Upstate New York is very staunchly Conservative (albeit in a Northern way, which means it's not necessarily a strongly religiously influenced Conservatism). The challenge is to make Upstate New York politically moderate. Bonus points if you can somehow make it Liberal.
AHC: Moderate Upstate New York
- Thread starter Emperor Norton I
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Japhy
Banned
To expand on this a few years ago the GOP almost got wiped out in Upstate New York as far as congressional districts go. Yes Anti-Cuomo sentiment is high up here but in no way is the region a bastion of the right wing. US Senator Gillibrand was elected up here in a Gerrymandered-to-hell for the GOP district, Bill Owens a few years ago won the North Country which had uninterruptedly sent a Republican to Congress since the formation of the party a few years ago because of a revulsion to the Tea Party. Paladino won all of his counties upstate yes, but even then he barely won anything, the Democrats carrying everything except some space-filling counties and the Westernmost part of the state where he had his base. Nan Hayworth got voted out in a landslide, Chris Gibson is the most liberal Republican in Congress, The rest of the GOP delegation isn't that radical upstate, in contrast to Long Islander Pete King. And of course most Congressmen upstate are Democrats.
If you're going to start talking about the State Assembly and Legislature though you're going dramatically the wrong way if you think its tied into National Politics and not a combination of machine discussions, regional needs, and the oft-forgotten fact that All Politics are Local. Joe Bruno, the big recent "boss" of Upstate Republicans was a liberal by a hell of a lot of standards, the reason he and people like him held on for years is because the State Colleges were brought up here, the redevelopment money was brought up here, and because the parks were preserved, the roads were paved, and the pork was passed around somewhere besides Southern Manhattan.
Pretty much besides pretty common opposition to the SAFE Act, the region by and large across the whole thing, is nothing but moderate and in play.
If you're going to start talking about the State Assembly and Legislature though you're going dramatically the wrong way if you think its tied into National Politics and not a combination of machine discussions, regional needs, and the oft-forgotten fact that All Politics are Local. Joe Bruno, the big recent "boss" of Upstate Republicans was a liberal by a hell of a lot of standards, the reason he and people like him held on for years is because the State Colleges were brought up here, the redevelopment money was brought up here, and because the parks were preserved, the roads were paved, and the pork was passed around somewhere besides Southern Manhattan.
Pretty much besides pretty common opposition to the SAFE Act, the region by and large across the whole thing, is nothing but moderate and in play.
Well, I live in Upstate NY. That's tough. The problem is to change this area you have to change NYC. We're 'bi-polar' opposites
If the state wasn't so NYC-centric and the economy more balanced its possible.
It's not immigrants. My city(Utica)has had a refugee center since the seventies and we get everyone from Senegalese to Cambodians. Central NY got a huge wave of Russian and Central European people. A lot of them stay here, we try to be business-friendly.
The Mafia used to control a lot from the thirties to the sixties, nothing new there. Now its drugs because Upstate NY is halfway to anywhere, i.e, Toronto- NYC, Ohio-Massachusetts...we don't talk a lot about Pennsylvania and Jersey is right out.
The SAFE act has kicked a lot of people over to the right and the Common Core school changes are a fiasco up here.
So how do we NOT be so conservative.....
Upstate/Adirondack was a haven for the rich-you need to get Greenwich Village/Bohemian culture to take root up here more dramatically.
That's all I can come up with.
If the state wasn't so NYC-centric and the economy more balanced its possible.
It's not immigrants. My city(Utica)has had a refugee center since the seventies and we get everyone from Senegalese to Cambodians. Central NY got a huge wave of Russian and Central European people. A lot of them stay here, we try to be business-friendly.
The Mafia used to control a lot from the thirties to the sixties, nothing new there. Now its drugs because Upstate NY is halfway to anywhere, i.e, Toronto- NYC, Ohio-Massachusetts...we don't talk a lot about Pennsylvania and Jersey is right out
.The SAFE act has kicked a lot of people over to the right and the Common Core school changes are a fiasco up here.
So how do we NOT be so conservative.....
Upstate/Adirondack was a haven for the rich-you need to get Greenwich Village/Bohemian culture to take root up here more dramatically.
That's all I can come up with.
New York minus the 5 boroughs and Long Island still voted for Kerry and Obama twice. It's pretty moderate, by American standards. Settled by New Englanders and all.
What in the world are you talking about? Obama carried upstate New York twice. Even John Kerry carried it (very narrowly) in 2004 (" Senator Kerry still managed a slim victory in Upstate New York, with 1,553,246 votes to 1,551,971 for Bush." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election_in_New_York,_2004)
Gore carried it a bit more comfortably in 2000: "Excluding New York City's votes, Gore still would have carried New York State, but by a smaller margin, receiving 2,404,543 votes to Bush's 2,004,648, giving Gore a 54.53% - 45.47% win." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election_in_New_York,_2000 (OK, that includes Suffolk, Nassau, Westchester, and Rockland--but when you subtract them, you still get a narrow Gore victory--and that, remember, is with Nader taking some votes away from Gore. http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/datagraph.php?fips=36&year=2000&off=0&elect=0&f=0)
If Upstate New York were a state, it would be in conventional terms purple to slightly blue (or red in David Leip's maps which use red for Democrats and blue for Republicans) at least in presidential elections. No doubt many of the smaller counties are heavily Republican, but they are usually outweighed by counties like Albany (Obama 64.5, Romney 33.2), Erie (Obama 57.3, Romney 41.0), Monroe (Obama 58.0, Romney 40.0), Onondaga (Obama 59.7, Romney 38.5), Rensselaer (Obama 55.0, Romney 42.8), Schenectady (Obama 56.7, Romney 40.9), etc. http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/datagraph.php?fips=36&year=2012&off=0&elect=0&f=1
No doubt some Democrats in Upstate New York who vote for Gore and Kerry and Obama are less liberal than they are, especially on social issues. But that is true in part of New York City as well! And in operational terms, an area that has gone Democratic in the past few presidential elections--however narrowly in some of them--cannot be called conservative, let alone "very staunchly Conservative." In fact, it is striking how areas like Monroe County (Rochester) and Onondaga County (Syracuse) which as late as 1988 voted for George H. W. Bush http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/datagraph.php?fips=36&year=1988&off=0&elect=0&f=1 have become heavily Democratic, at least in presidential elections.
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Herm, I should have specified the scenario. One, I was referring to the Western region. I tend to ignore the other as I suspect it's overrun by wasteland raiders. Two, my concern was primarily the sea of red that does surround the metropolitan areas of Buffalo and Rochester; counties which are rather red.
Peter Parker
Banned
Have the US annex Canada, so maybe some liberal stuff will pour down
It would be hard for upstate conservatives, being between New York City and Canada
It would be hard for upstate conservatives, being between New York City and Canada
Japhy
Banned
Well, I live in Upstate NY. That's tough. The problem is to change this area you have to change NYC. We're 'bi-polar' opposites
I also live in Upstate New York and I'm not sure what you're talking about. Its not like the state hasn't poured a ton of money into upstate helping turn things around.
Maybe he just means "conservative compared to New York city". Though, it's kind of difficult to think of a way for the less densely populated upstate area to become more left-wing than a major city. Maybe a POD in the nineteenth century could give America a strong, permanent agrarian socialist movement or something? I don't know.
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Hunh? Echoing the other Upstaters on the board.
RURAL Upstate is conservative, sure, but Syracuse and Rochester sure arent.
That's my interest, which I should have outlined better (and worded better; I was sleepy and the thread may be dead in the water as a result); those counties that are Conservative are rather Conservative, and those people that are Conservative in those areas are rather Conservative from personal experience, and I never figured out how to get across to them politically and would have no idea how to convert anyone politically. Liberalism does exist in the urban areas. But my point is to get those Red counties to go moderate. My generalization was in terms of area coverage and not population (bearing in mind I also meant to refer to Western New York). Again, the wording and attempt to convey that was all fudged up, though.
Get it heavily settled by Scandinavians/'48ers or hippies way back in the day, make it an area of labor unrest? Probably doesn't work well outside of picturesque mountain and coal mining regions though, the former could just turn it into ND. Rural NY still isn't terribly conservative compared to rural-rest-of-the-country.
VT was always progressive Republican Yankeeville and its left-leaningness was regenerated by Californication of a sorts, but VT and upstate NY have different topographies mostly. And different economies and institutions...
VT was always progressive Republican Yankeeville and its left-leaningness was regenerated by Californication of a sorts, but VT and upstate NY have different topographies mostly. And different economies and institutions...
Liberal or conservative are relative terms
If you think President Obama is a conservative then upstate is conservative.
If you think President Obama is a conservative then upstate is conservative.
If you look at a map of New York state's congressional districts http://cdn.moelane.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Final-New-York-Special-Master-Map.jpg there is exactly *one* congressional district in upstate New York which (within its current boundaries) went decisively against Obama in both 2008 and 2012--the 27th. The 22nd went very narrowly for both McCain and Romney. The 23rd went narrowly for Obama in 2008 and narrowly against him in 2012. The 24th, 25th, and 26th districts all went decisively for Obama twice due to Democratic strength in Syracuse, Rochester, and Buffalo (and some of their close-in suburbs) respectively. So even western New York is hardly a GOP stronghold. (See http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/...trict-for-the-2012-2008-elections?detail=hide for the presidential results by congressional district.)
The 27th congressional district can be considered somewhat Republican. It went 54-44 for McCain in 2008 and 55.3-42.9 for Romney in 2012. Even those however are respectable figures for a Democrat in an overwhelmingly white rural and outer-suburban district. (If the Democrats got percentages like that of the non-urban white vote across America, the GOP could go out of business!) And in any event, being Republican-leaning is hardly the same as being "very staunchly Conservative": Chris Coillins, the Representative from the 27th, is a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership, considered a centrist-to-moderate-conservative group. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Main_Street_Partnership Tom Reed of the 23rd, the other GOP congressman from western New York is also a member. (So are the other two GOP Congressmen from upstate New York, Chris Gibson and Richard Hanna.)
So my answer is that not just upstate New York but western New York *is* already politically moderate. True, outside metropolitan areas it is Republican-leaning--what would one expect, given its demographic characteristics?--but it supports a relatively moderate brand of Republicanism. And it is sort of unrealistic to expect, say, Wyoming County or Allegany County to support Democrats--they resemble rural counties in Ohio more than they do New York City (and are geographically closer to Ohio as well). But they are not typical even of western New York, let alone Upstate as a whole. (To confine oneself to areas west of Syracuse: Not only did Obama easily carry Erie and Monroe Counties twice, he also narrowly carried Niagara County twice, came very close in both Ontario and Yates Counties, etc.)
Trivia note: according to *CQ's Politics in America 2002*, in 1996 Bill Clinton carried *every* congressional district in New York state. He even carried the 27th (which was even more Republican then than it is today, because it did not include Niagara County) by 44.3-44.2...
The 27th congressional district can be considered somewhat Republican. It went 54-44 for McCain in 2008 and 55.3-42.9 for Romney in 2012. Even those however are respectable figures for a Democrat in an overwhelmingly white rural and outer-suburban district. (If the Democrats got percentages like that of the non-urban white vote across America, the GOP could go out of business!) And in any event, being Republican-leaning is hardly the same as being "very staunchly Conservative": Chris Coillins, the Representative from the 27th, is a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership, considered a centrist-to-moderate-conservative group. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Main_Street_Partnership Tom Reed of the 23rd, the other GOP congressman from western New York is also a member. (So are the other two GOP Congressmen from upstate New York, Chris Gibson and Richard Hanna.)
So my answer is that not just upstate New York but western New York *is* already politically moderate. True, outside metropolitan areas it is Republican-leaning--what would one expect, given its demographic characteristics?--but it supports a relatively moderate brand of Republicanism. And it is sort of unrealistic to expect, say, Wyoming County or Allegany County to support Democrats--they resemble rural counties in Ohio more than they do New York City (and are geographically closer to Ohio as well). But they are not typical even of western New York, let alone Upstate as a whole. (To confine oneself to areas west of Syracuse: Not only did Obama easily carry Erie and Monroe Counties twice, he also narrowly carried Niagara County twice, came very close in both Ontario and Yates Counties, etc.)
Trivia note: according to *CQ's Politics in America 2002*, in 1996 Bill Clinton carried *every* congressional district in New York state. He even carried the 27th (which was even more Republican then than it is today, because it did not include Niagara County) by 44.3-44.2...