Maintaining my analysis of the Senate races I bring us to Maryland. On the heals of my thoughts and map about Pennsylvania, my quip regarding the cultural milieu of Pennsylvania could almost be reversed when considering her neighbor to the south. i.e. Maryland is "Alabama" with "Pittsburgh and Philadelphia" in the center! And in truth the eastern shore and the Appalachian panhandle of Maryland are far more conservative than the urban/suburban I-95/1-83 center.
There are other truths about these regions as well. The ethnic/racial/religious diversity of the center is so completely more dynamic than the white/Christian bookmarks of the state. Conversely the economic dynamism of the center also outpaces the downturns in the east and west. In the west the major city is Cumberland, a languishing municipality who's fate is tied to the rail-transportation industry and coal; and in the east it's a mixed bag: seafood struggles; poultry plods on, and tourism hopes for mostly better days.
Yet the truth that matters most is population numbers. If you add up the margin of victory Republican candidate Steele achieved in the nine eastern most counties combined, you get a total +Republican vote of 32,568.
Compare that to the Democrat candidate Cardin's margins of victory in Baltimore City: 75,298; in Montgomery Co. 98,107; or in Prince George's Co. (America's first majority Black county--oh yea, NOT in Mississippi, not in South Carolina, not Louisiana! but MARYLAND) 99,177 votes. The fringes can be as red as they want, but with a heartland whose population amounts to 75-85% of the state's total, they do not have very much influence on the outcome.
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