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October 17, 2004
Republican PR
The AJC today runs a piece of Republican PR about the state going to the Republicans. Here's the link. Now, the rumor is that they have a little poll conducted at the paper that shows the first Republican governor is not very popular in "Republican" Georgia, but that's beside the story.
Let's look specifically at the counties that they talk about in their story -- Lee, Tift and Houston. All 3 of these counties have seen either a large influx of Northerners move in (who are Republican) or have been "relocation" counties where Republicans moved in from other counties. In Lee's case, Dougherty and Baker counties have gotten more Democratic in recent years (white flight?).
Anyway, Lee County is such a traditionally "Democratic" county that it voted for exactly 1 Democrat for President since 1960 -- Jimmy Carter in 1976 (but not in 1980 when he ran for re-election). Tift County has only voted for Carter (twice) since 1960, and Houston County is the same.
But who are you going to believe? Me, or you own lying eyes. Here is a map (click to enlarge) that shows how the Georgia counties have trended from 1988's (the first year I have data) Bush v Dukakis election to 2000's Bush v Gore election.
Counties that are shaded blue gave Al Gore a higher percent than Dukakis and George W Bush a lower percent than his father. Counties that are red gave Al Gore a lower percent than Dukakis and gave George W Bush a better percent than his father. How do the AJC counties fare? Well, Lee has gotten slighty redder. Dukakis got 25.6% and Gore got 25.4%. Lee has gotten 1.2% more Republican in 12 years. Houston and Tift, on the other hand, have gotten more Democratic, not Republican. Gore did .8% better than Dukakis in Houston and .6% better in Tift. Make your own conclusions.
Posted by Chris at October 17, 2004 12:53 AM
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