Why did Obama do so poorly in SWPA in 2008?
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  Why did Obama do so poorly in SWPA in 2008?
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Author Topic: Why did Obama do so poorly in SWPA in 2008?  (Read 901 times)
Alcibiades
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« on: December 31, 2020, 09:14:07 AM »

I am of course aware that SWPA is part of Appalachia, which was one of the few areas of the country where Obama did worse in 2008 than Kerry in 2004, but his performance stands out as being particularly poor there. He failed to win a single county (except for Allegheny), whereas Kerry had won 3. By contrast, Obama won several counties in WV and KY coal country, as well as in neighbouring Appalachian Ohio, to say nothing of his performance in general in the white rural Midwest and industrial working class areas. So why did he do quite so badly in SWPA compared to other similar areas?
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DINGO Joe
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« Reply #1 on: December 31, 2020, 10:16:39 AM »

Well, the swing against Obama was much greater in EKY and South WV.  Otherwise, the swing map really didn't look much different for adjacent parts of WV and Ohio.  While it is coal country, it's a little more economically diverse so in fact he did better there than in the aforementioned region.
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If my soul was made of stone
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« Reply #2 on: December 31, 2020, 12:02:37 PM »

Fairly socially conservative region (big fans of Casey Sr. and Rep. Murtha) that had started moving away from the Dems with the turn of the century and voted heavily for HRC in the primary. Obama still performed respectably there, with Fayette and Greene decided by less than a point apiece, but the writing was already on the wall, and the great collapse came in the following decade. Beaver has interestingly remained quite open to voting for downballot Dems such as Casey Jr. and Wolf. The comparative performance vs. coal country counties to the south was overall a little better, and the holdouts such as Elliott or McDowell seem more like highly localized flukes than indicative of any meaningful regional trends, and have in fact swung much harder to the GOP now due to being less economically diverse and lacking metropolitan connections.

Or maybe they just really, really like Vietnam veterans named John, so much that they decided to stick with the GOP thereafter.
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Alcibiades
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« Reply #3 on: December 31, 2020, 12:20:06 PM »

Fairly socially conservative region (big fans of Casey Sr. and Rep. Murtha) that had started moving away from the Dems with the turn of the century and voted heavily for HRC in the primary. Obama still performed respectably there, with Fayette and Greene decided by less than a point apiece, but the writing was already on the wall, and the great collapse came in the following decade. Beaver has interestingly remained quite open to voting for downballot Dems such as Casey Jr. and Wolf. The comparative performance vs. coal country counties to the south was overall a little better, and the holdouts such as Elliott or McDowell seem more like highly localized flukes than indicative of any meaningful regional trends, and have in fact swung much harder to the GOP now due to being less economically diverse and lacking metropolitan connections.

Or maybe they just really, really like Vietnam veterans named John, so much that they decided to stick with the GOP thereafter.

Yeah, Beaver’s an interesting case, what with going Dem in 2018. I assumed it was due to some countervailing pro-D suburban trends mixed in with residual working class support.
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MoreThanPolitics
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« Reply #4 on: January 06, 2021, 10:22:49 AM »
« Edited: January 06, 2021, 11:30:40 AM by MoreThanPolitics »

Obama was viewed as a privileged liberal elite in most of Appalachia, which didn't align with the coal miners and low-income residents there
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