Ohio Demographics and Curiosities

[tinfoil_beret]

I crunched some numbers on Ohio last night and found some
curiosities. I took the Ohio adult populations and racial
demographics from the 2000 census.

County Breakdown by Population

Adults          Kerry   Bush
0-24,999        1       20
25,000-49,999   0       28
50,000-99,999   5       15
100,000-149,999 1       6
150,000-499,999 7       2
500,000-999,999 1       1
Over 1,000,000  1       0

Red counties drop off at 100,000 adults. Bush wins only 3 of
ten counties with over 150,000 adults. Large cities don't like
Bush.

Let's see if it has anything to do with the minority
population.

County Breakdown by African-American Population

% Black	        Kerry   Bush
0% to 2.49%     2       52
2.5% to 4.99%   3       9
5% to 7.49%     2       7
7.5% to 9.99%   3       2
10% to 14.99%   1       1
15% to 19.99%   4       0
20% or more     1       1

Red to blue county ratios drop off sharply at over 2.5%
African-American.

Let's see what happens when we bring up all counties with more
than 5% African-American populations OR over 200,000 adults.

(The vote tallies below came from cnn.com. Again, the
demographics come from the 2000 census.)

Blue Counties

County	    Kerry    Bush	% Kerry	% Bush	Adults	%White	%Black
Jefferson   18674    16887	52.5	47.5	 58073	92.5	5.7
Stark	    92295    89859	50.7	49.3	284162	90.3	7.2
Trumbull    65321    40220	61.9	38.1	170296	90.2	7.9
Lorain	    76512    59751	56.2	43.8	210114	85.5	8.5
Erie	    20652    18019	53.4	46.6	 59889	88.6	8.6
Summit	   152897   116184	56.8	43.2	406913	83.5	13.2
Mahoning    81500    47968	62.9	37.1	196406	81.0	15.9
Lucas	   128874    85405	60.1	39.9	335573	77.5	17.0
Franklin   275573   234196	54.1	45.9	800657	75.5	17.9
Montgomery 138262   134716	50.6	49.4	421083	76.6	19.9
Cuyahoga   433262   215624	66.8	33.2   1045988	67.4	27.4

Red Counties:

Butler	    54185   106735	33.7	66.3	246511	91.2	5.7
Marion	    11492    16729	40.7	59.3	 50024	92.1	5.7
Madison	     6080    10931	35.7	64.3	 30287	91.8	6.2
Ross	    13701    16940	44.7	55.3	 55747	91.7	6.2
Pickaway     8388    13864	37.7	62.3	 39940	91.9	6.4
Greene	    29349    46841	38.5	61.5	112527	89.2	6.4
Noble	     2618     3799	40.8	59.2	 10878	92.5	6.7
Clark	    32824    34444	48.8	51.2	108389	88.1	8.9
Richland    24056    36253	39.9	60.1	 96839	88.2	9.4
Allen	    15822    31629	33.3	66.7	 80381	84.9	12.2
Hamilton   190956   215639	47.0	53.0	627129	72.9	23.4

Hello! Hamilton County has over 600K adults, but it's red.
Kerry beat Bush in counties with 150K to 500K adults by a
ratio of 7 to 2. And Hamilton has almost 27% minorities. In
counties with over 10% African Americans Kerry beats Bush to a
pulp. So why did Bush win this county with the odds against
him? Well, the county does have a relatively high ratio of
upper class with almost 13% of households earning $100,000 or
more. Over 70% of the county's 573,612 registered voters made
it to the polls on November 2. Bush beat Gore 54% to 43% in
2000. Dole beat Clinton 50% to 43% in '96. 

You might call this a Republican county, but check this out.
In '92, with Bush Sr. as the incumbent after a miserable first
term, Bush took 48%, Clinton took 37% and Perot grabbed a
whopping 15%. In 2004 Kerry gained 4% over Gore in 2000, with
1% from Bush's 2000 and 2% from other candidates in 2000.
Check it out:

      Votes    Rep.  Dem.    Other   
1992  403,450  48%   37%     15% (Bush/Clinton/Perot)
1996  370,673  50%   43%      7% (Dole/Clinton)
2000  375,571  54%   43%      2% (Bush/Gore)
2004  408,238  53%   47%      0% (Bush/Kerry)

Yeah, right! 33,000 more people didn't come out to wait in the
rain for nothing! It looks a lot like 1992, except we don't
have a third-party candidate hogging a bunch of votes. Where
do you think that Perot's 15% of the county's votes went? I
wonder if I just found another 20,000 (5% x 408,238)
disappearing Kerry votes.

Some of the other counties above look suspect to me, too. I'll
look at them more later.

Correction: I adjusted the number of found votes down to
20,000. 47% (from Kerry 2004) less 37% (from Clinton '92)
equals 10%. 15% (from Perot '92) less 10% equals 5%.

Notice that 53% (from Bush 2004) less 48% (from Bush '92)
equals 5%.

[bj2110]

1. Mondale / Clinton... LOL

If that was intentional, it was a good joke.

I'm not sure if you're on to anything or not. Seems like there's a trend in Hamilton County that the 2004 election continued.

Great work, though. Keep digging.

[tinfoil_beret]

3. Whoops!

That was Dole. Where did I get Mondale? I was looking right at the historical data. We'll call it a brain fart. Thanks for catching my error.

[november3rd]

2. ohio counties

contact buzzflash.

they're running good articles on ohio numbers these days.

looks to me like you are onto something, after all, the turnout is supposed to be higher in 2004.

[tinfoil_beret]

4. Sent. eom

[bemis12]

5. I don't think..

... that a county that voted Democratic in its largest numbers ever, both in real votes and percent, is the best indicator of fraud.

[roseBudd]

6. Hamilton County should be even more African American in 04

due to white flight. Cincinnati is 43% black

[tinfoil_beret]

8. Wow!

If Cincinatti has such a large ratio African Americans, it should have tipped the scales. Does anybody have reports of misallocation of polling machines, ie. unbearably long lines, in Cincinatti? I have no doubts that if everyone in the county who showed up to vote actually voted that it would have gone to Kerry.

That could explain how they prevented Hamilton county from going blue!

[tinfoil_beret]

9. The answer is yes!

Another post here gives the facts: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=84787&mesg_id=84787

[ignatzmouse]

7. Punch Card Fun

Hamilton is ES&S punch card, a system notoriously capable of manipulation. One needs to look at the voter turnout and see if it is comparitively less than other counties the same size. To take it a step further, go to the precinct level to compare the urban turnout against the more wealthy precincts. Then, one would need to check the rate of punch card reads in the various precincts. It would give one a better idea of whether or not the vote had been manipulated.

The non-read rate of punch cards can be over 10% if the person manning the tabulator doesn't pack the stack with enough pressure, sometimes by hand. The weight of the card stock also effects the tabulator's read rate and can even cause the machine to jam if the cards are the wrong weight. Of course, there is also the possibility of direct human intervention in switching in pre-punched card batches before the ballots reach the central counting office.