Ticket Splitting
Some folks who analyze some of these key races in other states make presumptions that often don’t ring true in Iowa.
For example, they assume that since the Republican is ahead in the race for governor in Georgia, that will help the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in that state…because these analysts say they can’t conceive of people splitting their votes this way—voting for the R for governor but the D for Senate.
And it is true, if you are really a partisan, that “ticket splitting” is not terribly likely.
But it’s a bit of a false analysis because it does not take into account non-affiliated, or independent, voters. Pretty easy, in fact, to assume lack of partisan consistency in voting from someone who does not declare partisan affiliation. And since roughly a third of the voting public is independent—well, you get the idea.
But it’s especially folly to make such an assumption in Iowa. For three decades, a great majority of Iowans voted to put a very conservative Republican, Charles Grassley, in the U.S. Senate—while at the same time, voting to put a very liberal Democrat, Tom Harkin, in that same U.S. Senate. An awful lot of Iowans, including those of you listening, can claim to have consistently voted for both Grassley and Harkin. And, overall, it worked just fine.
Yes, this is a hyper-partisan era, so those on the extreme ends of the political spectrum are even more extreme than ever; those folks are straight D or R voters. But the very hyper-partisanship is leading many more of us to flock to the middle, left behind by each side’s extreme. That makes predicting voting behavior far more difficult…and makes taking any voter for granted simply based on some other demographic political suicide for a campaign.
