Sunday, November 09, 2008
blues pinks grays
As I've marveled at the map of a country that elected Barack Obama, I've also enjoyed an election map of New Jersey, a state that gave Obama a resounding win. The Star-Ledger published a map of the presidential results in every town in Jersey. The towns aren't labeled. There are three shades of red for McCain, deepest being more than a 25% plurality, lightest is pink, three for blue, & gray where less than 5% separated the candidates, which the map treats as a "tie."
What jumps out immediately is the diagonal blue belt of the Route One Corridor stretching across Mercer & Middlesex Counties, spreading outward. Ocean, Monmouth, & northwest Jersey are shades of red. Atlantic County is now mostly blue. Burlington didn't deliver a single deep red McCain town.
Obama carried only four small Cape May towns; Wildwood, West Cape May, Cape May Point (the lovely village with the lighthouse), & Woodbine. But much of Cape May is single digit McCain. The Repug county chairman down there not only gloated, he mocked the "youth vote." I say to Mr. Von Savage, if Barack had stopped there for two hours in August & had a rally in Cape May Courthouse, you might not be so smug. Plus, the Democratic county organization State Senator Jeff Van Drew tried to build in the 1990's, & which had some success back then, fell into apathy. Democrats in Cape May missed a great opportunity this year. Why am I obsessed with Cape May, which has small political importance in Jersey? It's our southernmost county, has our only southern-flavor city, & was one of the birthplaces of the religious political right movement. There were some scary people in Cape May County when I was a kid. But Cape May now is where environmentalism & preservation of a quality of life blend liberal & conservative.
The map would have been bluer, with more grays & lights pinks if Obama had needed to build a ground game here like the ones in PA & VA. Our electoral votes were in the bag. He carried the state 57% to 42%. Nobody bothered to campaign here. Not even Sen. Frank Lautenberg, who is hardly beloved but does his job. Democrats had hoped to flip three congress seats, got only one & that was in the Philadelphia media market. The poor showings in the other two districts were at least partly due to Obama enthusiasm flowing elsewhere. Many Dem party volunteers packed up & worked in other states.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
What jumps out immediately is the diagonal blue belt of the Route One Corridor stretching across Mercer & Middlesex Counties, spreading outward. Ocean, Monmouth, & northwest Jersey are shades of red. Atlantic County is now mostly blue. Burlington didn't deliver a single deep red McCain town.
Obama carried only four small Cape May towns; Wildwood, West Cape May, Cape May Point (the lovely village with the lighthouse), & Woodbine. But much of Cape May is single digit McCain. The Repug county chairman down there not only gloated, he mocked the "youth vote." I say to Mr. Von Savage, if Barack had stopped there for two hours in August & had a rally in Cape May Courthouse, you might not be so smug. Plus, the Democratic county organization State Senator Jeff Van Drew tried to build in the 1990's, & which had some success back then, fell into apathy. Democrats in Cape May missed a great opportunity this year. Why am I obsessed with Cape May, which has small political importance in Jersey? It's our southernmost county, has our only southern-flavor city, & was one of the birthplaces of the religious political right movement. There were some scary people in Cape May County when I was a kid. But Cape May now is where environmentalism & preservation of a quality of life blend liberal & conservative.
The map would have been bluer, with more grays & lights pinks if Obama had needed to build a ground game here like the ones in PA & VA. Our electoral votes were in the bag. He carried the state 57% to 42%. Nobody bothered to campaign here. Not even Sen. Frank Lautenberg, who is hardly beloved but does his job. Democrats had hoped to flip three congress seats, got only one & that was in the Philadelphia media market. The poor showings in the other two districts were at least partly due to Obama enthusiasm flowing elsewhere. Many Dem party volunteers packed up & worked in other states.
Labels: Cape May, New Jersey politics, THE election
