Election Aftermath

In securing the presidency Tuesday night, Barack Obama won several states which went to George W. Bush in 2004:

Indiana, Florida, Ohio, Virginia, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada

And as of today North Carolina and Missouri are still "too close to call," but North Carolina is leaning toward Obama and Missouri is leaning toward McCain.

For me, the biggest surprise was Indiana. Indiana had not gone to a Democrat since 1964, and in 2004 it gave Bush a 21 point lead. No doubt that the economy was a big issue for Hoosiers.

Also, the fact that Obama was able to capture Indiana, Virginia, and presumably, North Carolina, is very telling. I did not think that Obama would sweep all three states, mostly because they all were pro-Bush in 2004. And like Indiana, the last time Virginia went Democrat was in 1964 (for NC, they last went Democrat in 1976).

In the long run, the more devastating losses for the Republicans may be losing Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico - not to mention nearly losing Montana, and showing some vulnerability in North Dakota and Arizona. In 1992, Montana, Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico were states that went to Clinton, and four years later Clinton picked up Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico. In the elections of 2000 and 2004, the Democratic candidate picked up one of those western states only once (Gore won New Mexico in 2000). As traditional electoral power states continue to lose electoral votes (such as Pennsylvania), some of these western states will be gaining electoral votes (Nevada for example may gain 3 after the 2010 census).

I have yet to see any solid reports of the national voter turnout. The Washington Post is reporting the total number of votes for each candidate as follows:

Obama - 63,550,319
McCain - 56,178,736

In 2004 about 62 million Americans voted for Bush, which broke the previous record for any one candidate.

If you take those two totals from Obama and McCain, you get about 119.7 million votes between them - which is lower than the 121 million total votes for Bush and Kerry in 2004. So those record national turnout numbers may not actually happen, but it could be a little while until the numbers are finalized.