February 19, 2009

Flyover country

I found this great image on the North Carolina State University website. It shows the blue/red voter breakdown across the country. There's far more blue in there than versus 2004 and 2000, as you'd expect. But the blue shift is a little too strong to be a realistic representation of what Beltway pundits would view as flyover country. Why? Because it's based on voter turnout. It correctly identifies voter sentiment among those who turned out - it does not count the opinions of those who supported neither candidate. It does not consider those who are more of a red bent, but were not strong enough on McCain to turn out and support a squishy purple candidate.







My point is that blue is over-represented in the assessment of American political thinking. It paints an accurate picture of those who turned out on election day only. This map is an ever changing one. In the next election, barring any unforeseen factors I'd expect to see something more akin to 2000. Not as necessarily as red, but certainly not like the one above.

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