This map is a mind-blower

I am having a hard time sleeping tonight and found this map and am still dizzy. This is the 2004 county-by-county map. http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/vote2004/countymap.htm
This, my friends, is humbling.

population centers.

Many of those huge swaths of red contain very little population.

Please.

First off, most of those red areas are just open land. They contain very small populations.

Second, many of those red areas only went for Bush by within ten or fifteen percentage points.

Third, all possiblities of fraud aside, Bush still only won the popular vote by 4 million, or about 3%.

One state, Ohio, was what kept us up until 2am on election night.

If the country were overwhelmingly supporting Bush, we would have been in bed by 11 on election night.

Take a look at the NUMBERS in each of the states on this map.

Since you presumably understand how the electoral college works, you don't need me to tell you that the numbers correspond to the states' populations.


Your map is only "humbling" in the sense that we only won over half the PEOPLE in the country, and not half the DIRT.

unpopulated deserts and forrests and sparsely populated backwoods and farm country look good on a map, but thats about it.

look nice on a map bush has a land mass landslide.

population wise, he has a slim majority.

===more people voted against this president than any other sitting president in history.

===kerry got more votes than any other previously elected president.

===bush elected by the smallest majority of any president snce 1916, and the smallest majority of ANY wartiem president in our history.

keeping aside the likely vote fraud involved and just taking the numbers as they are, if 140,000 people in Ohio voted differently, we'd be discussing a Kerry cabinate now.

anything else you need to know?

MANDATE MY ASS.

you can say it all you want, doesnt make it true. the facts are the facts.

I was under the impression that urban dwellers still outnumbered rural Americans. You learn something new everyday, huh?

You would see the same map if you made all areas with 1000+ people/ sq. mi blue and less than that red. you are forgetting density.

This party was built arround rural farmers and union workers.

Now its the party of the big cities.

And we keep wondering why we keep losing.

areas have the highest rates of population so much so that places like Los Angeles (where I am) with so many many people can and did turn the whole state blue. The burb of LA that I live in has a larger population than the WHOLE state of North Dakota, many of those red areas are sparsly populated.

It's also inaccurate. Looking at florida, I see Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties in gray. They were solid blue. As a matter of fact, Broward voted TWO TO ONE for Kerry (Go Broward - Thanks, Randi!)

Also keep in mind that huge swaths of that red have only 5~100 people per square mile.

I live in San Francisco, which is about 6 miles by 6 miles square with about a million people, more than live in the entire state of Wyoming which is like 500 miles across.

That's why the popular vote was much closer than this map appears. People who live in and around cities (ie people who interact with all different kinds of people on a daily basis and actually have some understannding of the world around them) voted democrat. People in rural areas and some suburbs (who live in a mostly white bubble and view both the cities and the outside world mostly through the prism of television) voted for Bush.

But you're exactly right, the 3 biggies in Florida plus the rest of Maine will turn a lovely shade of blue once they're done. Alaska will be painted red, significantly increasing Bush's lead in acreage.

This country needs a good 5 million populus city, actually several. Maybe China or Japan wouldn't mind uprooting and airlifting a few of the ones they can do without.

Do you realize we won 48% of the vote this election? That map means nothing.

In 3 of the last 4 elections, we've won more votes than the other side.

Sure, we can cry about the rural voters going heavily GOP, but why should we? You work with what you got, and we have plenty.

You don't see the GOP whining about losing Manhattan by 62 points? Or Los Angeles 40? Or San Francisco by 60? Or Chicago?

We are on the verge of having an electoral lock on the presidency. In the past 4 elections, Democrats have won, consistently, states that equal up to 252 electoral votes. Those states we won this past Tuesday are ours. We own them. If a war-time, incumbent Republican president who is using every fear tactic in the book, running against a largely liberal Democrat, can't pick them off, no one can.

The Republicans, without Florida and Ohio, have, what? 239 electoral votes?

We hold on to our current Blue states, and carry Ohio or Florida next time, we're heading for the White House:

and keep losing, and the earth is shifting beneath our feet.

We lost the last election by +500,000 votes. We lost this one by -4,000,000.

Next time we're not going to win Wisconson or Michigan.

We either bring back rural voters or we're not going to last very long.

Things aren't really so Blue versus Red. Lots of Purples out there...



http://www.princeton.edu/~rvdb/JAVA/election2004/

The site also has a relief map showing population/voting. Yes, lots of the really red areas are mostly populated by jackrabbits & prairie dogs. Too bad the animals can't vote--I bet they're environmentalists. Let's get PETA on it!

Makes the US look like it has more sense.

And in the rural county here, 2700 went for Kerry, 2000 Bushit. There are many rural people who HATE bush, so don't be so ready to attack them.

The red areas, not the people. Don't be disillusioned by the amount of red, some of those counties probably don't even have a Pic n' Save.

2/3 of the national population lives east of the Mississippi. 3/4 live in cities or suburbia.

If tumbleweeds and saguaros and cattle could vote, Bush would have a landslide.

A lot of those Texas counties have under 5,000 voters. Only 1/5 of the population of Oregon (1 electoral vote equivalent) lives in the eastern 2/3 of that state, and the same for Washington State, and 1/3 of Nevada lives in all its 'red' counties- and if you take out the small county with Reno/Lake Tahoe, all that red area sinks to representing about 1/10.

The only impressive thing about this map is the cities not marked with blue. Dallas-Fort Worth, Oklahoma City, Houston, Kansas City, Omaha, Louisville, Cincinnati, Birmingham, Jacksonville, Tampa, San Diego, maybe Orlando, perhaps Phoenix. All of the places considered most highly regrettable to live in by civilized people- surely a completely accidental coincidence....

Sacramento County (home of many State UNION workers) went for *

Sad.

by civilized people"

That attitude doesn't help matters, now does it?

Not even a rock, not even a dirt clod.

Except you can't punch a diebold machine without hands ;)

What do you suppose Dubya's cowboy boots are made of, hmm? Maybe a cholera bacteria would vote for Bush.

That lovely blue spot on the western edge of Missouri...that is KC...the burbs may be red, but the city is true blue!!!!

There needs to be a bigger debate about what Dems are before we think about anything else.

The sooner Dems realize we are not the heartland Dems of the New Deal era but the Dems of the post-civil rights era the sooner we will start specifically trying to target metropolitan areas, to seriously try to flip states with big cities like Virginia, Georgia and Florida -- just as we did with states like Oregon and Washington.

That is how the modern Democratic party wins. There is no use and no need to go back in time in order to become a majority party again.

What Dems need to do is to completely get rid of the 60's style utopian liberalism (let the Greens have them) and embrace the more pragmatic liberal approach of the big cities which is more concerned with real-world situations than theoretical coffee house discussion.

There are many constituencies to be gained from metro areas -- ranging from Latinos to single career women to secular Republicans -- that Dems don't currently have a grip on.

very well said indeed.

Just a little nuisance. Probably all prairie dogs, dirt and fools out there. Hell we almost won. Why should we change? We don't have to worry. If we just tack a little further to the left next time, we're sure to win.

Who say's we're "out of touch" with middle America? Why that just isn't so. We are communicating all the time with other Americans in the blogosphere.

We don't have to listen to people suggesting we change our ways, try to address concerns about moral values, try to understand the misgivings of red state voters. The hell with all that.

We're liberals, by golly. We're so fucking smart that we don't have to listen to anybody!

To win over rural voters, without sacrificing basic Democratic principles, like civil rights? Like a women's right to choose?

from what we used to be that they don't listen to our message on the economy and if they don't do that then we've lost them on the social message.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=1333152&mesg_id=1333152

1) Lose Roe

Abortion has turned Democrats into "Baby Killers!" in the minds of most people in the red states. When Roe is overturned next year, we will finally be free of this horrific, cursed issue we've been carrying on our backs for a generation. It will be an opportunity to redefine us in the minds of the red staters.

When abortion is lifted from our backs, it will clear the single most significant obstacle to majority support for our party and for the broad sweep of its remaining agenda.

The Democratic Party does not exist for the purpose of defending abortion rights. It exists for the purpose of governing this nation. The nation--with the support of evidently the majority of women--has made it clear it does not support abortion rights. It will have to live with the consequences of that stupidity. It will have to learn the lesson all over again. Meantime, our party is now relieved from the responsibility to keep throwing ourselves on this terrible sword election after election. It is now up to the women's movement to find a solution to this issue that will enjoy the support of a majority of the electorate.

2) Gain Jesus

The other problem is that we are afraid to use the name of Jesus in our political appeals because we think it implies that we are religious in the sense of the fundies and evangelicals whose views we detest. But invoking the words and views and injunctions of Jesus need not be an endorsement of religion at all. Most of us already treat him as one of the three great philosophers in history (Budda, Confusious and Jesus). We can--and must--steal him back from the right wing.

We have every right to look askance at religion. But we can no longer continue to blow off the fact that the heart of our party's philosophy comes directly from the philosophy of the man named Jesus. If we don't start putting that to good use, we are utter fools.

Putting it to good use means not being afraid or ashamed to use the name Jesus (not "Christ"--a title--but Jesus, a man's name) in our discussions and our political appeals. It has nothing to do with religion. It has everything to do with social philosophy and our personal moral obligations towards others and toward making the world a better place.

about Jesus. And if we could ditch the abortion issue w/o losing women that would be great (though you can color me skeptical about that possibility). But it would be so nice to place it squarely on Repuke ass when a new Supreme Court overturns it. JESUS, is it too much to aks that the pukes should pay for a few generations for their disgusting appeals to the worst instincts in man?

I really do agree that we need to steal the fascists' thunder. All Demo candidates from here out should have to learn the Jesus quotes that cut to the core...on justice and equality. Shame, shame, shame the motherfuckers!!! It'll make us feel good as a side benefit. ;)

One question though: are the sheeple really shameable?

You think that compromise is possible and that it's possible to turn back the clock.

I hate to tell you that's not the case.

The story about Roe politically is not the ugliness of abortion. It's about unbearable hypocrisy on the part of the 'pro-life' people. And it's about fertility cultism taken from the medieval/pagan European agricultural world, but pretended to be Christianity. It's about women defining themselves as less than adults, less than responsible for the state of the world other than providing the function of producing offspring.

It's a materialist fallacy to assume that a sperm meeting an egg generates a supernatural entity- to parse the "thinking" a little, the supernaturalness can be discovered out to be an inherent property of human DNA molecules. Then, since there is 90-some percent identity with bonobo chimpanzee DNA and 99% of the differences are functional meaningless, we can probably narrow down the stretch of human DNA that contains the human soul to a few individual basepairs, probably less than hundred overall. Maybe even down to one or two!

There's the same kind of problem with Jesus of Nazareth. The Christian Right doesn't care too much about being shown respect, only about fealty, and Jesus doesn't serve the purpose you think in their interpretation of Christianity. True, too many Democrats are atheists as a result of abusive and fallacious formulations of Christianity, and they are reactionary to all formulations reminiscent of the things that harmed them and were incompatible with integrity. True, many Democrats are people who aren't Christian by upbringing or tradition. And many go too far with the small fry whose only way of making sense of their miserable and restricted lives is to propose that they serve the great and unquestionable purpose of Christian expansionism and imposition.

But the story is far worse. A great many of these seemingly harmless and generally well-meaning people are more deeply enlisted in the Religious Right than you or they realize. The fact of the matter is that the element they respond to most strongly is the message of power, the message of their own significance and Messianist purpose, the catering to their vanity and defensiveness toward a world in which they are not very powerful or competent and which they don't really understand. The method is always the same, and it is the remaking of the form of Christianity into increasing conformity with the generalized scheme of occultic religion. Groups that rely greatly on exclusion, on privileged states of knowledge/initiation, and complicated ceremony, fall into it very easily and rapidly. Every theocrat in the land is an occultizer of Christianity, every follower of the Christian Right is a self-professed initiate into an occultic interpretation and method. Now, the point of occultic religion is to expand a sense of superiority of ability and of certainty and of competence, but it does so by ignoring commonplace reality to a large degree and social/community responsibility for the Uninitiated in particular. And it tends to fixate on Magical powerfulness over the things of life -physical and mental illness, and political manipulation- initially. In its uglier phases it becomes fixated on Death and behaves as if Death were the meaningful aspect or content of its deity. Jesus is a magus, a virtual one, in the system. It's dreadful even to contemplate what that says about our society, but the sad thing is the realization that it must be so.

There simply is no lasting compromise possible between integrity and immaturity, that is the politics at bottom of the abortion issue. Which side is which can be plausibly debated but the two cannot be kept from clash.
There simply is no lasting compromise possible between the scientific approach to knowledge and the occultic kind. Science and rigorous argumentation (its intellectual arm) were developed in medieval Europe to combat the occultism that pervaded all of life and was destroying all coherence of what was known by common sense and simple investigation and observation. Occultism even used to be a part of medicine and treatments were figured out via an astrological method- the illness we call cancer was assigned to that constellation of the Zodiac.

The people we are talking about don't even agree with what the Enlightenment did- clean up God to fit what we call theism. We are the Party that represents Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment/Modern-thinking people to them and the interests involved in understanding and living in the world that way. Though, of course, we are not pure in it. The God of Modern people is nontheistic, and the flimsy bridge you propose to keep between the pre-Enlightened minds and post-Enlightened ones doesn't quite work. For one thing because your proposal of how to deal with Jesus of Nazareth doesn't even affirm the theist linkage that is perhaps the only possible common ground that can be reached, and secondly because probably only a few people- philosophers, mostly- have ever found pure theism, at which both sides must meet, a bearable or sustainable religious perception. People simply slide off it in one or another direction in practice, it's a fence post of a position.

But the reason for us to be on this side of the divide is that it matters to us, or at least our sense of integrity is incompatible with doing otherwise in the reality we see. For most of them the dilemma is that they know they are outmatched by reality, so they have to redefine their perception of reality and/or redefine integrity (in their own minds) so that things become manageable. That is why their God seems so small so often and their hypocrisy blatant, the clever idiocy involved so glaring. And yet, our side is never quite convinced of the depravity and limitation that they perceive to life, the depth of their problem(s), the downward spiral of results in their attempts at solutions, and that lack of perception to the depth of the problem(s) is where our side's take on reality consistently falls short. But if we did, we wouldn't have the faith in ever achieving any measure of progress. Our denial is mutual but functionally complementary.

And I liked the lose the coffee arguments in favor of real life practicalities because it dovetails with something I posted on another thread. What I am arguing for is refashioning the message to reflect reality-based emotion rather than arguments. Please read and if anyone knows anyone who can get it to someone with influence (to at least consider it) please PM me.

I thought that for the most part our ads were bland and superficial. We are dealing with people who respond to emotional appeals (recall commentary about the girl whose mother was killed on 9-11 and that the focus groups were so moved by it--one commentator said men were crying). Well, that ad made me mad but in a more cerebral, intellectual way. "If Gore had been president, she wouldn't have lost her mom" and "Any president would have hugged her (let no photo-op go by)" and when she said she said she felt safe because Bush was president, I said, "Idiot." But it illuminate one fact. People responded to it emotionally. And then I remembered the ads used so effectively against Clinton's health care plan. Those, too, were emotion driven vignettes.

So our ads should be single issue ads. No more shotgun (multiple issue) ads. They should tell a story--note these can archtypes and use actors. James who lost his job and his health insurance and then had a car accident and who is now faciing bankruptcy, Phil whose super-smart 13 year is in trouble because he is bored by teaching to the test, a rural Nepalese woman whose baby died because of the defunding of family planning agencies who would have provided clean birth kits, Meredith in college but now has to drop out because state funding cut, Sally who found that Bush's drug cards didn't help her a bit, Tom and his wife, a retired couple, who learned that their former employers were dropping their medical insurance because they could do so and throw them onto Medicare only), Ben and Joan putting off retirement so they can help their kids because their son's job was outsourced, Mary and Phil whose marriage is strained because Phil's mom is asking if she can come and live with them because she doesn't think she'll have enough social security to live on when she retires in a few years, Sonia who needed a "partial birth abortion" (I know that is not a medical term and is an invention of the right) for medical reasons and now can't have another child--her baby lived a minute or two, now we see her in the nursery taking a teddy bear out to put with attic sale stuff--she'll never need it. There's thousands of pathos-filled stories-results of Bush/Republican policies that tug at the heartstrings and also (sadly) play the fear card ("that could happen to me").

The point is to draw the viewer in to a story he or she can identify with. The protagonist should not talk to the viewer (well, maybe a quick one or two lines). The ads should be a slice of life, a mini soap opera. These ads do not change our message but they bring our values to life. It is not abandoning our principles but repackaging them and making them vivid.

There is benefit from analyzing what went wrong (picking over the bones), but I had the uncomfortable feeling that the campaign was too cerebral, too rationale. I didn't see the danger because that approach resonated with me. But even if I had I didn't/don't know anyone of influence to suggest this idea to. Finally, the fault lay in not analyzing Republican success and co-opting it.

you are proposing that we abandon our values to buy votes. We're losing the southern racist vote, too, so maybe we should support discrimination as policy.

We have to realize what we are - the party of metropolitan values-- as the map clearly shows. That is where most of our votes come from. Why should we continue to ignore and be embarassed of that fact ? "America" isn't simply the heartland, it's also the streets of the big cities and their suburbs.

The same way we control states like NY and California, is the same way to control the country at large: by overwhelming with our metro turnout. Target the metro areas in states like Virginia, Georgia and Florida and permanently put them in our column. Then it would be the Repubs sitting around wondering how to beat us.

and it will DIE without him.

From Jefferson on down.

Its no accident the last two Democratic presidents have been Rural Southerners.


The 'little guy' IS the rural voter, we're turning our backs on him.

Do follow this cosmopolitan/metropolitan strategy AGAIN after its failed twice in a row is not the answer.

Now that Roe will be overturned, we have an opportunity to win it back.

and finally abandoned the party more over civil right's issues as a whole -- not just abortion.

The rural voter does not like the fact that the modern Democratic party respects and supports the rights of the metropolitan voter, who they consider to be the "liberal elite" (which is simply code for "minorities, gays and their god-hating white friends"). We metro voters are hard working Americans, not some group outsiders.

The farm belt was never particularly bigoted. They were and are populists. They understand the difficulties of minorities.

Does that mean there aren't bigots among them? Of course not. But by and large the people of the midwest are fair minded.

When you stereotype them and pidgenhole them and refuse to even consider that they may have a valid point of view, YOU are the moral bigot, not them.

You want to win elections? Or do you want to stay real comfortable in your cocoon of arrogance?

Just coded. "Moral/family values." "Small Town America."

They really are terrified of racial diversity and homosexuality, IMO.

One last question: does this mean I shouldn't order my "Darwin eats Jesus fish" bumper decal?

Caption: Dennis is married to Jean - the Grand Dragon of Indiana - and her personal guard.

And they have been bamboozled into believing that the trash on TV is a direct result of liberals and liberalism and liberal "anything goes" morality.

Are there a lot of rednecks in "Small Town America" ? Sure. There are a lot of them in the big cities also, but they keep their mouths shut there because they're surrounded by minorities.

As for Darwin, he wasn't a non-believer until the very end. This is from his autobiography completed a year before his death in 1882:

"I feel compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist. This conclusion1 was strong in my mind about the time, as far as I can remember, when I wrote the Origin of Species..."

Personaly, I prefer to call it the walls of civilization.

They can get back to their farm animals now.

the hard working Latino family, the single woman trying to make it in the "boys club", the striking transit worker, etc.

The rural farmer is opposed to the civil rights of the very people who provide the modern Democratic party with most of it's support. The rural farmer is permanently in the hands of the Republicans, at least for another generation.

Gosh, when did you do the polling where you were able to discover:
"The rural farmer is opposed to the civil rights of the very people who provide the modern Democratic party with most of it's support."

I had no idea rural farmers hated Latinos, women and striking transit workers. I was completely unaware they were against civil rights for these groups until you brought it to my attention.

Well that's sure a very good reason for us to blow them off, pay no attention to their concerns and continue to remain out of touch in our little ivory towers of condescension.

and we're sick of being thought of by Red America as being some type of outcast/reject group of people. The streets of metro America are every bit as American as the cornfields and farms of the heartland.

You refuse to accept that some of them -- not your stereotypical right wing fascists of course -- but a HUGE proportion of them are decent, good, honest, hard working Americans who DO care about what kind of moral environment they bring their children up in.

These people have been propagandized into believing we are baby killers with "anything goes" morality.

These people used to be solid Democratic before Roe. Now they are solid Republican. But we CAN get them back if we will only listen to them and caste our beliefs in language they understand.

these same rural voters that are so concerned with "what kind of moral environment they bring thier children up in" are the ones that will be overturning roe v. wade in the next few years. and once they accomplish this, they will not forget that us democrats will be trying to get it back. the rural voters have spoken. i say we chalk them up in the loss column, and focus on our metro base. we also cannot fight the RW media spin machine that is in place in these rural areas, it is a waste to even try. get our base out, and expand it into the suburbs. have the repubs reached out to the black urban communty lately? no. are they still kicking our ass? fuck yes. we don't need EVERYONE on board, just more people than they have.

People do.

Wake up.

They only beat us by 3% nationally.

Man, that sure constitutes a mandate, doesn't it.

I guess I should start respecting the views of the very people who think I am an America-hating terrorist just because I don't see how great Bush is.

Because they sure respect my views.

These unbending, unflinching tools are just the sort of people I want to try to reach a compromise with.

Oh, I just love how some people stereotype those who they think are their lessers:
"the very people who think I am an America-hating terrorist"
What a crock of hyperbole.

Not really family that I care to see, uncles in MO.

from saying YOU are a terrorist.

Second, it's true that midwesterners have been brainwashed into believing liberals are baby killers without any moral values.

But we can change that impression among those who in fact do share our values but don't know it. In order to do that, WE have to reach out to THEM. We have to learn where they're coming from and what they think. And we have to start framing our issues on moral grounds, even invoking scripture and the name of Jesus in support of them. If we don't have the humility and good sense to do this, we will continue to lose.

I think the biggest step is in changing the language. Anti-abortion activists certianly are "pro-life" in their views. Christans who condone pre-emptive wars based on lies and Christian in name only.

One of the things that really sent me over the edge was a political survey that made the email rounds and was in Parade Magazine, or USA Weekend, or some shit like that. It was supposed to help undecideds learn where they stand, what end of the spectrum they were on, and who would best represent their views.
Normally, I would approve of something like this. That is, if it is done in a fair and impartial manner.

But the questions were very slanted. It was sickening. One of the most offensive and blatently right-wing question was "Who do you trust more, a Doctor or Trial Lawyers?". That one really bothered me.

What disgusted me most was that people were being goaded into thinking that Bush represented their values, and it was done under the disguise of being fair and bi-partisan.

I am tired of push polls and political surveys that ask "Do you think abortions should be given to anyone at any time for any reason, or would you favor restrictions?" in order to manipulat people into voting Republican.

If we are to re-introduce ourselves to middle America, we need to go after shit like this first.

First one is a flash animation with different data on demographic maps. Go to their website and explore the site. Enjoy

http://gis.esri.com/esriclips/clip.cfm?ClipID=320

Land doesn't vote.

One of the sterotypes we need to escape is the one reinforced by red state / blue state analysis. This is only leads to unclear thinking about the problem. If we only look at the state level we endup buying into the media's description of the problem. "We lost the south" or we've been taken over by rual hicks.

Different states are going to require different strategies depending on the local situation. We should target certain battle ground states where we can extend our base. We are loosing in Texas, Arizona, Colorado because the major urban centers there are heavily republican. Phoenix, Houston, Dallas, Denver, etc.

We will loose if we get trapped in simplistic analysis that is fostered by blue state/red state images.

Before we start trying to take over the LEAST likely areas such as rural communities and the heartland, start with the MOST likely - which are metro areas that AREN'T currently Dem strongholds. We already have proven we can do this, and have a model of how to go about it: Washington and Oregon are the most recent examples. What once were solidly conservative GOP states are now Dem strongholds ONLY BECAUSE the metro centers of Porland and Seattle have overwhelmed their respective states. This is the ONLY logical way Dems are going to become a majority party anytime soon, by overtaking a few more states such as Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Virginia, Georgia, and Florida. We will lose conservative leaning states (such as the upper midwest) in the process, but the tradeoff is more than worth it. We will have ideological coherence and a stronger, larger electoral vote base, thus allowing us to start off a presidential contest with MUCH better odds.

If you do a comparison and size the counties according to population they would be about equal. Of course, Kerry would have won if not for fraud too.

there is little tolerance for racial or ethnic diversity. It's where scoundrels start burning crosses when the minority population hits 5%.

It's BIGOTLAND!

The only meaningful map would show the blue areas as equal to the red areas.

Nice try, but spouting right wing talking points will get you nowhere here.

Go here for the real story:

<http://www.nytimes.com/pages/politics/campaign/index.html?8dpc>

Click on "Interactive Feature" above the small map of the US.

The first map will tell you the real story. Notice how very tiny the red circles are.

Notice how very huge the blue ones are. That's the real story.

Plenty of lizard votes.

Feel better?

i feel so much better now.

The map posted by the original poster is just like the world map that showed USA as the center of the world, and Africa smaller than Greenland.

It PISSES ME OFF to no end, and as far as I'm concerned it's nothing more than Republican psychological manipulation.

they seem to be sparsely populated, yet voting dem.

if we write off the south, as so many people here are calling for us to do.

First of all the map doesn't show the intensity of the vote. Second, the 2000 map looked pretty much the same yet Gore/Nader pulled some 3 million votes more than Bush. While 2004 was not a good year, don't confuse acreage with citizens.

with more people than those vast red you see on that map.

Especially if you look at the population scaled maps. The tall towers of urban democrats are surrounded by a lot of not so tall red suburban counties.

The rural counties are not the issue. In ohio for example, people have moved out of Cleveland to surrounding suburban communities. Ohio is not really rural any more it is Urban Kerry voters vrs. Suburban sprawl Bush voters.

Suburban voters are where Bushes support came from. They are
1. Educated
2. White
3. Religious (not all fundamentalist)
4. Make more than $100,000 / year.

This is consistant with the exit polling data which is the most reliable information we have on the election regardless of what the votes says.

We have to frame an election strategy that makes inroads into this group of people. The populations trends are not to urban counties but to the Ex-urban areas around cities that are Bush country. We ignore this at our own peril.

lots of cities where the blue is... (some exceptions of course)

Too busy blaming everyone and everything and not realizing how bad this loss was. And now the knives are driving people like me out of the party. Keep up the fine work folks. Just don't ask me to write checks for your Don Quixote adventures...I'm tired of losing.

The government is elected by the PEOPLE, not the land area. The Preamble to the Constitution does not begin, "The acreage of the United States of America, in order to form a more perfect union...."

You'll notice that Nebraska is entirely red and Massachussets is entirely blue. Nebraska is at least 5 to 6 times larger, yet they get fewer than half as many electoral votes, and have only about a third the representation in the House of Representatives. Is this fair? Of course it is, because there are many more PEOPLE in Massachussets; otherwise, the state of Alaska would make up a full quarter of the Congress.

This is taken from an actual satellite photo of the US at night. Looks pretty dark in most of those "red" states, excepting the Freeper south.

Without it, this country is finished. Education wise, they are all in the blue areas.

We will still be a superpower with those blue dots alone, a third world country with the red dots.

Let's hear it for the Kansas Jayhawks located in Lawrence Kansas...a progressive island in a sea of red!!!!

Much of that "red" is empty land. We won where the people are.

Cook County in Illinois (Chicago and certain suburbs) is solidly blue, yet it shows up gray on the map. What's up with that?

cook county isnt counted on this map.