Why is Ohio so different from Michigan and Pennsylvania?

[Alhena]

Michigan looks so bad for McCain that he pulled his campaign there. Pennsylvania polls have shown Obama with an average lead of 15 points. Yet Ohio remains maddeningly close- why is that?

Ohio has about the same percentage of African-Americans as Pennsylvania, and they both lie partly in Appalachia. Obama lost to Hillary by similar margins in Ohio and Pennsylvania. And yet Obama is now polling much better in Pennsylvania than Ohio- why is that?

[Medusa]

1. Slow on the uptake?

dumber than dirt?

[LisaM]

2. Because of southern Ohio

It's actually more similar to the south than to the north. Cincinnati is practically a southern city.

[d_r]

8. cincy almost south

yeah, but don't tell southerners that.

It is sort of like Texas - westerners say Texas is in the south, southerners say Texas is in the west.

[LisaM]

13. Well parts of the south

It's certainly a lot like northern Kentucky, which most northerners would consider southern. Everything is relative.

[The Magistrate]

16. Quite Right, Ma'am: Civil War History Remains Instructive In Analyzing Our Politics Today

Ohio, though remaining in the Union, was a hot-bed of secessionist treason throughout the Civil War, the mother-lode of the 'Copperhead' society, and under martial law for a considerable portion of the conflict. It elected in 1864 a governor, Vallandigham, whom President Lincoln had previously had escorted across the line into Confederate territory under flag of truce, as commutation of a sentence he had received from a military court for treasonous utterances.

Once the topic of civil rights came to the fore of our politics, and Goldwater took up the banner of opposition to breaking Jim Crow in the election of 1964, the degree of allegiance to Confederate secession has become a very reliable indicator of where the Republican party will receive votes.

"I will fight the secesh till Hell freezes over, then fight on the ice!"

[Zynx]

3. It has a lot more of that "Ol' time religion". Pennsylvania and Michigan have it too, but not nearly

as much.

[scheming daemons]

4. Ohio has a lot of WV, KY, and IN in it.......

Cincinnati is a more refined Kentucky..... but full of hateful racist crap.


Columbus is a lot like Indianapolis... bible thumping christian farmers on the outskirts.


SE Ohio might as well be called NW West Virginia.

[WeDidIt]

5. Religious Fundamentalism

Seriously, that's the real difference. They take their fundamentalist relgiion very seriously in rural Ohio.

[yardwork]

6. Demographics. Ohio is kind of a cross-section of the whole country.

Michigan and Pennsylvania have a larger percentage of big city residents and unionized skilled workers. Northern Ohio has those, too, and that part of Ohio is reliably blue. But other sections of Ohio - notably the southeast and many sections of western Ohio - are rural, small town, fundamentalist, and almost all white. MI and PA have those regions, too, but they are smaller in proportion to the whole.

Ohio has long been a center of the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups. Some of the rural counties in Ohio are scary.

[Thrill]

7. They haven't had enough of their jobs leaving and not seeing any new ones created

[HereSince1628]

9. It's connection to coal culture.

Southern Illinois (i.e. Little Egypt) has a similar coal fields mentality.

I think it's less about mining and more about the fundamentalist religious culture, but conservatism is strong in coal country.

[sunwyn]

10. I live in sw Ohio and everything south of Dayton is called the annex of Kentucky.

Rednecks abound

[Chrisnreno]

11. Something in the water, perhaps? Beats the hell outta me. nt

[peace13]

12. Is this about the 50th thread today about what is wrong with Ohio?

Trust me, people are working their butts off for Obama. Obama's young people and the old locals are trying to make this thing happen. If you have concerns please get to Ohio and help out. You have to remember that Ohio had Ken Blackwell and our stolen election. We now have a wonderful SOS that works for the people 100% of the time. Please folks if you are worried about Ohio, do something. This kind of chatter does nothing to solve the problem. Sick of it in Ohio, Kim

[rucky]

14. Not as strong of a union presence

UAW in Michigan
Steelworkers in PA

Nothing much in OH, unionwise, that's not on the lakeshore

[doc03]

29. Nothing much Union-wise that's not on the lakeshore

the Upper Ohio valley is practicly the birthplace of the Union movement for the entire USA. A problem is most of our union jobs were sent to China. Did you ever hear of the Homestead Massacre at Carnegie Steel or the Battle of Blair mountain in Matewan WV?

[Ninga]

15. From the Gov. Himself "Democrats in Ohio are not Liberals" you tell me, what does

THAT mean?

[blm]

17. Because the DNC decided to not fight for it in the mid90s and let party infrastructure COLLAPSE

allowing the RNC and GOP officials to gain control of every level of the election process where the votes are allowed, cast and counted. The RNC has been stealing elections in Ohio since at least 2000. And DNC let them do it. Many of us believe the DNC chairs during that time ignored states like Ohio and Florida deliberately, especially in 2004.

[yardwork]

26. Yes, that's true. Thank goodness for Howard Dean.

[Phoonzang]

18. MI shares a border with Canada and Wisconsin. PA shares a border

with DE, NJ, MD, and NY all deep blue states. Ohio shares a border with Indiana, W. Virginia and the 'tucky.

Or not...I don't know.

[HughMoran]

19. More fundy bigots?

:shrug:

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

20. Hey, they call it CincinNazi or CincinNasty for a reason. nt

[Drunken Irishman]

21. Because Southern Ohio is more like Northern West Virginia.

[demokatgurrl]

22. It doesn't have (relatively) big cities like

Chicago and Philly. I think the cities have a strong influence on at least the part of the state that are within commuting distance. In PA we also have Pittsburgh- not as big as Philly for sure, but it's a city. I don't think we have many African Americans in rural areas either- more in cities and suburbs.

Just guessing..

[Cosmocat]

25. We have a winner !!!

Philadelphia has 1.5 million people in it proper - and the massive suburbs.

Pittsburgh has 300,000, which is pretty much the size of Ohio's biggest cities.

If you look at a red/blue map of Pa in presidentials, it does pretty much resemble a "T" with philly and pittsburgh being the blue lower outside areas, the rest of the state red.

[Pattib]

23. Same reason my area (FL Panhandle) has more registered Dems, yet always goes for a Repub,

God, Guns, Gays, Abortion and finally, but most importantly stupidity. My county has a majority of registered Democrats. Every election cycle the Repub. candidate wins with 80-87% of the vote. Go figure.
Those spam emails that we all endure, (which are promptly sent to the trash heap)are spread around at my job like they are part of the Bible, which is taken literally here. Well, the parts which allows them their prejudices, at least.
I've guided them to snopes, some of them get it, most of them are mouth-breathing-Fox News watchers. They don't want to know the truth. It's easier to call a Democrat a commie bastard and keep reading those wing-nut emails.

[doc03]

24. I would say because there are a lot of transplants from

WV and Kentucky particularly in the southern part of the state. Both sides of my family were originally from WV and come north to work in the steel industry. Here is a great song by Dwight Yoakum a Kentucky transplant.


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

[AllentownJake]

27. I can answer PA

PA is really 3 states. You have the Eastern section which is more similar to NY, DE, and NJ very liberal and Catholic. Than you have the middle which is similar to Indiana, backwoods of North Carolina, and West Virginia. Than you have the Western portion that is more similar to Michigan and heavily Union.

Ohio doesn't have the liberal east. It only has the north which is union like Michigan and Cleveland.

[doc03]

30. Only the north which is Union! The Upper Ohio Valley

is where the Unions in the USA were born, that's why we have little new industry here today we have been blacklisted by industry for decades because of our strong union record, and what jobs we had have gone to China or Mexico.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

28. A generation of Republican Rule...

Prior to 2006, they pretty much ran the place for something like 18 years. Also there's a big "brain drain" problem with young people get their educations and leave for other states - so many of the more reliably liberal voters are now living in Chicago, Detroit, and Pittsburgh.