Back to blue

For the first time in 44 years, Indiana has gone blue in a presidential election.

President-elect Barack Obama claimed the state’s popular vote Tuesday with 50 percent versus McCain’s 49 percent, according to CNN.com, giving Obama a lead by only 26,163 votes. The official call was not made until about 2 a.m.

The re-election of Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels coinciding with the swing toward Obama has transformed Indiana into, overall, a bipartisan state.

This election marks the first time the state’s electoral votes have gone to a Democrat since the election of President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964.

“There’s nothing wrong with splitting a ticket,” said senior lecturer of political science Christine Barbour. “People do it all the time. Mitch Daniels is a moderately conservative person, so it’s not a big jump. I could imagine someone supporting a Mitch Daniels and a Barack Obama. It doesn’t require any mental gymnastics to do that, so the puzzle isn’t as puzzling as it seems.”

However, some members of the community feel differently.

“I was surprised,” said sophomore and Republican supporter Amy Stansfield. “I definitely think the youth vote had a lot to do with it. I give the Campaign for Change on the Bloomington campus a lot of credit because they did a good job getting voters registered.”

Obama’s victory might have stemmed from his activity throughout Indiana during his campaign.

“Obama had a superior ground game,” Barbour said. “He organized the heck out of this state, and McCain didn’t see it coming until it was way too late. He didn’t have anything on the ground to compare to what Obama had ... I think it made a huge difference.”

IU College Democrats President Anna Strand was a part of that ground game. The student democrats registered more than 11,000 people to vote and spread the word about the Obama campaign.

“I think there’s an absolute immense amount of pride,” Strand said. “I am the happiest person in the world.”

Department of Political Science Professor Gerald Wright said the election’s outcome does not represent a fundamental shift in the Hoosier state.

“Indiana hasn’t changed,” Wright said. “Ohio hasn’t changed. What happened is that Obama just ran an extraordinarily good campaign in a year that was very good for Democrats.”

Barbour said it also might have originated from the changes in the populous throughout Indiana – citing the growth in the Hispanic population in the state.

“The demographics of Indiana are changing,” Barbour said. “Different groups clearly voted for Obama in different proportions. As the demographics change, so does the voter preferences.”

However, Democrats should not get their hopes up, Barbour said. She said she feels it is a combination of several factors, including the proximity to Illinois – the state Obama represents in the U.S. Senate – and his campaigning throughout Indiana. For instance, she said she believes Hillary Clinton might not have been able to win Indiana if she was the Democratic candidate.

“I think it’s too soon to tell,” Barbour said. “I don’t think any Democrat would have been able to take this state. It was a peculiar combination of circumstances. We haven’t gone radically blue. We’re purple.”

The map of the counties and precincts which went red or blue in the majority support Barbour’s belief.

“There are vastly more red counties than blue – it’s just the blue ones are more densely populated,” Barbour said. “Much of the state is the same as it was the day before yesterday.”

Chelsea Kane, chairwoman of the IU College Republicans, said she believes it is doubtful much will change in Indiana in the coming years.

“This is not going to turn our state,” Kane said. “It really depends on what happens when Obama is president. We, as Hoosiers, might need to re-evaluate our idea of Democrats, but I don’t really think that will happen.”

-Indiana Daily Student reporter Zina Kumok contributed to this report.