way to put it is that either the view was very much incidental (i.e. he held it but didn't really care) or he was lying.

Of course, would someone please reconcile his present views with the old "Obama is a Muslim" nonsense?  That ought to be rich!

Well, that certainly doesn't work at all. A Muslim would not endorse homosexual marriage.

You think coal country voters care about whether Obama has a desire to wipe out the industry?  No, they only care about his policies.

0bama is a racist himself, so point your fingers elsewhere. 

Please elaborate.

Who is Zero-bama?

He's the evil (imaginary) twin of the President that a lot of people seem to want to pretend is in office.

Just look at the Justice Department.

If you're going to attack your fellow democrats as racists for not voting for 0bama because he's black don't forget to attack your fellow democrats who voted for 0bama just because he is black.  If 0bama were all white, Hillary would be President now.

Is 0bama Obama's blacker, socialist evil twin or something?

Is that really why you think all Democrats voted for Obama? Because he's black?? Oh my god you're being ridiculous dude! I guess you think it works both ways: a lot of Republicans voted for McCain because he was white so therefore there much have been a ton of democrats who voted for him because he's black. LOL that's cute. I promise you, McCain got many more votes from racists that did Obama.

I know this is hard for you to believe, but most Obama voters just really liked him or his policies. And sure, black people voted for him almost unanimously, but they've been loyal democrats for decades.

Nice try.