Weakest Support Group in a Coalition

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

In 2000, Bush's weakest areas of course were the NE and West Coast and especially the wealthy, secular suburbs that he got butchered in, like in Long Island for instance. He lost many of these areas to McCain in the primary. When Bush became unpopular, Republican suffered some of their worst defeats in those areas in 2006 and 2008.


In 2008, Obama lost a lot of working class areas to Hillary in the primaries, places like West Virginia, Arkansas and so on. In 2010 it is no accident that the term "Blanching" gets coined in one of those states. Even in Massachusetts, people noted the similarities between Brown's map and Clinton's map in the Dem primary. Democrats also got butchered in White Working Class areas in both 2010 and 2014.


In 2016, Trump's weakest link was high-end suburbs. He lost most all of them to Cruz, Rubio or Kasich. Now of course we see signs of a Suburban Revolt against Trump.

Bottom line is the demographics that a given President is weakest with (among those that do support them that is), forms the basis for, and it is in those areas that you see, a surge for the other party in the midterms. Of times, when the other Party does capture the White House, it will include those demographics as one of their demographics, possibly even one of their strongest.

In some ways, while Bush deserves a good bit of the blame for pushing the GOP towards a Trumpist direction, the natural flow of the two party cycles, also pushed in that direction, because the Clinton 2008 voters were Obama's weakest demographic. So the Republicans found their biggest gains in rural, WWC dominated areas in the midterms and the next Republican President was elected with them as part of their base, just like high end secular suburbs formed a key part of Obama's.

[RINO Tom]

Very interesting.  However, not to nitpick, I wouldn't say "high end secular suburbs" were a "key part of Obama's base" ... firstly, he didn't pull ANYWHERE near the margins in those areas as he did in inner-cities or college towns, and the latter far outnumber the former in terms of votes.

[Skill and Chance]

This doesn't really fit with 2012, though.  The wealthy suburbs swung hardest to Romney and Obama actually flipped some WWC-heavy counties to him and improved in many others he already won. 

Then there's the thornier matter of 1976, which simply was nothing like what came before or after.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Very interesting.  However, not to nitpick, I wouldn't say "high end secular suburbs" were a "key part of Obama's base" ... firstly, he didn't pull ANYWHERE near the margins in those areas as he did in inner-cities or college towns, and the latter far outnumber the former in terms of votes.

Well not to nit pick, but that depends on how you define "base".

If you define it as smallest coherent majority you can win a primary with and whose turnout impacts a general election, but other than that has limtied impact, yes.

But if you take a more expansive definition to include a group big enough to materially swing an election like WWC votes for Trump, then no. Obama did rather well many of those areas like the Philly Burbs, So-Cal, Denver suburbs and so on.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

This doesn't really fit with 2012, though.  The wealthy suburbs swung hardest to Romney and Obama actually flipped some WWC-heavy counties to him and improved in many others he already won. 

Wealthy suburbs maybe, but where it mattered not so much. For instance he certainly didn't get enough in those suburbs to win CO, VA or FL. He did get enough to win NC, though.