True, but then we have to factor in the non-voters, and what percentages the other candidates got in those counties, etc.
Hear, hear. The candidates knew the rules going in and that’s what they played by. Anybody that’s still saying that Bush should concede because he lost the popular vote (as a letter writer in today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution said) needs to retake Civics 101.
To me, liberal means diverse, tolerant and open-minded. I believe that people tend to be exposed to more ideas when the population is more dense. This exposure makes one realize that she/he should be more open-minded.
Who is calling the “farmers” independent? As conservative and republican as they may be, they would revolt if the government cut their subsidies.
But the Earned Income Tax Credit? Unjust and un-American.
When the money talks, everyone knows what happens to the ideology.
Give me a break.
MR
My theory is that in cities, life tends to change rapidly, and city-dwellers are more open-minded to change, because ther jobs and well-being may depend on it. Left-wing parties usually effect more drastic changes that appeal to these people.
People in rural areas depend a lot on things being “just the way they are”, especially farmers and church-goers. Right-wing parties are for people who like to be stuck in a rut.
Blue Ridge Boy here…(who voted Libertarian)
and
These are two of the lamest (and most common) mis-characterizations I’ve heard. You two should be ashamed of yourselves.
Having lived in both cities (Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington DC) and the country (college in Frostburg, MD and Iowa City, IA and currently living in the Blue Ridge Mountains on the VA/WV border) I feel comfortable weighing in here. Can the two of you offer any depth of experience that you bring to the table?
Let’s deal with it one at a time shall we? ** Warning! Experience-based statements approaching! Ask me for a cite and I’ll ignore you!**
I’m glad it means that to you. That doesn’t mean that people who don’t live in cities/suburbs are close-minded bigots. I bet you find more distrust and intolerance in Washington DC than you will in my community. I’m a Jew. No one has ever called me on it. (OK, I once got ribbed that I could watch the Redskins game on Sundays without feeling guilty…) But in DC being Jewish was automatically regarded as a politcal statement. Because I was Jewish it was assumed that I held certain beliefs or traits. How the hell is that more tolerant?
What makes you think we don’t get exposed to ideas out here? Yes, population density means more people (and probably more discussion, granted) but that doesn’t mean we’re out here polishing the rifles and waiting for deer season. It’s my experience (a la the point immediately above) that the higher the density and the louder the debate the less people are willing to consider other viewpoints. Believe it or not we have book discussion clubs, charitable events, group meetings, etc out here. And I’d be willing to bet (unsupportable statement here! Sorry) that our per capita attendence is higher than in Washington.
Tell that to the entrenched bureaucracy in Washington DC. WDC is three mayors and a federal takeover into an attempt to ‘clean out the dead wood’ (Sharon Pratt Kelly even used a broom as her campaign symbol) and progress isn’t exactly hoppin’ off the page there.
(Baseless accusation alert for which I apologize but I really am ticked off here)
Could it be that the cities tend to vote democratic because their jobs depend on it?
ahem Again…sorry.
Is that an uncalled for slam or what? And I don’t farm or go to church!
I’d say that it’s not that we ‘like the way things are’ so much rather than we believe that WE’RE able to deal with our own problems? Is it wrong to believe in volunteering or giving? I can think of three schools within 10 miles of my house that are currently fund raising and we’re supporting them all? The Legion Hall and Masons (I’m not a member of either) are both prominent in food drives and other help for the needy. Again, I’m willing to bet that, per capita, my neighbors and I contribute more in time and money than city dwellers do.
In the end I think it comes down to the question of how involved does the average city/country dweller feel they are in their community? Yes, I realize that there are more people involved in the cities but there are simply more people in cities. But how many of you have lamented the vast majority of your neighbors who are not involved and just stay home?
I’ll take country living over (my experience again) impersonal and ineffective city living any day.
How do you factor in the fact that most people that work on Wall Street and in finance seem to be Republican?
I could be wrong on that, but it seems to be true from my anecdotal experience.
PeeQueue
Well, I guess you just figure that Wall Street is merely one atypical byway in a large, large city.
Jonathan – I’m not sure anyone was slamming country life in particular. But as you claim that you’ve inhabited both worlds, do you have any theories that might explain the OP?
It certainly appears that there is a pattern in the voting that indicates that it’s not just a generality.
HAHAHAHA 
I love it!
Living in an eastern…uh, NEW ENGLAND city I find myself swarmed by democrats. The folks who brought you rent control! Welfare! Double-digit Inflation!
Republicans, the folks who brought you Big business! Deficit Spending! Donating weapons to our enemies!
Government: the biggest load of crap since God made the universe.
end
Well, if I had to guess, I would think it has more to do with the fact that there is a general belief that a Republican in office would be better for the market.
PeeQueue
Which is borne out by exactly what empirical evidence? Sheesh.
I’m a New Yorker, and all the investment bankers, day traders, and stockbrokers I know wouldn’t vote Republican if it were the last party on earth. They don’t read the WSJ, either.
Wow Maeglin, that’s counterintuitive. or so it seems to me. Tell me, do these non-Republican brokers et al. dislike the Republicans because they think the Democrats are better for the market, or because of other considerations that trump economics?
Perhaps if you were a little more specific I would have a reasonable chance of responding with substance.
Each has his own reasons, to be sure. So I would have to say both.
Many of them do believe that a republican in office, especially backed by a republican legislature, would be extremely pernicious in the long term. They may be perfectly willing to reap short-term benefits, but are extremely wary of republican fiscal policy, especially irresponsible fiscal policy in the guise of conservatism.
MR
Warning: Hijack ahead.
Empirically speaking, a divided government is better for stock prices than a power monopoly. The reason is simple…perception of legislative risk (i.e., price controls on pharmaceuticals from Democrats would be an obvious example) weighs heavily on the market. A divided government is less likely to do any legislative damage. If people can project earnings comfortably, they are more willing to pay higher prices for a given level of earnings than they are if they have to worry about legislative risk.
A Democratic president is SLIGHTLY better, historically, than a Republican president for stock prices. Throw out the two major anomalies this century on the upside and the downside (The stock market crash under Hoover, and the technology fueled rise under Clinton in his last term) and this picture starts to change. I can probably track down some data on this next week, if someone reminds me. I’m going on vacation first. 
Economically speaking, the President has almost nothing to do with economic cycles or stock prices. If anyone is still laboring under the ILLUSION that a President does control these things in any substantial way, I heartily reccommend “Secrets of the Temple: How the Federal Reserve Runs the Country,” by William Greider, an EXCELLENT and entertaining book on the Volker Fed under Carter and Reagan.
Working on “Maestro” now, just published by Bob Woodward, about the Greenspan Fed, but it’s a little dumbed down, compared to the Greider work.
Now, back to the OP…
I think it goes back to the ideals of rugged individualism. And some of it is Democrat’s own fault. People in rural areas country tend to vote Republican because you still have idiots on the Democratic side claiming rural voters must be unsophisticated rubes…that’s the only way they could possibly have voted for Bush or Reagan or Goldwater or whoever.
Democrats, take note: such arrogance, condescendence and insensitivity is a GREAT way to mobilize rural voters against your favored candidates.
People will flock to the party they feel wants and respects them, and it is clear many democrats don’t respect rural voters anymore. (They seem to have forgotten where Populism got its start. The Democratic party was once the home of the farmer and the rural voter against Wall Street and the big money in the big cities. How times change.)
I also believe that city dwellers and rural dwellers have radically different experiences with taxes. A city dweller pays taxes, but he gets a subway he can ride to work, a bus, a highway nearby he can actually use, because it connects HIS town with others. He gets to go to a park that’s around the corner from his house. He can call the police and they are there in 3 minutes. He gets a sewer system. So he’s getting some tangible benefits he can see every day, in the flesh, for his money.
The rural voter pays the same state and federal taxes, but Highways are miles away. Parks are miles away, and he doesn’t need them anyway, he can get away into the woods, or he can play catch on his own field. If he calls the police, he’s on his own for half an hour. He puts in his own septic tank instead of tapping into the sewer system. If there’s road construction, he sees 9 Tennessee Department of Transportation workers standing around while 2 fill a pothole (and one, always a chick, stands in the road and holds a flag.)
Naturally, one is more tolerant of taxation than the other–the rural voter percieves his taxes as going into thin air.
And since the cops are 30 minutes away from his house, the country gentleman finds it pretty irritating when city folks tell him he shouldn’t be able to own a gun for self defense, because cops will protect him.
Just a few ideas.
But is it correct that country folks have less need for institutionalized cooperation? In Canada, our left wing grew up in the prairies where it is as rural as it gets. The farmers needed to cooperate to survive. They had to cooperate not just on a personal level, but also on an institutional level. Thus the creation of credit unions for banking, agricultural cooperatives for marketing, subsidized freight rates for shipping, universal medicare for health, and an entire left leaning political party for representation (the Social Credit Party, now the New Democratic Party.)
I wonder if it is not so much an actual rural independance in the US, but rather a perceived rural independance. Every culture creates its own myths and ideologies, and then acts in relationship with them. In the US the myth of the rugged, self-reliant individual is strong in rural areas, so out of it rises republican support. Under similar physical and economic circumstances, Canadian ideologies grew in a different directions due to a different political and historical development (no revolution and a much more controlled expansion). Thus a Canadian prairie farm may be indistinguishable from an American prairie farm, but the political ideology of the farmer may be very different.