Red States vs. Blue States

[ffeineandsugar]

Out of curiosity: is the cultural divide in this nation / political divide in this nation just a media creation, or do people think it could be real? And what could it be leading to?

Ideas?

[IllustriousPotentate]

Here's a map of the 2000 election. Counties that Gore won are shown in blue. Counties that Bush won are shown in red.

As you can see, most of the Democratic base lies in poor rural areas; (the Southern Bible Belt from Alabama to North Carolina, the Mississippi River plains); in urban areas (the BosWash megalopolis), and in places with a high ratio of minorities (South Texas, Indian Reservations in Minnesota, the Dakotas, and the West).

[Coop]

The political divide is very real. It happens all over the world. This is because the voters of the same alliegance tend to flock together like sheep. Since they all reap the same rewards from their local government for being loyal to their party, they stay put, making it harder for an opposing party to gain access to the voting ground

[BeFell]

At 5/8/04 05:44 PM, IllustriousPotentate wrote: Here's a map of the 2000 election. Counties that Gore won are shown in blue. Counties that Bush won are shown in red.

The only blue I saw in my state was in Sun Valley Idaho. There aren't very many poor people in Sun Valley. In fact John Kerry owns a house there.

[bumcheekcity]

It happens here too. All the countryside constituancies are COnservative. Look at all the blue here.

http://www.uk-p.org/Election2001/Images/e01_gen.gif

[darkphantom]

At 5/8/04 06:03 PM, bumcheekcity wrote: It happens here too. All the countryside constituancies are COnservative. Look at all the blue here.

Actually looking at that it appears that Lib-dems own all the countryside the torys own all towns and Miscellanious districts & labour own all the urban citys tho... very odd voting behaviour.

PS: Plaid cymru!!! No wounder wales is such a dump (i'v been there I can say so.)

[bumcheekcity]

At 5/9/04 09:28 AM, darkphantom wrote: Actually looking at that it appears that Lib-dems own all the countryside the torys own all towns and Miscellanious districts & labour own all the urban citys tho... very odd voting behaviour.

Only in Scotland, which is niiceably more liberal. Labour own most of the towns and cities. And the Tories hold all the English Countryside spots.

[Blitz-Mage]

Blame it on me being used to being an American, but it just seems odd to me seeing a political map with more then two parties holding office! Granted, it looks like only the Labour, Conservative, and Liberal Democrat parties ammount to much, it still looks odd seing eight other parties hold office too!

And that's especially sad to think, considering that I'm planning on voting Libertarian this November!

But yeah, as others have already said, there is a real cultural divide between Democratic and Republican voters. The wealthy (except Hollywood) and upper middle class tend to vote overwhelmingly Republican, while working class and lower middle class usually votes Democrat. The very middle class is usually a toss up.