Why Did Obama do badly in Appalachia in 2008?

[Bootes Void]

He did worse compared to Kerry despite being in a much more favourable environment. Why was this? Did old democrats die off? Cultural reasons? Environment issues? Or the Republicans targeted this area heavily

You see this poor performance in KY, TN, WV, western Pa, Northern Alabama, Arkansas etc.

Why was this?

[President Johnson]

I think a combination of racial prejudices, cultural change and Yellow Dogs dying out. An African American from Chicago was just a bad fit for that region anyway.

[butWhyNot?]

Pissed off Hillary supporters.

In all seriousness though, it was simply a trend continuation.

[If my soul was made of stone]

While he took a beating in the more "classically" Appalachian parts of the region, more urban counties swung towards Obama a fair bit (Buncombe NC, Knox TN, Kanawha and Monongalia WV, etc.), as well as a few smaller counties with demographic quirks (such as Jackson NC, which is 10% Native) or weird local political patterns that hadn't died out yet (Menifee KY, which swung Democratic in both 2004 and 2008, probably due to opposition to Iraq in the ancestrally isolationist region). 2012 was really when the dam broke there.

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

I think a combination of racial prejudices, cultural change and Yellow Dogs dying out. An African American from Chicago was just a bad fit for that region anyway.

That's all correct, but you missed the pivotal point: Appalachia was still Clinton country back then. Hillary won the above-mentioned areas by a huge margin during primary season, and all of them swung heavily against Obama. Wasn't that the time when the technical term PUMA was created?
I would also add Oklahoma, which was carried by Hillary by a margin of over 20%, to the list, as its Dixie part - which is adjacent to the former Clinton State - also showed immense swings against Obama.

[ElectionsGuy]

I think the short answer is that a lot of these people were DINOs who were basically holdouts of Bill Clinton's party and [wishfully] thought Hillary would be a continuation of that rather than a change to something more culturally liberal.

Like Trump with college+ whites, he sped up trends with these groups that would've happened eventually. The Democratic Party was not going to go back to the Bill Clinton days. Hillary would've done better than Obama but by the end of her potential presidency the same shift would've happened.

[TDAS04]

A combination of factors, most of which have been already discussed in this thread.  However, it’s hard to argue that race wasn’t the biggest factor.  After all, it’s not as if McCain was a better fit for these places than Bush.  Or that Kerry was a good fit.

[UWS]

Maybe partly because of Biden’s « No coal plants in America! We’re not supporting clean coal! » comments.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ55UzAsp6M

[sting in the rafters]

“Bitter people cling to guns and religion”

[AtorBoltox]

This one's a real headscratcher!

[darklordoftech]

His name.

[Motorcity]

This one's a real headscratcher!

I know!
 
I have no idea why Appalachia didn't support a black Muslim man from Chicago named Barack HUSSEIN Obama

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

This one's a real headscratcher!

I know!
 
I have no idea why Appalachia didn't support a black Muslim man from Chicago named Barack HUSSEIN Obama

Hillary can really be proud of her supporters. 😂😂😂
Can anyone ascertain their home state through their accents?

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

Racial prejudice to some extent. I think his fall off has been somewhat exaggerated though. In West Virginia he didn't do that much worse then Kerry and still won a handful of counties. The real drop-off came in 2012 and that was due largely to the preexisting decline in union membership being accompanied by hostility towards four years of the environmental policies of a Democratic administration.

[Vosem]

https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=2006&fips=47&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1

The "pissed-off Hillary supporters" theory, or the theory that Obama really was perceived as meaningfully culturally different (in a way that race probably contributed to, but wasn't determinative of), is probably correct. Black candidates who campaigned appropriately were absolutely able to put together Clintonian coalitions in that period (see, for illustration, Harold Ford Jr.'s 3-point defeat in Tennessee; compare with Obama's 15-point defeat).

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

Appalachia as a whole swung Dem from 2004 to 2008, though it still trended Rep.

2016: Trump + 34.84
2012: Romney + 24.12
2008: McCain + 17.31
2004: Bush + 18.50
2000: Bush + 12.63
1996: Clinton + 0.06
1992: Clinton + 2.46

[darklordoftech]

FWIW, in the 2016 Arkansas GOP primary, Rubio won the county in the center of Arkansas that swung Democratic from 2004 to 2008 while Trump won the counties that swung Republican from 2004 to 2008.

I wonder: Could Trump appealing to Kerry-McCain voters explain why his attacks on the Bushes didn’t hurt him?

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

FWIW, in the 2016 Arkansas GOP primary, Rubio won the county in the center of Arkansas that swung Democratic from 2004 to 2008 while Trump won the counties that swung Republican from 2004 to 2008.

I wonder: Could Trump appealing to Kerry-McCain voters explain why his attacks on the Bushes didn’t hurt him?

Definitely, not just Kerry-McCain voters but many who voted for Obama as well. This is why Hillary's attempt to paint Trump as "not a typical Republican" backfired because that was part of his appeal.

[Bootes Void]

Appalachia as a whole swung Dem from 2004 to 2008, though it still trended Rep.

2016: Trump + 34.84
2012: Romney + 24.12
2008: McCain + 17.31
2004: Bush + 18.50
2000: Bush + 12.63
1996: Clinton + 0.06
1992: Clinton + 2.46

do you know how it went in 2020?

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

Appalachia as a whole swung Dem from 2004 to 2008, though it still trended Rep.

2016: Trump + 34.84
2012: Romney + 24.12
2008: McCain + 17.31
2004: Bush + 18.50
2000: Bush + 12.63
1996: Clinton + 0.06
1992: Clinton + 2.46

do you know how it went in 2020?

not yet calculated it.