30 fastest growing counties in the US

[RobertPlant]

KENDALL, IL
PINAL, AZ
ROCKWALL, TX
FLAGLER, FL
LOUDOUN, VA
FORSYTH, GA
LINCOLN, SD
PAULDING, GA
WILLIAMSON, TX
DOUGLAS, CO
HENRY, GA
NEWTON, GA
COLLIN, TX
UNION, NC
HAYS, TX
FORT BEND, TX
OSCEOLA, FL
FRANKLIN, WA
BARROW, GA
DELAWARE, OH
HAMILTON, IN
JACKSON, GA
LYON, NV
MONTGOMERY, TX
ST. JOHN'S, FL
WASHINGTON, UT
DENTON, TX
DALLAS, IA
CHEROKEE, GA
SPENCER, KY

average percent of the vote that Obama got in these counties: 38.2%. I think that these are the type of counties where us democrats should try to battle for. Any of you guys live at or near these counties? I live in Polk County, Iowa which is right next to Dallas County.

[tekisui]

1. 38.2%? Not a battle worth taking on.

I'd have to see the individual county vote margins to know which ones are worth it.

[bluestateguy]

2. Now add up what percentage John Kerry got in those counties in 2004

and compare that with what Obama took in 2008 in the same counties. I bet you will see some real improvement.

Anyway, those counties are exurbs, while Democrats do much better in suburbs, cities, factory towns and college towns.

[Hawkeye-X]

3. Douglas County is just south of here.

Two counties over.. next to El Paso, so it's a mix of both Dems and Republicans.

It's represented by the a-hole Coffmann

And has been represented by Thugs since the district was created in 1983

[RobertPlant]

5. didn't Tancretin use to represent Coffman's district? n/t

[Hawkeye-X]

6. Yep, that was his district

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado%27s_6th_congressional_district

[daylan b]

4. By the time you compromise enough to take most of the

counties on that list I'm familiar with in Texas you'll be pissed off that conservatives run the party.

[Walk away]

31. You're right. I think we've already compromised enough...nt

[LiberalFighter]

7. In those counties you only battle enough to reduce their margin.

[RobertPlant]

11. county by county

Obama was in the 50s in Kendall, IL; Flagler, FL; Loudoun, VA; Newton, GA; and Osceola, FL
Obama was in the 40s in Pinal, AZ; Lincoln, SD; Williamson, TX; Douglas, CO; Henry, GA; Hays, TX; Fort Bend, TX; and Dallas, IA
Obama was in the 30s in Paulding, GA; Collin, TX; Union, NC; Franklin, WA; Delaware, OH; Hamilton, IN; Lyon, NV; St. John's, FL; Denton, TX; and Spencer, KY
Obama was in the 20s in Rockwall, TX; Forsyth, GA; Barrow, GA; Jackson, GA; Montgomery, TX; Washington, UT; Cherokee, GA

[Bluzmann57]

8. Welcome to DU

From a fellow Iowan. I live on the east coast of our great state, Scott County. And I think that Democrats should battle for every county in the USA but realistically, we won't win them all. I guess the question is what percentage of the population of the U.S. lives in the counties you mentioned? I'd worry more about the overall population than these particular counties.
And Robert Plant? I love Led Zep. In fact, if you play NTN trivia, I AM Led Zep. Just a completely unrelated side note. Please visit our little Iowa Forum sometime.

[tbyg52]

9. I'm in Fort Bend

I'm pleased to announce that we were nowhere near that average (on the good side) and are probably (knock on wood) going blue very soon.

[MrModerate]

12. I used to live in Fort Bend . . .

Sugar Land, specifically, and I could never understand how the place was so red when everyone I spoke to in the grocery story or the doctor's office, etc., was centrist to left-of-center.

Now I was only there for a year, so maybe I never really plumbed the depths. What would you say was driving the change you refer to?

[tbyg52]

17. Tom DeLay's old district (TX-22)

was not just Fort Bend. It was gerrymandered just for him. There's no point in a Dem even running.

Fort Bend is extremely ethnically diverse and has two active Democratic clubs, hopefully with more to come.

[greencharlie]

10. I see a lot of BRIGHT RED counties there that I've been to.

Collin County, TX is home to PLANO, FRISCO and McKinney, that's some SUPER conservative, traffic jam on Sunday Morning type real estate. Ditto for Denton Cty, Tx.

Rockwall, Tx is east of Dallas and kinda' like a rancher-wannabe cowboy town.

Pinal Cty, Az... I think of meth-house, white trash, trailer parks...

[Dr Morbius]

13. Do you like the West Wing? The TV show, I mean.

Please watch this clip. It's called "Post hoc, ergo propter hoc," and I think it explains why we probably would be wasting our time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HL_vHDjG5Wk

[mitchtv]

14. I live in Riverside Ca county

one of the highest unemployment rates in the USA along with one of the highest home reposession rates in the county.

[FarCenter]

15. Delaware County, OH is in the OH-12 district, Pat Tiberi

This is the district that John Kasich held until 2000. Tiberi has won by fairly large margins since.

Delaware County is northern suburban to rural Columbus Ohio metro area. Probably not vulnerable. Maybe it is growing rapidly because Republicans are moving there from some other districts that are better prospects.

[WCGreen]

18. that is exactly why Delaware is growing...

[jody]

16. It's unlikely Obama will increase his support in GA counties. n/t

[CurtEastPoint]

19. Agree. All are sub or exurban counties in Metro ATL and red as hell. n/t

[CreekDog]

20. Really silly point you are making, here's why:

Los Angeles County grew just 3.6% between 2000 and 2008

Pinal County (on your list) grew 82%.

So, Pinal added roughly 148,000 residents.

Los Angeles County (with its piddly 3.6% growth) added a measly 343,000 residents, about three times that of Pinal County.

Oh and Obama's percentage in LA County? 69% of the vote.

Also, you should have a reference as well as the time period the data you are posting is from.

Just posting a bunch of statistics without a single reference or time period is asking to be laughed at.

[jody]

21. Excellent point but CA's 37 million citizens have 2 senators and WY's 500k citizens have 2 senators.

[CreekDog]

22. and?

if Wyoming grows really fast, are they going to get 3 senators?

[jody]

26. And if CA grows real fast will it get 3 senators? Fact CA & WY each have 2 votes for justices and

that's the best way for any president to have a real long term impact on our nation in every aspect.

[CreekDog]

27. i said that wondering what on earth was the point you were trying to make

we are talking population growth and politics and you start talking about the Senate which is the one elected body of government whose numbers are completely unaffected by population growth.

:banghead:

you're just distracting from the point that the OP is completely flawed.

[jody]

30. OP stressed "democrats should try to battle for" and it's cheaper to campaign for senator in the

smallest states like WY than the largest states like CA.

That's my point and is precisely related to the OP's focus on winning political seats currently held by Republicans.

Moreover one senator has more political clout that several congresspersons spread over several states.

In any case nothing we say on DU matters anyway and that's too sad. :shrug:

[uppityperson]

23. link to source? can't talk more until we get that. Thanks.

[Rex]

36. Here.

http://www.texastribune.org/blogs/post/2010/mar/23/records-texas-suburban-growth/

[uppityperson]

38. Thanks. I did a search and had a brazillion hits. Off to look.

[Rex]

41. NP, just got lucky and found it right away.

[Dappleganger]

24. Forget about St. Johns county.

They tried to start a Young Democrats' club and maybe 8 people showed up. This county is so republican it's sickening. There's a few democrat/liberals here and we cling to each other for life support. Whenever there are activist events going on we have to go into Jacksonville (Riverside, Five Points, Springfield).

We do put our yard signs up when it's voting time, however. ;)

[RobertPlant]

25. where I got this information

http://www.census.gov/popest/counties/CO-EST2009-08.html. I chose to look at the top 30 fastest growing counties. To calculate the election results I went to Dave Leip's website where you can find that.

[CreekDog]

29. your 30 counties added 2.2million; entire USA added 26 million

your 30 counties account for a small proportion of the growth in the nation overall.

[tabbycat31]

34. my county is the same way

and Obama lost the county by 3 points in 2008.

2/3 of our representatives and both of our senators are Democratic. Our governor was until January and the R who sits in the governor's mansion has a 33% approval rate after his first 100 days.

We started and failed because of (in my mind) strategic reasons-- they wanted to get people to come to our events by cold calling every registered Democrat in the county. Not a way to reach voters under 35 IMO.

[tabbycat31]

35. my county is the same way

and Obama lost the county by 3 points in 2008.

2/3 of our representatives and both of our senators are Democratic. Our governor was until January and the R who sits in the governor's mansion has a 33% approval rate after his first 100 days.

We started and failed because of (in my mind) strategic reasons-- they wanted to get people to come to our events by cold calling every registered Democrat in the county. Not a way to reach voters under 35 IMO.

[rainbow4321]

28. Collin County, TX here

Reddest of red areas, goes 70 percent red every election. WHY local people running for office even feel a need to add the word "Republican" to the signs they plant on the side of the road is beyond me...

Having said that, the Dem turnout for the 2008 primaries and election was like nothing I have ever seen in the 20+ yrs of living in this county. Pukes were so scared they were stalking us at voter registration tables..and oooohhh did they look bitter and pissed when we had Dem tables at early voting areas..meanwhile Dem voters were running to our table, glowing, wanting their pics taken with Obama/Biden signs.
Primary night the Texas 2 Step ran 2 hours late to finish because there were sooo many Dems showing up and not enough machines for us to use...see, repukes had their machines, we had ours and it was not pretty. Because they were the controlling party in the county, they got to choose where Dems had to stay in the school building and where the repukes were. Needless to say, they crammed us into small classrooms and oveflow in to the halls while their small group got the huge cafeteria.

I still remember having to park back in the muddy field behind the school on primary night since it was so packed with Dem cars..this other lady and myself walked away from our cars as we said outloud to each other "I wonder if we will need tow trucks when we leave later?"

Bottom line, we (Dems) are here and can get motivated..question is, was this a sprint for 2008 or a marathon that will go on for future elections.

BTW, we had so many Dems attending our county Dem convention, they had to move it to a larger location, hold it on a different day, and it lasted......24 HOURS to get all the business done. Yes, 24 hours. Previous conventions had 300 attending, this last one had 3,000 (that included delegates and people like me who went to watch the process.)

[Walk away]

33. It must have felt good to know you had so many sane neighbors.

I have a friend moving to Texas and I am not thrilled about visiting her. I have only ever been to Austin and when I was there, everyone I met kept telling me not to go anywhere else in the state.

[rainbow4321]

39. It was encouraging to alot of us

One guy who was a speaker at the county convention said that he and his wife had headed to the caucus event and were taking their time, stopping at Sonic, etc.. cuz they knew it would like other years when the only people there would be them and their precinct chair. They arrived and opened the door only to see a thousand people....many were his neighbors. His first thought "I finally felt it was safe to put out my Democratic yard sign"!!

[Walk away]

43. That's so cool. I hope you all get to feel like that again. nt

[depakid]

32. Like Dean said- the people in these counties need sensible progressive policies

just like everybody else.

What you don't do is pander to the irrational and dysfunctional Republican right- nor enable and legitimize religious fundamentalism in order to pursue votes that you will likely will not get.

That's a lose/lose proposition for everyone involved.

[TexasObserver]

37. The Texas counties are primarily GOP leaning bed room communities near big cities.

ROCKWALL, TX - near Dallas
WILLIAMSON, TX - near Austin
FORT BEND, TX - near Houston
MONTGOMERY, TX - near Houston

[rainbow4321]

40. Yep....Collin County, north of Dallas

A county that thrived locally under Clinton and crashed/burned when chimp came along..dotcom bubble burst did us in..lay offs, losing homes, people who lived in huge homes were suddenly turning towards community resources to get by in life.

The county was going under financially so they announced that they would turn to the health care business to help the economy. The result: a surge of hospitals built since then, some within spitting distance of each other. All fighting over patients and doctors, one had to lay off nurses because the facility was losing doctors (and their patients) to the shiny, new hospital down the streets.

Everything went bad under chimp yet the locals still swear by the repukes' party.

My repuke run city is still having money problems, they are talking about having libraries shut down once a week on a rolling/taking turns basis. Yet they keep re-electing the same fools over and over.

[NoPasaran]

42. GOP-leaning Williamson County sent Democrat Diana Maldonado to the TX House in 2008

Hays County, to the south of Austin has been represented by Democrat Patrick Rose since 2002. As Travis County becomes more and more expensive the surrounding counties have been trending more blue as naturally Democratic voters move into new subdivisions.

[Ishoutandscream2]

44. Rockwall county Texas here

Quite possibly the reddest area in the united states. Home to representative Ralph hall (Bushbot).