North Carolina: Democratic Trend Slowing Down?

[illegaloperation]

It will very likely speed up now that the Republicans are about to blow up the state.

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North Carolina was run by conservative Democrats. They are equivalent to moderate Republicans in many other states. That's why the state has things like right to work law.

What has happened is that Art Pope (North Carolina's answer to the Koch Brothers) bankrolled Republicans to victory in the state in 2010 and 2012.

Pat McCrory may be the de jure governor of North Carolina, but Art Pope is the de facto governor. McCrory appointed Pope to be Budget Director for North Carolina, the most powerful appointed position in the state.

Pope is now in the driving seat. He has supreme influence over the Republicans in the legislature.


The Republicans in the general assembly are insulated from public opinion because of redistricting (NC governor has no veto power over redistricting). They can get votes in the lower 40s and easily maintain control of both houses of the general assembly.

[illegaloperation]

Gov. Pinocchio doing work: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/12/pat-mccrory-motorcycle-abortion-bill_n_3588466.html

[illegaloperation]

"War on Women".

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Thanks a lot, Pat.

[illegaloperation]

Slashing Unemployment Benefits: This should motivate you to get a job. The only people that should be receiving benefits are the people looking for jobs.

Cutting income taxes for rich while raising sales taxes on everyone else: I though it was a flat cut for everyone, a cut just for the rich is completely unfair and I disagree with it.

Cutting back on early voting and Sunday voting: I never read about this, but this sounds stupid, however raising voter ID laws reduces fraud which is what I agree with.

Not expanding Medicaid: Only should be used for poor people who really need it. There should be no "fakers" out there reaching out to Medicaid when they don't need it, so I think this is for the better and worse.

Education: Expanding the voucher system lets parents choose the kind of school they want.

Ending Tax Deduction: Disagree

People want jobs. A lot of they can't get jobs and that's why they are unemployed.

Ditto about the taxes.

Voter frauds happen with absentee ballots: this Voter ID does nothing to prevent that.  The answer to reducing voter fraud is to eliminated absentee ballot (except for armed service members and other overseas agencies).

Eliminating early voting, eliminating Sunday voting, eliminating same day voting registration and eliminating child taxes credit from voting from college does NOT have anything to do with voter fraud either.

Teachers should be given a paid raise not a paid cut. South Carolina paid teachers more than do North Carolina.

[illegaloperation]

North Carolina was run by conservative Democrats. They are equivalent to moderate Republicans in many other states. That's why the state has things like right to work law.

What has happened is that Art Pope (North Carolina's answer to the Koch Brothers) bankrolled Republicans to victory in the state in 2010 and 2012.

Pat McCrory may be the de facto governor of North Carolina, but Art Pope is the de jure governor. McCrory appointed Pope to be Budget Director for North Carolina, the most powerful appointed position in the state.

Pope is now in the driving seat. He has supreme influence over the Republicans in the legislature.


The Republicans in the general assembly are insulated from public opinion because of redistricting (NC governor has no veto power over redistricting). They can get votes in the lower 40s and easily maintain control of both houses of the general assembly.

You mixed up "de jure" and "de facto". "De jure" means "concerning law", while "de facto" means "concerning fact".

fixed

[illegaloperation]

It's slowing down but trends don't go on forever. It will be more interesting to see how a non-Obama candidate does. Obama did well with the African American population in the tar heel state and he won the election so those are two reasons for over performance.

North Carolina is moving slower to the left because of the recession. The pace will probably pickup again.

Also, it is incorrect to assume that it will move back because Obama is not on the ticket.

Obama may have performed well among the African Americans, but he performed poorly among Southern whites. A different Democratic candidate can improve the margin of Southern whites.

[illegaloperation]

It's slowing down but trends don't go on forever. It will be more interesting to see how a non-Obama candidate does. Obama did well with the African American population in the tar heel state and he won the election so those are two reasons for over performance.

North Carolina is moving slower to the left because of the recession. The pace will probably pickup again.

Also, it is incorrect to assume that it will move back because Obama is not on the ticket.

Obama may have performed well among the African Americans, but he performed poorly among Southern whites. A different Democratic candidate can improve the margin of Southern whites.

That's a great point, but Bush didn't appear to do that much worse than Romney did and he actually did better than Romney with whites in NC. Really the turnout numbers aren't stressed enough. The reason southern states trended D is because of increased black turnout, even though Whites went slightly more republican. Also let's not forget that white turnout was not fantastic this election cycle so we'll see where turnout is at.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/28/black-voter-turnout-2012-election_n_3173673.html

The reason both Virginia and North Carolina are trending left is the growth in the urban areas.

In Virginia, it's the D.C. suburb; in North Carolina, it's Charlotte and the Research Triangle.

[illegaloperation]

North Carolina leans Republican and Virginia is barely Republican with all things being equal. In the next election, they could both be in the toss up column though.

In 2012, Virginia was +0.5 while North Carolina was +4.7 (compared to the national average).

According to Nate Silver, if in 2016 Clinton can perform exactly as Obama did 2012, she will carry the state just from demographic changes.

And while it can be argue that Obama over perform among the black vote, there's also the possibility that Clinton can perform better with white vote than did Obama.

[illegaloperation]

North Carolina leans Republican and Virginia is barely Republican with all things being equal. In the next election, they could both be in the toss up column though.

In 2012, Virginia was +0.5 while North Carolina was +4.7 (compared to the national average).

According to Nate Silver, if in 2016 Clinton can perform exactly as Obama did 2012, she will carry the state just from demographic changes.

And while it can be argue that Obama over perform among the black vote, there's also the possibility that Clinton can perform better with white vote than did Obama.

As long as the trend continues you're right. However, take into account that the Republicans could run a great nominee too. For example, Chris Christie could get the undecided whites instead of Hillary Clinton.

Maybe Republican will nominate a horrible candidate and lost Georgia for all we know.

I am a science person.

When I do my lab experiments, I have the control (what doesn't change significantly) and variable (what changes).

Obviously, if my control changes significantly, my thesis is meaningless because it's inconclusive.

Between tests, the solvent evaporates and the control slightly changes, but it's still close enough for me to make conclusive observations.

If between tests, I changes the temperate, then my observations are no longer conclusive, because the control significantly changes.

Same thing applies here. Otherwise, if the control changes, (for example, Democrats nominate a racist white candidate while Republicans nominated a charming black candidate), the observation no longer applies.