NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 6, 2008 

CONTACT:  Diane Gramley -- 1.814.271.9078 or 1.814.437.5355

Is Pennsylvania Really a ‘Blue State’? Did Race Play a Part in the Presidential Election?

(Harrisburg) – Pennsylvania finds itself in the same quandary as other states such as New York which has several large liberal metropolitan areas and has been labeled ‘a blue state,’ but where the vast majority of the physical area remains conservative and is labeled ‘red.’  Those holding the beliefs and values historically held by the majority of Americans have to overcome the increasingly liberal views of those in the large cities.  Senator John McCain won 49 of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties.  However, Senator Barack Obama received 41% of his Pennsylvania vote in the liberal Philadelphia area.  

Additionally, voters were told many times that if they did not vote for Obama they were racist.  Even Congressman John Murtha made the outrageous statement that people in his district were racist.  But if someone votes for a candidate simply because of their skin color, are they racist?  Exit polling shows that 95% of African-American voters pushed the touch screen beside Obama’s name.  Again, is this racist? 

“Race definitely played a role in the Presidential race.  I’ve spoken to black pastors here in Pennsylvania who were very frustrated because the people in their church pews on a Sunday morning were not willing to look at the liberal views of Senator Obama, they were simply going to vote for him because he is a black man,” noted Diane Gramley, president of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania (AFA of PA), a statewide traditional values group. 

Marriage Protection Amendments were on ballots in Arizona, California and Florida.  All three state constitutional amendments passed, but California and Florida also went to Senator Obama.  In California 70% of black voters voted for Proposition 8 and overwhelmingly supported Amendment 2 in Florida, then turned around and voted for the man who has called the federal Defense of Marriage Act ‘abhorrent’ and publicly opposed the states’ Marriage Protection Amendment efforts. 

“Race should never play a role in voting for or against any candidate.  But when a voter is not willing to look beyond the color of a candidate’s skin to see where he or she stands on issues such as one man one woman marriage that are important to the voter as evidenced in both California and Florida, then something is wrong.  Because of this unwillingness to look at the voting record of Senator Barack Obama, the most pro-abortion, pro-homosexual presidential candidate ever has just been voted into the Oval Office,” further commented Gramley.

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