...and then there is HOPE ! (basic analysis of irregular voting in Ohio primary)

(initially posted in the Ohio forum, reposted here upon finding this forum, thanks Kukesa ! )


...and then there is HOPE !

because voters "tampered" with this election.

(put the word "tampered" at the back of your mind, we'll get to it in a minute).

In analyzing this election, for historical context we cannot go back to 2004, there was no primary contest in Ohio.

While it was not a presidential year, 2006 offers a better baseline for comparison. Both republicans & democrats had contests, Blackwell-vs-Petro and Strickland-vs-Others.

I managed to find these voter turnout numbers on SOS site for 2006 & 2008 respectively :

http://www.sos.state.oh.us/SOS/ElectionsVoter/results2006.aspx?Section=1682

http://vote.sos.state.oh.us/pls/enr/f?p=152:11:0

Take a red county like Wayne, Poli said they cast 16,477 Dem ballots on Tuesday. In 2006, they cast 5,172 dem ballots.

So on Tuesday, they cast more than triple the number of dem ballots from 2006. That is a 220% increase in the number of dem ballots from 2006, think about that for a second.

Next, in the 2006 primary Wayne county cast a total of 14,458 ballots (D + R + I), on Tue they cast 32,104 ballots (D + R + I). Again, an astronomical 120% increase, by the standards of election Math.

The numbers are even more skewed when you look at REDDER than RED counties like Butler & Warren.

So something motivated voters (democrats, independents & republicans) to overwhelmingly vote and they voted democratic. Whether it is because they saw a viable female or black candidate for the first time, or because they hate Hillary, or because they can't stand the idea of Barack being the president, or because voting for Hillary gives McCain a fighting chance in November.

No matter what their reasons were, positive or negative for Hillary or Barack, the state as a whole behaved contrary to its equilibrium behavior, in essence Ohio gave up its natural flavor.

The absence of a republican primary stacked the deck so heavily in the democratic column that Ohio failed to capture the essence of the nation. Had Romney stuck around for another two primaries, McCain would not have had the mathematical certainty that he did on Tue and Ohio would have had a more natural Dem primary.

Looking at the next three primaries - Wyoming(18) Mississippi(40) & Pennsylvania(158). Barack is expected to win both WY & MS, if he does 10-8 and 23-17 respectively, he will net +8 effectively canceling Hillary's gain on Tue.

Then comes PA on April 22nd, similar to Ohio in many respects, EXCEPT voters CANNOT TAMPER with the election, like they did in Ohio. It is a closed primary, so PA will have a more natural democratic primary than Ohio did. With 6 weeks to campaign, Barack is likely to net a few more delegates in PA.

Coming back to Ohio, among those who voted D on Tue:

- the Rs will return to their base in Nov (except as VJ pointed out somewhere that they are now forced to sift thru dem literature before Nov and for many years to come :-) )

- The Ds will stay with the who ever the nominee is

- Having chosen to take a D ballot in the dem primary, many independents could vote D in the general election.

So there is still HOPE, for the nation and for Ohio, that decision 2008 is not McCain !


PS: This is a follow up to my initial post that ALL was lost when Hillary won Ohio. "I have a bad feeling"

--

I hear the chip, chip, chipping sound of Obama waging a war of attrition on the Clinton camp. He'll get there too--wait and see. I'm hearing that he's got more delegates from Texas now than she does. And every day a few more superdelegates. And he's got a steep learning curve. He'll get there, and a two-to-one Dem majority in the electorate will be waiting to vote for him in November. Ok, I feel really optimistic tonight--but hey.

that it could be Hillary against McCain. While we love her in many ways, she is ill-positioned to take on McCain.