could it be that Maine and New Hampshire are switching positions?
If the Northeastern suburbs are starting to move hard to the Democrats, while rural areas start to shift to Republicans, that would make sense.
Yep. I think we're beginning to see the culmination of what had been a gradual realignment transforming into a more rapid one during this election cycle. The Republican Party, as it stands today, is anathema to minorities and most educated white voters - especially those living in large metropolitan areas. Rural and working class white areas will become increasingly Republican. I'd predict we'll see this manifest in the leftward swing of counties that constitutes the Boswash megalopolis, essentially establishing a nearly solid blue wall from the counties of NoVa to southern New Hampshire. We'll also see a greater divergence in trends between the rural and/or blue collar parts of states trending R (such as Western Pennsylvania, Northern Florida, Northern Maine, Upstate New York) and the metropolitan and educated parts of states trending D (Research Triangle, Boswash from NoVa to Southern New Hampshire, Coastal California, the Denver-Boulder-Fort Collins area, and places like Austin and Atlanta).
This is the most depressing thing I've read all day and you're probably completely right.
Well, rural New England+NY's North Country is the only area that has resisted this trend over the past 20 years. In fact, it's a lot more Democratic now than it used to be not so long ago. It's possible that this trend will begin reversing itself in 2016, but I still have reasonable hopes that this one holdout will continue resisting.
