Whenever a Democrat wins a close statewide race in Oregon, we hear Republicans grumbling that those damn liberal elitists in Portland and Multnomah County gave the election to him. Sometimes, if they’re in a really bad mood, they’ll say they “stole” the election for him.
But Evan Manvel, writing on Blue Oregon, makes an important point: Without votes from all over the state, John Kitzhaber wouldn’t have won.
Kitzhaber’s final margin over Republican Chris Dudley was less than 20,000 votes. “Kitzhaber wouldn’t be headed to Mahonia Hall if not for the 19,000-plus voters in Douglas and Klamath counties who supported him, even as those counties went for Dudley overall,” Manvel writes.
Likewise, although Dudley easily carried Deschutes County, Kitzhaber picked up more than 24,000 votes here – more than enough to put him over the top.
Manvel continues: “In the newspaper, we’ve seen graphics that portray the state in bright red and blue counties, with no gradations of purple. … While these all hold an element of truth, they hide a greater truth: In every county in Oregon, there are people of all persuasions. There are a whole lot of rural Democrats, and a bunch of urban Republicans, and a horde of independents.”
There are logical reasons why we tend to think in terms of red-vs.-blue, urban-vs.-rural, eastside-vs.-westside, Manvel says – one of the big ones being our two-party, winner-take-all election system, which tends to obscure the subtle shades of difference and sharpen the contrasts.
“Yet there are compelling reasons to shift how we report and think about the results,” Manvel writes. “When we’re reminded of our similarities, we’re more likely to succeed in working together. When we think of those who disagree with us as our neighbors instead of far-away strangers, we can have conversations we might not otherwise have.”
This article appears in Nov 4-10, 2010.
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Shades of grey is what life all comes down to. Unless you are a religious zealot, we all understand this and conduct ourselves somewhere in our favorite shade.
Our political system however has become one about left vs. right not a good plan vs. a better plan. Little room for grey leaves us all stuck in the shadows if closed minded ignorance.
It is a valid point to say that “In every county in Oregon, there are people of all persuasions.” But, to assume that all counties break relatively evenly because of that reality is a non-sequitur.
Most counties – with a few exceptions – were within a 60-40 split one way or the other. But in Multnomah County, the split was an astounding 70.5 to 27.3 – the largest such difference in a true population center in the state. In addition, there were a total of 1,382,177 votes cast for governor. Voters in Multnomah County cast a total of 274,092 of those votes – or nearly 20 percent (19.8% to be exact). The final split statewide: 48% for Dudley, 49% for Kitzhaber.
Now, take ANY single county (other than Multnomah) out of the mix and the percentages don’t change that much. Maybe Dudley wins that way, maybe Kitzhaber still wins. Either way, it’s still close. But, if you take Multnomah County out, it changes the election DRASTICALLY in Dudley’s favor. Remove Multnomah County and Dudley wins going away, 54.4% to 45.6%. Or, let's not take ANY county out and simply split the vote more like other counties. Let's say Kitzhaber wins Multnomah County 60-40. Even in THAT scenario, Dudley wins the overall race 51.7% to 48.6%.
Now, the fact of the matter is that the vote of EVERY Oregonian counts equally and Kitzhaber won fair and square. No gripes here. And it’s true that Governor-elect Kitzhaber needed every vote that was cast his way. But to suggest that Multnomah County isn’t where he won the election is ludicrous. It is the most heavily populated county in the state. And, with the exception of a few sparsely populate rural counties, it is the county with least political diversity. Like it or not, elections are decided there more than anywhere else in the state.
An incredible amount of truth to this article. If the MEDIA didn’t feed into the “you against us” talk and helped by broadening their reporting, just maybe, we wouldn’t have so much divisiveness.
same old bullcrap
There is little difference between these two candidates…both are statists beholding to the public employee unions. Until the incestuous relationship between elected officials and public employee unions is destroyed, government will continue to bleed the taxpayers to death while over-compensating and over-benefitting Oregon’s privileged aristocratic class…the bureaucracy.
Collaborators like Governor-elect Taxhaber, having been bought and paid for by public employee unions, will seek new revenue sources to to feed the unsustainable public employee burden. Oregon’s citizens will face an ever-increasing tax burden, fee burden and regulatory burden, driving out and driving away entrepreneurs, businesses and jobs until the inevitable collapse. When and if the National economy recovers from analogous Federal problems, Oregon will have chosen not to participate.
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It is time for the state of Jefferson….
Please. If Deschutes county votes were tossed Kitzhaber would have won by more! Multnomah county drives the entire state. Did you see the stats on the marijuana ballot measure? Every county in Oregon voted against it but Multnomah voted for it 57% to 40%. It took an overwhelming majority in every other county to offset Multnomah. It just did not happen for the Governors race.
Remember elections are based on people not land mass. The majority of the land might be more conservative, but the land is just that, land. If you want a population center that is more conservative there is always Idaho. There the population of the rural VS urban are reversed.
When this country formed the fear was that the most populace states would overshadow the smaller states and those Agrarian States having smaller populations so the Electoral college was instituted to even the states on electing the pres. We see how the lack of such a mechanism allows a few counties to control the politics of the state. California suffers the same problem. The solution for Oregon would be to institute a Electoral College for positions that represent the voters State wide, i.e. the Governor, AG, Treasurer, Sec of State etc, to assume office they would have to win the majority of the counties. The problem with the present system is the very different needs, concerns and issues of the Rural vs the City populace. A candidate for Statewide office has only to campaign in those areas having the greatest population. Redistricting has seen that certain areas control the political landscape of Oregon with the ultimate result of leaving Rural areas out of the process. So we have a Gov that carried 7 counties and an out going gov that I believe carried 3 or 4. These high population areas are overwhelmingly Liberal giving their agendas the lead in State gov while the more conservative areas of the State get the scraps. Equal protection under the law and equal representation do not exist under the present situation.
Ballot hoarding in Multnomah County is an atrocity. While the rest of us vote and make our voices heard in Oregon (usually a 60-40 split), the shady characters running the Multnomah County elections hold ballots to determine how many “questionable” ballots they need to accept to sway the election (Multnomah County is the last county to report 100% of its precincts). No doubt, Kitzhaber was elected by a one-sided Multnomah County election result; but 70/30 split violates the statistics. Its a sham and an embarrassment to Oregonians.