tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926413038778731189.post9002436650039771347..comments2023-10-16T07:13:12.123-05:00Comments on A plain blog about politics: Read Stuff, You ShouldJonathan Bernsteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15931039630306253241noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926413038778731189.post-24568027048102305802013-08-16T11:59:11.381-05:002013-08-16T11:59:11.381-05:00Trende writes: "More recently, here is a comp...Trende writes: "More recently, here is a complete list of states that had Democratic PVIs in 1988, listed from most Democratic to least: Rhode Island, Iowa, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oregon, West Virginia, New York, Wisconsin, Washington, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Vermont, California, Missouri, New Mexico, Connecticut, Montana, South Dakota. Five of those 20 states are red today, and states like Iowa, Minnesota, Oregon, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are on the purple end of the spectrum, rather than the deep blue end."<br /><br />Five of those states are red? West Virginia, Missouri, Montana, and South Dakota add up to four, not five--or am I missing something? And note that two of those four states were at the very bottom of the top twenty. (And Obama's victory by more than twelve points in Oregon in 2012 doesn't seem that "purplish" to me.) <br /><br />In fact, I would say that the figures actually prove continuity rather than change or "randomness"--not only did Obama in 2012 win sixteen of the twenty states with the top Democratic PVI's in 1988, but these states furnished him with 213 of the 272 electoral votes he got in those states where he did better than his national average.David Thttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09260587086663631888noreply@blogger.com