QUOTE(Abu Beacon @ Apr 26 2005, 07:47 PM)
How the president won Ohio, 2nd term
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Mark Naymik, Robert L. Smith, and Dave Davis
Plain Dealer Reporters
It came down to America's bellwether, wrong only twice in the last 104 years.
Ohio decided Election 2004 and in a spectacular fashion, forcing the candidates and the nation to wait as votes from the state's 88 counties poured in.
In the end, President Bush beat Sen. John Kerry by 2 percentage points, or 136,000 votes of 5.4 million cast, letting the 43rd president collect the state's 20 electoral votes and stay on for another four-year term.
Bush did so by building on a campaign strategy tested four years ago that targeted voters in rural counties and so- called "collar counties" circling major urban areas.
To rally this base, Bush took advantage of several conservative lightning- rod issues, most notably a constitutional amendment to ban gay-marriage, known as Issue 1.
Reaching deep into the state's 63 rural counties and giving campaign attention to the state's 16 suburban counties, he beat back a dramatic surge of new registered voters in the state's nine urban counties, which heavily favor Democrats.
"There's going to be a lot of political scientists studying this election for years," said Jo Ann Davidson, chairwoman of the Ohio Valley Region of the Bush- Cheney campaign.
They are going to find, she said, that a state often seen as five distinct regions, or five Ohios, is blurring into two: the suburban and rural counties vs. the urban counties.
"When you lose Franklin County by huge numbers, as we did, and still win Ohio, that's pretty unusual," Davidson said about the central Ohio county that includes the city of Columbus. "It's a changing voting pattern we're seeing in Ohio."
Democrats agree, and the new pattern scares them.
"As Ohio becomes a more suburban and exurbia state, it is harder for us," said Jim Ruvolo, chairman of Kerry's Ohio campaign.
Bush carried the rural counties over Kerry, 58 percent to 42 percent, and the suburban counties, 62 percent to 38 percent. That was enough to offset Kerry's 57 percent to 43 percent victory in the urban counties.
Those numbers are evidence of a new political geography.
For years, political experts have viewed Ohio as five culturally distinct regions with differing but dependable views on politics and life.
Democrats dominate the heavily unionized industrial heartland of Northeast Ohio while Republicans rule southwest Ohio, a Little Dixie region more akin to neighboring Kentucky than the northeast region.
Outside Toledo, northwest Ohio is an agribusiness belt populated by conservative, church- going families who reliably vote Republican.
Central Ohio is the new exurbia, an emerging swing region of sprawling suburbs and white-collar jobs, though immigrants and minorities have liberalized its traditionally conservative politics.
Though losing Franklin County, which anchors the region, Bush grew his support in the surrounding suburbs.
Democrats looked hopefully to Appalachia, a swing region where voters tend to vote their pocketbooks. The mountaineers lean Democratic if they're worried about jobs, and some Appalachian counties are suffering double-digit unemployment.
Kerry and Edwards campaigned in Appalachia several times, most recently in early October, hammering Bush for his jobless economy. But Tuesday's vote showed the effort had little impact.
Bush's broad geographic support suggests that his campaign's voter mobilization effort, started more than two years ago, lived up to its billing as the party's most detailed and extensive ever and one that targeted voters with sophisticated profiling. And it suggests that Bush's frequent mentions of conservative social issues played well in the rural and suburban counties.
Residents of the hill counties will swing Republican if worked up about "social issues," political strategists say, and the Republicans made sure they were.
They crafted a southern Ohio campaign around the themes of gays, guns and God, using Issue 1 to bring them to the polls, said John Green, a political scientist at the University of Akron.
"The Bush campaign and their allies certainly did push those themes," he said.
Davidson described the strategy as one that stressed family values, but the themes were presented starkly.
During the final weekend before the election, Bush volunteers distributed fliers around the state that read: "Who shares your values?" It noted that Kerry opposes a "partial-birth abortion ban" and the appointment of "pro-life judges."
The flier also quoted from a speech Bush made earlier this year before the National Association of Evangelicals.
"I will defend the sanctity of marriage against activist courts and local officials who want to redefine marriage," quotes the flier.
Such messages resonated in Appalachia's Gallia County.
"This is the Bible Belt," said Harold Montgomery, owner of the only full-time barber shop in Gallipolis. "The election falls back to moral and social issues: gay rights, prayer in schools, the right to bear arms and abortion."
Gallia County's voters approved the gay marriage ban 10,590 to 2,658.
Meanwhile, Bush won one poor Appalachian county after another. He was similarly successful in rural counties throughout the state.
"We exceeded our goals in all these really small counties," Davidson said. "When you lump them together, it's pretty significant. I think it was the family values vote."
Exit polls taken Tuesday support her view.
Voters in Ohio's rural counties cited "moral values" as a top concern, nearly as much as voters who cited "economy and jobs."
John Madden, a born-again Christian, said he was among just four of 90 adult parishioners at his church in the Farm Belt's Sandusky County who supported Kerry. His pastor never suggested whom to vote for, but reminded worshippers that abortion and gay marriage are wrong, he said.
"I thought the jobs issue would be the big issue. I think the moral issue was the big issue," he said. "It resonated with a lot of people."
That Bush wound up winning all of northwest Ohio except Toledo's heavily Democratic Lucas County didn't surprise John Riker, a fuel-truck driver and farmer from Bowling Green.
"We're farmers - and Republicans," said Riker, as he sipped a predawn cup of coffee at the Ideal Bakery in Gibsonburg. "This is good for the businessman."
Ruvolo admitted that Democrats are not going to win on cultural issues and that Issue 1 hurt them. But he said Bush was particularly effective in campaigning on a message that uncertainty and change during a time of war is not good for America.
"It worked," he said.
When Bush delivered his acceptance speech Wednesday, he had claimed victory in 72 of the state's 88 counties, the same number he won in 2000.
Compared with his victory against Al Gore four years ago, Bush increased his raw vote total in all 88 counties, most heavily in 72 counties he carried. And many of those overwhelmingly supported Tuesday's passage of the state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
With solid gains in every small county, Bush neutralized the steep gains Kerry made in Cuyahoga and Franklin counties. Kerry added about 73,000 votes in both counties, when compared with Gore's performance four years ago. (Exactly how many new voters cast ballots Tuesday cannot be determined yet.)
Rep. Ted Strickland, whose district includes much of southeast Ohio, says he doesn't attribute Kerry's loss to lack of effort, a flawed message or a defective ground game.
"Everything that could have been done was done and that's one of the discouraging things about the outcome," said Strickland, adding that he can't imagine how the Democratic ground operation could have been better organized or better financed.
"I think he lost because there was a perception in significant areas of small-town and rural Ohio that somehow Kerry did not hold views and values that were consistent with their own," Strickland said.
Plain Dealer reporters Margaret Bernstein, Amanda Garrett, Bill Lubinger, Brian Albrecht, Fran Henry and Elizabeth Auster and computer-assisted reporting editor Tom Gaumer contributed to this story.
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:
mnaymik@plaind.com, 216-999-4849
© 2005 The Plain Dealer
© 2005 cleveland.com All Rights Reserved.
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Mark Naymik, Robert L. Smith, and Dave Davis
Plain Dealer Reporters
It came down to America's bellwether, wrong only twice in the last 104 years.
Ohio decided Election 2004 and in a spectacular fashion, forcing the candidates and the nation to wait as votes from the state's 88 counties poured in.
In the end, President Bush beat Sen. John Kerry by 2 percentage points, or 136,000 votes of 5.4 million cast, letting the 43rd president collect the state's 20 electoral votes and stay on for another four-year term.
Bush did so by building on a campaign strategy tested four years ago that targeted voters in rural counties and so- called "collar counties" circling major urban areas.
To rally this base, Bush took advantage of several conservative lightning- rod issues, most notably a constitutional amendment to ban gay-marriage, known as Issue 1.
Reaching deep into the state's 63 rural counties and giving campaign attention to the state's 16 suburban counties, he beat back a dramatic surge of new registered voters in the state's nine urban counties, which heavily favor Democrats.
"There's going to be a lot of political scientists studying this election for years," said Jo Ann Davidson, chairwoman of the Ohio Valley Region of the Bush- Cheney campaign.
They are going to find, she said, that a state often seen as five distinct regions, or five Ohios, is blurring into two: the suburban and rural counties vs. the urban counties.
"When you lose Franklin County by huge numbers, as we did, and still win Ohio, that's pretty unusual," Davidson said about the central Ohio county that includes the city of Columbus. "It's a changing voting pattern we're seeing in Ohio."
Democrats agree, and the new pattern scares them.
"As Ohio becomes a more suburban and exurbia state, it is harder for us," said Jim Ruvolo, chairman of Kerry's Ohio campaign.
Bush carried the rural counties over Kerry, 58 percent to 42 percent, and the suburban counties, 62 percent to 38 percent. That was enough to offset Kerry's 57 percent to 43 percent victory in the urban counties.
Those numbers are evidence of a new political geography.
For years, political experts have viewed Ohio as five culturally distinct regions with differing but dependable views on politics and life.
Democrats dominate the heavily unionized industrial heartland of Northeast Ohio while Republicans rule southwest Ohio, a Little Dixie region more akin to neighboring Kentucky than the northeast region.
Outside Toledo, northwest Ohio is an agribusiness belt populated by conservative, church- going families who reliably vote Republican.
Central Ohio is the new exurbia, an emerging swing region of sprawling suburbs and white-collar jobs, though immigrants and minorities have liberalized its traditionally conservative politics.
Though losing Franklin County, which anchors the region, Bush grew his support in the surrounding suburbs.
Democrats looked hopefully to Appalachia, a swing region where voters tend to vote their pocketbooks. The mountaineers lean Democratic if they're worried about jobs, and some Appalachian counties are suffering double-digit unemployment.
Kerry and Edwards campaigned in Appalachia several times, most recently in early October, hammering Bush for his jobless economy. But Tuesday's vote showed the effort had little impact.
Bush's broad geographic support suggests that his campaign's voter mobilization effort, started more than two years ago, lived up to its billing as the party's most detailed and extensive ever and one that targeted voters with sophisticated profiling. And it suggests that Bush's frequent mentions of conservative social issues played well in the rural and suburban counties.
Residents of the hill counties will swing Republican if worked up about "social issues," political strategists say, and the Republicans made sure they were.
They crafted a southern Ohio campaign around the themes of gays, guns and God, using Issue 1 to bring them to the polls, said John Green, a political scientist at the University of Akron.
"The Bush campaign and their allies certainly did push those themes," he said.
Davidson described the strategy as one that stressed family values, but the themes were presented starkly.
During the final weekend before the election, Bush volunteers distributed fliers around the state that read: "Who shares your values?" It noted that Kerry opposes a "partial-birth abortion ban" and the appointment of "pro-life judges."
The flier also quoted from a speech Bush made earlier this year before the National Association of Evangelicals.
"I will defend the sanctity of marriage against activist courts and local officials who want to redefine marriage," quotes the flier.
Such messages resonated in Appalachia's Gallia County.
"This is the Bible Belt," said Harold Montgomery, owner of the only full-time barber shop in Gallipolis. "The election falls back to moral and social issues: gay rights, prayer in schools, the right to bear arms and abortion."
Gallia County's voters approved the gay marriage ban 10,590 to 2,658.
Meanwhile, Bush won one poor Appalachian county after another. He was similarly successful in rural counties throughout the state.
"We exceeded our goals in all these really small counties," Davidson said. "When you lump them together, it's pretty significant. I think it was the family values vote."
Exit polls taken Tuesday support her view.
Voters in Ohio's rural counties cited "moral values" as a top concern, nearly as much as voters who cited "economy and jobs."
John Madden, a born-again Christian, said he was among just four of 90 adult parishioners at his church in the Farm Belt's Sandusky County who supported Kerry. His pastor never suggested whom to vote for, but reminded worshippers that abortion and gay marriage are wrong, he said.
"I thought the jobs issue would be the big issue. I think the moral issue was the big issue," he said. "It resonated with a lot of people."
That Bush wound up winning all of northwest Ohio except Toledo's heavily Democratic Lucas County didn't surprise John Riker, a fuel-truck driver and farmer from Bowling Green.
"We're farmers - and Republicans," said Riker, as he sipped a predawn cup of coffee at the Ideal Bakery in Gibsonburg. "This is good for the businessman."
Ruvolo admitted that Democrats are not going to win on cultural issues and that Issue 1 hurt them. But he said Bush was particularly effective in campaigning on a message that uncertainty and change during a time of war is not good for America.
"It worked," he said.
When Bush delivered his acceptance speech Wednesday, he had claimed victory in 72 of the state's 88 counties, the same number he won in 2000.
Compared with his victory against Al Gore four years ago, Bush increased his raw vote total in all 88 counties, most heavily in 72 counties he carried. And many of those overwhelmingly supported Tuesday's passage of the state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
With solid gains in every small county, Bush neutralized the steep gains Kerry made in Cuyahoga and Franklin counties. Kerry added about 73,000 votes in both counties, when compared with Gore's performance four years ago. (Exactly how many new voters cast ballots Tuesday cannot be determined yet.)
Rep. Ted Strickland, whose district includes much of southeast Ohio, says he doesn't attribute Kerry's loss to lack of effort, a flawed message or a defective ground game.
"Everything that could have been done was done and that's one of the discouraging things about the outcome," said Strickland, adding that he can't imagine how the Democratic ground operation could have been better organized or better financed.
"I think he lost because there was a perception in significant areas of small-town and rural Ohio that somehow Kerry did not hold views and values that were consistent with their own," Strickland said.
Plain Dealer reporters Margaret Bernstein, Amanda Garrett, Bill Lubinger, Brian Albrecht, Fran Henry and Elizabeth Auster and computer-assisted reporting editor Tom Gaumer contributed to this story.
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:
mnaymik@plaind.com, 216-999-4849
© 2005 The Plain Dealer
© 2005 cleveland.com All Rights Reserved.