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Obama loses Silicon Valley to Clinton: Is anyone surprised?
It must have come as a surprise to the boisterous Barack Obama supporters who were flagging down commuters at light rail stations south of San Francisco after work on Tuesday, but Hillary Clinton won far more votes in Silicon Valley than did her rival from Illinois.
In Santa Clara County, home to Google, Apple, Yahoo, Intel, HP, and Sun Microsystems, Clinton won a commanding 54.8 percent share of the vote.
Obama, by comparison, won only 39.3 percent. That's a remarkable margin of 16 percentage points. It's far more than the 9.5-point margin that Clinton claimed statewide, meaning Obama fared worse in Silicon Valley than he did in the rest of California.
By an 8-point margin, Clinton also bested Obama in neighboring San Mateo County immediately to the north, which is home to YouTube, Spoke.com, and Internet-monitoring firm Keynote.com.
Here's the chart:
(Credit: California Secretary of State)So why did Obama--who's popular online and has been touted as a more tech-savvy candidate--lose the nation's high-tech heartland by an embarrassing 16-point margin? If he should have won anywhere, it should have been those two counties. Right?
Conventional wisdom would have said so. Obama collected more contributions from Americans working in the technology industry than his Democratic rivals, after all. He received $139,500 from Google employees, compared with Clinton's mere $61,400 in donations. Yahoo employees also preferred him over Clinton, if their donations are any indication. Obama can claim two Silicon Valley politicians, Reps. Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo, as supporters; he's four times as popular on Eventful.com as Clinton.
Obama garnered a higher rating than Clinton on a recent scorecard compiled by a technology lobby group, and the video of his Google visit became far more popular than Clinton's. He even won a supposed "MySpace primary"--which, in retrospect, was probably dominated by overeager 15-year-old high schoolers.
The problem with the above analysis is that it assumes that clicks in online polls and credit card numbers typed into a Web form by political enthusiasts necessarily translate into votes. They don't, or at least they didn't here. Traditional politicking and on-the-ground organization still count for more, and that's one area where the Clinton machine excels.
As I wrote last month, it worked for the Clintons in New Hampshire, and it worked again even in Silicon Valley, one of the most tech-savvy places in the world. It shows once again that it's so much easier to click a mouse button (or type in a credit card number, or post to a discussion forum) than it is to register to vote and then actually do it. Even Obama Girl didn't bother.
It's too bad for Obama that the actual voting didn't take place online as well.
To be fair, Obama won higher percentages in other Bay Area counties. He bested Clinton in San Francisco (52.4 percent to 44.4 percent) and Berkeley and Oakland (Alameda County, 50.6 percent to 44.7 percent), and the high-income areas across the Golden Gate Bridge from the city (Marin County, 55.1 percent to 38.7 percent).
(Credit: California Secretary of State)But those are liberal areas where you'd expect Obama to do well (he opposed the Iraq war, remember, and once indicated that he wanted to ban all handguns, a sentiment that many San Franciscans certainly share).
Remember those above charts the next time you read press releases about the supposed importance of a Facebook primary or hear fatuous claims about the number of "friends" a candidate has on MySpace. If those things mattered--they don't--we'd be talking about President Ron Paul today.
Declan McCullagh, CNET News' chief political correspondent, chronicles the intersection of politics and technology. He has covered politics, technology, and Washington, D.C., for more than a decade, which has turned him into an iconoclast and a skeptic of anyone who says, "We oughta have a new federal law against this." E-mail Declan.
all know Hillary will win. I wish it would be Ron Paul, but of course
the media has pretended he doesn't exist as he's the only one that
could beat Hillary in an election.
hotbed. Lots of investment types and typical suburban centrists.
The SF, Marin and Berkeley/Oakland returns are more what would
be expected.
I never said the south bay was a liberal hotbed (though it's northern California, not Utah, so it's quite liberal by almost any definition).
What I said is the Valley -- which is more than just the south bay -- is a hotbed of people who seemed to support Obama. See the Google and Yahoo campaign contributions I cited. But when it came to actually voting, they didn't.
It's no universe only illusion painted by gravitated form.
Effciency is Death because nothing is ever perfect.
A vicious cycle of form not evolved and we're not talking dawinism here, The higher the level of life intergration the higher the level of subserviance of course god would never know that building a world in Sand have to hold back the competition.
No matter who or what i will always see true knowledge Quaziery of forever (language will die)
Hillary Clinton and the war with russia and enforcement of the occult.
Perfect.
Barak obarma and the rath of Gods rip.
All but to sell your soul for fear of transformation unto the new land for a glory that was never yours.
Forever opening up like the most bueatful flower of imperfection.
Time Traveling amoungst membranes of forever.
Space seeming but a movement
You life but a political swing.
Wikipedia says the 14th congressional district "includes portions of San Mateo, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties, most notably containing Silicon Valley."
Like Marin, Obama did very well in SC (http://vote.ss.ca.gov/Returns/dcd/1444.htm). Take that away and he wouldn't have won the 14th CD.
She should be divorced after leaving her husband for what he did to her in front of the whole world. She should be living up to the ideals of her party, using her skills as a speaker and a lawyer to help people...for free.
Instead she trades those ideals, her honor, the honor of women for the chance at all of that power. She users her husband and his political machine to help her achieve that goal.
She is truly a sad individual.
If she was a man in the same situation, this would even be an issue.
everyone elses? You have manufactured this black, and white
view of honor, and ideals she must somehow aspire to. In doing
so, you are telling us you know her, her husband, her family, her
beliefs ... better than she does.
For the time being, not withstanding the efforts the ruling
government over the past 8 years, this is supposed to be a free
society with all that it entails.
Stupidily biased!
What is of interest to me is effectiveness. While some have a backward looking rosy patina of affection for the Kennedy administration, historically it was mostly a failed administration. Even with the connections of the Kennedy family, the wealth and JFK's experience in the Senate, he did not have the power base in Washington to execute on policy. His foreign policies experience was minimal. Even in areas where he is given credit such as the space program, he led but did not legislate. The heavy hauling for that program was in place prior to his election and was done by Lyndon Johnson, a man with a very strong power base in the capital and beyond.
This is where Hillary is a better choice than Obama. For the previous two administrations, the civil service staff has been stacked with political appointees who were moved over from the political positions where they serve at the pleasure of the President into permanent civil service. Whoever wins the next election confronts an entrenched and highly resistant power base left from Bush legacy. While Obama makes fine speeches, I do not think he has the necessary power base to legislate and govern. I think he will, as Kennedy did, become a lame duck from day one regardless of his popular appeal.
We need an executive, not a rock star. Hillary Clinton is far better prepared and has the necessary power base. Barack is a fine man and his time will come. This is not it. If we choose the passions of race or gender or youth over experience and well-planned goals that can be accomplished, we are making the same mistakes the right wing made in choosing Bush by selecting the man that appeals to our passions over the person best equipped to do the job. The mistakes of that kind of choice are too evident to enumerate here.
Given our choices, Hillary Clinton is the right choice. Perhaps rather than looking at the demographics, it is time to analyze the requirements. That is how engineers think.
The fact of succumbing to some sort of vote for a stronger powerbase speaks volumes of how we have let our leadership become unaccountable. Fascism lives!
Secondly, the Senators past experience won't really be an asset. Peak Oil, Peak Water, Peak Population were not on the radar during the Clinton years. And I say this in respect for her experience around the situations in the Whitehouse but we all know WJC has yet to tell her everything.
We're entering a period of unprecedented national and international concerns with dire consequences if our leaders don't address them with visions for the next 200+ years.
Sen. Clinton respectively is not a visionary!
But very smart on the references to current issues and legislation. Hell I'll give her the benefit of the doubt on strong management skills for maintaining operations. But it's the maintain and sustain of our current course is what is so troubling!
There is no one prepared for this position because we are entering in a new age on earth and humanity.
So I respectively disagree with the notion of the requirements you have suggested. They seem a bit non-forward in thinking and I am puzzled by an engineer who's thought processes do not maintain a methodology for future out-of-tolerance conditions.
P.S. Let's focus on what the many can accomplish if inspired to do such and not the individual leadership deliverables!
Your thinking perpetuates the problem.
One more way that the profession of journalism is shifting in response to changes in communication technology...
Debate classes as a core requirement in mass media journalism undergrad programs!?
I think in terms of Orders From Management Above, News.com writers are generally encouraged to participate in talkback. This isn't a new thing, and we're trying to improve our talkback mechanism to encourage good conversations. But because writers have different personalities, some do it more than others.
Come on Paulies, run to the quest! Save our country from those DemLibs! A Clintonian pariah is coming. Only you can stop it.
original Silicon Valley, encompassing parts of San Mateo, Santa
Clara and Santa Cruz counties WAS WON by Barack Obama. 47,804
(49.9%) to 42,808 (44.7%).
In my congressional district (14)which is centered around Palo Alto and is more representative of the high tech industry, Obama won by five points.
One only has to look at the percentage of the votes casted for Edwards and extrapolate that against Edwards California poll numbers to get a sense of how many absentee voters voted in California. Mrs. Clinton name identity and her favorable poll numbers helped her when many of the absentees were casted on top of the large Latino and Asian voters in the bay area together send her into Feb 5th with a huge advantage.
Lastly, myspace/facebook friends does not mean silicon valley it means youth support. Then again, maybe iconoclasts don't understand these sort of things ;)
Exit polls show that those who voted on Tuesday favored Obama.
Obama also has a huge ground game which worked its butt off trying to counter the absentee situation here.
The more people know Obama, the more support he gets.
Wow... this column isn't journalism, this is propaganda.
-Kev
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by joseph thavundayil
February 7, 2008 12:38 PM PST
- americans are chasing obama bin laden and embrasing obama hussain .sounds odd to see people are eager to make another born muslim as th head of the USA.Didn't you learn a lesson from the bushmania.
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Reply to this comment
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- What?
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by Thomas, David
February 8, 2008 10:17 AM PST
- A. He's not muslim
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See all 54 Comments >>B. He's born American born
C. I really didn't comprehend your comment.