All the maps you see of the US election results are sharply divided into blue states and red states. It occurred to me that since “a state goes for Obama” sometimes means “by nine votes”, that it might be interesting to see a sort of representative map. So, the purple map of US election results:
The whole country’s pretty similar in colour, innit? I suppose this is what Obama was talking about with the “I’ll be your president too” stuff…
(map from wikimedia (svg), election results from Google, map as SVG, script to generate map)
Cool. But why is North Carolina solid blue?
Posted by Andrew Pendleton on November 5th, 2008.
Not bad, but it does not reflect the population densities of those states. The North East has a massive population for instance, compared to the red Mid-West.
(I could not get OpenID to work – something to do with a captcha?)
–
Iain Cheyne
Posted by Anonymous on November 5th, 2008.
It would be interesting to have this map drawn per county, rather than per state.
Posted by pvanhoof on November 5th, 2008.
As a Republican, I am happy to see this happen. I like Obama. Congrats on getting the right person to run this time.
Posted by Chris Parker on November 5th, 2008.
Good point, and it proves how easy it is to tweak statistics to your needs.
Quoting Churchill : “Statistics are like a drunk with a lampost: used more for support than illumination.”
( I could not get openid to work either, but at least I didn’t get the “whatever” post, this time :) )
Posted by Mats Taraldsvik on November 5th, 2008.
Andrew: yeah, sorry, minor bug in the script. It’s now been rewritten to work properly (and I’ve posted the script, too).
All: yeah, openid is broken. I’m working on it.
Posted by sil on November 5th, 2008.
[...] America (and beyond) on this day after the election, and Stuart Langridge has found an even better map of how the country voted for the next president than your basic red/blue [...]
Posted by Peng’s links for 5 November « I’m Just an Avatar on November 5th, 2008.
Is the fact that Canada’s shown in uniform beige a coincidence or a subtle political statement? ;)
Posted by Adam Williamson on November 5th, 2008.
Adam: it was like that on the wikipedia map I borrowed. :)
Posted by sil on November 5th, 2008.
I figured it was something like that, I was just being flippant :)
It’s also interesting to learn that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans are different colors!
Posted by Adam Williamson on November 5th, 2008.
Some better maps
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/
Posted by Iain Cheyne on November 6th, 2008.
This is kinda brilliant. Nice work.
Posted by Scott on November 6th, 2008.
Now you know I not not one to complain but your comment’s CSS seems to be really arsed!
Really really arsed!
Posted by Ross Bruniges on November 7th, 2008.
Ross: I know, I know.
Posted by sil on November 7th, 2008.
Hi, I made a similar thing here…
http://www.sunnyblue.net/tp/workblog/?p=180
Posted by Tom on November 7th, 2008.
That’s an interesting map! Here are some even more provocative cartograms…
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/
Posted by George on November 7th, 2008.
[...] Stuart Langridge: It’s a purple world …means “by nine votes”, that it might be interesting to see a sort of representative map. So, the purple map of US election results: [...]
Posted by US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » Stuart Langridge: It’s a purple world on November 8th, 2008.
[...] » It’s a purple world » as days pass by, by Stuart Langridge It occurred to me that since “a state goes for Obama” sometimes means “by nine votes”, that it might be interesting to see a sort of representative map. So, the purple map of US election results:. The whole country’s pretty similar in … [...]
Posted by US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » » It’s a purple world » as days pass by, by Stuart Langridge on November 19th, 2008.
[...] By: US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » » It’s… So, the purple map of US election results:. The whole country’s pretty similar in [...]
Posted by US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » By: US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » » It’s… on November 21st, 2008.
[...] Comment on It’s a purple world by US Election On Best Political… So, the purple map of US election results:. The whole country’s pretty similar in [...]
Posted by US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » Comment on It’s a purple world by US Election On Best Political… on November 22nd, 2008.
[...] By: US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » Comment… [...] Comment on It’s a purple world by US Election On Best Political… So, the purple map of US election results:. [...]
Posted by US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » By: US Election On Best Political Blogs » Blog Archive » Comment… on November 24th, 2008.