If You Were A Teabagger Mommy And Daddy, Where Might You Look For A Domicile To Bring Up The Little Monsters?

The Southern Poverty Law Center could probably give us an empirical idea about what parts of the country have the worst actual KKK infestations. I had an idea the other day though to look at the last 3 presidential elections and see which congressional districts gave less support to Barack Obama's winning campaign than they did to the two less successful campaigns of Al Gore and John Kerry. What I'm wasn't looking for was who won which district. What I was looking for was how Obama did in each district compared to how Gore and Kerry did. And specifically, what I was looking for-- regardless of whether Obama won or lost the district-- where he did worse than Gore and Kerry.

As you can probably intuit, Obama's share of the district by district vote totals were dramatically better than Gore's and Kerry's. Example: Gore took 28% of the Alaska vote in 2000 and Kerry took 36% in 2004. Obama did better than both by winning 38%. Regardless of whether it's a red district or a blue district, Obama did better than Gore and better than Kerry in every single one of California's 53 congressional districts, better than either in every one of Colorado's 7 districts and better than either in all 5 Connecticut districts.

Obama's worst overall performance in California-- where he won 61% of the statewide total-- was in the "Oakie" part of California around Bakersfield, where reactionary imbecile Kevin McCarthy represents a district that appears to have been gerrymandered to exclude as many non-whites as possible. (California is 46.7% white and the 22nd CD is almost 67% white.) Obama only managed to win 38% of the vote-- still considerably better than either Kerry (31%) or Gore (33%). Obama's best California performance was in the Oakland/Berkeley district, the 9th CD, represented by Barbara Lee, where he won 88% of the vote, up from the already lopsidedly high margins racked up by Kerry (86%) and Gore (79%).

So where did Obama do worse than both Kerry and Gore? Very few districts-- 30 of the 435 districts. And what do they have in common? Well, there's no way to get around it: racism. Northern Alabama's 4th CD is over 90% white almost three-quarters rural, and the biggest "city," Gadsden, has 37,000 people. The district is poor, ill-educated, and backward in every way there is to measure backwardness. Alabama wasn't exactly Obama country; he only took 39% of the vote. But he only got 23% in the 4th CD-- less than Kerry's 28% and less than Gore's 37%. You want to bet how many parents kept their kiddies home from school last Tuesday? You want to bet how many households will claim Fox News and Hate Talk Radio as their primary-- or only-- source of news? And the 5th, squeezed between the 4th and Tennessee, is in the same boat: fewer votes for Obama than either Gore or Kerry. Arkansas, trending redder and redder, at least nationally, for a couple decades, is the only state where every district reduced it's percentage for Obama from what Gore and Kerry won. Three of those four districts have Democratic congressmen. Oddly, the only Arizona district where Obama fell down, the first, is also represented by a conservative Democrat, Ann Kirkpatrick (most observers' likeliest guess to be a one-term congressmember). He won 44% there, down from 46% that voters gave Kerry and Gore.

Always keepin' it classy over on the far right

Another Blue Dog district, this one in Florida's panhandle (FL-2) saw a decrease from 2000 and 2004. Obama increased his share of the vote or-- in one case-- held his own in the rest of Florida except for two progressive South Florida districts where Democrats always do well. He did well too, winning 65% in FL-19, Robert Wexler's district, and 63% in FL-20, Debbie Wasserman Schultz' district. But both Kerry and Gore did better. There was a certain tinge of mistrust among the elderly Jews between West Palm and Miami Beach. The story was very similar in Anthony Weiner's Brooklyn/Queens district (NY-09) where Obama won with 55% as opposed to Kerry's 56% and Gore's 67%. The Republican poison had worked... at least enough to throw 3 of the most liberal districts in the country into a rarefied category of districts where racism came into play. The rest of the list (with Obama's total followed by Kerry's and Gore's):

KY-05- 31%-- 39%-- 42%
LA-01- 26%-- 28%-- 31%
LA-02- 74%-- 75%-- 76%
LA-03- 37%-- 41%-- 45%
LA-07- 35%-- 39%-- 42% (home of Lord Boustany)
MA-04- 64%-- 65%-- 65%
OK-02- 34%-- 41%-- 47%
OK-03- 27%-- 28%-- 34%
PA-04- 44%-- 45%-- 46%
PA-12- 49%-- 51%-- 55%
PA-18- 44%-- 46%-- 47%
TN-01- 29%-- 31%-- 38%
TN-02- 34%-- 35%-- 39%
TN-03- 37%-- 38%-- 41%
TN-04- 34%-- 41%-- 49%
TN-06- 37%-- 40%-- 49%
TN-08- 43%-- 47%-- 51%
TX-08- 26%-- 28%-- 31%
WV-03- 42%-- 46%-- 51%

Remember, Obama did miserably in both Idaho districts and all three Utah districts, but he still beat what both Kerry and Gore did. These 30 districts where he did worse... bad trends for people bringing up kids who don't want them turning into ignorant, hateful teabaggers one day. I'd move.

Meanwhile, deranged right wing terrorist Buford Furrow, who's serving life in prison for murdering a Filipino postal worker and wounding 5 children during a shooting rampage at a Jewish community center in L.A. sent a letter to the L.A. Daily News that all teabaggers and Republicans should read carefully lest their excesses land them in the same state as Furrow. As Glenn Greenwald pointed out at Salon today, the conservative movement didn't just get hijacked in the last few months or even years. They've been building towards this again for decades.

“Hello, I am a sorry we couldn’t speak during your earlier interview request. Today, I received the paper work of the denial of that request. I have filed an administrative remedy in response to this unconstitutional refusal to your visit.

I did want to speak to you for the simple reason that I feel deep remorse for my crime. About five years ago, I threw away my racist books, literature, etc. and took up a new leaf. I now publicly renounce all bias toward anyone based on race, creed, color, sexual orientation, etc. and I am a much happier person. I feel a life based on hate is no life at all.

Those people I hurt, and the man I killed that day in 1999 will probably never forgive me, but I am truly sorry and deeply regret the pain I caused. My mind was filled with sickness, and unfortunately I acted on it. But I am now a “model” inmate who has renounced criminal activity and spend my day with exercise, art, and learning prison civil law. I can’t change the past, but I can damn sure change the future, and my future will never include Neo-Nazi activity again. That is all I can do.”