By: Politico

Perhaps no geography in America is as misunderstood as the nation’s small towns and rural areas. The home to no more than one in five Americans, these areas barely register with the national media except for occasional reports about their general decrepitude, cultural backwardness and inexorable decline.
Yet in reality this part of America is far more diverse, and in many areas infinitely more vital, than the big city-dominated media suspects. In fact, there are many demographic and economic dynamics that make this part of America far more competitive this year than in the recent past.

Much of this stems to what could be best described as the growing urbanization of rural regions. Even though many very small towns – say fewer than 10,000 people – have continued to lose population, there’s a significant demographic and economic rebound taking place in a host of somewhat larger communities. Places, for example, like Sioux Falls and Fargo in the Dakotas as well as Asheville, N.C., Wenatchee, Washington and Springfield, Mo., have been drawing a steady from of people and businesses from both big cities and suburbs.

This dynamic could provide some welcome surprises for Democrats, and potential nightmares of Republicans. Over the primaries, Sen. Barack Obama startled observers with his ability only to win over Democratic voters in places like the Dakotas, Montana, Kansas, Nebraska and Indiana. More importantly, according to recent polls, he is running between 10 and 40 points ahead of where John F. Kerry ended up in these states in 2004.

Where are these new Democratic voters coming from? Most of Obama’s primary wins came in what may be seen as the new Heartland, a widely dispersed group of fast growing smaller towns and cities stretching from the Sierra Nevadas to the Appalachians. He did particularly well in college towns – Grand Forks, Missoula, and State College, Pa. – as well as those places where high-tech and cutting edge manufacturing companies have set up shop over the past decade.

This demographic and political dynamic has been building for years. In 2004 even John F. Kerry came close to winning places like Wisconsin Rapids, Wis., a small city of 17,500 in the central part of the state. Although the area has lost some high-paying blue collar jobs in the paper industry, it has also attracted a growing number of sophisticated companies like software firm Renaissance Learning, which employs over 750 in the area, as well as significant health care and value-added food processing industries.

Some of these workers are originally from the area, but many others bring with them tastes and opinions forged in the Silicon Valley, Raleigh-Durham or Massachusetts tech corridor. Their politics may not be Chicago liberal, but people settling in such emerging “virtual suburbs” tend, like their tech-oriented real-time counterparts, towards a somewhat pragmatic, mildly liberal politics.

Other demographic groups are also changing the political complexion of some of these areas. Hispanics, for example, have been moving in large numbers to rural and manufacturing areas in the Great Plains and rural south which, until recently, were dominated by often culturally conservative Anglos.

At the same time, affluent baby boomers from the coasts and large Midwestern cities – some retired, some working via the internet – are also flowing into some of these places, a trendy likely to continue. Surveys of older Americans find far more would prefer to resettle in small towns than in big cities. Some of the fastest growing towns for seniors include places like Missoula, Mont, Eugene, Ore., Moscow, Idaho and Charlottesville, Va.

As a result, these areas have become more cosmopolitan in their outlook. It is no longer unusual, for example, to see Indian, Chinese and other foreign-born professionals – or Asian restaurants or edgy coffee houses. Fargo, once the very definition of staid, now boasts an excellent boutique hotel (the Donaldson), a clothing store catering to metrosexuals and several respectable, pricey restaurants.

These shifts have not escaped the notice of the Obama campaign, which, for example, has put 50 campaign workers and 100 volunteer teams in North Dakota, long considered a lock for Republican in November. Similar deployments are taking place in other traditionally rural states. The stated aim of competing in the Great Plains and Intermountain West regions is not an idle boast; the demographic conditions for such a drive already exist.

Yet it may still be a stretch to see some of these places voting for a big city liberal like Sen. Obama. It’s one thing to support home-grown populist Democrats like North Dakota’s Sen. Byron Dorgan or Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer. These politicians have a fine sense how to negotiate the cultural and economic sensibilities of their constituents on issues of farm subsidies, guns or gay marriage.

The best hope for Sen. McCain lies in hoping Obama’s Hyde Park intellectualism and liberalism won’t play well – except among more affluent recent migrants and students. McCain may not win as big as Bush did in 2000 and 2004, but he could well hold onto enough rural and small town voters to keep these states in the Republican column. McCain’s moderate image may hurt with some evangelical voters, a group more prevalent in smaller towns, but outside of the South at least, this may keep more moderate, younger and recently arrived voters in the fold.

Finally, the fact that many small towns are doing relatively well may make voters somewhat less likely to bolt the GOP. Few places in the countryside are suffering anything like a Dust Bowl-like catastrophe, although some now worry about a looming decline in commodity prices. And on some issues, like fossil fuel development, McCain can appeal to small town constituents which have been enjoying an energy-fed boom. Pushing American energy development will particular appeal in these areas, although in others the Arizona senator’s opposition to ethanol subsidies could hurt in others.

And even in the rural places worst hit by the economy – such as traditional small manufacturing-dominated towns in places like Indiana, Ohio, the Carolinas and Pennsylvania – Obama has yet to prove himself. In almost all these places, Hillary Rodham Clinton triumphed easily in the primary, totally usurping the forceful grassroots populist message. Obama has yet to show that knack.

Rural and small town areas have a fewer very poor and far greater concentration of middle income voters – earning between $35,000 to $50,000 – than cities and far fewer wealthy households than either cities or suburbs. These mostly white working class voters – heavily concentrated in rural states like Wyoming, West Virginia, the Dakotas, Montana, Maine, Idaho and Kentucky – could end up being the key to winning the micropolitan and small town electorate. And these places could prove a critical battleground in this year’s election.

There are two regions where these voters might matter most. One is the sparsely populated Great Plains states that once represented a long-time solid block of Republican strength. Chipping away at that base, Obama not only has the chance to steal some electoral votes but could divert McCain’s resources in more traditional battleground states.

The other are a series of traditional battleground states – Ohio, Missouri, and Indiana – where rural and small town communities represent a larger than usual share of the population and are critical to Republican hopes. If Obama can gain some of the traction Hillary Rodham Clinton achieved in these states small towns and cities, McCain’s chances of winning fade almost to nil.

Joel Kotkin is a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University and executive editor of www.newgeography.com. Mark Schill is a principal at Praxis Strategy Group in Grand Forks, N.D. and the site’s managing editor.

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