More random photos about town.
One of those overhead latticework sign-holding thingies reflected in a tanker truck. Would have liked to have done more with it, but I only had time to grab a shot or two before the light changed.
More arena construction. Not sure what those strips hanging down are for.
A crane underarm, to the extent that cranes can be said to have underarms.
August 4th, 2009 at 11:27am
Posted by Eli
Entry Filed under:
Photoblogging,
Pittsburgh
This can only be good for Republicans.
Chris Cillizza in the WaPo highlighted a new poll out today on party identification by state which contains not a grain of good news – for the Republican party.
(…)
The Republicans currently have an edge in just 5 states, Alaska, Alabama, Idaho, Utah and Wyoming. Since the last Gallup poll in 2008 measuring voter ID by state, 9 states have changed classification from one category to another. Virginia, Indiana, Florida, Georgia, South Dakota and Nebraska moved from the Republican category to the Democrat, Colorado, Nevada and Alabama moved toward the Republicans.
To put this in starker terms. Add up all the states which strongly identify as Republican and you have a total of 15 electoral votes. Do the same for the Democrats and you have a total of 350 electoral votes. Not a typo – 15 electoral votes for the Republicans and 350 for the Dems.
Declining poll numbers are transitory but voter ID tends to be more static. This poll is a stark reminder of the problems Republicans face in moving from their status as a regionally-based party into one with national appeal. Remember this when you hear the pundits breathlessly predicting a “Republican comeback.” It’s going to be hard to stage a comeback when you’ve only got a majority of voters in five states.
Regionally-based party? There’s only one red state in the entire South – the only region where they have any concentration of states is a subset of the Mountain West. Presumably turnout is a force-multiplier, and presumably the South still has a lot of registered Dixiecrats, but that’s still one hell of a bleak map for the GOP.
In the comments to a previous post, I said:
The problem with focusing on the crazies is that their demographic is shrinking. At a certain point, even 100% of the crazies won’t be enough. We may have passed that point already, in fact – I certainly hope so.
It kinda looks like maybe we have. Now if we can just get the Democrats to stop acting like Republicans, we’ll be all set.
(h/t PW)
August 4th, 2009 at 07:16am
Posted by Eli
Entry Filed under:
Politics,
Polls,
Republicans
