The Red Delta Map

This is a map of U.S. counties that, in 2008 compared to 2004, voted more Republican.  The New York Times had a version of this map, but they also showed, in varying shades of blue, counties that voted more Democrat in 2008 compared to 2004.  Since most of this map that you see is white, you can deduce that most of the NYT version is blue.  Indeed, most counties in Indiana are dark blue.

Though, just because a county in this map or the NYT map is red does not necessarily mean that McCain got more votes than Obama in the county, nor does a blue county in the NYT map guarantee that Obama beat McCain there.  It’s just measuring the delta factor.

Looking at the red delta counties, John McCain made advances in eastern Kentucky and eastern Tennessee, eastern Oklahoma, and north Alabama, and of course, Arizona.  What’s interesting is that most of Arkansas is red, and a lot of southern Louisiana is red.

Steve Sailer accounts a lot of this to the “Scots-Irish Gap,” that is, so-called “Scots-Irish” of the mid-South were voting for one of their own.  Ironically, John McCain had roots in Carroll County, Mississippi, and it is not red on this map.  Dr. Brent Nelson, disputing Sailer’s “monocausal” thesis, vis-a-vis Dr. Nelson’s own home state of Arkansas:

There are several factors.   (1)  There may be something to Sailer’s spiel about the Scotch-Irish,  but I think that is a bit of a stretch this far along.   It is a factor, but it is not as knock down drag out important as Sailer wants to think it is.   But we will dignify it by calling it a cause, albeit a secondary one.

(2)  White Democrat turnout was slightly lower than one would expect.   Some white Demos were disappointed that Hillary was not the candidate.    Others did not want to vote for a black but did not want to vote for a Republican either.   They decided not to vote.

(3)   The rumor was widespread that Obama is really a Moslem/Muslim (however it is transliterated this year).    This had an impact because close to 80 percent of the people in Ark. are Southern Baptists.   The Moslem rumor gave people an excuse to vote against Obama on religious grounds when they were really uncomfortable with him as a black.      The religious factor was probably also strong in Okla.,  another heavily Baptist state.    Racial feeling would be weak in Okla.  because Okla. is only 7 percent black.

(4)  Strong pro-military sentiment in Ark.,  many military retirees.   Little Rock Air Force Base is a big operation.

Most of the blue counties are black-impacted Delta counties.  The other 2 blue counties are Pulaski (Little Rock) and Jefferson (Pine Bluff).

In this a good year for Democrats, Arkansas went in the other direction.  This is one extra complication in the process of figuring out a state whose voters that, on the same day in November 1968, voted for a segregationist (by modern standards, not those of 1968) for President (George Wallace), a liberal Republican for Governor (Winthrop Rockefeller), and a liberal Democrat for Senate (J. Wm. Fullbright), simultaneously.  Whoever truly figures out Arkansas politics deserves a Nobel Prize.

Also noteworthy is southern Louisiana.  Two words:  Katrina, Rita.  And the black voters that will never return.