2012 Presidential Election Results, Eight Shades of Purple

The idea of presenting election results as neither solely red nor solely blue, but rather as shades of purple has been previously demonstrated by Mark Newman. This map  uses this technique to illustrate election results for eight counties within Greater KC.

The redder the purple the larger the margin of Romney’s victory in that county. The bluer the purple, the larger the margin of Obama’s victory. (Romney won six of the eight counties shown here.)

Based on the Politico.com data used to construct this map Miami is the reddest shade of purple and Wyandotte is the bluest; Clay county is the most equally divided, or the purplest, so to speak.

Voter Decline

Who knows if it’s voter fatigue, indifference, disappointment, or the inability to find proper identification. For whatever reason, voter turnout dropped across the board within the region. Platte County dropped the least, Johnson County the most.

2012 voter turnout sources used:

• Cass, Clay, Jackson and Platte counties, and KCMO
• Johnson County
• Leavenworth County
• Miami County
• Wyandotte County

2008 voter turnout sources used:

• Kansas counties
• Missouri jurisdictions