I don’t have that much problem with most of the alignment of states and whom they seem to be getting in line with according to the polls. Well, I have a little with Nevada leaning towards Obama, Florida leaning toward Obama and even North Carolina leaning towards Obama but I can see how it could happen. But I don’t see the connection between Indiana and McCain.
Could someone explain it to me (I’m way out here in the West and many of you are back nearer there). Now don’t go all political on me ("We believe in the American Way and God and the Flag…etc.) More farmland, less rust belt–things like that.
Could is possibly be that we like McCain (well, dislike him less than Obama)? Obama is pretty much emblematic of everything we dislike, and no, that’s not a race thing.
Physically, Indiana lies between Ohio and Illinois, and is similar in many ways. However, Ohio has Cleveland and the older industrial cities in the northeast (Akron, Canton and Youngstown) which push the state towards the Democrats (though not quite far enough in 2000 or 2004, unfortunately); and Illinois has Chicago pushing that state well over the Democratic line. So Indiana will always be more Republican than its neighbours – though this time I think it might turn blue, that will be only after Ohio turns blue.
Mainly just rural downstate voters who slant conservative. Illinois is actually the same way but the gigantic voting bloc of Cook County mitigates all the red downstate districts. Look as a map of how Illinois voted by country in 2004 and it’s a huge red state with spots of blue around Chicago and the couple college towns. Indiana’s main cities of Gary & Indianapolis aren’t nearly as large and I don’t believe that Indianapolis slants blue nearly as hard as Chicago does.
The fact that Obama may actually win Indiana is what is notable, not that it is still one of the few states that McCain has a marginal lead in. (In fact 538’s model puts it roughly a coin flip as to which way Indiana will land.)
I’m here in Hoosier land and agree that it is heavily Republican and I will be shocked if it goes blue. I personally am a Democrat and voted for Nader in 2000 because Indiana was certain to go Red and I wanted to support the idea of a third party more than I wanted to support Nader specificly (that is to say that voting Gore or Nader would have been equally futile).
Many of the people I live and work with are likely to believe that Obama is a secret Muslim that will immediately give reparations to Blacks, Native Americans and Al Quaeda (sp?) fighters upon taking office*. They are convinced that an Obama presidency would mean confiscation of guns and socialism. They think Palin is a “breath of fresh air”. Rush is HUGE around here. People here tend to like things to stay the same or better yet, go back like they used to be (i.e. whenever that particular person was in high school). Republicans around here are Republican because thier parents and grandparents are Republicans.
*According to an e mail forward that hung in the breakroom for a long time.
Well, personal experience and anecdotes aren’t facts, but I do know that many, many people who used to live in parts of Chicago and the southern suburbs moved to IN due to white flight. And they typically moved to NW IN, so that they can still commute to Chicago and make Chicago pay but have IN expenses. I know of at least 3 different families who moved to Munster/Schererville because their neighborhood “changed”.
Not saying all Hoosiers, not saying it’s THE factor, but to say race has nothing to do with it is false. Race has something to do with some of it, I’m sure.
It also sort of ignores that O’Bannon, our governor prior to the current Daniels, was a democrat despite how “red” the state is. While polls close relatively early (although I seem to recall them closing at 7 rather than 6) they also open rather early, allowing people to vote prior to work. Many businesses also allow workers to arrive late/leave early in order to vote. While Indiana tends to vote republican, any republican merely assuming it’s a done deal is acting foolishly. Hoosiers will vote in a democrat when it’s perceived to be in their self-interest.
Let’s see, we’ve got David Stephenson, the Shipp/Smith lynchings (inspiration for “Strange Fruit”)and a long history of racism. Yeah, I’d say it’s a safe bet that race has a little something to do with it.
But historically we are a red state. Personally I think it’s because no matter how populous Indianapolis, Gary and a couple of other major cities get, they will still be outnumbered by the rural population. Old farmers and children of old farmers who are carrying on the old ways and highly resistant to change.
That Obama is making it as close of a race as he is suprises me.
Indiana is defaulted to McCain because it always votes Republican. Lot’s of rural areas filled with gawd-fearing whites make the state uncompetitive in presidential elections. The fact that the state is now seen as a toss-up shows how tough things have become for McCain in this race. Indiana does have Indianapolis and Gary and there are lots of colleges that will will go heavily to Obama, but tradition favors McCain. If McCain loses IN he will lose the election, but if IN goes blue the election will be an electoral route anyway. So McCain must win this state while Obama doesn’t need it, but he can force McCain to blow his time and money shoring up a state that I’m sure McCain once looked upon as an absolute given.
Oh, no–my FIL believes something like this. He is “uncomfortable” with Obama. Can’t give me a reason. (He also thinks the Democratic party is the bastion of corruption and slime). So, it’s partly he’s anti-Democrat (no matter who is the candidate), partly that he’s old, set in his ways and persists in seeing himself as a good ole boy from rural Ohio, even though he has 2 college degrees (Chem E) and ran a department at Amoco, and partly because he is indeed racist. He’s the kind of Rep that no matter what the GOP does, he swallows the whole “family values”, “they hate our freedom” schtick.
He wouldn’t pay any attention to the whole Muslim nonsense, that’s my MIL’s specialty. You could tell her that Obama rapes babies and she’d believe it (she’s also college educated and worked as a teacher–in a primarily black neighborhood for 25 years). Conversely, McCain could be found with a dead gay prostitute and it would be put on the Dems somehow. There is no talking sense to these people.
