McCain Lost Ground In The 'Burbs

NPR's stats genius Robert Benincasa sends this analysis of the presidential election. In a nutshell: Suburbanites felt the pain of the failing housing market — they felt it, and they went for the Democrat promising change.

We'll have more on the podcast today. For now, Benincasa:

 

In Tuesday's election, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama captured greater proportions of voters in the economy-minded emerging suburbs and far-flung exurban areas than his fellow Democrat John Kerry did in 2004.

That's the conclusion of an NPR analysis of counties in the nation's 50 largest metropolitan areas. Applying a typology created by the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech, NPR found that Obama approached a majority in emerging suburbs with 48 percent of the vote, improving on Kerry's 43 percent.

Excluding Alaska and the six New England states, Obama flipped 327 counties that had gone to Republicans in 2004 to his party's column in 2008.

Among those to flip were California's Riverside, San Bernardino and San Diego counties.

"Those are exactly the kind of places where you've seen the housing market fall out," said the Metropolitan Institute's Robert Lang. "People who bought a house in the first quarter of '06 and are upside down on a mortgage — that's a kind of angry voter."

While Obama did move the ball in the outer and developing suburbs, he was strongest in urban core areas and inner suburbs, winning 78 percent and 62 percent of the vote in those areas, respectively. Kerry won 69 percent of the vote in the urban core in 2004.

Republican Sen. John McCain and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, succeeded in changing some counties' colors, too.

The 45 counties that turned Republican red from Democrat blue in 2004 were concentrated in the South, especially in places like Arkansas, Tennessee, West Virginia and Kentucky figured prominently.

McCain also won over three of John Kerry's suburban counties in the southwest corner of Pennsylvania — Fayette, Washington and Beaver.

Bonus: The Metropolitan Institute's 2006 election report.