Who wins the Wisconsin Primary?

[RBH]

Romney by 8 votes

[California8429]

At this point Romney, I hope Santorum comes back, he had been leading in WI in the past. But this is really his last chance. He lost Michigan, Ohio, and Illinois. All states he could have won, if he loses WI too it's completely over. Those were big delegate rust-belt economic states.

[Tender Branson]

Normally I would say Romney by 5-10%, but considering that Santorum's margin was 10% bigger in Louisiana than what the polls said I'm not so sure anymore. But the LA result could just be a Southern thing and WI will probably still vote for Romney. So lean-Romney.

[LastVoter]

Santorum.

[argentarius]

Guys I don't know much about Wisconsin (other than about the Packers and that there's cheese) but is it similar to Minnesota and Iowa or is it more like Illinois.

[Colbert]

I'm like you, argentarius.

I only know green bay packers (but don't knowed about cheese. There are REALLY US cheese???) and the fact that Wisc. is a "nordic state", with labor-dem tradition, near like minnesota. Religiously, they are, I think lutherian, something like that.

Well, really don't know a lot about this state

[Frodo]

Too bad TexasGurl isn't here to provide us with her insight on this state. 

[Colbert]

Too bad TexasGurl isn't here to provide us with her insight on this state. 

is there a good site wich explain the particularity of each 50 states (politic tradition, cook, religion, ethnicity, etc? )

[Averroës Nix]

Too bad TexasGurl isn't here to provide us with her insight on this state. 

is there a good site wich explain the particularity of each 50 states (politic tradition, cook, religion, ethnicity, etc? )

Nate Silver's ongoing Political Geography series is worth reading. He typically posts each state's entry a day or two before its primary or caucus.

[Colbert]

I don't find his profile

[Averroës Nix]

Colbert, you can see Nate Silver's latest entry, which is for Lousiana, here: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/political-geography-louisiana/

He hasn't posted a profile for Wisconsin yet.

[Gass3268]

There is very much an East-West divide when it comes to culture and politics in Wisconsin. The Eastern part of the is more German and more conservative (except Milwaukee and Kenosha). While the Western part of the state is more Scandinavian and more liberal (except the Twin City area, while still predominately Scandinavian, is the fastest growing conservative area in the state).

http://verseau.wordpress.com/2010/06/05/geographic-curiosities-the-east-west-divide-in-wisconsin/   

I would imagine Santourm will do well in the Western and Northern parts of the state. The people that live here are more like those from Iowa, Minnesota and Upper Michigan.  While Romney will do well in the southeastern parts of the state, especially  the 4 heavily Republican Milwaukee suburban counties and Milwaukee County itself. There are more similarities with the Chicagoland, Detroit and Cleveland. I would also expect Romney to win Dane County, with a stronger than average Paul presence, but he won't get that many votes here as  there are only like 75,000 Republicans in the county. To me the swing areas that could decide the election will be the Fox River Valley/Lake Winnebago area (Fond du Lac, Oshkosh, Appleton and Green Bay) and the Sheboygan/Manitowoc areas. These are in the Eastern part of the state so culturally they may be more willing to go towards Romney, but at the same time they are medium sized industrial towns that Santourm won in Michigan and Ohio.       

Without any recent credible polling, Ras doesn't count, I would guess that Santourm will win barely. This state is very much a mix of Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Upper Michigan and I would expect the results to be similar.   

[Bacon King]

My gut feeling is that Republicans in the Milkwaukee and Madison metros will give Romney a win here, just like Chicago did in IL, Cleveland/Cincinatti did in OH, and the Detroit area did in MI. However, I honestly don't know too much about Wisconsin, so I could easily be wrong. One thing, though, regarding the comparison with MN and IA that some have made- Santorum's generally performed a lot better in caucus states (excluding those held on tiny islands, anyway) so I'm not really sure that Santorum's successes in those states will necessarily cross the border into Wisconsin.

[Torie]

To complicate matters, the Fox River Valley belt has a dovish streak (48'er Germans), which is my guess as to why that area trended so heavily to Obama. I am not sure how well Rick will play there given his "bellicosity."



The "Scandanavian" belt as it is characterized on the other side of the state by the way trended to McCain.

[Nhoj]

To complicate matters, the Fox River Valley belt has a dovish streak (48'er Germans), which is my guess as to why that area trended so heavily to Obama. I am not sure how well Rick will play there given his "bellicosity."



The "Scandanavian" belt as it is characterized on the other side of the state by the way trended to McCain.

The most likely reason for the trend had to do with mccain spending alot more on media in MSP and Duluth markets.
Also the Scandinavian belt gos further south then you imply.

[J. J.]

Right now, I'd say edge Romney.

[perdedor]

Romney wins by ~5%.  I'm not sure how Santorum plans to drive people out to the polls without the media narrative of a competitive GOP primary.