Obama and Kerry got almost the same number of votes in Ohio

[ProSense]

The Caucus

Democrats Have G.O.P. to Thank, at Least in Part

By JOHN HARWOOD
Published: November 9, 2008

The encomiums greeting Barack Obama’s victory last week presented a reverse image of the darts for John Kerry after his 2004 defeat. But Kerry campaign veterans could not help noticing an oddity in the returns.

In the battleground state of Ohio, where Mr. Kerry lost the presidency to George W. Bush, the 2.74 million votes he received almost precisely matched Mr. Obama’s 2008 total. Mr. Obama won because John McCain received 300,000 fewer votes than Mr. Bush did.

That points to a cautionary reminder for Mr. Obama and his team: the election turned partly on what they did right, but also on what Republicans did wrong. And there is no assurance that Democrats will confront a similarly star-crossed opposition in elections to come.

<...>

Mr. Obama, a senator from Illinois, inarguably fashioned an impressive victory for any Democrat, much less the first black nominee in American history. His 52 percent share of the popular vote exceeded that of any Democratic candidate since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 — and topped Ronald Reagan’s 1980 majority against Jimmy Carter. With breakthroughs in the South, Midwest and Mountain West, Mr. Obama captured at least nine states carried by Mr. Bush in 2004, with the outcome in Missouri still unclear.

Yet the record-shattering turnout that some observers predicted appears not to have materialized. Curtis Gans of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate projects that, when outstanding votes are tallied, the number of Americans casting ballots will fall short of the 130-million floor predicted by the McCain and Obama campaigns.

more

2004

Bush 2,859,764 (51%)
Kerry 2,741,165 (49%)


2008

Obama 2,708,988 (51%)
McCain 2,502,218 (47%)

Obviously, the 350,000 votes suppressed would have changed the 2004 outcome.

[Lex]

1. Obama is so awesome he made the Republicans stay at home

and not vote!

Mandate.

[ProSense]

4. This election was definitely a mandate. n/t

[niceypoo]

20. I know two that didnt bother voting

My Brother for one. A guy that works with me for two. Both cited Palin as their reason for not voting. The Palin effect.

[blm]

30. No - GOP officials in Ohio PADDED Bush's tally in 2004 in precincts they controlled

and the Ohio Dem party was too weak to assert any monitoring of those tallies as DNC chairs since 1997 deliberately sat on their hands and allowed Ohio's Dem party infrastructure to collapse.

[LittleClarkie]

33. No, I'd reckon the person we have to thank for that was Palin.

The conservatives distaste for McCain might have played a part (the "I don't like either McCain or Obama" people) But I know at least three conservatives who thought Obama was a good man and who thought Palin was a nut. She appealed to the base, the undecideds or moderates not so much.

[BluegrassDem]

2. But unlike Kerry, Obama never depended on Ohio to win...

that's the point. Obama knew Ohio would be a tough road. It's not like this is some kinda surprise. Obama, from the beginning, made plans to win the election without the need for Ohio. And he would've still had over 300 EV's if Ohio went for McCain. That's the beauty of it all.

[PBS Poll-435]

3. Provisionals?

Let's wait for all of the votes to be counted.

:-)

[geek tragedy]

5. He gained 560K on Kerry and 1.2 Million on Gore in Florida.

McCain actually got the same number of votes as Bush did there.

[ProSense]

6. Excellent.

In 2004, Kerry gained 671K on Gore in Florida.

The OP though was an interesting point about Ohio.

[geek tragedy]

11. We need to improve in Ohio--and in Virginia and North

Carolina and Indiana. They're still razor thin states. The turnout in FL was amazing, though.

[MadBadger]

12. We won in Virginia by 6 points. Thats not exactly razor thin.

[alcibiades_mystery]

7. But, Mr. Harwood, Obama didn't NEED Ohio

And that was the fucking point.

Next.

[ProSense]

9. Here's a good point from the article:

“If we improve as much between now and 2012 as we did between 2004 and 2008,” Mr. Fowler predicted, “we can win South Carolina.”

We can even pick up a Senate seat or two or four along the way.

[JI7]

10. this should be a thread in itself

amazing.

[ProSense]

13. Seriously, the potential is awesome. n/t

[IndianaJones]

8. Obama was 10x the candidate too. Ohio just sucks. nt.

[krawhitham]

14. gay marriage was on the ballot in 2004

[creeksneakers2]

15. In 2004 they counted all the provisional ballots

I think they brought Kerry an extra 70,000 or so.

[kennetha]

16. Interesting Article

It sent me searching for more comparisons to see if Republican demoralization was widesprea or what. It looks like a mixed bag. In some places, the total turnout seems to have been down largely beacuse Republicans sat this one out. In other places, McCain matched Bush's 2004 totals but got swamped nonetheless by huge increases in the democratic totals.


California »
Obama 6,374,619 61%
McCain 3,871,760 37%
100% of precincts reporting

Kerry 6,745,485 54% 100% of precincts reporting
Bush 5,509,826 45%

Obama underperformed Kerry, but Bush WAY overperformed McCain. Looks like Republicans in California simply stayed home in droves, despite prop 8, which should have pulled then out of the woodwork.

Washington
Kerry 1,510,201 53% 100% of precincts reporting
Bush 1,304,894 46%

Obama
1,547,632 58%
McCain 1,097,176 41%
93% of precincts reporting

Still some votes to be counted here, but Washington looks comparable to California. Obama's vote just barely tops Kerry's numbers, while McCain significantly underperforms Bush. Again, it looks like Republicans stayed at home.

Oregon
Kerry 943,163 52% 100% of precincts reporting
Bush 866,831 48%

Obama 978,605 57%
McCain 699,673 41%
97% of precincts reporting

Again, another place where Republicans appear to have stayed home in significant numbers. Obama barely tops Kerry McCain way underperforms Bush.


But it wasn't just a matter of Republicans staying home. There are also places where McCain roughly equalled Bush, but Obama way surpassed Kerry -- Florida, Virginia, North Carolina are just three examples:

Florida:
Obama 4,143,957 51%
McCain 3,939,380 49%
100% of precincts reporting

Bush 3,964,522 52% 100% of precincts reporting
Kerry 3,583,544 47%

McCain got the republicans to turn out here in roughly the same numbers that Bush did. . But Obama got a lot more dems and independents to turn out than Kerry did. Bravo! In Fla democratic energy must have been awesome.


North Carolina:
Bush 1,961,166 56% 100% of precincts reporting
Kerry 1,525,849 44%

Obama 2,123,395 50%
McCain 2,109,402 49%
100% of precincts reporting

NC is one of the few places where McCain actually seems to have energized his base and turned them out in higher numbers than Bush did. But he still got beat by even more energized dems. . Betcha that hurts!

And in Virginia, we have these striking numbers.

Obama 1,905,588 53%
McCain 1,703,478 47%
99% of precincts reporting

Bush 1,716,959 54% 100% of precincts reporting
Kerry 1,454,742 46%

Obama once again have McCain a pretty good shellacking even though McCain matched Bush almost vote for vote. Again, I don't think you can say Republicans stayed home in Virginia. Here it looks like a matter of a lot more dems and probably independents turning out.

What's the bottom line? Obama Won!

But it does seems that in places Republicans did stay home in droves. They exceeded their 2004 numbers in very, very few places. Where they did, they still lost because Dems turned out in significantly higher numbers in many of those places -- but certainly not everywhere. The combination of Republican demoralization and increased Democratic enthusiasm in certain well-targeted states seems to have been the key for Obama.

[JI7]

17. i think some Republicans got turned off by the hate at those Palin events

they were still not going to vote Democrat since they don't agree with us.

but they were so turned off by Palin and the hate being spewed that they did not want that to represent them as Republicans.

remember, Ohio was the place of many of the ugliest rallies. there are a bunch of youtube videos of it.

[Franks Wild Years]

18. I think there are a few factors...

Latent racism is one of them. I don't believe in the Bradley Effect, that people lie to pollsters. But if Obama were a white man called Bob Smith I think he'd have won even more convincingly and I think the pre-election numbers would've indicated that was about to happen. Also, I don't think it'd have made much a difference to his overall percentage, but he received 7% less of the gay vote nationwide than did Kerry, which is a can of worms I'm keeping the lid on.

[ProSense]

22. I believe

vote suppression played a factor in Florida in 2004.

[iceman66]

19. But how many of Bush's 2004 votes

are actually real votes, as opposed to phantom Diebold votes?

This could account for the discrepancy.

[ProSense]

21. Now that's a good question.

I'd question flipped votes more than phantom votes.

In 2004, Kerry bested Gore by more than 8 million votes, but that wasn't enough.

Obama is just above 6 million more than Kerry.

Each election, especially when turning out voters is a huge focus, we expect increases.

Given McCain's numbers, Bush's 11.5 million over his 2000 numbers seems more like an anomaly than ever.

[Johonny]

23. Its a legitimate question that has no answer

because there wasn't and now can't be a real investigation

[blm]

34. exactly - I highly doubt GOP officials in gahanna were the only ones who heavily padded their Bush

totals.

[apnu]

24. This comes as no surprise to me.

Elections are as much about voting for your guy, as they are about turning out votes for your guy. He who runs the better campaign (both in terms of image and turnout of the "base") and gets lucky breaks wins elections because that better campaign will be better at getting people out to vote for you.

Going all the way back to Regan-Carter, you'll see this pattern. Regan ran a better campaign than Carter, and had the lucky break of going up against an unpopular President. (I have no direct knowledge beyond Carter except what's in history books, so I'll stay in the modern era)

Again in 1984, Regan ran a better campaign and Mondale didn't plus shot himself in the foot too, lucky for Regan.

Bush-Dukais? same pattern, more effective campaign, and luck that Bush looked less like a loser than his opponent.

Clinton-Bush, again the same thing. Clinton ran the superior campaign, against an unpopular sitting President and had the luck enbodied in Ross Perot.

Clinton-Dole. Clinton ran an excellent campaign, and Dole looked dead from the get go. Lucky for Clinton, considering that during the mid-term elections, Democrats got pasted bad.

Bush-Gore, Bush ran a better campaign than Gore. Rove controlled the tone of the campaign and made Gore play defense half the time. Then they had the luck of it all comming down to FL, where they knew they had the inside track, and the extra luck of Nader.

Bush-Kerry, once more, Rove ran a superior campaign to Kerry's which seemed to never figure out what it was trying to say, simply, to the American people. And Bush had the luck of 9/11 and (enough remaining) popularity of the Iraq war, plus stacking the deck in OH to make sure that key state stayed red.

And now Obama-McCain. Obama, clearly, ran a superior campaign than McCain which will go down in history as what not to do. Obama had some measure of luck on his side because of an unpopular sitting President, and a campaign game-changer in the economy which always favors Dems, generally.

[ProSense]

25. That's complete BS.

Bush-Kerry, once more, Rove ran a superior campaign to Kerry's which seemed to never figure out what it was trying to say, simply, to the American people. And Bush had the luck of 9/11 and (enough remaining) popularity of the Iraq war, plus stacking the deck in OH to make sure that key state stayed red.

Rove ran a dirty fraudulent campaign. Kerry got 49 percent of the popular vote, close to or more than what most Presidents win with. Despite all the factors, including Bush's popularity still at slightly over 50%, Kerry came very close to unseating him.

[apnu]

27. Dirty campaigns are effective campaigns sometimes. Depends on that moment in history.

Fraudulent campaigns are also something of an American tradition going back, almost, to the very beginning of our country.

Kerry came close, yes, but his campaign failed. My point stands, IMO, Bush had a better campaign than Kerry, plus a luck on his side. Bush got more breaks than Kerry, and Bush won. I didn't say it ways fair, nor that that I liked it, or if it was even right. But what happened is what happened.

For that matter, Gore nearly won too. He was closer to Bush than Kerry was in 2004. The Rovian campaign style is to be good "enough" to win 50.1% of the election. Just enough and nothing more than that. This year, the winds of fortune smiled on Obama and that divisive bullshit and dirty campaigning didn't work, in fact, it was a spectacular failure.

[ProSense]

29. Gore and Kerry got nearly the same percentage of the popular vote, and

as for fruadulent being an American tradition, what utter crap.

This nonsensical thinking is why the country desperate needs change.

[apnu]

31. Not nonsensical at all

The American electoral process has been gamed locally many many times in the past. Take Chicago as a great example. There is still talk of Chicago being thrown to Kennedy with many irregularities. Plus the history of "vote early, vote often" here in my town is still a joke used today. And then there is our "Pineapple Primary" where people were tossing grenades at polling places to suppress (and yes murder) voters. And that's Chicago, we haven't even talked about the dirty tricks used in the south against African Americans for years and years to suppress the vote. Such as putting coffins next to African American polling places and staging thugs at the doors to name a few.

It is an American tradition. A bad one, but something we, as a whole people, do. Its wrong and illegal, but it happens, year after year after year.

As for Rove, he played dirty, nationally, and muddied the waters enough to steal it from the people. It was effective you can't argue that, were it not effective, Obama would be following 8 years of Gore right now.

[ProSense]

32. Theft is not genius.

Is Bush also a genius for his war crimes?

Using fraud to justify fraud is idiotic.

[Montauk6]

26. 'Scuse me if I just cain't git grasp on this yere FUZZY MATH!

I mean, come on, isn't this like saying that Obama shouldn't feel TOO confident because in 2004 Bush won and in 2008 McCain lost. I mean... wtf?

And, if we forget about voter discrepancies for a sec, how many of those legitimate voters for Bush in '04 simply changed their minds and went with Obama this time?

Look, READ MY LIPS: OBAMA KICKED ASS, end of discussion.

[ProSense]

28. Fuzzy math?

Real numbers are not fuzzy. No one is questioniong Obama's tremendous win. The point in the OP is a comparison to Ohio. There is nothing fuzzy about that. Period.

[TheDonkey]

35. That's crazy, But i'm not shocked that Bush ruined his party

only an 8 year lag from him ruining the country.