Posted on 06/21/2009 1:04:32 AM PDT by Leisler
A new nationwide study released by the nonpartisan Bay Area Center for Voting Research (BACVR) ranks the political leanings of every American city and finds that Detroit, Michigan is the most liberal and Provo, Utah the most conservative.
In all, the BACVR researchers examined voting patterns of 237 American cities with populations of over 100,000 and ranked them each on liberal and conservative scales.
The list of Americas most liberal cities is dominated by cities with large African American populations that are concentrated in the Northeast, Midwest and California.
Conversely, the study found that the staunchest conservative cities are clustered in the South and interior West and have extremely low numbers of African American residents.
Detroit, MI, and Provo, UT, epitomize Americas political, economic and racial polarization, says Peter Thai, a BACVR researcher. As the most conservative city in America, Provo is overwhelmingly white and solidly middle class. This is in stark contrast to Detroit, which is impoverished, black and the most liberal.
Gary, Indiana, a rust belt former steel town, comes in as Americas second most liberal city, followed by Berkeley, California, which ranks third. Washington, D.C. comes in as the fourth most liberal and Oakland, California comes in fifth.
On the list of the nations most conservative cities, Texas cements its reputation as Americas most rock-ribbed state, having three cities in the top five. Lubbock and Abilene, Texas rank as the second and third most conservative cities, respectively, followed by Hialeah, Florida in fourth place and Plano, Texas in fifth.
BACVR researchers found a direct correlation between a citys political ideology and its racial makeup. The great political divide in America today is not red vs. blue, north vs. south, costal vs. interior or even rich vs. poor it is now clearly black vs. white, says Phil Reiff, a BACVR director.
While there are a few liberal cities without large African American populations, these wind up being the exceptions. College towns like Berkeley and Cambridge have modest black populations but remain bastions of upper middle-class, white, intellectual liberalism. These liberal white communities, however, are more reminiscent of penguins clustering together around a shrinking iceberg than of a vibrant and growing political movement, Reiff says.
The Bay Area Center for Voting Research is a nonpartisan think tank based in Berkeley, California. A full copy of the report and the complete list of rankings for all 237 cities are available at http://www.votingresearch.org
http://www.votingresearch.org. Americas 25 Most Liberal Cities (in descending order)
Rank City State
1 Detroit Michigan
2 Gary Indiana
3 Berkeley California
4 Washington, D.C. Dist. of Columbia
5 Oakland California
6 Inglewood California
7 Newark New Jersey
8 Cambridge Massachusetts
9 San Francisco California
10 Flint Michigan
11 Cleveland Ohio
12 Hartford Connecticut
13 Paterson New Jersey
14 Baltimore Maryland
15 New Haven Connecticut
16 Seattle Washington
17 Chicago Illinois
18 Philadelphia Pennsylvania
19 Birmingham Alabama
20 St. Louis Missouri
21 New York New York
22 Providence Rhode Island
23 Minneapolis Minnesota
24 Boston Massachusetts
25 Buffalo New York
Americas 25 Most Conservative Cities(in descending order)
Rank City State
1 Provo Utah
2 Lubbock Texas
3 Abilene Texas
4 Hialeah Florida
5 Plano Texas
6 Colorado Springs Colorado
7 Gilbert Arizona
8 Bakersfield California
9 Lafayette Louisiana
10 Orange California
11 Escondido California
12 Allentown Pennsylvania
13 Mesa Arizona
14 Arlington Texas
15 Peoria Arizona
16 Cape Coral Florida
17 Garden Grove California
18 Simi Valley California
19 Corona California
20 Clearwater Florida
21 West Valley City Utah
22 Oklahoma City Oklahoma
23 Overland Park Kansas
24 Anchorage Alaska
25 Huntington Beach California
Don’tchyaloveit?
They assume the voting trend indicates racial discrimination.
Does anyone consider that once blacks move in and start voting democrat LIKE THEY GENERALLY DO (with rare exception)then the voting trend of that city changed even though the other residents still vote the same way?
And when liberals start winning elected positions and start screwing everything up, LIKE THEY ALWAYS DO, the conservative voters start looking elsewhere?
So sure - there may be a racial aspect here - but not exactly they way they’re thinking.
I love Seattle, but we really need someone like Gulliani to come in here and clean it up.
Nice to see Colorado Springs high on the conservative list. That’s one of our possible retirement destinations.
“With all the phantom employees and voters in Camden, I’m sure it is well over 100,000.”
LOL You’ve got that right!!
“concentrated parasite nests”
CPN bump. Great choice of words.
“decaying bastion of liberalism”
Another great phrase... bump. DBL.
Color me disappointed. I live in Arlington, TX and we are only #14 on the list, have to do better than that.
Sorry I didn’t reply. I had to go to work at 5 am to do shutdown type plumbing and electrical work at a bar, before it opened at 11 a.m. so that the state and feds can take half of everything I make, deflate my life earning through printing money by another half, and put me on a conservative, gun owning, political active, Tea Party street demonstration, Constitution quoting terrorist list.
Also, I couldn't help but notice that the top, liberal city is one that liberals want to bulldoze.
We like San Diego. I don’t know where the city ranks, we’re in Oceanside. The county in general has a lot of retired and active duty military. At least, keeps us from going to far left. Then there’s the ocean.
Hoboken is now filled with wealthy Yuppies, while Jersey City has condos on the waterfront that cost over a million. The Heights and Journal Square are rather dumpy, but nowhere near as bad as Greenville or most of Newark.
San Diego city and San Diego County voted for Obama. Dominated by smug a-sholes, despite the military presence.
You aren’t suggesting that Detroit is mismanaged, are you ?
There is a ‘critical mass’ of welfare recipients in any city .. beyond which the middle class is taxed to death to support, and just leave. Whatever conservatives/traditionalists/middle class that once lived in Detroit bolted decades ago. Same with all the other top liberal cities (except the college towns). We have become more segregated rather than less since the ‘60’s
“Interesting California had the most, “Most Liberal” (4) 3 north, 1 south
And California had the most “Most Conservative (7) all south
Break up California in to Northern and Southern and the Southern part has a chance “
We’re trying! That is misleading. The Northern end (above San Fran) of the State is staunchly conservative, but sparsely populated. LA should have been on the most liberal list.
http://www.jeffersonstate.com/
I guess you don’t live here. Judging San Diego to be liberal by the vote belies the day-to-day evidence. Here’s a tip, if you think San Diego is a liberal place, stay away. We’re almost full from all those liberal retired military who come here and decide to stay.
Common characteristics of "liberal cities":
1. High crime
2. High taxes
3. High unemployment
4. High welfare participation
5. Extensive corruption
6. Rotten public schools
7. Population loss and abandoned areas
Common characteristics of "conservative cities":
1. Relatively low crime rates
2. Relatively low taxes
3. Relatively high employment
4. Relatively low welfare participation
5. Only moderate corruption
6. Functional public schools
7. Economic health and population growth.
Now, based on simple observation, how could one possibly contend that liberalism improves the state of the governed? It has failed everywhere it's been tried...
It’s kind of ironic that those die-hard Dems in the Lehigh Valley are exactly the folks Obama was dissing to the San Francisco crowd. The Dems I know in Allentown are big on keeping their guns, clinging to their God and religion. But you can bet your bottom dollar they voted for BHO.
they probably know almost jack about the issues ....they just vote Dem and have since FDR bagged em
they are still waiting on that 40 acres and a mule the radical Republicans promised them and toss in a litle hatred for crackers and you got a nice political cake
many of these Southern cities on this list were very conservative (but not GOP) before blacks moved in from rural areas en masse and whites fled to suburbs
now it's black Democrat cities surrounded by white GOP suburbs in every southern city I know of of size....only exceptions are the 2 or 3 with relatively low black populations like Nashville (25% black)(60% Dem) but the whites in Nashville proper are majority Democrat....huge northern migration here last 25 years and not the good ones...the good ones came to the suburbs not so much city proper
which I left recently btw...now in Williamson county....70% GOP...mo better
they probably know almost jack about the issues ....they just vote Dem and have since FDR bagged em
they are still waiting on that 40 acres and a mule the radical Republicans promised them and toss in a litle hatred for crackers and you got a nice political cake
many of these Southern cities on this list were very conservative (but not GOP) before blacks moved in from rural areas en masse and whites fled to suburbs
now it's black Democrat cities surrounded by white GOP suburbs in every southern city I know of of size....only exceptions are the 2 or 3 with relatively low black populations like Nashville (25% black)(60% Dem) but the whites in Nashville proper are majority Democrat....huge northern migration here last 25 years and not the good ones...the good ones came to the suburbs not so much city proper
which I left recently btw...now in Williamson county....70% GOP...mo better
they probably know almost jack about the issues ....they just vote Dem and have since FDR bagged em
they are still waiting on that 40 acres and a mule the radical Republicans promised them and toss in a litle hatred for crackers and you got a nice political cake
many of these Southern cities on this list were very conservative (but not GOP) before blacks moved in from rural areas en masse and whites fled to suburbs
now it's black Democrat cities surrounded by white GOP suburbs in every southern city I know of of size....only exceptions are the 2 or 3 with relatively low black populations like Nashville (25% black)(60% Dem) but the whites in Nashville proper are majority Democrat....huge northern migration here last 25 years and not the good ones...the good ones came to the suburbs not so much city proper
which I left recently btw...now in Williamson county....70% GOP...mo better
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