re: #8 EPR-radar

That is very unusual. Is it known why these conservatives are sticking with the Dems in Kentucky?

I have a theory. Unlike deep Southern states, Kentucky had a Republican Party centered in Appalachia where there was strong loyalty to the Union during the War. So when the 1960’s came around, the Kentucky GOP wasn’t an empty vessel for segregationists to take over; it was primarily concerned with pork-barrel politics. Kentucky also has a small African-American population because it didn’t have big plantations worked by slave labor but small family farms growing tobacco, so racial politics was never as intense here as further south, except for some trouble in Louisville in the seventies when school busing for desegregation started. Thus the Kentucky Democratic Party remained heavily white and conservative and rural democrats didn’t feel pressure to move to the GOP. Kentucky also still has a relatively strong union presence in the private sector, so Kentucky Democrats could be both socially conservative and pro-labor.