The media is calling this a landslide. Obama's win was not due to getting massive votes but due to Obama playing the Electoral college game better then Kerry / Gore. As of Nov 5 morning Total votes 2004 122,267,553 2008 119,121,000 2008 McCain 55,278,000 Obama 62,322,000 2004 Bush 62,040,606 Kerry 59,028,109 ___________________ Bush / Obama about same vote total McCain down 5 Million form Kerry McCain was close. This is the difference, Here is why Obama won Ohio +207,000 Florida +200,000 Virginia +155,000 Indiana +23,000 N Carolina +11,000 Colorado +140,000 Nevada +120,000 About 900,000 votes...Thatâs it! But all in the right place. The difference may have been a little bit of the black turnout. I think the Hispanic change from 2004 was the main difference. Bush won in 2004 because of the Hispanics. McCain should have picked a Illegal Mexican as his running mate.
Our medias here are saying that Virginia has not voted Democrat for at least 20 years : the guy must have done something right?
That is my point. In my post I state what he did right. The conclusion is this was not a major shift in idealology like 1980, but just a smart numbers game well excecuted. In Virginia the differ 2004 3,170,000 2008 3,426,000 2004 Bush 1,716,000 Kerry 1,454,000 2008 Obama 1,791,000 McCain 1,635,000 Obama +150,000 2008 had +250,000 more votes Obama picked up 200,000 McCain picked up 50,000 More then half of Obama 200,000 are from new Black voters. The rest are young voters. Obama was able to get more democrats to vote period. I don't agree the state has turned left.
Reagan was able to get Democrats to vote Republicans. That is how you turn a state. It seems that Obama was only able to get more Democrats excited to vote. It does not look like he received much crossover vote. You are correct, votes are about winning. But, over the long term you want people to vote on policies not personalities. Obama is one of kind. Next time you may be stuck with a personality like McCain and policy becomes more important.
I really can't get your reasoning right. Are you going to tell me that 52% of the voters were Blacks? It seems more than 60% of women voted for him: do you mean that usually 60% of women always vote Democrats? Even some small villages turned completely democrats. Why is it so hard for you to accept that the guy did a good job, was the better candidate and he won because he was good. Now I must say he must have been bloody hell good with his skin color.
Obama flipped Virginia and Indiana and could FLip NC. Now for McCain that would be like turning NY or CA red. It was not a squeaker, even though I expected one. Because of last 8 years I expected a bin laden tape (just in time) and some states just going to mccain by like 2000 votes... People get over it, the conservative (reagan) revolution is dead. Obama was called a liberal and it did not sink him immediately. He was also not too "exotic" for people. I cannot wait to hear Rush Limbaugh implosion today. Callers will call in expecting US to turn into Venezuela by March.
Obama lost the White vote This is a personality vote. It does bode well for the long term when the boring politicans come back. This has nothing to do with voters going for the Obama message
He brought on new democrats to vote. Mostly college students who thought it was cool to vote for obama. A lot of republicans stayed home. especially fiscal conservatives. There are lots of republicans, like myself who are at the center socially and are fiscally conservative. Our voices have been drowned out by the religious right and the neocons. The entire northeast and west has been gutted of republicans. Thats because last 8 years republican congress and republican president fucked up big time. They didnt do the job they were put in place to do. This election was more about anti-bush and anti-republican congress who back stabbed republicans who put them there than it is about Pro-obama and pro-democrats. My guess is democrats are gonna think people voted for them to raise taxes, socialize medicine, spend spend spend on everything without getting results and they will be booted out of office next cycle. I have no hope for america. politcal system is broke, financial system is broke, foriegn relations are broke,educations system is broke, people are broke. I didnt hear one solution that makes sense from either one of the candidates in either party. America RIP