Ungrateful For Me To Ask . What Happened In North Carolina ?

[outsideworld]

As the vote tallies were coming in a kept holding faith that we would eventually overtake Romney or that the early vote had not been counted or something .

The was record turnout for African Americans , why didnt we carry the state this time, I actually thought it was a more likely state than florida and we won that .

[Seedersandleechers]

1. Good question

Wish I knew the answer.

[Kookaburra]

2. Been asking that same question

All I can say is there is a church on practically every corner -- especially where I live -- and they told people every Sunday how to vote.

[WI_DEM]

3. Considering that Obama won NC by 0.8% in 2008 it is not inconceivable that

he would lose the state by 2% in 2012 when his national vote went from 53% to 50%. North Carolinians did a stellar job. The South was a tough region for Obama and he only went down about 1.2% as compared to his national vote. Given Romney's success in most other Southern states, NC held up very well--especially given the drubbing Dems got in most other offices up for contention in NC. The Obama campaign kind of indicated it wasn't at the top of their priorities when Obama and Biden stopped visiting the state in Mid October, despite continued advertising and other surrogates.

[LisaL]

7. It appears to have gone according to probability of winning.

NC had the lowest probability among swing states. Florida was next. Hopefully they finish counting votes in FL one of these days.

[Cosmocat]

27. Also, the governor

I have some friends down there who said that the negatives from Bev Purdue were pretty bad.

[BootinUp]

4. 9.6% UE

http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm

[HereSince1628]

8. What makes NC voters more concerned about UE than Californians?

Not doubting that the UE is significant to NC, but clearly California responded in a different way to worse UE numbers.

[BootinUp]

9. Combined with other factors

like intelligence.

[HereSince1628]

15. It's something but probably

not an intelligence gap.

[BootinUp]

19. To be accurate...call it education

religious fundamentalism, etc. In order for Obama to win there you would have needed a strong economy imho.

Know anyone from Mount Holly NC? I lived in Charlotte NC for 10 years.

[HereSince1628]

33. Don't know any folks from Mt Holly, but I know some from Goober Holler, Arkansas

Actually, while teaching I got to know lots of people all around the country.

Generally, intelligence is pretty similar, urban, suburban rural, north, south and in between.

Attitudes vary much more than intelligence, sometimes with noticeable regional differences.

[DURHAM D]

5. I don't know.

In 2008 Obama won the state by 14,000. In 2012 he lost by 100,000. Knowing how much work the campaign did here registering new voters, etc. the question for me has now become how did he win NC in 2008? I am at a loss.

[LisaL]

6. NC always had lowest probability of winning among swing states.

PPP came out with polls just before the election-NC was the only swing state where Romney was ahead (however slightly).
So, it's not surprising.

[patricia92243]

10. NC has always been red. Turning it blue for the last election was unusual. We just went back

to our old red-neck ways. I hate it when my vote is wasted.

[Daniel537]

25. It was not wasted.

Every vote the President received, whether it was in NC, OH or Wyoming for that matter, makes your voice heard. I always vote even in races where i know i'm going to be in the minority. Don't get discouraged. Remember that NC is no longer solidly R. It will be in play again next time, count on it.

[Daniel537]

11. I wouldn't get too discouraged about NC

It was always going to be a tough state to win, but we kept it competitive when most pundits had it solidly for Romney. Remember that just 8 years ago Bush won it by 13%, so its a state that's going to be in play for us going forward. The Solid South is solid no more.

[oswaldactedalone]

12. It's very disappointing to us

who live here as well. I'd like to see OFA or an incarnation of it stay in place, but I'd also like to see more cooperation with OFA and local Democratic Party organizations. I tried to be a part of both but the tension between OFA and the local party HQ was palpable. I was surprised and disappointed by it.

[union_maid]

16. Keep trying

You're getting closer and you're the future. The past very lets go easitly.

[struggle4progress]

13. (1) I think the GOP quietly out-foxed us here in 2010, since nobody expected them

to take the General Assembly then; (2) Having taken the GA, the GOP got to control redistricting -- all the lines were redrawn to support GOP; (3) in the end we only upped D turnout by 30K relative to 08 while R turnout went up by 150K relative to 08; (4) so we got clobbered

Some possibilities:

(a) maybe we did a great job on turning out the early vote but didn't put enough into the election day turnout
(b) despite OFA's hard work here, and the convention being here, we just got blasted on the ad side
(c) reactionaries capitalized on Obama's stated support for gay marriage, after the May amendment disaster
(d) the D governor not running for a second term hurt us

[LisaL]

14. Why didn't D governor run for a second term?

[struggle4progress]

17. She said she wanted to work on economic problems, instead of campaigning

[LisaL]

20. How is she going to work on economic problems if she is not the governor?

[struggle4progress]

28. It's a little late to ask her to reconsider her decision now

[dsc]

30. she meant during her lame duck status

but frankly she knew she would lose which is why she didn't run. I just wish she had figured it out earlier so we might have had a fighting chance.

[Proud Public Servant]

18. Remember, Obama lost ground everywhere

It was a big win, but the fact is that Obama both got fewer votes and won his states by smaller margins than in 2008, across the board (as far as I can tell). He won Florida by 240,000 votes last time; he's up 40,000 votes at the moment. He won Ohio by 250,000 votes last time; he's now on track to win by only 110,000. Nor was that just a swing-state pattern; deep-blue states like Hawaii and Vermont also gave him less cushion in his victories. Even in his strongest constituency -- DC -- There were 23,000 fewer votes cast, and they all came out of Obama's pool (Romney, by contrast, got almost exactly the same number of votes as McCain).

So if the pattern was that the president was going to come in with lower vote totals and tighter margins across the board, it makes sense that the places that he won by razor-thin margins -- places where he had no cushion, no votes he could afford losing -- would flip. His three closest margins were in IN, NC, and NE-2. So there it is.

[outsideworld]

24. great analysis n/t

[karmaqueen]

21. Tea Party is big here.

Besides the tea party, local radio and TV in our area is run completely by real nuts. There is a great group of progressive people but just not enough. Oh, and the military towns, Jacksonville, Fayetteville, and all the military retirees everywhere..There are a lot of reasons.. We will keep trying. The environment needs to be stressed more..Everyone cares about the ocean but have no idea of which party will protect it.

[dmosh42]

22. The rich know how to maneuver all the dummies, while they do their looting!

[yellowcanine]

23. Hey, Obama won all of the seriously contested states except NC.

So I am not complaining. If he had done as well with the white vote in NC as he did in Ohio he would have won the state. So that is basically the answer to the question as to what happened in NC.

[Aeroette]

26. I saw church van after church van arrive at the site I was working.

I think the Religious Right really got out the vote this year. That could explain some of it. They just seemed more organized this time around.

[dsc]

29. frankly it is a miracle that we were still a swing state at the end

His national percentage was down 3 and he won here in 08 by .8. Add in the disaster that our governor's race was and it was a miracle.

[JRLeft]

31. He only lost by 2 points, if you pay attention to demographics it isn't that different from Virginia

North Carolina will be a blue state in the future.

[ready2go83]

32. I want to know

I live in NC and I want to know as well. I am very upset that this state was not turned blue again. Someone alluded to the high unemployment but still, a lot of heart and soul was poured into this state for the elections. It's weird to me. But the thing about NC we have a few blue leaning cities here surrounded by red, backwards hick towns. It was probably more about the religious vote, although there is nothing really that compassionate about that idiot Romney.

I also think Mccain didn't have much of a ground game here, but Romney did. And yes many blacks turned out, but too many of the whites here were so damn oblivious and didn't turn out as much as they should. Someone else got mad when I made that point, but it is true, not enough white liberals showed up to vote, I guess they figured they didn't have a stake in this?

[geek tragedy]

34. We barely won there in 2008, and Obama has lost ground relative to 2008

in just about every state. Which is natural, given that a struggling economy is going to erode an incumbent's popularity, whether that's fair or not.

NC will be a battleground in 2016, and both sides will fight like hell for it.

[RosedaleGuy]

35. Dems should have fought more for NC

they didn't think they could win it so they devoted resources elsewhere but it looks now like it was winnable by flipping a few more white women voters.

[bornskeptic]

36. Obama got 35000 more votes in NC this year than in 2008,

but Romney picked up 150000 more than McCain. It's not like a lot of people who voted for Obama in 2008 switched to Romney. The Republicans apparently did a better job of recruiting new voters.

[ready2go83]

37. .l...........

And why were so many willing to be in the Republican camp? There are so many religious nutjobs here. Many of them got angry because Obama supported gay marriage and these ads played over and over.

[zebe83]

38. I thought GOTV did a great job....

we didn't win, but you can't win them all.