Education and voter trends

The order of the states can be found at http://www.statestats.com/edrank.htm

“”A little while after I met with Kent Conrad, I spoke on the phone with Karl Rove, who has been the chief political strategist for Bush's entire career in elected office. Obviously, Rove was thinking past the tax cut, to a whole first-year program for Bush that could strengthen the Republican Party considerably. 'Take a look at our agenda,' Rove said. 'Education. This year, we picked up seven points in the suburbs over '96. Our education plan allows us to make further gains in the suburbs. It will also allow us to make gains with Hispanics and African Americans. The tax cuts will make the economy grow. As people do better, they start voting like Republicans — unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing. Look at the course of the campaign. There's a lot of data. If you give people the choice between a tax cut and more government services, they'll choose the tax cut. The more Bush talked about an across-the-board cut, the more support for it grew. People do have a desire for basic services — schools, helping the less fortunate — but not for unrestricted government.'

—"Bush's Trillions: How to Buy the Republican Majority of Tomorrow," published in the February 19, 2001 issue of The New Yorker.

Percents from http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0876793.html and http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0922901.html

State	Governor	S Senator	J Senator	Representatives (PITA)	2000 (% GOP)	2004
Vermont	R	D	I		41%	39%
Massachusetts	D	D	D		33%	37%
Connecticut	R	D	D		38%	44%
New Jersey	D	D	D		35%	46%
Maine	D	R	R		44%	45%
Virginia	D	R	D		52%	54%
Montana	D	D	D		58%	60%
Wisconsin	D	D	D		48%	49%
Iowa	D	R	D		48%	50%
Pennsylvania	D	R	D		46%	48%
Nebraska	R	R	D		62%	66%
Minnesota	R	D	D		46%	48%
Rhode Island	D	D	D		32%	39%
Kansas	D	R	R		58%	62%
New York	D	D	D		35%	40%
South Dakota	R	D	R		60%	60%
Maryland	D	D	D		40%	43%
Wyoming	D	R	R		68%	69%
Idaho	R	R	R		67%	68%
North Dakota	R	D	D		61%	63%
Missouri	R	R	D		50%	53%
North Carolina	D	R	R		56%	56%
Indiana	R	R	D		57%	60%
Texas	R	R	R		59%	61%
South Carolina	R	R	R		57%	58%
Colorado	D	R	D		51%	52%
Delaware	D	D	D		42%	56%
Florida	R	D	R		49%	52%
Tennessee	D	R	R		51%	57%
Kentucky	D	R	R		57%	60%
Arkansas	D	D	D		51%	54%
Washington	D	D	D		45%	46%
Ohio	D	R	D		50%	51%
Illinois	D	D	D		43%	44%
Oklahoma	D	R	R		60%	66%
West Virginia	D	D	D		52%	56%
Utah	R	R	R		67%	73%
Michigan	D	D	D		46%	48%
Oregon	D	D	R		47%	47%
Georgia	R	R	R		55%	58%
Hawaii	R	D	D		37%	45%
New Mexico	D	R	D		48%	50%
Louisiana	R	D	R		53%	57%
Alabama	R	R	R		56%	62%
Alaska	R	R	R		59%	61%
California	R	D	D		42%	44%
Mississippi	R	R	R		58%	59%
Nevada	R	D	R		50%	51%
Arizona	D	R	R		51%	55%

I'm lazy - the Ralph Nader vote is being counted as 'democrat'. For places beyond the decimal for percents, it is rounded to the nearest whole number. For .5, up on an odd number and down on an even number (see the "rounding to even" method at wikipedia)

To see a breakdown by county http://www.princeton.edu/~rvdb/JAVA/election2004/ (the license on the images are CC)

Trying representatives is a Pain In The Ass when you suddenly hit California with 53.