Mandate for CHANGE

[decodelighted]

I thought this article and the charts were very compelling.

Some highlights:

When it was over, more than 120 million pulled a lever or mailed a ballot, and the system could barely accommodate the demands of Extreme Democracy. Obama won more votes than anyone else in U.S. history, the biggest Democratic victory since Lyndon Johnson crushed another Arizona Senator 44 years ago. Obama won men, which no Democrat had managed since Bill Clinton. He won 54% of Catholics, 66% of Latinos, 68% of new voters -- a multicultural, multigenerational movement that shatters the old political ice pack.

And check out this more detailed map of last night''s result. If Bush thought a 2 million vote spread in the popular vote was a "mandate" ... what is SEVEN million? Here''s what Bush said of his 2004 victory: I earned capital in the campaign, political capital, and now I intend to spend it. I trust that Barack Obama will spend wisely.

 

[decodelighted]

Map

 

[Rank Amateur]

The map is mis-leading. It assigns blue tint to counties which voted red. A strange way to do it.

Historic popular vote totals --------------> http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0781450.html

Some interesting stuff in there. Obama got about 1% more total popular votes than Bush last time out.

Clinton was elected with 42% in 1992, Obama got 54% this time. Bush 56% last election.

 

[iheartscience]

Wow, cool article and map, deco. It''s amazing what a turnaround some areas had. I was watching CNN on election night and you probably saw this if you watched CNN, but the guy with the special county by county map thing kept showing the differences in random counties in 2004 and 2008, and even in red counties Obama got way more votes than Kerry, and obviously McCain got way less votes than Bush. Which is really kind of shocking if you think about it-I think most can agree that McCain would be a much better president than Bush. But it just goes to show how far the Republican party has fallen.