Obama in Central Florida

Central Florida for Obama
By Alex Barrett

ORLANDO, Fla. – Think the election this year was close? Take another look at the local results.

On Tuesday, Barack Obama made a huge push in Florida, and Orange County gave him a rather large boost as well. In the tight Florida Presidential race, Orange County was a convincing win for Obama.

How convincing? How about 60/40 in support of Obama, beating McCain by well over 100,000 votes and sealing away a democratic victory in one of the highest populated areas of Florida. Winning the populous areas of the states is vital to winning the state itself, especially when 27 electoral votes are on the line.

The rest of the state was divided almost evenly, with Obama or McCain leading by only a few percent, with the exception of our backyard. If you were to glance at the map of Florida last night, you would have noticed a lot of GOP red splattered across the map, but it was the blue areas that sealed the deal for Obama. Areas such as Orlando, including Orange, Osceola, and Volusia counties, and other main city areas such as Tallahassee, Miami, and Tampa posted huge disparity between the parties, all leaning towards Obama.

In other states, it seems the same can be said; New York, for example, looks like it has the chicken pox with all of it’s red blotches, but it was an Obama state when it was all said and done simply because the major metropolitan areas were so swung to the democratic side, it completely nullified the GOP controlled outskirts.

These statistics can also be used when you look at states such as New Mexico, Ohio, and Iowa, all of which, coincidently, voted strongly for Bush in the past few elections. They are among the states that swung from the GOP over to the democratic side, presumably seeking that ever-awaited change that Obama has used to fuel his campaign. Only time will tell if their swing was in the right direction.