Oct 20 2010
Surge Of GOP Clear At Excellent NC Election Site
This is the way election sites should be set up in the internet age. This North Carolina Transparency Project has incredible site to quickly review the electoral make up and status for the state. It concisely communicates an incredible wealth of information. All states should be producing something like this.
For example, you can compare voter registration changes over any time frame. One thing that is evident since November 2008 is that voters have left both the Democrat and Republican parties, as can be seen if you look follow this link and look at the top row (totals). If you mouse over the graphs you can see the actual data by group. Since November 2008 the only group to increase in voter registration is independents, all others lost voters.
This page shows the absentee voting status. Using the previous page we know that as of October 2010 the make up of the North Carolina voter pool is D-44.7%, R-31.6% and Ind-23.6%. But the early voting tallies show D- 43.5%, R-38.9% and Ind-17.6%. Clearly the Democrats are voting relative to their general slice of the registered voters. But the GOP is surging (as of now) 7% above their proportion of the registered voter pool. Surprisingly (for now) the independents seem to be the ones slow off the mark. It will be interesting to keep an eye on this state to see how the actual voting is transpiring.
Update: Early voting in NV is showing the same GOP surge – which of course is really bad for the soon-to-be ex-Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Early-voting numbers out of Nevada’s two biggest counties could spell trouble for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in his tough contest against Republican Sharron Angle.
In Reno’s Washoe County and Las Vegas’s Clark County, Republican turnout was disproportionately high over the first three voting days, according to local election officials. The two counties together make up 86 percent of the state’s voter population.
Some 47 percent of early voters in the bellwether Washoe County so far have been Republicans, while 40 percent have been Democrats, according to the Washoe County Registrar. Nearly 11,000 people had voted in Washoe over the first three days of early voting, which began Saturday.
Voter registration in the county is evenly split, 39 percent to 39 percent. The disproportionate turnout is a concrete indication of the Republican enthusiasm that is expected to portend a nationwide GOP wave.
So, why are the polls tightening as the votes show an intensity gap favoring the GOP? It could be those fed up with government and jazzed up to throw the Dems out are not responding to pollsters. Or it could be biased turnout models as we may have seen in the recent PA Senate poll by PPP (though, be careful here – PPP accurately picked up the Murkowski and O’Donnell upsets by loosening up their likley voter filters). Who knows.
Or maybe these massive wave elections are those 2% cases the pollsters assume with a 95% confidence are not happening!
I early voted this morning – turnout seemed quite heavy based on what I’ve seen in the past!
and the most significant thing I noticed is that while I was there I estimated the line of people I was in was about 70% seniors.
of course this is just my personal observations which may or may not be representative of the larger group.
wws, I noticed the same here, too. One thing I noticed is what those people are wearing! Some of them wore t-shirts with references to the GOP, Republican, or tea party labels!
Did you notice the same?
btw, check chron.som/politics. There is an article about how and why the Dems are pouring money into Texas – redistricting with four new seats!
I was in College Station and Byran last week.
College Station had lots of Flores and few Chet Edwards signs.
Bryan had more Edwards signs than Flores, especially in the Hispanic parts of town.
The laugh was the huge Edwards sign at the Hispanic surname law firm (No free word of mouth from me!) across the street from the Bryan city hall.