Strange county results

[minionofmidas]

Take a look at the Hawai'i overseas vote 2000 and 2004.

[minionofmidas]

Take a look at the Hawai'i overseas vote 2000 and 2004.

55% D in 2000, 80% D in 2004. Why did that happen?

Take a look at the total number of votes, and it will presently become clear.

[minionofmidas]

Actually, the shifts in Travis and Williamson County, Texas surprised me a bit.  Travis is really the only "left-wing" county in Texas, where there are out of place Northern California voters. 

Nader got nearly 10% there in 2000 and Bush won the county by 5%.  Without Nader in 2004, Kerry won the county by 14%.  I'm pretty sure that was the largest swing in the nation for the Dems and Nader was not the only part of it.

San Miguel Co, CO, was the largest Dem swing - about 28 (or 14, depends on your definition) point, or about 8 (4) points larger than in Travis county, which I guess is in the top twenty but not very far up (it's the largest Dem shift in the South though)

[minionofmidas]

Likely in 2000 Bush got an artifically high result there because Cheney gave him a big boost. This year the Cheney effect had worn off.

Yeah, but 2000 was the first time that Teton was the Dems' best county in the state (see my thread, Best Dem and Rep results, by county ).
As for why I'm not quite sure, but obviously resort area workers turned out heavily for Kerry. Since many of these people are pretty young and have relatively recently moved to wherever they are now, I'd figure it's got a lot to do with Dem registration drives since and low turnout among 18-30 year olds in 2000 - much like the equally pronounced Dem swing in college town-dominated counties.

Oh, à propos LDS: Alpine County CA which Kerry swung is 45% Mormon.