Why did Little River County, AR swung so hard to the Republicans in 2008?

[TrendsareUsuallyReal]

LMAO @ Red Avs saying racism. Do you people ever get tired of bringing race into everything?

Sure dude, I'm sure they swung Republican by 30% in 2008 of all years because they agreed with the Republican Party's economic agenda

That's a very possible reason.

I take it you’ve never spent any real amount of time interacting with people in the rural south

[TDAS04]

Whites in Arkansas swung hard to the right in 2008 because of both racism and PUMA mindset.   Then, as Obama came to define the Democratic Party, old time Democrats in the state had enough, as they helped elect Republicans to all major offices, and wouldn’t support Hillary herself in 2016.

Even in 2008, Arkansas Democrats controlled 3 out of 4 House seats, both Senate seats, the Governorship, and all statewide offices.  In addition, the state had one of the most solidly Democratic state legislatures in the country.  The US elects a black Democrat President, and 6 years later, Republicans control everything in Arkansas.

[NOVA Green]

Did anybody ever mention that 2008 DEM Primary moment in PA when Obama talks about "bitter people clinging to their guns and religion"?'

It's a small pop County, but maybe that hit some folks the wrong way....

Ok--- maybe that is nothing burger to explain the unusual swings in one county.

Now, I might be more interested in what happened in Bowie County Texas in 2008 (Pop 93k), which is where Texarkana is located on the Texas side of border and Miller County Arkansas in 2008 (Pop 44k), since it appears there might have been spill-over impact going on in the area at that time...

The Texarkana Metro area has a Pop of 150k, which includes Little River County....

How can we simply talk about one small county which is part of much larger "Micropolitan Center" in complete isolation?

I don't have the answers, but it's logically part of a bigger shift within the area....

 

[Agonized-Statism]

Why is this thread still going?

Middle class white people fighting their valuable fights online.

[Grassroots]

LMAO @ Red Avs saying racism. Do you people ever get tired of bringing race into everything?

Sure dude, I'm sure they swung Republican by 30% in 2008 of all years because they agreed with the Republican Party's economic agenda

That's a very possible reason.

I take it you’ve never spent any real amount of time interacting with people in the rural south

Clearly you haven't, despite being in Texas. Are you a hermit or something?

[darklordoftech]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

[TrendsareUsuallyReal]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

Without looking at a map, I doubt it. The vast majority of Kerry-McCain swings came in regions in the south where Clinton ran strongest compared to Dukakis, like Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, and a lot of Appalachia.

[darklordoftech]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

Without looking at a map, I doubt it. The vast majority of Kerry-McCain swings came in regions in the south where Clinton ran strongest compared to Dukakis, like Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, and a lot of Appalachia.

Interesting. I wonder if there’s any 1988-1992 swing maps.

[TDAS04]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

Clarke County, Iowa.

I might also check on the four South Dakota counties that swung Republican in 2008; they’re possibilities.

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

Clarke County, Iowa.

I might also check on the four South Dakota counties that swung Republican in 2008; they’re possibilities.

Clarke County, Iowa is quite a weird place. Only Iowa County to swing R from 2004 to 2008. And it swung D from 2000 to 2004.

[R.P. McM]

LMAO @ Red Avs saying racism. Do you people ever get tired of bringing race into everything?

People don’t vote for what they want. They vote for who they are.

And who they are, are yellow dogs finally waking up to the democratic party being too socially liberal for their interests. Race was not in these peoples heads at the voting booth.

This is delusional. John Kerry was more socially liberal than Obama and he did pretty well with yellow dogs. keep in mind he was also painted as a "Massachusetts liberal", a "coastal elitist" and so on. as I said before, there are very few logical explanations for why so many voters would switch from Kerry to McCain other than racism.

McCain was more experienced in a time of crisis/they thought Obama was too uninterventionist, there are many reasons.

But Trump was the least experienced presidential candidate in American history, and he campaigned as an anti-interventionist. Southern whites supported him overwhelmingly. So ... yeah, we all get it. Some of you folks are in deep denial. Or, more likely, racists yourselves. Notice that no Republicans are ever willing to identity as racist, but a whole sh!+load of them say and do racist things all the time. I'm sorry, but the jig is up, the mask has fallen. Lying isn't going to save you at this point.

There are plenty of racist elements in the GOP, there have been since the 1850s.  Simply I dentifying with one of TWO parties doesn’t, however, make you guilty by association ... never has, never will, at least not for grounded people.

Absurd. Of course identifying with the Dixiecrats or the secessionist Democrats of the 1860's made you a racist! Hahahaha! You know the NSDAP was a popular political party, right? Were its adherents anti-Semites for supporting Hitler? (Maybe they were attracted to his trade policy ...) Or does this ludicrous axiom only apply to American political parties in the early-21st century?

So anybody identifying with any party prior to the current day is a racist.

Well, the past is pretty ugly. But no, I wouldn't characterize a Republican in the 1950's as racist. Because racism wasn't a core tenet of the the GOP of the 1950's. But Dixiecrats? Yeah, they were just Southern Democrats dedicated to the the preservation of white power! It matters what the organizing principle of your political party is. So for the NSDAP, yeah, it was anti-Semitism. For the contemporary GOP, it isn't moral values, fiscal responsibility, Constitutionalism, free markets. the rule of law, or foreign interventionism. So what does that leave? Racism, sadly. Yeah, the organizing principle of the modern GOP is just opposition to immigrants and ethnic minorities.

[lfromnj]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

I think there is one county in Iowa that swung R.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke_County,_Iowa#Politics

[Politician]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

I think there is one county in Iowa that swung R.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke_County,_Iowa#Politics

Funnily, it trended D in 2004 and 2012.

This pattern isn't uncommon; mostly WWC areas in the Midwest where Kerry overperformed, Obama did mediocre in 2008 but where voters were turned off by Romney's personality.

[RINO Tom]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

I think there is one county in Iowa that swung R.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke_County,_Iowa#Politics

Funnily, it trended D in 2004 and 2012.

This pattern isn't uncommon; mostly WWC areas in the Midwest where Kerry overperformed, Obama did mediocre in 2008 but where voters were turned off by Romney's personality.

There are plenty of relevant discussions to be had about Trump's stoking of racial tensions ... that should be obvious.  However, it is also quite obvious that Democrats will defend whoever their voters are as moral people, and they'll trash them when they're gone.  All of these snot-nosed teenagers who got fired up in 2016 and joined Atlas to tell everyone how smart they are probably don't remember this, but those "WWC" Midwestern areas were described on this very board as QUITE literally not racist/Southern enough to vote for the GOP back in 2012.  They were "Yankee," as posters would put it.  They were too Northern, and they were treated like the current "WWC" voters in Western Massachusetts and Vermont were - simply too enlightened to fall for the GOP's tricks.  A place like Orange County?  Practically Southern, fairly evangelical, QUITE intolerant, not nearly as enlightened as these places.  Once those WWC Midwestern areas ditched them, the narrative quite literally became they are just simply too racist for the Democratic Party.

A partisan believes his party upholds morals against an immoral opposition, and he will do mental gymnastics all day long to justify why those voting for him are doing so out of a moral cause.  The utter hypocrisy and 180 degree way this forum has done the Midwest dirty since 2016 should honestly shed most of the credibility that your average 2020 board or Presidential Elections Trend board poster has.

It could quite possibly be true that literally every single racist and undesirable votes Republican now, and there are ZERO immoral people left in the Democratic Party, haha ... but they treated it as if this were the case back in 2012 ... and 2008 ... and 2004.  Becomes hard to take the claim seriously when it always gets *worse*.  I'll just wait until 2024 to listen to this shlt, haha.

[darklordoftech]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

I think there is one county in Iowa that swung R.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke_County,_Iowa#Politics

Funnily, it trended D in 2004 and 2012.

This pattern isn't uncommon; mostly WWC areas in the Midwest where Kerry overperformed, Obama did mediocre in 2008 but where voters were turned off by Romney's personality.

There are plenty of relevant discussions to be had about Trump's stoking of racial tensions ... that should be obvious.  However, it is also quite obvious that Democrats will defend whoever their voters are as moral people, and they'll trash them when they're gone.  All of these snot-nosed teenagers who got fired up in 2016 and joined Atlas to tell everyone how smart they are probably don't remember this, but those "WWC" Midwestern areas were described on this very board as QUITE literally not racist/Southern enough to vote for the GOP back in 2012.  They were "Yankee," as posters would put it.  They were too Northern, and they were treated like the current "WWC" voters in Western Massachusetts and Vermont were - simply too enlightened to fall for the GOP's tricks.  A place like Orange County?  Practically Southern, fairly evangelical, QUITE intolerant, not nearly as enlightened as these places.  Once those WWC Midwestern areas ditched them, the narrative quite literally became they are just simply too racist for the Democratic Party.

A partisan believes his party upholds morals against an immoral opposition, and he will do mental gymnastics all day long to justify why those voting for him are doing so out of a moral cause.  The utter hypocrisy and 180 degree way this forum has done the Midwest dirty since 2016 should honestly shed most of the credibility that your average 2020 board or Presidential Elections Trend board poster has.

It could quite possibly be true that literally every single racist and undesirable votes Republican now, and there are ZERO immoral people left in the Democratic Party, haha ... but they treated it as if this were the case back in 2012 ... and 2008 ... and 2004.  Becomes hard to take the claim seriously when it always gets *worse*.  I'll just wait until 2024 to listen to this shlt, haha.

People seem to forget the narratives from before the last election. People always think there’s a “permanent (whichever party holds the Presidency) majority” and that regions are perpetually trending however they voted in the last election. In 2004, there was a “permanent Republican majority”, in 2012 there was a “permanent Democratic majority”, now there’s a “permanently Republican midwest”, etc.

[Technocracy Timmy]

It could quite possibly be true that literally every single racist and undesirable votes Republican now, and there are ZERO immoral people left in the Democratic Party, haha ... but they treated it as if this were the case back in 2012 ... and 2008 ... and 2004.  Becomes hard to take the claim seriously when it always gets *worse*.  I'll just wait until 2024 to listen to this shlt, haha.

I actually fully agree with your criticism which is why I’m a lot more skeptical of a Dem win in 2020 than a lot of other fellow Democrats. Since 2000, the Democratic Party has consistently lost wwc votes every cycle (except for 2008 where Obama likely net gained votes here - but it was much weaker than the swings he got with other groups. And a ton of wwc voters in the south and Appalachia still swung for McCain). I don’t know where the ceiling is, but I doubt Trump reached it in 2016 and that’s pretty unsettling.

[lfromnj]

I wonder if Bush 41 did better in 1992 than in 1988 in any of the same areas where McCain did better than Bush 43.

I think there is one county in Iowa that swung R.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke_County,_Iowa#Politics

Funnily, it trended D in 2004 and 2012.

This pattern isn't uncommon; mostly WWC areas in the Midwest where Kerry overperformed, Obama did mediocre in 2008 but where voters were turned off by Romney's personality.

I think Trumbull in Ohio too, it really shows how awful of a candidate Mittens was where he does worse while not having the worlds biggest recession in history.

Oh yeah forgot a 2nd county, but this time its Southern

Jefferson county texas.